A group of whisky loving mates from North Bondi have been crowned The Whisky List’s champion blind whisky tasters of 2022.

From a field of 105 whisky experts and lovers, the team called Sneaky Nuts 2.0 consisting of Jeff Taitz, Jason Mendoza, Brad "the legend" Milner, and Darren Katz (pictured left to right) were awarded 21 points (from a possible 60 – ten points for each whisky tasted) in the blind whisky tasting – Most Ultimate Whisky Champs – as 2022 closed out.

Mr Katz said, “Our team is proud to have been crowned the most ultimate whiskey champs of Australia for 2022." 

The winning team entered last year and vowed to come back ready for 2022's blind whisky tasting. Their eagerness and regular whisky catch ups as a group of mates trying different whiskies helped them prepare for this year's competition.

"This was an incredibly tough line up this year but we came out smoking and barrelled our way to a win. We look forward to more amazing whisky evenings with Ollie and The Whisky List team,” added Mr Katz.

Just one point separated Mr Katz's team and second place tied winners Andreas Straus and Tom Jagers who both scored 20 points individually. For those who remember, Andreas Straus was crowned the Most Ultimate Whisky Champs winner in 2021, and came back in strong position fighting for back-to-back titles. Mr Straus was invited to join the livestream this year, alongside fellow whisky lover Irina Sims, who scored an impressive 16 points.  Third place was awarded to the team called Fireballers scoring 17 points.

Rules:

  • Each entrant receives a tasting kit with 6 numbered whiskies.
  • On the evening: Ten minutes to taste each whisky during the event livestream and submit your best guess Maximum of 10 points for each whisky across five 5 weighted categories, including whisky origin, distillery and age. The harder the category, the higher the points.
  • Highest score out of 60 wins. 

This was definitely one of the more tricky line up of whiskies to guess. As the competition rules state, every whisky is available at bottleshops across Australia, yet some of the most common whiskies like the Macallan 12,  Michter's Unblended American Whiskey and Ardbeg Wee Beastie really tripped a lot of contestants up.

Occasionally someone gets the exact whisky right which is great to see, however the easiest way to score points and how we've seen winners each year is the individual or teams who focus on scoring the easier points, like country of origin and style of whisky like sherry cask. And then narrowing down the harder questions like which distillery and whisky they're trying.

This year, the top 9 scores were only 5 points apart. Second place was tied. That's definitely the tightest race we've seen yet and a testament to the quality of competition everyone brought this year.

Watching the online livestream during the event you get a real sense of community. Everyone is throwing around banter, a few Aussie distilleries jumped in for the chance to win as well. People just had a great time for the last virtual event of 2022.

Whisky is about being accessible, fun and community. That's the ultimate goal of this event and why we originally kicked it off during the height of lockdowns two years ago. The feedback from everyone has been great. We adore seeing all the friendly trash talk and banter during the livestream chats. What warms my heart the most is just how accessible having this event virtual allows for a lot of people from all walks of life and locations to join in and have fun. The welcoming whisky community in Australia is the reason why we put on these events! adds Maruda.

Time to start training for 2023!

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