#46.4 The return of the smoke

The gentle side of the smoke: Bowmore

TL; DR: We visited a “classic” Islay distillery: Bowmore! Located in the centre of the namesake village, it’s very recognisable with its typical white buildings, directly facing the sea. The tour was extremely interesting, particularly the part around the malting floor, and it ended with two cask samples. What else?

(missed Part 3/Part 2/Part 1?)

Our plan for the day was a good one in principle, and we were looking forward to it: after returning on Islay from Jura, we’d visit Finlaggan (check!) and Caol Ila distillery (check!), then drive to Bowmore for a tour at the local distillery, get a shower at the leisure centre (interesting fact: it is built in a former Bowmore distillery warehouse, and the pool is heated by the distillery), a few drams at the Bowmore Hotel and dinner at Peatzeria.

The tour at Caol Ila went quite long, so we had to drive fast to our next destination. During the tour we got bad news from Justine: the showers in Bowmore’s leisure centre were broken, so no showers for us that day…unless we went for a shower outside (oh well). We knew that it probably meant no shower for the day. We parked the van just outside the village, on the sea front, a very nice spot. As we were late, we had just enough time to warm up some “beefy bake”, a couple of pies and a sausage roll we bought the day before at the shop on Jura. A bit rushed, but not bad (the mince pies were particularly tasty).

A bit rushed, but we got there!

The distillery was then 10 minutes away, and it is in front of Bowmore main square. At the check-in, the staff offered to keep Gianluigi’s backpack for the tour (nice of them!), and we had just enough time to peek at the shop: other than the regular expressions (Bowmore 12y, 15y, 18y, decently priced) and some travel retails, the only other expressions on sale were 20+ years old (and very pricey). We didn’t have to wait long though, because our guide Margaret (25 years in the job!) gathered us and the others (mostly a group of American tourists) to start the tour.

In the courtyard, she told us that the distillery is the oldest on Islay (and one of the oldest in Scotland), dating back to 1779. Similarly to Laphroaig (owned by the same company, formerly Beam Suntory, now just Suntory), they kept their malting floor, where they malt enough barley to cover 25% of their yearly 2.15 mlpa (million litres pure alcohol) production. They soak the barley for 26 hours, then they move it to one of the three malting floors with a chariot, 140kg at the time (100 times, for a total of 14 tons), and it stays there for 24 hours, after which they start turning it every 8 hours.

Man at work…
While the barley is resting.

The whole process takes between 5 and 7 days, depending on the season and the barley (in our understanding, the low carbon one germinates faster). The barley is then dried in the only remaining kiln, including 10 hours with peat smoke, to reach a phenol part per million (ppm) of around 25-30. Thanks to some improvements, they moved from using 15 tons of peat per week to only 3. The kiln is run for a total of 44 hours (including the previously mentioned 10), before the malt is finally milled. To note, all the peat is machine cut and, contrary to other distilleries, they’ve been using it for 40 years. Suntory also started a peat restoration project, to achieve a sustainable peat usage, but this we knew from our first visit to Glen Garioch in October 2021. While she explained the malting process, we followed Margaret in the building, also walking on the spread barley…the other attendants were eager to try a couple of runs with the rake, but we were all set (we remembered how hard it was from our visit at Dunphail).

One of the nicest mash rooms we saw.

Each mash comprises 6 tons of sourced malt and 2 tons of their own, and the grist is milled to the usual split 20/70/10% between husk, grit and flour. The malt is then transferred into a semi-leuter mashtun (for over five hours), where three runs of water are added at increasing temperatures to absorb as much sugar as possible, with the third one used as first water in the following mash. Their water source is the same as in the 1800s, although with recent improvements (which we don’t remember, sorry), they reduced consumption by 70%. Fermentation, kickstarted with solid yeast, takes place in one of the 7 washbacks and lasts about 70 hours. Finally, the fermented wash is distilled twice in one of the two pairs of stills, two 30,000-litre wash stills and two ~15,000 spirit stills. The spirit cut from the second distillation is between 74% and 61-60%abv.

The “classic” selfie.

After visiting production, we went to the mythical N°1 Vaults, one of the warehouses on site, where we had the first part of the tasting. Other available experiences are the N°1 Vaults warehouse tasting (£65), which doesn’t include a tour, and one that combines the tour and the warehouse tasting (£85), plus a few other very pricey ones. As we walked in, we saw two casks, a 2010 (13y) ex-bourbon barrel (54.3%) and a 2010 (again, 13y) sherry hogshead (53.6%). We had a dram from each, and they were both delicious. We got similar notes in the third dram, their core range 18y, very tasty despite the low abv (43%), which was served in the tasting bar. Nice touch, we could keep one of the two small glencairn glasses they’d given us in the warehouse.

Dramming in the N°1 Vaults

Justine joined us at the tasting bar, while we were almost finished with our dram. As we came out, Gianluigi tried to get into the leisure centre, on the fence whether to risk the outside showers…However, the centre was closed, despite being over one hour from the closing time indicated online (5.30pm). So, we decided to go back to the vans to drop some stuff, and then head towards the Bowmore Hotel bar, for a dram or two (it ended being one, prices were a bit high). It was finally time for dinner, which we’d booked at the local pizzeria: the PEATzeria! While the fritto misto we had as a starter was quite tasty, the pizzas were a bit disappointing: the topping choice was clearly aimed to American tourists, and the pizzas were a bit uncooked. Because we were hungry, and well, it was still pizza, we ate without making any fuss, maybe we were just unlucky.

After dinner we moved to the bar next door, the Lochside. Drams were better priced there, so we had a few, including some stunning like the Mac Talla Rum cask 2024 Feis Ile: delicious stuff! But the day had been a long one, so we soon walked back to the vans for the night.

Anyway, the tour at Bowmore was very good, and Margaret was a great host. Even if it’s not the cheaper among the basic tours on the island, because of the drams in the warehouse (plus the 18y), it was definitely worth every cent.

A couple of tasty drams…

The only “meh” note was not about the distillery, rather about the facilities on Islay. It is always incredible to realise how little there is and in which conditions (the public toilets in Port Ellen, Bowmore and Jura are quite old), in particular when thinking how much money whisky brings in. Other than the Bowmore leisure centre, the only other available shower was at the Port Charlotte community centre, but only after 2pm. On the contrary, in other trips we found all-day open showers: in Tobermory (Mull) they were open from 9 to 5pm (cash only), but in Carbost, in front of Talisker distillery, the toilets/showers are open 24/7, and you can access after a card payment (and we’ll have an even better story in the coming weeks!). We wonder why facilities like these are not on Islay.

Not a bad day, not a bad day at all…

Stay tuned for our last distillery tour on Islay (for the moment)! Until then, slainte!

Bowmore Distillery Tour (with Cask Exclusive Tasting)

Price: £25.00 pp (July 2024)

Duration: 1hr 15min

Tasting: 3 drams, 2 samples from the cask, 2010 ex-bourbon barrel (54.3%) and 2010 ex-sherry hogshead (53.6%), Bowmore 18y (43%), and a complimentary mini glencairn

Distillery Exclusives: none

Target: whisky curious

Value for money: good

Highlights: the building and the cask samples

Recommended: pricier than other tours, but worth it

Link: https://www.bowmore.com/en

#46.2 The return of the smoke

Off to Jura

TL; DR: After Port Ellen, we drove to Port Askaig to catch the Feolin ferry to Jura. Very different landscape here, except for the main settlement it feels very remote. The Jura distillery is tucked between the hill and the sea. Despite its not great reputation, we had some very good drams, and a great time overall.

(missed Part 1?)

The tour at Port Ellen overran slightly, about 10-15 minutes, which eroded the time we had to get to Port Askaig to catch the Feolin ferry and get to our next destination: the Isle of Jura. We sprinted in the vans, us first and Justine behind, and got there at the exact time it was scheduled to leave, just to see the ferry leaving…to our surprise, as it doesn’t happen often with Scottish and British public transport to be so on time. We were so close to make it that we joked about “Starsky and Hutch-ing” our way into the boat with a sprint, but it would have been a big ask to Mr. Vantastic. Oh well, the next ferry was only an hour later, still on time for our tour. We started fixing ourselves some food…but the ferry came back right away, and the staff decided for an extra trip (probably they needed it to accommodate two big lorries coming the other way). While Gianluigi drove on the ferry and then from the pier to Craighouse (the main settlement on the island), Teresa and Edo were holding the half-cooked food in the back (thankfully there are no pictures of this clumsy moment).

Spot the drammer.

The landscape looked different from Islay: more trees, less buildings, and the presence of the two Paps (the hills that can be seen from the north-eastern side of Islay) is certainly very notable. Fun fact, on the island there are more deer than people (nowadays about 250). Jura is also famous for being the place where Orwell wrote his masterpiece 1984.

Anyway, once in Craighouse, we parked the vans in a nice spot Justine had found, behind a multipurpose warehouse (including the Deer Island Rum distillery, closed unfortunately) and next to an old pier. A great spot, quiet and with some tables and benches too… just a shame that as soon as the wind calmed down, midges appeared to torment us. We just had time to walk to the Antlers Bistro for a coffee before going to Jura distillery for the tour.

And the tour begins.

The visitor centre is quite small, only a small entrance hall and a wee shop. Other than some merchandise and their full range of whiskies, they also have some special editions, a couple of distillery casks, bottlings, and the travel retail range. The guide for the day was Fiona, a local who has worked there for many years. She walked us through the shop and some offices to the courtyard, where she started introducing the distillery history, from its establishment (1810) to the first license (1831), and the troubled late 19^th and early 20^th century, when it closed. In 1960, the distillery was acquired by Charles Mackinlay & Co (of the famous Mackinley blend), rebuilt and extended, and in 1963 they restarted distilling. Since then, the distillery has never stopped producing (except for maintenance of course), not even during the whisky loch (when they just reduced production to 3 days per week).

Someone got distracted.

Their main malt supplier is Crisp, mainly Sassie and Lauriet, and they do heavily peated runs four weeks per year. The mill, a classic Porteous, was bought second hand in 1963, and never changed since. Their grist ratios are a bit different compared to others, with 15% flour, 25% husk and only 60% of grit. They do 28 5-ton mashes per week, working 24/7, and use the typical three waters at increasing temperatures (64.5, 75 and 85°C) in a semi-leuter mashtun. Each washback (six in total, all stainless steel) takes two full mashes, to which they add 150kg of Mauri yeast, left fermenting for about 60 hours. The two pairs of stills are heated by steam coils and used for a typical double distillation (7 hours the first one, 8 the second one), with a cut between 72% and 64% abv. Some casks are filled on site, usually the ones destined to stay in one of the four warehouses on the island (total capacity of 24,500 casks), while all the vatting and bottling (including re-racking for finishes) happens at Whyte and Mackay’s mainland sites in Invergordon and Grangemouth. To note, they recently demolished part of a warehouse to make space for a biomass boiler, so to decrease their environmental impact.

A glimpse of the still room.

After the tour, it was finally time for the tasting! A few words here: Jura whiskies, despite being best sellers in the UK, tend not to have the greatest reputation among whisky enthusiasts. Sales are probably driven by the notable number of expressions available at supermarkets (the Bourbon Cask, formerly known as “Journey”, the 10y, 12y, 14y Rye Cask, Seven Woods, Rum Cask, Red Wine Cask, Pale Ale Cask…have we forgotten any?), so well played to them. But quality-wise? Well, let’s say that in our opinion it’s not the best whisky you can find, not even for the money probably (when on sale, these expressions can be quite cheap). We had one bottle of Jura Journey a few years ago and tried very few independently bottled whiskies (maybe 2 or 3), so we were very curious to taste other expressions and didn’t really know what to expect. This is why, when we booked this tour, we went for the extended, fancier tasting.

The tasting was set up in a dedicated warehouse-ish space (a damp room with a few dozen casks). Because we’d already parked for the night, we could all drink, yay! First dram, a 15y whisky finished for 1-2 years in oloroso sherry (42.8%), bottled for the south-east Asian market. Very sweet, a good start but not our thing (and the colour was suspiciously dark, which made sense given the target market). The second dram was definitely better, a travel retail 19y “The Paps” (45.6%), finished in a PX sherry butt (40 years old!). However, the third dram was the one where things started to get serious. It was a distillery cask, 1^st fill ex-bourbon barrel, vintage 2016 (7.5y) and bottled at 60% – a very fruity dram, not too hot despite the high abv, and it took water very well too. The fourth dram was another distillery cask, same cask but a bit older (vintage 2008, 15y) at a slightly lower abv (55.5%), a very nice dram too. Finally, we had a choice between an unpeated 33y (distilled 1990, bottled in 2023) from a PX hogshead (44.8%), and an 18y heavily peated ex-bourbon barrel (distilled 2005, bottled 2023) at 53.7% – being four of us, we got two of each and we shared. They were both delicious in their own very different way.

A good line-up…

After the distillery we went for dinner at the Jura Hotel. Our attempt to enjoy a pre-dinner pint outside lasted about 3 minutes, before the midges swarmed and made us run for a table inside. We had good time, good food, tasty pints and, worth noting, we found very clean bathrooms and strong Wi-Fi too! We soon retired to our campervans, to enjoy a last dram before a good night sleep (no wind this time!).

There are worse places to spend the night.

Overall, we loved the visit and the tasting, and Fiona was a great host, so money totally well spent. During the tasting we realised Jura can produce very tasty whisky, so probably the issue with their range is downstream. What is a bit strange, to us, is that all the supermarket expressions (all well below 46%, probably chill-filtered and with E15Oa too) seem to be aimed for the casual or novice drinker, none of them targets non-beginners. Other distilleries/brands (Glen Scotia, Loch Lomond, Laphroaig, Pultney, Tomatin, just to name a few) tend to target a wider range of drinkers, it’d be interesting to understand what drives Jura’s different approach.

Stay tuned for our time back on Islay! Until then, slainte!

Jura Distillery Exclusives Tour

Price: £50.00 pp (July 2024)

Duration: 2hr

Tasting: 5 drams, Jura 15 Sherry cask East Asia exclusive (42.8%); 19y The Paps travel retail (45.6%); Distillery cask 7y (60%); Distillery cask 15y (55.5%); choice between 33y ex-PX cask (44.8%) and 19y heavily peated ex-bourbon cask (53.7%), and a complimentary glencairn

Distillery Exclusives: Distillery cask ex-Bourbon 7y (60%, £90.00); Distillery cask ex-Bourbon 15y (55.5%, £120.00)

Target: whisky geeks

Value for money: good

Highlights: the island and the tasting

Recommended: if you want to try some good Jura’s, definitely!

Link: https://www.jurawhisky.com/en/

#44.3 Spirited in Speyside

From Ben Rinnes to Tomintoul

TL; DR: Another sunny day in Speyside, so we finally did what we’d wanted to do for a long time: climb Ben Rinnes! In the afternoon we visited Tomintoul, attending a Spirit of Speyside tour and (quite generous) tasting. We were not very familiar with this malt, which turned out to be a very solid and sweet Speysider!

(missed Part 2/Part 1?)

We woke up well rested, under the trees and with birds chirping all around us. We had breakfast in our van: coffee, yogurt, fruits, and we indulged in a couple of cookies as well. Again, it was a magnificent sunny day, so we could go ahead with our plan: go for a walk before starting our whisky activities.

We’d decided to climb Ben Rinnes, the hill in the middle of Speyside, whose slopes provide water to many distilleries around it. It was not a long walk, less than 8km, but it was quite steep, a 550-metre ascent in total from the parking lot to the top of the hill. We started early, around 8.30am, when not many others were hiking (we only met about 4-5 people while going up). The climb started quite uphill right away, and the ascent was interrupted by a couple of short plateaus, before the last climb of more than 300 metres.

Finally a good day to climb Ben Rinnes.

Once on top, though, we got rewarded, as the view is quite amazing. As were going up, on our left, we spotted a distillery very close to the top – we guessed Benrinnes but we were wrong, it was Allt a’Bhainne. Others could be seen (well, mostly the vapours) once on the top. Our plans to have a snack at the top were ruined by the strong wind, so we quickly started descending back to the parking lot. We bumped into a lot of people, probably because of the time, although the sky was clouded when we got to the van. On the Walk Highlands website the hike (back and forth) was estimated around 3-4 hours, but it took us only 2, so we had some spare time!

Quite windy up there!

Back in the van, we started looking for a place for coffee and a bite, possibly in the direction of our next destination, Tomintoul. We were unlucky at first: some cafes were still closed until summer, some were opening later in the day. We were saved by Bike Glenlivet, a cafè inside an outdoor centre, less than 10 minutes past the distillery. There we could enjoy a sandwich and, past midday, a warm soup.

We arrived at Tomintoul distillery a few minutes early, just the time to park, take some photos and check in. The distillery is tucked at the bottom of a woody hill, along the road, with another hill in front of it: we were told later that during the heather flowering season it becomes all purple, which is why purple is one of the flag colours.

About to explore the distillery producing a ‘gentle dram’.

The visitor centre actually consists in a room with the shop and a big table for tastings. Fun fact: in the room there is also a giant bottle (over 100 litres!) of Tomintoul 14: the Guinness World Record holder for biggest whisky bottle, in our understanding. The distillery is usually open to public, but their regular tours are on Mondays, Tuesdays and Thursdays, making it a bit hard to schedule a visit. This was one of the reasons to visit them during the Spirit of Speyside, the other being that we were not very familiar with their whisky, so an enhanced event could have made us know them better…and it did, indeed!

Teresa losing the ‘who’s the tallest’ contest again.

The tour was hosted by Rob, the distillery manager, and Iain, the master blender who gave us a dram of their 16yr (40%abv), one of their flagship expressions. We always appreciate the tours where they give you a dram at the beginning, well done! The distillery was founded in 1964, so it is “young” compared to their peers, and they produce unpeated (marketed as Tomintoul), lightly peated (peated Tomintoul) and heavily peated (Old Ballantruan) single malt. The latter takes name from the spring where they source water. The peated run lasts about 6 weeks per year, much less compared to the 40 weeks of the unpeated one. They use Crisp malt, which is stored in 8 malt bins before processing through a dresser and the classic Porteus mill. The grist is then moved 12.2 tons at a time to the mashtun, with 48,000 litres of water at 65°C, followed by the usual two other waters at increasing temperature, to maximise the sugar intake.

The mash-tun is mashing. Smashing.

Once the wort (clear after the first water, cloudier after the second) is cooled down to 20°C, it is moved to one of the 6 washbacks, where they add solid distillers’ yeast. Fermentation lasts about 60 hours, then the wash is distilled in one of the two wash stills, and then again in one of the spirit stills. Cut points are usually from 72% to 61.8%, and it takes more or less two hours. Originally the distillery had only two stills, the second pair was added in 1974. Rob showed us one of the byproducts of the first distillation, a syrup with almost 0% alcohol, which is sold to farmers.

…And the classic selfie.

Still in the still room (pun sort of intended), Iain joined us again, this time to give us a dram of the 25yr (43%), a very sweet and delicious one! We then visited one of the warehouses, a racked one (the most common from the distilleries built in that era). They can store up to 150,000 casks on site, while the rest is shipped to the main site in the Lowlands. There, Iain demonstrated us the use of a (leaky!) copper dog, although the whisky inside it came from a bottle, not straight from a cask: a single cask from a Bordeaux wine barrique, vintage 2008 (14yr), bottled at 60.7%.

A 25yr dram after visiting the still room. Nice surprise!

We headed back to the visitor centre for the remainder of the tasting: first, a couple of Madeira matured expressions, a 15yr limited release (46%) and a single hogshead from 1998, bottled in 2022 at 24 years of age (50.2%). The next dram was their Cigar Malt, a quite delicious sherry cask matured expression, lightly peated, and very solid despite the 43% strength (a shame it was a bit pricey). We finished with an Old Ballantruan from the core range: the 15yr (the other two are the non-age statement and the 10yr, all bottled at 50%): a sweet and smoky dram. At that point, a group of Spanish who were on the tour (one of them was a London-based employee of Angus-Dundee, the distillery owners) brought out some Jamon Iberico, which paired perfectly with the last two drams!

A wide range of flavours here!

We left the distillery very happy (not just because of the drams, Gianluigi was dry!), taking one of their bottle with us: as most of their core range is bottled at 40% or 43% and the limited expressions were a bit pricey, the perfect one for was the 14yr: not only unchill-filtered and bottled at 46%, but also from ex-bourbon casks, which in our opinion is the best type of cask to grasp the distillery character.

We arrived at our destination, the Parkmore Cottage and Camping in Dufftown, where our friend Justine (from Kask Whisky) was waiting for us. We had a beer, dinner and a few drams with her, to conclude the day on a high. And what a great day was that, first the climb to Ben Rinnes, and then Tomintoul. With 7 drams their tour was one of the most generous as well (compared to higher priced tours with less than half of the drams…), giving us a chance to fully appreciate the potential of their very solid and fruity (gentle, as they like saying) whisky.

Stay tuned to know about our day at another Speyside whisky distillery…until then, slainte!

Tomintoul Distillery: Behind the Scenes Tour and Tasting

Price: £70.00 pp (Spirit of Speyside 2024)

Duration: 2hrs (actually, almost 3!)

Tasting: Tomintoul 16yr (40%), Tomintoul 25yr (43%), single cask from a Bordeaux wine barrique (2008, 14yr, 60.7%), Madeira 15yr limited release (46%), Madeira single hogshead (1998, 24 yr, 50.2%), Cigar Malt (43%), 15yr Old Ballantruan (50%)

Target: whisky geeks

Value for money: very good!

Highlights: the tasting (including drams during the tour)

Recommended: yes

Link: https://tours.tomintoulwhisky.com/

#44.1 Spirited in Speyside

Catching up Kininvie

TL; DR: May again, which means Spirit of Speyside again! And again, we tried to bag as many distillery tours as we could. First off, the mysterious Kininvie: hidden behind their stablemate Balvenie, it’s a treasure to be found…and we’ll have a pleasant surprise too!

In the last couple of years, the Spirit of Speyside has become one of the unmissable events for us. It’s a festival, but it doesn’t feel like one, probably because of the wide area the events are spread around: the whole of Speyside! There are so many events: fairs, walks, tastings, tours, even runs! Of course, for us it is a good opportunity to visit distilleries that are normally closed to public. In 2023 we managed to visit “a few”, this year we tried to do the same.

This year we made our long weekend a wee bit shorter: from Thursday to Sunday only, skipping the Wednesday and the Monday. It was enough, because, unlike last year, we managed to book all the distilleries we wanted to visit over 4 days! The only ones we decided to pass on were Glen Keith (the event is insanely expensive, like north of £250… yes, it included Strathisla, which we visited twice already, but still a brainfart) and Glenglassaugh (the event was pricey, £200, but included visits at Benriach and Glendronach too, transport and lunch…not a bad deal, but still too much considering all the other visits we’d planned).

The first distillery we hit this year was Kininvie, in Dufftown. It is owned by W. M. Grants, like Glenfiddich and Balvenie. Actually, we’d already visited most of the distillery during our fantastic tour of Balvenie in 2021, with James. Mash-tun and washbacks are indeed in the same building as Balvenie’s ones, and the mill is actually the same! This time though, we will see everything about Kininvie!

A cryptic bus timetable…

Back to the trip, we left early in the morning, as the tour was at 11am (but also to avoid the silly Edinburgh’s rush hour traffic…silly because given the size of the city, it shouldn’t be like that). We also left a bit earlier because we’d planned to leave the van in Craigellachie, get the bus to Dufftown, walk back to Craigellachie after the tour. Everything went according to plan, except that the bus from Craigellachie to Dufftown was, like, over 20 minutes late. No problem though, we were still able to get there in time for our tour, and in the meanwhile we had time to chat to our friend Graham Fraser, who was taking the same bus to go to Glenfiddich instead. He is a fellow vPub barfly and also a “drammer around” like us, but more experienced, with over a 100 Scottish distilleries under his belt: impressive!

After checking in at the Balvenie visitor centre, we had a big surprise: Paul (who we met at Linkwood last year) has recently moved to Balvenie and Kininvie as production manager, and would give us the tour! He is a super nice guy, and thanks to his impressive career in whisky, also extremely knowledgeable, so we were super happy about that!

Paul gave us the tour, such a nice surprise!

The history of Kininvie is peculiar: it was built in 1990 to supply malt for blends (Grant’s and later Monkey Shoulder), instead of Glenfiddich and Balvenie, kept to be bottled as single malts. They started producing on the 4^th of July of the same year, and nowadays the equipment is also used to experiment with barley and yeast strains, including running a rye campaign every year before the silent season: Paul was very excited about the freedom to experiment.

A happy “worker” at Balvenie malting floor.

The tour started with a visit of the Balvenie malting floor and kiln, which was under repair waiting for some replacement parts. After a walk in the kiln, we moved to the main production building with mill, mash-tuns and washbacks. On average they do up to 25 mashes per week, using 240 tons of barley. When they don’t experiment, the barley strains used at the moment are Sassie or a mix of Sassie and Diablo, which have mostly replaced Lauriet. The barley is mashed with the usual three waters at increasing temperatures (65, 75 and 85C). Fermentation takes place in one of the 10 wooden washbacks, next door to the Balvenie’s ones. They use Mauri yeast and go for either a short fermentation (60h) to get a cereal-y cloudy wort, or a long one (over 70h) to obtain a lighter and fruitier one: the one we tried was very sweet, and Teresa picked up notes of white chocolate.

Gianluigi feels cool because it’s his 100th distillery!!!

Finally, it’s time to visit the still room, located in a hidden (hence the name of the tour) dedicated building behind Balvenie. They have three triples of stills (with enough space for a fourth, in case of expansion), for a total of nine. Each triplet works as a unit, with one big wash still for the first distillation and two smaller spirit stills for the second one. The cut points are very variable depending on what they are producing, but usually the second distillation takes 10 hours: 1.5 to heat up, 4.5 for heads and tails and 3 for the heart run. Once at the spirit safe (the piece of equipment used to control the cut points of the distillation run), we could try some newmake spirit, at a whooping abv of 70%! A very nice touch!

A hidden still room…

…a beautiful one.

After that, we moved to one of their massive racked warehouses next door, where after a brief, nerdy chat with the warehouse manager George, we tried some drams. Kininvie releases are very rare: the only one we’d tried previously was during an online event in 2020, as part of the Belfast Whisky Week: the KVSM001, a 5yr triple distilled single malt matured in ex-bourbon casks. We had like it back then, so we were now quite excited and curious about the tasting at the distillery. We started with a “single distillery blend”, KVSB003: a vatting of single malt (matured in European oak casks) and single grain (matured in virgin American oak) produced at the same distillery, 4yr and bottled at 48.2% abv. The second one was a component of this blend, the single grain KVSG002: it is actually a rye whisky (although we think it wouldn’t comply with the American definition of “rye whiskey” because the rye part was less than 51% of the mashbill, only 1 ton malted rye vs. 8.6 ton malted barley), matured in virgin American oak, distilled in 2015 and bottled in 2019 at 47.8%. These drams were both quite interesting, but we recently find rye whisky a bit too herbaceous, particularly the ones produced in Scotland and Europe. Nonetheless, we were quite excited because the labels on the bottles provided a great deal of information, a real deal for us whisky nerds!

We then moved to a single malt, a 23yr distilled in 1991 from a combination of hogshead and sherry butts, bottled at 42.6% (a bit weak to our palate, but nicely tropical and balanced). Finally, the gem was the cask sample: a 10-year single malt from a first refill Sherry butt at 68.4% (the cask filling strength was 70.3% abv!!!): it definitely needed water, but once it opened up it was really fantastic!

About to pour something really delicious.

And with this visit, the Spirit of Speyside festival was officially underway, starting with a bang! Like we noted last year, the staff were so happy to show us around, truly a refreshing experience, and so nice to see Paul in his new role! But it was time to move to our second whisky “adventure” of the day, so we quickly left the distillery on foot.

Stay tuned for more on this. Until then, slainte!

Kininvie Hidden Distillery Tour

Price: £60.00 pp (Spirit of Speyside 2024)

Duration: 2hr

Tasting: 5 drams, Kininvie single distillery blended KVSB003 (single grain rye whisky and single malt), single grain rye whisky KVSG002, Kininvie 23y Single malt, cask sample (ex-sherry cask, 10y) and newmake spirit (for details see the descriptions above)

Target: whisky nerds

Value for money: good

Highlights: the still room

Recommended: yes

Link: https://tickets.spiritofspeyside.com/sales/events/2024-festival/kininvie-hidden-distillery-tou

#43 Cask finish DIY

Diary of an experiment

TL; DR: Have you tried to finish your own whisky in a wine cask? Well, we did, and although we already knew, we could see how hard it is. While the result was not great, we definitely learned a few things.

This post is going to be different from others, as we won’t tell you about a distillery visit, nor a trip, nor a tasting. We’ll talk about an experiment we did recently – still a journey, if you wish.

The idea came after some thoughts on whisky maturation in casks that previously held wine. It took a while to us to realise this is a controversial topic. At first, we didn’t give it much thought as it felt it was just part of the broader “wine” category (including Sherry, Port, Madeira, etc.), but then we noticed many whisky enthusiasts think wine cask maturation is a separate thing, often perceived as bad… so what’s the deal with red/white wines? We had amazing drams matured in wine casks (Arran Amarone, to name a popular one, but also a stunning Glen Garioch 19y fully matured in an ex-Bordeaux cask tried at the distillery, or the Glen Moray 10 Elgin Limited Edition, finished in ex-Chardonnay casks). Let alone the STR (shaved/toasted/re-charred) casks made popular by the late Jim Swan: some can deliver a lot of flavour in a short time, which is particulatly crucial for new distilleries. However, we also had some very “meh” wine-matured whiskies (we won’t name names here), dull at best, so we totally get the scepticism of some.

A taste of Gianluigi’s home, Gutturnio wine.

Probably our Italian upbringings sparked further curiosity on the topic, so we did a bit of research and noticed that while maturation in casks such as Amarone, Barolo and Cabernet-Sauvignon is fairly common nowadays, lesser known red wines aren’t a thing (yet). One wine in particular seems to be overlooked: Gutturnio. Typical from Piacenza’s province (Gianluigi’s hometown), it is a mix of Barbera and Bonarda grapes, and comes either fizzy or still (“superiore”). A thick red wine, that goes well with the greasy local cuisine, quality-wise you can find the cheapos from supermarkets, up to several tenths-of-euros per bottle. We wondered for a while, then, after a conversation with Woody and Megan from Woodrow’s of Edinburgh, we decided to give it a try and start an experiment.

We asked some friends about to visit us to bring over a bottle of Gutturnio, Gutturnio Zerioli Riserva (later on Gianluigi’s brother would challenge this choice as not great, but hey ho) and then we bought a 1-litre virgin oak cask (American oak, Q. alba) from Master of Malt (where it was cheaper, if you exclude some suspicious vendors on Ebay). On the 26^th of August 2023 we filled the wee cask with 75cl of wine, and left it in there for a bit over 3 months.

A nice dram, before we destroyed it.

While the cask was seasoning hidden away in a cupboard (turning it from time to time), we chose our dram. We wanted something without much cask influence, so we aimed for second-fill (or more) ex-bourbon casks. Living in Edinburgh made things easier, as we could access the two Scotch Malt Whisky Society venues, although it wasn’t easy to find a whisky available both to try and purchase. We still managed to taste 6 or 7 bottlings from various distilleries, and the final choice fell on a 12-year-old Dufftown (distillery that we had the chance to walk past in our first trip to Speyside, but never properly visited), called Biting on a Bung (91.34), distilled on the 7^th of July 2009 and bottled at 59.0% abv.

On the 5^th of December, we disgorged the wine. To our surprise the cask was soaked – of the 75cl of wine we’d put in, only 35cl came out! We knew that some absorption would happen, but not to this extent!

On the same day, we filled the cask with the whisky while leaving 20cl to ourselves, in case we messed things up (spoiler alert, we did). We didn’t have a timeline in mind, we just wanted to try the whisky at different times, but here one miscalculation: we went back to Italy two weeks for Christmas, leaving it unchecked for probably too long. When we came back, we took a sample right away: a lot of colour (copper red), some typical red-wine notes on the nose (tannins and red berries), but very metallic on the palate. We hoped these metallic notes would disappear with some more time in the wood, but they didn’t, so in early March, exactly 3 months after filling the cask, we disgorged it and, again, only 30cl of whisky came out (another 20cl of liquid absorbed) – 30cl of ‘metallic liquid’, clearly not a success.

Filling the cask with whisky…and hope.

It only took three months for the colour to change!

We followed up the experiment, this time not with a proper whisky but with spirit from our infinity bottle: despite leaving it in the wee cask for only a couple of weeks, the same unpleasant notes re-appeared (although not so much absorption this time). Oh well.

So, what did we learn out of this experiment? How to waste a good half-litre of whisky? Definitely, but not only that. We already thought it must be hard to properly finish a whisky in the right cask for the right amount of time, but we were surprised by how easy it is to mess up (well, probably the small size just accelerated the process)!

You really don’t want to taste the end product …Maybe next time is going to to be better?

We made a list of variables to consider:

The cask! After so many distillery visits, we know wood quality is key (but tbh we didn’t feel like investing big for our random experiment)
Time to season the cask with wine (maybe too much?)
Time to finish the whisky (again, too much?)
Climate conditions (our flat is very very dry, but there’s not much we can do…)
Whisky robustness (maybe it was a too delicate one for this kind of experiment?)
Quality of the wine…or even the type of wine?

So many variables…it’s really hard to wrap our heads around it, although we could sum up all these variables into one: experience, i.e. really knowing what you’re doing. We clearly didn’t, but thankfully this is not what we’re doing for a living. Nonetheless, it was fun! What’s next? Currently the cask is empty, but we’ll try to fill it soon to avoid it to dry too much…with, maybe, rum? Another wine? Let us know if you have any ideas!

Until next time, slainte.

#42.3 A weekend on Skye

Raasay, paradise

TL; DR: As we woke up on the Saturday we drove to Sconser, to take a ferry to the Isle of Raasay. We visited the distillery, where we had an amazing in-depth 3hr tour and tasting, we hiked and, the next morning, we drove around this truly amazing corner of the world.

(missed Part 2/Part 1?)

Waking up in a place like Carbost is something else. Despite the many campervans, the morning was very quiet, and the only sounds we could hear were the waves gently crashing on the shore. After packing up the bed and before getting on the move, we walked down to the pier, to get some of the fresh (very fresh!) morning sea breeze. We left Carbost after a short stop at the public toilets in front of Talisker distillery. It didn’t take long to get to Sconser, and as we were slightly early, we had time to fix ourselves a coffee with the Bialetti’s moka (well, still Italians after all) before the ferry to Raasay.

Beautiful morning in Carbost.

It was the first time on the island for us. Although geographically close to the mainland, Raasay can only be reached from Skye. The crossing was about 20 minutes, and once there we parked at the pier, where there are also public restrooms and a 24h open waiting room. The distillery was only 10-minute walking, so we decided to just walk there and see how the day would pan out. Our plan depended on the weather: if it was nice, we would have spent the night on the island, otherwise we would have taken the last ferry. It was a glorious day, so we ended up taking the ferry the next morning.

Even more beautiful morning on Raasay.

The distillery is in Clachan, just outside Inverarish, the main village. On the way there, there is an old market/barn building, now mostly abandoned. It won’t be the first one we spot, as the current population is only about 190 people (up by 30 with respect to the 161 marked on the Raasay Single Malt bottles). At that cross we turned right, leaving the Raasay House and Hotel on the left: a huge former mansion, now a tourist centre only open in high season. The main distillery building is called the Borodale House, an old Victorian house that used to be a hotel with a pub before it was bought by the company R&B Distillers to build the distillery. Other than distillery and shop, there are also a hotel, a restaurant and a bar serving hot food until mid-afternoon.

An old Victorian house turned into a distillery…and more.

Being the off season and a Saturday, not all tour options were available, but we found one that seemed great: the Dunnage Cask Tour, which included a tour of the distillery and the bottling plant and a warehouse tasting. As we checked in at the distillery we had a brief scare: our reservation was lost in translation, apparently someone had forgotten to mark it down. The shop manager was very cool about it though, she said there we just needed to wait a bit, and as an apology she offered us a coffee (nice touch). We waited in the bar, taking advantage of the incredible view of Skye from the big windows on a very sunny day. Gabriel, our guide, arrived about 40 minutes later (directly from home). His family moved to the island when he was a kid, and he and his brothers represent a good percentage of the 30-odd distillery workers. This is his side job, while he’s studying to get a medical degree. Gianluigi wondered how his life would be different if, instead of doing chemical analyses on tomato sauce, he had worked in a distillery as a student job.

And the tour begins!

Gabriel was extremely knowledgeable, and while we visited the various stages of production in the very contained area, he provided a huge amount of information. Starting with the barley, they get 30-ton a month of it from the Kintyre peninsula, and the two strains they are using are Lauriet and Concerto. For the peated runs, they get 48ppm (part of phenols per million) barley, malted using Highland peat from the north-east of Scotland. As for the milling, their grist composition is slightly different from others, with only 9% of flour, 19% of husks, and 72% of grit. Their water source is a 60m deep borehole located behind the distillery.

Mashing happens in a big 1.1-ton stainless steel closed mashtun with the usual three waters at increasing temperature, and they aim for a cloudy worth. Linked to the 5-day production week, fermentation is between 3 and 5 days. They have six stainless steel washbacks equipped with a cooling jacket, to slow down fermentation and allow the (liquid) yeast to extract “as much flavour as possible”. The two stills (wash-, 5000-litre, and spirit, 3600-litre) are made by Frilli, an Italian firm from Siena (like Teeling in Ireland and Inchdairnie in Fife), and the cut they take from the second distillation is usually between 75% and 65% abv. When they do peated runs, they use the cooling jacket in the lyne arm to increase reflux and get a lightly peated spirit. The peated newmake spirit comes out at about 14ppm, which is then reduced to 7-8ppm during maturation. It was actually very informative to get to know the ppm level on the liquid, especially when many distilleries only refer to the barley specification.

Still room with a view.

Modern safe.

The production area includes a gin still, where they run the sourced neutral grain spirit with the chosen botanicals (which, of course, we don’t remember). After the production tour, we took some stairs outside the building, to get to the bottling plant, on top of the hill behind the distillery. There, Gabriel showed us the manual and automatic bottling machines, but also how lots for different markets get labelled and stored until they get shipped. Back to the main building, Gabriel took us on a jeep and drove to the warehouse.

Warehouse time!

It was the time for the tasting, but first Gabriel let us take the bungs out of the casks…an operation that took us very long, as we are both quite clumsy, but we could finally get a taste of the yummy content. The tasting consisted of six drams, one for each component of the Raasay Single Malt, their main core expression. These whiskies are matured in ex-Rye, ex-Bordeaux red wine, and Chinquapin virgin oak casks, both unpeated and peated. We knew what to expect: during the pandemic we did an online tasting of these six components, although they were not 3-year-old yet, so technically not whisky. This time these are properly whiskies, as the vintage of the cask was 2019 for the unpeated, and 2020 for the peated ones.

Opening a cask…not that easy!

We loved the peated chinquapin oak, and the unpeated ex-bordeaux and ex-rye casks – one extra confirmation that, if done properly, young whisky can be delicious too. This range is available to buy at the distillery (when we visited, not the peated ones) bottled in the Na Sia range (Gaelic for “The six”). While sipping the last dram, Gabriel took us around the warehouse, and we found out that they recently started using re-fill casks (initially they used only first fill).

Better than a museum.

After the tasting we were definitely ready for some food, which we got back at the distillery while trying a nip of the bottlings available at the shop (Slaintè Club bottlings, Year of the Dragon and others, see below in the box).

Left the distillery, it was a very nice evening, so instead of going back to the van we decided to go for a walk to the village and then to the hill behind the distillery, Temptation Hill…despite the cheesy name, it was quite beautiful and very relaxing. Back at the van, we had dinner, but we soon went to bed, after such a great day.

A nice walk at sunset (almost)…

The following morning, we decided to skip the first ferry of the day to drive around the island: we probably drove along all the possible roads, talking advantage of some breath-taking landscapes – from the very north of the Island, along the mighty Callum’s Road, with a very interesting story, to the south and its the old pier (and frankly, quite too many abandoned vehicles…). We finally took the ferry for Skye around midday, and from there we drove almost non-stop to Leith (well, non-stop because most cafes along the road were closed…expect for the Apiary in Dalwhinnie, where we had some delicious cakes).

…and a great drive at dawn (almost).

“Only” 10 years to make this road.

This was one of the best experiences we had in a while, both the distillery visit (thanks Gabriel!) and the scenery. Raasay is truly a paradise that we’d like to explore more, so we really can’t wait to go back for a holiday…well, and maybe a couple of drams too!

Until next time, slainte.

Raasay Dunnage Cask Warehouse Tour

Price: £75.00 pp (February 2024)

Duration: 2-3 hr

Tasting: 6 drams from the cask, 5y cask strength unpeated ex-Rye cask, ex-Bordeaux wine cask and ex-Chinquapin oak (virgin oak), and peated ex-Rye cask, ex-Bordeaux wine cask and ex-Chinquapin oak

Distillery Exclusive: the Na Sia range (see above), Raasay Scottish Whisky Distillery of the year 2022 (4y and 10 months, finished in Quercus humboltii Colombian oak, 50.7%), Tourism Destination of the Year Celebration (4y, finished in ex-Manzanilla casks, 52%)

Target: whisky geeks

Value for money: good

Highlights: everything

Recommended: a bit pricey but totally worth it!

Link: https://raasaydistillery.com/

#39.4 The Highlander Trip

A quiz, a tasting and a distillery visit

TL; DR: Saturday was a “rest” day, after three distillery visits (actually five in two days!). However, we still had some whisky activities scheduled: a whisky-themed quiz and a tasting at the Carnegie Whisky Cellars. It was a great day, and it was followed by a visit (re-visit for us) at Clynelish on the Sunday.

(missed Part 3/Part 2/Part 1?)

On Saturday we woke up not that rested: Teresa’s cough was getting worse, the humidity inside Mr. Vantastic not helping. Gianluigi wasn’t at his 100% either, with a bit of hangover hanging there. In normal conditions we would have got a warm drink and a good breakfast right away, but unfortunately Dornoch is a bit of a ghost town before 9-10, so we couldn’t find an open cafè nearby, nor open public restrooms. Eventually, the latter opened (thankfully). A few minutes later we met Justine, and took a walk to the beach with her.

Such a beautiful morning in Dornoch.

It was a very sunny day, not that cold, and Gianluigi even dipped his feet in the North Sea waters. We walked back to the village, where we could take a quick shower at our friends AirBnB. As a “thank you” Gianluigi went to the Harry Gow Bakery and got yummy morning rolls for everyone! Teresa felt adventurous and tried the macaroni pie – better than expected, although not sure she’ll have it again.

It wasn’t that cold…He says.

There were no distillery visits scheduled for the day, it was like a rest day, but we’d have had an early evening tasting at the Carnegie Whisky Cellars shop, and a very fun activity was waiting for us before then: a whisky quiz! It was our friend Charlie, a whisky enthusiast more seasoned than us, to organise it. As a location, we went to the Dornoch Castle Whisky bar. Space was a bit narrow, so we were all around the same long table and with little chance to mix: we ended up in the same team, the Home Office (because of our working from home patterns, but also as a political mockery). We had a lot of fun, but we didn’t win: we tried to gamble our last round for a high reward, but we didn’t make it to the top. Afterwards, we went to the Cocoa Mountain to get a warm (and yummy) chocolate. Unfortunately, Teresa kept getting worse, so we decided to get a hotel for the night instead of sleeping in the campervan. Because this was a last-minute decision, we had to scramble back, and we ended up being late for the tasting…d’oh! Fortunately, our pals were all very understanding.

An amazing whisky tasting is about to start.

The Carnegie Whisky Cellars is a shop on the main street in Dornoch, on the same block as the castle. It is run by Michael, the manager, who started there in 2016, and by his assistant David. Beside the shop, there is a very nice room with low ceiling (ehm, the cellar?), and a long table around which we had the tasting. It was a very good one, Michael’s knowledge was impressive, and the choice of drams hit the spot. The lineup started with an old Haig blend, followed by a delicious Thompson Brothers Teaninich (bottled for the shop), a single cask 21y Braveal, a cask strength Campbeltown blended malt Gauldrons (probably mostly Glen Scotia), and two cask samples, one from a local distillery (don’t know if we can disclose it, but it wasn’t Dornoch) and another one from a Campbeltown distillery. While Gianluigi enjoyed his drams, Teresa mostly saved them as she wasn’t feeling well, so after the tasting she went back to the hotel to rest. She revisited the tasting recently, and she loved it as well! Gianluigi instead joined the others for a very nice dinner at Greens (just next to the shop), followed by drams at the Dornoch Castle Whisky bar, and a final pint at the Coach House, before joining Teresa back at the hotel.

The back of an old Haig bottle…What a statement!

In the morning we were both feeling much better, and as soon as we could we had our breakfast (Scottish full, of course) at the hotel, where we said goodbye to our pals Fiona and Mike, who left soon after. We met with the rest of the gang in the main square, but we didn’t join them on the minibus: we were both working the day after, so the plan was to drive back to Leith straight after the visit at Clynelish distillery.

This was the second time there for us, with the first in May 2021 right after the lockdown. While we really like the whisky, the distillery visit was a bit of a bummer: too expensive and too focused on Johnnie Walker (you can read about it here). Fortunately, things changed since then, they have various experiences, and we chose the Production Tour and Premium Tasting, more suited to whisky enthusiasts (£30). The others are the Flavour Journey (sounds very Johnnie Walker-esque, £19), the Express Tasting (£15) and the Premium Tasting (£65).

Dramming around with friends.

The guide for the tour was Shirley, and she was way more knowledgeable than the guide we had in 2021 (to be fair, we are now more knowledgeable too). The tour scheme was the usual, although it was a lot richer in information. They get their malt from Glen Ord maltings, unless Talisker is in high demand, in which case they get it from Buckie. The mill (as usual, Porteus) is the only piece of equipment they didn’t refurbish in 2016, and they set the usual 20/70/10 split in the grist (husk/grit/flour). With the mashing (common to many Diageo distillery, two waters: raising the first one from 62°C to 84°C) they aim for a very clear wort, which then undergoes about 80-85 hours of fermentation.

They recently changed yeast strain, they now use Lalamond. They only do unpeated whisky, but for their neighbour distillery Brora, the peat comes from near Montrose. The stills are a copy of the original 1960s ones, replaced in 2016, and they are fired with steam produced with oil and gas. Similar to our previous tour, however, we couldn’t visit the warehouse (it’s in the Brora area…). Anyway, most of the whisky is shipped away in tankers.

Dramming around with friends nr. 2

The tasting was supposed to be 3 drams, but because we were a big group, Justine managed to negotiate an extra one (yay!). We had the tasting in the bar upstairs, with a magnificent view down towards the sea. Today it was Teresa’s time to enjoy her drams, Gianluigi behind the wheel. We started with the Clynelish 14y (the flagship!), followed by the Distillers Edition, finished in Oloroso Seco for 6 months (we had a bottle of this). It was followed by the Distillery Exclusive, a non-age statement, full ex-bourbon matured whisky bottled at 48% – no mention or colouring or chill-filtering, but given the colour, we think it is unlikely they used caramel colourant. It was good, but not £105 good (this was batch 2, batch 1 in 2021 was ***only*** £90). Finally, we tried the Four Corners of Scotland, a bottling they made to celebrate four iconic distilleries (together with Caol Ila, Cardhu and Glenkinchie) for making Johnnie Walker. Again, quite good but at over £200, insanely priced. A shame these prices, but hey ho, life goes on.

An unexpected photo bomber!

Anyway, we were happy with this distillery visit, much happier than after the first time. Nonetheless, excluding Friday’s tour de force, the real highlights of the couple of days were the whisky quiz (thanks Charlie) and the tasting at the Carnegie Whisky Cellars. Some very good memories to bring home, which is where we headed afterwards, not before a stop in Inverness.

Stay tuned, and until next time, Slainte!

Clynelish Production Tour and Premium Tasting

Price: £30.00 pp (November 2023)

Duration: 1hr 30min

Tasting: 3 (+1) drams, Clynelish 14y (46%), Distillers Edition (vintage 2006, bottled 2021, 46%, Oloroso finish), Distillery Exclusive (NAS, 48%), Four Corners of Scotland 16y (49.3%)

Distillery exclusive: NAS (48%), mostly ex-bourbon cask

Target: everyone

Value for money: good, definitely better value than the flavour journey we did in 2021

Highlights: the bar/tasting room and the view from it

Recommended: yes

Link: https://www.malts.com/en-gb/distilleries/clynelish

#39.3 The Highlander Trip

Down the neck of the giraffe

TL; DR: Third and final distillery of the day (not of the trip), Glenmorangie. The behemoth of the north, producing one of the best-selling malts, a visit we’d postponed for some time. A visit we’ll remember as one of the funniest we had in a while.

(missed Part 2/Part 1?)

The tour and tasting at Balblair ended under a heavy rain. We were quick in jumping back on the bus, which drove us to the next distillery: Glenmorangie! The distillery is located next to the A9 just passed Tain (you can’t see it from the highway), a mere 10 minutes away from Balblair. We’d never had the chance to visit it before, despite driving past it more than a few times.

Ready for the third (!) distillery visit of the day.

Despite its popularity, we haven’t tried many Glenmorangie expressions. Probably one of the reasons is that it doesn’t appear often at independent bottlers, and when it does it usually carries a high price premium (unless it’s marked as “secret Highlands”, of course). Other than the omnipresent 10y “the Original”, we tried the 12y Lasanta (sherry cask finished) and 14y Quinta Ruban (Port cask finished) in a tasting back in 2020, both solid. About other popular expressions, we recently tried the 18y – delicious and very drinkable (the 43% ABV helped), while because of our lack of enthusiasm for Sauternes finishes in general, we never gave a chance to “the Nectar”, the expression formerly known as Nectar D’Or. We also tasted the “A Tale of Cake” (Tokaj wine finish) in a tasting, sweet but truly delicious, but until our distillery visit that was the only one in the “A Tale of…” range we’d tried. To note, not long ago, Glenmorangie have also brought up a “Barrel Select” range, including expressions finished in Malaga, Cognac, Palo Cortado, Amontillado, and more recently Calvados (and similar to the “A Tale of…” range, originally priced around £75-80).

Definitely a big operation.

Anyway, back to the trip! The driver left us in the parking lot, from which the 7-mlpa size of the distillery can be fully appreciated. We took a few pics, and then we started walking down a short path to the visitor centre, which is in front of the main distillery building, on the other side of a small lane. There is also an orange giraffe statue on the path: it is associated to the brand because of the height of Glenmorangie pot stills, the tallest in Scotland. These are considered to contribute to the lightness of this spirit by allowing only light molecules to climb up the tall stills’ necks and leap over to the lyne arms and the condensers.

Contrary to Balblair, the visitor centre is very brightly lighted, almost like an airport duty free and, in general, it felt very “corporate”. On display, other than the usual merchandise, there were most of their recent bottlings, but also some older expressions: we spotted some bottles of the “A Tales of Cake”, priced at £350 (the RRP in 2020 was £75!). Needless to say, they stayed on the shelf.

We were given a few minutes to check the shop and for a neep in the loo, after which our guide Lewis walked us outside the visitor centre and into the distillery building to start the tour. We gathered in a small room (which we filled quite quickly), where a very expensive Renovo bike made with some leftover wood from old casks was displayed, for a short introduction. We immediately realised Lewis was a great character, definitely one of the most entertaining guides we had in recent years. He quickly picked up that we were whisky nerds, so instead of describing all the phases of production (which all of us knew…probably too well) he sat back and replied to all our gazillion questions with a very dry humour. When he was asked “what about the 12 men of Tain?” (in front of a picture of them on the wall) he answered “well, they were 12…and they came from Tain”.

The impressive still room from the outside.

Because of this, and because pictures were not allowed inside the distillery, we don’t have many notes about Glenmorangie. The tour inside was quite standard – milling, mashing, and fermenting – but we could try the wort, a nice touch. The still room is really huge, almost looking like a cathedral. After that, we went back to the courtyard, where we could look at (but unfortunately not go inside) the Lighthouse: a new small fully equipped distillery next to the old one, where Dr Bill Lumsden, the Head of Distillation for both Glenmorangie and Ardbeg (one of the great innovators in current times) can run small batches and experiments. The building in itself is very beautiful, and somehow fits nicely next to the old buildings.

Old and new getting along well!

We can see why they called it the *Lighthouse*.

After wee look at a warehouse, it was finally time for the tasting, prepared in a room just behind the visitor centre. It was a bespoke tasting, so to minimise the chances that someone already had some of the drams, our friend Justine (who organised the trip) chose one recent expression and 3 distillery exclusives. We started with the last of the “A Tale of” releases, “A Tale of Tokyo” (46%), finished in Mizunara oak. It was good but not memorable: all the whiskies finished in Mizunara oak that we tried (3 or 4) were interesting but that’s it, not something we’d go for. The other three drams were sublime: two single casks, one matured in a custom oak barrel and one in red wine, and the last a vatting of two ex-Pedro Ximenex sherry casks. Really great drams, just a shame that the price tag was a bit too high for us.

Getting ready…

…for this. What a tasting!

Lewis humour (well, and these last three whiskies) made our tour at Glenmorangie quite unique, and it didn’t feel corporate at all (which some of us were worried about). Experiences like this are the ones that really stay in our memory, and we are so grateful for.

We left the distillery empty-handed, but very happy nonetheless, and after a brief bus drive to Dornoch, it was time for dinner, after which we went back to the van for a good sleep (spoiler: it was not!).

Stay tuned to hear about it, and until next week, Slainte!

Glenmorangie Tour & Bespoke Tasting

Price: £65.00 pp (November 2023)

Duration: 1hr 30min

Tasting: 4 drams, Tales of Tokyo (46%, NAS), Distillery Manager’s Selection (2^nd fill custom cask, 56.1%), Distillery Exclusive Release Cask 12835 (12y, vintage 2006, bottled 2019, ex-red wine cask, 55.1%), Distillery Exclusive Release Cask 1784 (16y, vintage 2003, bottled 2019, PX sherry, 55%)

Distillery Exclusives: see above

Target: everyone

Value for money: pricey, but at least we tried something new

Highlights: Lewis really made this tour memorable

Recommended: yes

Link: https://www.glenmorangie.com/

#32.1 Driving through Englandshire

A peek into White Peak Distillery

TL;DR: On the road to Wales for our summer holidays, we drove through England, and we got to two distilleries: first of the two, White Peak. We had heard great things about their whisky, but had never tried. Our visit confirmed their good reputation, and we probably had the best distillery tour outside Scotland.

The decision on where to go for our summer holidays was quite easy. First, we wanted to use the campervan for the first time for over a long weekend, but because of some mileage limitation on our insurance we couldn’t go too far, so here Ireland and Cornwall were not an option. Also, after our 2022 North of Scotland and Orkney trip, we definitely wanted to avoid midgies, so we excluded the West Coast of Scotland and Outer Hebrides too. Finally, we wanted to see something new: at this point, excluding the overpriced Lakes District, there was almost only one destination left: Wales! But to get to Wales, we’d need to cross a good chunk of the country south of the border, otherwise known as Englandshire.

Not too bad honestly, the recent world-wide whisky revamp touched England as well, and there are now over 40 distilleries on the English Whisky Map. Many of them are very young, and some were born as gin distilleries and only afterwards they switched to whisky. Others, however, are now quite established, with well-matured and tasty products. We already visited two, the Lakes Distillery, in Cumbria, and Copper Rivet, in Kent.

First distillery visit of the trip, yay!

Anyway, we left Edinburgh and, after a first stop in Leeds (to meet friends who recently became parents and their new-born kiddo), we drove straight to the first distillery we wanted to visit: White Peak. The distillery is in Derbyshire, near the Peaks District National Park, in Ambergate. It was funded by the Vaughn family, Max and Claire, in 2016, and their first single malt was released in February 2022. The chosen name for the whisky is Wireworks, because the distillery is located in a very beautiful former industrial estate on the river Derwent, a former wirework indeed! The industry complex dating back to 1876, closed in 1996: a lovely industrial revolution style building.

A charming industrial location (for those who like the genre).

We were very curious to visit this distillery. We had heard good things but we hadn’t had the chance to try this malt before, so here we go! Once there, we quickly checked in, but being early, we had time for a coffee and a stroll outside: a few meters away from the entrance they set up a nice summer garden, with lots of old industrial bits and bobs.

White Peak summer garden, such a lovely spot.

Back to the bar, we started our Warehouse Tour with Dave. He works there as a distillery manager and distiller, which was great as he gave us lots of insights! So, first off, he told us that although they make gin and rum too, the 90% of their business is the production of single malt. In contrast with the industrial revolution style budling, the equipment is very modern, and bar the stills, it looks like a modern brewery. They buy their malted barley from Crisp, and they then process it in a very modern brewing-style mill. This only applies to the unpeated malt however: the peated one, which constitutes 10% of their mash, is pre-milled. A thing in common with many distilleries is the use of three waters, from which they obtain a clear wort for a fruity character. The long fermentation, 6 days, is done with two types of yeast, dry distiller and brewer’s. The latter is live yeast from the Thornbridge brewery, in particular the one used to make the Jaipur IPA. This is both to provide a twist to their flavour, and to honour the Derbyshire brewing history.

Distillation is made in two small Scottish-style copper pot stills, and the usual cut points for the heart (ie what is kept from the second distillation) are 78% and 67%, quite wide indeed! They produce more or less 10 casks per week, mostly into ex-bourbon barrels from Heaven Hill or ex-wine shaved-toasted-recharred (STR) casks. They produce about 60,000 litres of alcohol per annum, putting them in the top 5 of English malt distilleries. After trying the newmake spirit, we moved to the warehouse, just next-door. Technically not a dunnage warehouse (the industrial building original floor is concrete), although the barrels are stored horizontally in a typical dunnage way. Their “angel share” (the percentage lost to evaporation) is about 10% over 3-4 years. David explained us their barrels policy, as we said, mostly ex-bourbon and STR, but with many exceptions: red-wine, Port, rum, virgin oak, etc, typical of young distilleries wanting to experiment. We also saw the casks for their next release, the Necessary Evil, in collaboration (again) with Thornbridge brewery. This year they used ex-PX casks which previously held stour beer.

An almost dunnage warehouse.

Still in the warehouse, a table with empty glasses and benches was prepared for us, for the tasting! The first dram was the Caduro, released a few days before our visit, a marriage of ex-bourbon (33%) and STR casks (67%), bottled at 46.8%. It’s a lightly peated malt, quite fruity, sweet and very tasty. The other two samples were both from the cask, a 4yr-ish ex bourbon cask filled at around 72%, and a slightly older ex American oak cask (but with French oak ends) filled at 64.5%. We have to say that they were both delicious – a shame they weren’t on sale.

All is ready for the tasting…

Back to the shop, as the buying queue disappeared, we asked Dave if we could try their other release: the Alter Ego (51.5%). For this, the cask make-up is similar to Caduro, but inverted (33% STR and 67% ex-bourbon barrels), and with different cut points too. It was tasty as well, but we felt that the Caduro was a bit more balanced.

The day finished with us driving towards Stratford-upon-Avon to get to the camping, to rest and get ready for another day and another distillery visit. Overall, the visit to White Peak was a great experience, probably one of the best we had recently, and for a very reasonable price. Of course, Dave was excellent, and as we said many times, doing the tour with a person involved in production is often more engaging.

Until next time, slainte!

White Peak Distillery Warehouse Tour

Price: £40.00 pp (July 2023)

Duration: 1hr 30min

Tasting: 3 drams, single cask ex-bourbon cask (4yr, filling strength 72%), single cask STR American oak cask with French oak ends (around 4.5yr, filling strength 63.5%), Caduro (46.8%abv), all not chill filtered and natural colour, and a complimentary glencairn

Target: whisky enthusiasts

Value for money: good

Highlights: the industrial site and the nerdy tour

Recommended: yes

Link: https://www.whitepeakdistillery.co.uk/

#31.6 Spirit of Speyside 2023

The beast of Dufftown: Mortlach

TL;DR: our fourth day at the festival started with a classic, a distillery particularly known for their complex distillation process: Mortlach. The visit was very interesting indeed, and the distillery manager Kirstie didn’t shy away from nerdy details.

(missed Part 5/Part 4/Part 3/Part 2/Part 1?)

On Sunday morning the sky was still overcast, it would start raining later in the day eventually. Oh well. After breakfast we wrapped up all our stuff: it was the last night in the camping, the following and last night of the holiday we would wild camp again, although we hadn’t figured out where yet. We left the camping driving towards Dufftown, in a backroad that goes past the back of the Speyside Cooperage, from which you can admire their casks pyramids. Being Sunday morning, Dufftown was very quiet, and not all cafes were open yet. We managed to park on the main road, in front of the local CoOp, and tried hunting for a coffee. After finding one, we walked our way towards our first appointment of the day: Mortlach distillery, the so-called beast of Dufftown.

Where are we?

It is a very old one, founded in 1823 after the Excise Act, and it was the only one in town until their manager at the time, William Grant, left to found Glenfiddich. In 1897 the distillery was expanded, and thanks to the work of the famous architect Charles Doig, the pagoda roofs were added. It was acquired by John Walker & Sons in 1923, but the company soon merged with Distillers Company Limited in 1925 (then United Distillers in 1987, Diageo from 1997). Before 2014, the only official bottling of Mortlach was the 16y “Flora and Fauna”, now discontinued and dearly celebrated (like most things of the past, the abuse of “’member-berries” is widespread in whisky-land…if you don’t know the reference, check South Park season 20).

The beast of Dufftown under a gloomy sky.

A core range was introduced in 2014 (with some controversial 50cl bottles) and revamped in 2018, while the current age-stated range includes a 12y (Wee Witchie), a 16y (Distiller’s Dram), a 20y (Cowie’s Blue Seal) and a 14y travel retail (Alexander’s Way), plus the occasional Special Releases. The newmake spirit is mainly filled in ex-sherry casks, although you can find some independently bottled ex-bourbon matured expressions (we have an 11y from Signatory Vintage, a marriage of 2 ex-bourbon hogsheads, which is quite tasty). Mortlach whisky is quite famous to be meaty, and thus considered a malt for seasoned drinkers. Fun fact, the 16y (very decent in our opinion) worked quite well every time we’ve given it to friends (both beginners and casual whisky drinkers).

At the distillery we were given a welcome cocktail, a Mortlach-based Old Fashioned (this time with regular angostura, not the orange one like at Dailuaine), and the distillery manager, Kirstie, introduced herself. She’s a graduate form the Brewing and Distilling Master at Herriot-Watt University, and of course extremely knowledgeable: her explanations definitely gave value to quite a pricey experience. We also bumped into a couple of barflies at the tour, Angus and Graham, met back in November at the Aqvavitae’s Blind Challenge in Glasgow.

The shiny mashtun…

After the introduction, we started the proper tour: we moved outside in the courtyard, and then near the milling room, which hosts an old red Porteus mill. A notable difference was that they take a smaller cut of flour in their grist (8%) compared to other distilleries (usually 10%). In our understanding, one of the reasons is that their water to grist ratio is higher, 3.8 instead of 3.6. The mashtun looks very new, made of stainless steel and closed, with the usual window to check its inside. They only have two water runs instead of three, with the second being warmed up to get the sugars that are usually obtained in the third run (lasting 6.57 hours in total).

…and the beautiful wooden washbacks.

The walls of the fermentation room, where six Douglas Fir washbacks are located (wooden because of a combination of aesthetics and convenience, since they can be disassembled unlike stainless-steel ones, all replaced in 2016), are decorated with some nerdy facts about whisky making, like the formula to calculate the % abv of the wash using the gravity readings, and the graph showing the trends of different types of sugars digestion during fermentation. Their fermentation time is usually between 55 and 59 hours, never less than 50, and they work with yeast that can survive higher temperatures, around 35C.

Knowledge pill on the wall # 1.

We then moved to the still room with its 6 stills (3 wash- and 3 spirit-), very unusually of different shape and size. The distillation is very complex: wash-still #3 and spirit-still #3 are paired, and they work like in a regular distillery. The other wash-stills (#1 and #2) work together, but their distillation is (unusually) divided into two cuts, the first goes into spirit-still #2, while the second (heavier) gets re-distilled three times (with the other distillations feints) in the other spirit still, the Wee Witchie, and the cut is only taken every third distillation. If you are confused, no worries, we are too, but the idea is to provide different characters to the newmake spirit. Someone in the past made the calculation, and it turned out the spirit is distilled 2.81 times – it would be nice to see those equations (nerd alert! Nerd alert!).

Theory…

…and practice! (The Wee Witchie is the closest to us.)

As we moved outside, we could admire one of the other characteristics that made Mortlach popular: the 6 worm tub condensers, one for each still. It is believed this is what provides meatiness to the spirit. They are made of wood, except one which is made of metal because the wooden one started leaking – they told us it might be replaced at some point with a new wooden one. They take the cooling water for the wormtubs from the river Dullan, one of their 6 sources of water for all the process: remember that they produce between 3.5 and 4 million litres of alcohol per year! Finally, we ventured in the warehouse, where casks from many distilleries were resting, including many non-Diageo ones, surprisingly. Kirstie explained us the processes happening in maturation: additive (compounds from the wood affect the liquid), subtractive (compounds from the liquid are removed by the wood contact) and oxidative (the contact with air changes the liquid, as you will know if you ever had a bottle open for more than 4-6 months).

The famous worm tub condensers.

Back outside, Kirstie showed us where some buildings used to be, as well as their still existing but currently unused malting floor, on the other side of the road (at the moment part of it is used as deposit for the Dufftown Whisky & Heritage Centre). We went back to the meeting room to enjoy the (stingy, considering 80 quid) 3-dram tasting. These were the flagship Mortlach 16y (43.4%), Mortlach 15y Game of Thrones Six Kingdoms (finished in ex-bourbon casks and bottled at 46%) and a non-age statement (NAS) from the 2022 Special Release. We’re quite familiar with the 16y (we used to have it, and gifted some), and we had tried the 15y GoT once (nice to revisit), so we were very curious about the third, mostly because the RRP was insane for a NAS, well above £200. This expression was finished in Tawny Port, Red Muscato wine, Virgin Oak casks and bottled at cask strength (57.8%). Turned out, it was nice but not mind-blowing by any means, as you’d expect considering the fanfare.

The tasting at the end.

Overall, this was a great visit, and Kirstie contributed to make it as nerdy as expected, for such a peculiar distillery like Mortlach. The price is a bit steep, £80 for a tour and 3 drams (+ cocktail), so it’s hard to recommend it. However, if you’re at the right moment of your whisky journey, it is definitely one to visit, despite the price. For us, it was worth it, and we look forward to more deep dives like this.

The Mortlach Distillery Tour (Spirit of Speyside)

Price: £80.00 pp (April 2023)

Duration: 2hr

Tasting: 3 drams and a welcome cocktail, Mortlach 16 (43.4%), Mortlach 15 the Six Kingdoms (46%), Mortlach Special Release 2022 (NAS, 57.8%)

Target: a bit more seasoned whisky geeks and nerds

Value for money: not great

Highlights: the detailed tour and explanation of such a complicated distillation process

Recommended: only if you’re quite ahead in your whisky journey (see last paragraph above)

Link: https://www.malts.com/en-gb/brands/mortlach, https://www.spiritofspeyside.com/