It was the toasted almond. Yeah, a frew drops of cinnamon sounds really nice! Now about a week after mixing it still taste much of the butterscotch. Almost a little to much. But i hope it smooths out after a few more weeks..
After a week you might... get a little more balancing out of your current batch but I am guessing that, if it is still on the sweet side for you, it is going to remain there.
Like I said previously; don't be afraid to tweak the recipe a little; it is quite forgiving. I would experiment with smaller batches (say 10-15mL) and start making small(ish) adjustments. It helps if you know what you are wanting to achieve.
"Too sweet/too much caramel and/or butterscotch" is not the same as "I want to taste more... tobacco, cream, or vanilla (whatever it is you find lacking)."
Too sweet/too much caramel/butterscotch; you would address by reducing the Butterscotch, Caramel Candy, and or RY4 Double. All three of which contribute to both the sweetness and the caramel-butterscotch profile (perhaps taking the RY4 from 7% to 6%, and halve both the Butterscotch and
Caramel Candy... 3->1.5% and 2->1% respectively).
Mix, shake, and taste. How does this compare? Better? Not sweet enough? Still too Sweet? Make notes of your initial perception. Now let it rest (steep) for a week. Taste again. Look back to your notes from the first tasting. How has it changed? Better? Worse? Not much different? What would you like to be different. Make more notes.
Tweak some more as needed to get it where it is right for
you. When you find "that" sweet magic;
then start mixing in larger batches.
Also, when you are using several flavor concentrates that all have similar taste (RY4D, Butterscotch, and Caramel Candy are all "caramel-like"), it can be
very helpful to make some small single-flavor testers (5mL?) so you have a better idea of what each is bringing to the overall mix. That way you might more easily identify
what you may be finding too much or not enough.
When I started tweaking Scutch for me, I wanted less sweet and caramel and more tobacco presence, so I reduced the RY from 7% to 4% and added 3% Black Honey (Tobacco). This was better for me; but I wanted a more interesting tobacco profile, so I reduced the Black Honey from 3-1.5% and added 1.5% of Mild Black... and so on. You can see that I tried to stay within the same total percentage by taking a little of "this" out and adding a similar amount of "that" in. I wasn't interested in changing the overall profile; I just wanted to give more emphasis to one portion of the profile while reducing that which I found too prominent.
)
