FUN FACTS ABOUT SCOTCH WHISKY 2019...
The world's first blended whisky which was a mix of malt and grain whisky was produced by brewer and small-time distiller Andrew Usher II in Edinburgh under the name Green Stripe, circa 1860. His father, Andrew Usher (1782 – 1855), was also a famous blender in the vatted malt era.
Subsequent blending and
mass distillation enabled whisky to grow from a drink rarely consumed outside
the United Kingdom, to one of mass export.
Andrew Usher II, John
Crabbie of Crabbie's Green Ginger and William Sanderson, whisky blender of Vat
69 were the three founders of the North British Distillery.
Andrew Usher II and brother
John Usher, partners in Andrew Usher & Co, were also the proprietors of the
Edinburgh Distillery.
Tabasco sauce is aged three years in previously aged white oak whiskey barrels from companies like Jack Daniel's.
Charles Dickens spelt it whiskey in Martin Chuzzlewit but used both whisky and whiskey in The Pickwick Papers. But then he didn't quite know which city he was in, did he?
Charles Dickens spelt it whiskey in Martin Chuzzlewit but used both whisky and whiskey in The Pickwick Papers. But then he didn't quite know which city he was in, did he?
Water for Laphroaig is acidic due to quartz mountains
and peaty lowlands, but the mineral content in the water is low.
North Korea’s Samilpo distillery created its own brand of whisky and launched it mid-2019. The Samilpo whisky bottle is based on the characteristic square design of Scotland’s Johnnie Walker, a popular but expensive brand in North Korea.
The distillery sells two different expressions of its whisky in a format similar to the international best-selling Scottish brand – a 40% ABV “Black Label” and a 42% ABV “Red Label”. There had to be some difference somewhere, I suppose. Its 45% ABV expression which was announced as part of the family is not yet available. The bottles present an unusual volume, 620 ml. Apart from this figure and the ABV, nothing is written in English.
With 78 out of 82 entities using Whisky, there is a strong case for stating that the global spelling of this spirit is whisky.
North Korea’s Samilpo distillery created its own brand of whisky and launched it mid-2019. The Samilpo whisky bottle is based on the characteristic square design of Scotland’s Johnnie Walker, a popular but expensive brand in North Korea.
The distillery sells two different expressions of its whisky in a format similar to the international best-selling Scottish brand – a 40% ABV “Black Label” and a 42% ABV “Red Label”. There had to be some difference somewhere, I suppose. Its 45% ABV expression which was announced as part of the family is not yet available. The bottles present an unusual volume, 620 ml. Apart from this figure and the ABV, nothing is written in English.
With 78 out of 82 entities using Whisky, there is a strong case for stating that the global spelling of this spirit is whisky.
At Bunnahabhain on the island of Islay, spring water is piped from the hills without passing over peat. The spring from which
it is sourced is rich in calcium and magnesium so the water contains more
minerals.
Between 1786 and 1803, a span of 17 years, the duties
on stills was increased by a factor of more than 77 times.
Bowmore's water takes a long path to the distillery
passing through quartites, limestones, sandstones, and through peat.
The first Scotch ever to sell for six figures ($160,100) was the aptly named Dalmore 64 Trinitas, one of just three bottles of this Scotch whisky ever made. Rare stocks are combined in each bottle, containing spirits dating from 1868, 1878, 1926 and 1939.
'Soft water, through peat, over granite' was the
traditional and still oft-quoted view of the best water for distilling. Remarkably,
less than 20% of Scotland’s distilleries use water that fits this description.
Eimverk Distillery in Iceland is dedicated to making premium Icelandic spirits from 100% local ingredients. Their whisky is named Flóki after one of Icelands first explorers, Hrafna-Flóki (Flóki of the ravens). Eimverk produces three whiskies, one Young Malt, one unique sheep-dung smoked malt whisky and one 3-YO Single Malt Whisky using locally grown Icelandic barley.
Pakistan's only distillery at the Murree Brewery is owned by a Parsi, Minoo Bhandara.
Eimverk Distillery in Iceland is dedicated to making premium Icelandic spirits from 100% local ingredients. Their whisky is named Flóki after one of Icelands first explorers, Hrafna-Flóki (Flóki of the ravens). Eimverk produces three whiskies, one Young Malt, one unique sheep-dung smoked malt whisky and one 3-YO Single Malt Whisky using locally grown Icelandic barley.
Pakistan's only distillery at the Murree Brewery is owned by a Parsi, Minoo Bhandara.
Macallan is still the most traded brand, followed by
Ardbeg and Bruichladdich.
Campbeltown-based Springbank produces a whisky
distilled 2.5 times.!? The distillery has a direct
fire wash still and two spirits stills. It takes the feints
(tails) of the first spirit still and combines them with a portion of the low
wines obtained during the initial stripping run(the output of the wash still). That mixture is then distilled
again right through the second spirit still; for the feints, it’s their third trip through
the still. That means a portion of the finished distillate has been distilled
three times, while another portion has been distilled twice – 2.5 times
distillation!
A small portion of the low wines is reserved and
directed through a small, strange little still Mortlach calls the “Wee
Witchie,” where it’s distilled three more times, with only the hearts added to
the final whisky. The resulting whisky is said to be distilled 2.81 times...
Benromach distillery has unveiled a new Scotch that’s
been triple distilled before being aged some eight years. The wort is first
distilled in a wash still before receiving two further distillations in a
spirit still. The first vintage of this offering, 2009, was then 'put to rest' in
first fill bourbon barrels before being bottled at 50% ABV.
Towser (1963 – 1987) is probably the most famous
distillery cat, having gained her reputation by killing 28 899 mice
(statistical number)… She even got a mention in the famous Guinesss Book of
Records for her life achievement, officially recognising her as the ‘world’s
best mouser”. She lived for 24 years at the Glenturret Distillery in Scotland.
The peat used to dry the barley and bring this
characteristic smoky aroma to some of your favourite whiskies was probably
between 1000 to 5000 years old... peatbogs only grow by around 1mm every year…
Whisky is a game of patience!
1.2 billion bottles of Scotch whisky were shipped from
Scotland in 2018. That’s 41 bottles every second!
A 25ml measure of whisky contains around 55 calories.
That’s the same number of calories as a peach. Others have differing values, but you do add calories!
You could fit the contents of 10.6 trillion standard
bottles of whisky into Loch Ness. However, I'm not advising anyone tries
this. Nessie is probably not a big drinker.
With a value of £4.359 billion, Scotch whisky exports accounted
for over 20 per cent of all UK food and drink exports in 2017.
Suntory has created its very own yeast strain:
Suntoryeus Lactobacillus.
Some 34 bottles of whisky are exported from Scotland
every second.
The Scottish Parliament first taxed whisky in 1644.
Licensed Scottish whisky production was banned from 1757
to 1760 due to a poor grain harvest.
With a population of 5.3 million, and more than 20
million barrels of whisky in store, Scotland has almost four casks of whisky
per citizen.
A 30-year-old cask of Macallan set a new world record
in 2017 for the most expensive whisky cask ever sold at auction. It fetched a
whopping £375,000.
Mountain Dew was originally meant to be a whisky
chaser.
The Glenfiddich bottle is triangular in shape to
represent the three pillars of whisky making: air, water and barley.
The Balvenie 8 YO was marketed in a triangular glass bottle in 1971.
The vast majority of whisky exported from Scotland is blended, not single malt.
The Scotch Whisky Experience 5-star visitor attraction tells the tale of Scotland's national drink. Set up in 1987 to educate visitors to Edinburgh about the joys of Scotch whisky, the Scotch Whisky Experience is now home to the world’s largest private collection of Scotch whisky, held in a glittering vault.
When prohibition ended and Americans were once again able to quench their thirst for whiskey, Irish distillers lacked the stocks to meet this new, now legal, demand. The Scot’s had plenty of whisky, and they leveraged their stocks and their reputation for quality into a dominant position in the American whiskey market at the expense of the Irish distillers.Daftmill is one of the very few truly self-sufficient distillery in Scotland.
At the end of the 19th century, Dailuaine was the largest single malt distillery in Speyside and also one of the most innovative in terms of design.
A small percentage of their farm crop (around 100 tons) is diverted for their own use. The process water comes from their own artesian well, and the draff produced after mashing is then fed to their prize beef herd.
Only 20,000 litres are produced during two x three-month seasons, one starting after the end of the busy spring period on the farm and stopping before harvest, the other during the fallow winter period between November and February.
These sixth-generation farmers reckon that they are only the third family to have farmed Daftmill in 1,000 years of existence.
It was only in 2003 that the idea of whisky making began to form in the minds of the owners.
It is the first member of the now burgeoning small-scale distilling movement in Scotland.
None of the maturing stock has yet been released, though samples from casks show that it is mature, balanced with a gentle herbal note, and very much ready for sale. Rarely seen as a single malt bottling (the occasional Flora & Fauna from owner Diageo, (sporadic independent offerings), Dailuaine is one of the many hard-working distilleries which quietly provide fillings for blends.
It produces a heavy ‘meaty’ make given its long fermentation, rapid distillation and the use of stainless steel in the condensers to cut down on copper interaction. That Flora & Fauna bottling (from ex-Sherry casks) shows this mix of richness and sweetness at its best.
A complete rebuild in 1884 saw the installation of Scotland’s first pagoda on a kiln whose pitch was deliberately steep to minimise the contact time between peat smoke and drying malt, one of the clearest indications of how the old ‘Strathspey’ style was changing.
In 1898, it merged with Talisker to form Dailuaine-Talisker Distilleries Ltd.
Dallas Dhu Distillery designed by Charles Doig is now little more than a museum.
Dallas Dhu Speyside single malt Scotch whisky is rarely seen, but when it does emerge from the shadows it shows a sweet fruited edge, some honey, oiliness and a wisp of peat smoke.
The vast majority of whisky exported from Scotland is blended, not single malt.
Japanese whisky makers rarely trade casks with one
another due to how competitive the market is.
Un-aged American whiskey is often called ‘white dog’.
The co-founder of Alcoholics Anonymous, Bill Wilson,
demanded whisky on his deathbed but was refused it.
While filming in the Congo, the majority of the cast of
The African Queen became sick with dysentery from drinking the water. Director
John Huston and actor Humphrey Bogart emerged unscathed, allegedly because they
drank nothing but whisky throughout.
Ardbeg sent whisky to the International Space Station
to test how zero gravity affects the maturation.
Early in 2018, the world’s first regulated whisky
investment fund was launched. Single Malt Fund allows investors to buy a small
part of a bigger collection of rare and limited-edition whiskies.
As per the Scottish Whisky Regulations of 2009,
Scotland is divided into two protected localities (Campbeltown and Islay) and
three protected regions (Highland, Lowland, and Speyside).
According to The French Federation of Spirits, whisky
accounts for the highest retail sales of any spirit in France at 47.2%. Compare this fact with sales of
Cognac which makes up only 0.7 per cent of sales.
Some 43% of German tourists in Scotland visit a
distillery while visiting, making it the second most popular activity for the
demographic.
John Jameson, the founder of Jameson’s Irish whisky was
Scottish.
The same John Jameson was the great-grandfather of the
radio transmission pioneer, Guglielmo Marconi.
There was a whisky rebellion in Pennsylvania in 1794
due to whisky taxing. The tax was eventually repealed in 1802.
John ‘Johnnie’ Walker was a grocer in Kilmarnock,
Scotland in the mid-1800s who specialised in blending tea before he decided to
start blending whisky.
The first Scottish distillery to install a Coffey Still
was the Grange Distillery, which fell silent in 1851.
White Horse is a mildly smoky Blended Scotch today. First produced by James Logan Mackie in 1861, it was particularly noted for its free use of the heavily smoked Lagavulin single malt Scotch whisky.
The name "White Horse" comes from an ancient inn in Edinburgh's Canongate.
The White Horse Blended Scotch Whisky of today contains 40 percent malts including Talisker and Linkwood.
In the late 1960s and early 1970s, the advertising slogan of White Horse Whisky was "you can take a white horse anywhere", accompanied by a white horse in various settings, such as a garden party.
During the Prohibition era in the USA (1920-33), there was a loop-hole in the law which allowed import and production of liquor for ‘medicinal and sacramental’ purposes. White Horse whisky could be imported as a medicinal spirit. So was Laphroaig.
Despite its smokiness, Ardbeg is renowned for its delicious sweetness, a phenomenon that has affectionately become known as ‘the peaty paradox’.
In a change from the usual one-off Committee Releases, Ardbeg 8 Years Old will be around for a while – not forever, but long enough to give you more than one chance to get hold of a bottle.
The spooky ageing warehouse of Highland Park Distillery in the Orkney Islands is believed to house the ghost of Eunson Magnus, a long-deceased Orkney man.
An aged ex-Sherry whisky is new territory for Ardbeg, so they wanted some opinions, producing the 8 YO For Discussion expression July 2021 for that express purpose. The Ardbeg Committee’s experienced palates are expected to provide the said opinion.
Ardbeg is the world’s most highly awarded smoky single malt whisky this century. Since 2008, Ardbeg has won more than 50 gold and double gold medals in key whisky competitions.
Ian Hunter was the last of the Johnston family to own and manage the Laphroaig distillery, between 1908 and 1944.
In 2019, Laphroaig released a new Scotch whisky, The Ian Hunter Story Book One: Unique Character in a novel manner, in the form of a heavy tome that, after a few pages, revealed a neat slot with a bottle holding liquid 30 years old and at 46.7% ABV nestled therein. It was also the first chapter of a series of rare and collectable aged whiskies that honour the legacy of Ian Hunter.
15 such volumes are planned for annual release, covering the history behind Laphroaig and the characters that created it.
They will all be 30 YO or older, unchillfiltered, 70 Cl and bottled at around the 47% ABV mark.
Over time, the original smokiness of Laphroaig’s bottlings, including this 30 YO whisky has become less of an assault on the senses.
The second release of Ian Hunter’s series has come in 2021. Book Two: Building An Icon is at 48.2% ABV.
Book Three: Source Protector 70 Cl ABV 49.9% will be a 33 Year Old, bottled at 49.9% ABV.
Indian Amrut is not the only Fusion Whisky, just the first. The Glover Fusion Whisky will be the second.
The second title in the fusion whisky series, The Kincardine, is a 7 YO blended malt whisky at 52.9% ABV and a fusion of the Indian Amrut single malt whisky and Scotch from Glen Elgin and Macallan distilleries.
The E&K 5 YO Blended Malt 57.8% ABV is the third, a fusion of Scotch whisky from Ardmore and Glenrothes distilleries and malt whiskies from Amrut Distillery in India.
The Glover Fusion Whisky Ltd. was originally formed as a small enterprise for Thomas Blake Glover, TBG & Co. To honour his achievements and role in the historical relationship between Scotland and Japan, independent bottler, Adelphi Distillery Ltd., was asked to create a blend of Japanese and Scotch malt whiskies.
Adelphi was offered the chance to select a single refill ex-sherry hogshead from one of the few remaining casks from Hanyu Distillery. It was shipped to England for marrying with a carefully determined volume of Scotch whisky from two single casks: 35% from an American oak ex-sherry hogshead distilled at Longmorn, and a minor percentage from a Spanish oak ex-sherry butt distilled at Glen Garioch.
The final ratio was assessed through extensive trial vattings by Alex Bruce and Charles MacLean. It was launched as a 22 year old malt whisky in 2015 at an ABV of 53.1%.
The Winter Queen is the next in the series of iconic blends from Fusion Whisky and Adelphi, created in honour of the Scottish princess, Elizabeth Stuart. It is a blend of Scotch malt whisky from Longmorn and Glenrothes distilleries and malt whisky from Zuidam Distillery in the Netherlands at 52.9% ABV.
The Brisbane 5 YO Blended Malt 57.5% ABV is a fusion of Scotch malt whisky from two Spanish oak ex-sherry hogsheads distilled at Glen Garioch, Highland, part of an ex-sherry butt distilled at Glen Grant, Speyside and three ex-Apera casks distilled at Starward Distillery, Melbourne.
The Glover 5th Edition Fusion by Adelphi 4 YO Cask Strength 54.7% ABV contains two of the most exciting single malts in the world: Chichubu from Japan and Adelphi's own Ardnamurchan Distillery.
Today, Jameson is the best-selling Irish whiskey in world.
By the beginning of the 20th century, Irish whiskey was firmly positioned as the best-selling whisky in the world. Its global market share has been estimated at around 70%.
It was the best-selling imported whisky in the U.S., outselling both Canadian whisky and the then fledgling Scotch whisky industry. Irish whiskey even outsold Scotch whisky in England.
The “big four” Dublin based distillers, John Jameson, John Power, William Jameson and George Roe, dominated the whisky trade with an annual capacity of over five million gallons of whisky a year.
By the end of the century, roughly 40% of Dublin’s work force was employed in the brewing and distilling industry.
Derry, Cork and Belfast were also major distillery centres.
Ardbeg 8 Years Old for Discussion is the answer to the question ‘what if, in an alternative universe, Ardbeg Ten Years Old was not the distillery’s “flagship” aged expression?’
Macduff Highland Single Malt Scotch whisky distillery has a classic, clean and functional Delme-Evans design, with the stillhouse being the most intriguing part of the engineering.
In here are five stills – two wash and three spirit – all of which have upward-tilting lyne arms that have a right angled kink in them.
The spirit stills also have horizontal shell and tube condensers. The character is nutty (slightly sulphury at new make stage), with quick mashing, short fermentation and cold condensers. It is this last technique which adds weight to the spirit. It could well be that the kink in the lyne arm helps create just enough reflux to contribute a balancing fruitiness.
Macduff whisky is bottled by its owner as either Glen Deveron or The Deveron.
Between 1966 and 1972, it became part of William Lawson, the whisky arm of Martini & Rossi.
Passport is a Speyside-influenced blended Scotch whose key markets are Brazil, Angola, Mexico, India, Russia and Eastern Europe.
The blend recipe for Passport was developed by Chivas Brothers’ blender Jimmy Lang during the 1960s.
It was a classical Chivas blend in that it embraced the company’s Speyside single malts, including Strathisla and Glen Keith. Indeed, Glen Keith was long promoted as the ‘Home of Passport’, with a banner replicating the bottle label displayed in the distillery entrance.
During the 1970s malt from the newly-built Allt-a-Bhainne and Braes of Glenlivet (now Braeval) distilleries began to appear in the Passport recipe.
Jimmy Lang served as master blender for Seagram’s Scottish subsidiary Chivas Brothers 1971 - 1989.
As well as his role in the creation of Passport, Lang developed the 100 Pipers blend and was responsible for Seagram’s key Scotch brands Chivas Regal and Royal Salute.
Roseisle Speyside Single Malt Scotch whisky distillery is a ‘flexible’ distillery. Six of its seven pairs of stills can switch between stainless steel or standard (copper) shell and tube condensers.
If a light grassy spirit is required, long fermentation (in excess of 90 hours) is used, along with slow distillation with air rests, and condensing in the copper condensers.
If a heavy style is needed then the stainless steel condensers will be used. The lack of extended copper ‘conversation’ will add the requisite weight to the spirit.
A nutty (malty) style could also be produced by shortening mashing and fermentation regimes.
The grassy style which is currently produced is different noticeably to that from other Diageo sites such as Glen Ord or Royal Lochnagar.
Cork’s West Cork Distillers, which owned the North Mall and Midleton distilleries, the latter the predecessor to Irish Distillers Ltd (IDL) New Middleton distillery where Jameson whiskey is produced today, had a capacity of 1.5 million gallons.
Derry’s Watts distillery, where the Tyrconnell brand of whiskey was produced, had a capacity of two million gallons.
Belfast’s Royal Irish Distillers had a capacity of 2.5 million gallons and produced Dunville’s, the best-selling Irish whiskey in the U.S. They also had the largest inventory of aging whiskey in Great Britain.
The Tyrconnell brand is produced today at the Cooley distillery, a subsidiary of Beam Suntory, while the Dunville brand is produced by the Echinville distillery.
By comparison, most Scotch whisky distilleries had a capacity of less than 100,000 gallons. The Glenlivet distillery, the largest Scottish distillery at the time, had a capacity of 200,000 gallons.
Robert Burns, Scotland’s bard, in his late eighteenth century poem Scotch Drink, called the native whisky of Scotland “. . . my Muse! guid auld Scotch Drink . . .”
The greatest threat of violence to legal distillers from smugglers in the Glenlivet area existed when shipments of legal whisky wended their way south to Perth and Dundee through the desolate glens and hillsides. The most dangerous was the “Spittal of Glenshee.”
In 1868, the laird of Aberlour[fellow legitimate distiller James Gordon], presented George Smith with a pair of hair-trigger pistols for ten guineas.
George Smith came to be known later on in life as “Old Minmore.”
The real Glenlivet. became the subject of a popular verse: Glenlivet it has castles three Drumin, Blairfeldy, and Deskie, And also one distillery More famous than the castles three.
James Chivas was well aware of the already legendary malt whisky made at George Smith’s Drumin Glenlivet Distillery, the one people called “the real Glenlivet.” James, therefore, made the stocking of this top-notch malt whisky a priority and a personal mission.
In 1975, Chivas Brothers was instructed to remove the Royal Warrant from Chivas Regal by that year’s end, 132 years after the first appointment.
Beyond the direct positive effect of the Royal Appointments, the queen’s influence and powerful persona encouraged the evolution of a whole new stratum of customers for Stewart & Chivas.
Stewart & Chivas and their famous victuals had become such a phenomenon that by the 1860s their business reached far south into England as the nobles returned home in the autumn.
The affluent English likewise brought with them a fervent, unquenchable thirst for the whisky of Scotland, but made it clear to James that they fancied a tamer, smoother whisky than that offered by most of the Highland malt distillers.
James spent more time in his office mixing various sample whiskies in an attempt to find a proprietary blend worthy of the Stewart & Chivas name as well as a blend that would fulfill the desires of the moneyed English.
On the heels of the implementation of the landmark Illicit Distillation (Scotland) Act of 1822 and the Excise Act of 1823, an explosion of licit malt distilleries mushroomed all over Scotland.
Following the path of George Smith’s Drumin Glenlivet Distillery, other fabled malt whisky distilleries like Macallan, Fettercairn, Longrow, Balmenach, and Mortlach, also began in 1824.
Ben Nevis, Port Ellen, Strathisla, Kippen, Glencadam, and Glenury opened in 1825.
Aberlour and Pulteney opened in 1826.
In 1835, only one single malt distillery, Lochruan, was licensed.
The Highlands’ notoriously combustible Era of Smuggling was largely doused by 1840, to the relief and gratification of both Parliament and the Highland land barons. The near two-century-long epidemic of illicit whisky making had been eradicated through the slow-dripping antidote of legislation.
George offered customers two varieties of Drumin Glenlivet at different “proof” levels in the 1830s and 1840s, ~65% & 72% ABV.
In the nineteenth century, all malt whiskies, including George’s prized Drumin Glenlivet, were dispensed straight from the barrel to the goblet without any reduction in strength.
The English invented the idea of proof in the seventeenth century for the purpose of assigning accurate duties according to alcoholic potency. The higher the alcoholic content, the stiffer the duties.
From the mid-1600s to 1818, excise officials routinely determined the alcoholic strength of beverages by mixing a portion with gunpowder, lighting it and gauging the intensity, the colour and the duration of the flame.
In 1816, Bartholomew Sikes, an excise official, perfected the hydrometer, a device that measured the specific gravity of liquids. From 1818 on, excise officials calculated alcoholic strength with a hydrometer.
To the British, a “proof spirit” contains 57.1 % alcohol and 42.9 % water.
In the US, proof signifies 50 % alcohol, 50 % water, a much simpler set up.
George’s popular frontline Drumin Glenlivet whisky, sold at a per gallon price of 10 shillings, registered at 11 % higher than proof, which probably meant that it hovered at from 60 to 65 % alcohol. This robust whisky, hardly a timid wallflower, was George’s best seller and was almost certainly cut with water by the majority of malt whisky drinkers.
For people with even stronger constitutions and perhaps cast-iron intestines, he also sold a flamethrower, high-octane version of Drumin Glenlivet at what was depicted as “25 % over proof” for 12 shillings and sixpence per gallon. About 70-71% ABV.
Actor Humphrey Bogart commented during a slump in his film career, “I never should have switched from Scotch to martinis.”
Entertainer and famed Scotch admirer Joe E. Lewis quipped, “Whenever someone asks me if I want water with my Scotch, I say ‘I’m thirsty, not dirty.’”
Since the first half of the nineteenth century, the Scotch whisky industry’s visionary, if pragmatic, captains piggybacked its exportation onto a never-before-seen juggernaut, the rapidly expanding British Empire.
George Smith stopped for a night in a heavily frequented inn in Spittal of Glenshee and saw one nasty smuggler named Shaw and his band of thugs eyeing him. George dozed off into a light sleep, both pistols cocked and ready, one in each hand. Shaw apparently pulled out a large butcher knife, leaned over George and softly uttered, “This gully [knife] is for your bowels.” A fully awake George uncovered the pistol in his right hand and aimed it directly at Shaw’s forehead, saying, “And this for a hole between your eyes.” George then discharged the pistol in his left hand into the fireplace across the room, causing Shaw to flee.
The most significant outcome of first Stein’s and later Coffey’s system started to take shape in the late 1840s and 1850s when pioneering whisky blenders, such as Andrew Usher, John Haig, John Walker, Matthew Gloag, George Ballantine, William Teacher, John Dewar, and Francis and Walter Berry, began combining the ethereal whiskies from column stills with meatier, more charismatic Highland malt whiskies from pot stills.
Royal Warrants had expiration dates, which may explain why some of the Warrants first granted Stewart & Chivas and then Chivas Brothers appear to be renewed.
Following the landmark Illicit Distillation (Scotland) Act of 1822 and the Excise Act of 1823, an explosion of licit malt distilleries mushroomed all over Scotland. Between 10 October 1823 and 9 August 1824, no fewer than 79 new stills were commissioned. The number of licensed distilleries in operation grew swiftly from 111 in 1823 to 263 by 1825.
In 1860, Guinness’s Extra Double Stout sold for 4 shillings, 6 pence per bottle; rum ranged from 9 to 14 shillings per gallon, while brandy garnered a steep 32 shillings per gallon because of stiff duties. Ordinary Highland malt whisky sold for 6 shillings 6 pence per gallon; finer malt whisky at 11 percent over proof brought in 8 shillings per gallon; and the malt whisky from George Smith’s new Glenlivet distillery at Minmore, considered Scotland’s crème de la crème, sold for 20 to 22 shillings per gallon.
James married an attractive young woman Joyce Clapperton at the mature age of 44. They had 4 children, Julia, Alexander, Williamina and Charles James.
Entrepreneurs William Hespeler and George Randall established the Granite Mills & Waterloo Distillery in Waterloo, Ontario, Canada- the company that Canadian whisky magnate Joseph Emm Seagram would purchase in 1883, marking the official beginning of the Seagram legacy in the annals of beverage alcohol.
In December 1882, Charles James Joyce Chivas married Emma Grosskopf in his adopted US city of Milwaukee.
Charles James Joyce Chivas was paid a monthly retainer as part of his father’s Will.
The water for the distillery came from a pristine subterranean source, called Josie’s Well, the same water source used in the distillery today.
In 1863, the Strathspey Railway opened a station in the village of Ballindalloch, a mere eight miles from Minmore. A train traveled daily from Ballindalloch south to the town of Tomintoul. Casks of The Glenlivet were soon being transported to the railway station at Ballindalloch on wagons. Running southeast to northwest, the Strathspey Railway also connected the hamlets of Boat of Garten and Craigellachie.
By the last quarter of the 1800s, Scotch whisky was available in most ports of call around the world.
Today, Scotch whisky can be found in over 200 nations.
There are ~137 distilleries in operation in Scotland today.
The last ten NEW distilleries are crowd-funded.
Numerous entities are promoting investment in whisky in Scotland and the UK.
Greater Scotland includes the 787 islands of the Inner Hebrides, Outer Hebrides, the Orkneys, and the Shetlands.
Of these rugged and windswept islands, 130 are inhabited. Six of the inhabited islands—Arran, Islay, Skye, Mull, Orkney, and Jura—currently produce single malt whisky.
Ben Nevis in the western Highlands is Scotland’s highest peak at 1,344 metres.
Today, only one percent of Scotland’s primeval forest remains. Deforestation likewise indirectly affected the Scotch industry, in that, with the forests gone, the main source of fuel in prehistoric Scotland became peat.
Scotland has no shortage of peat since peat bogs still cover an estimated 810,000 hectares (over 2 million acres) of the nation’s surface.
The Guild of Barber-Surgeons was a powerful professional entity in Edinburgh at the turn of the sixteenth century. Their mission, as royally sanctioned by the King’s “The Seal of Cause,” was to maintain and promote the highest standards of surgical practice.
The Guild of Barber-Surgeons was so highly regarded, in fact, that in 1505 King James IV bestowed on them the exclusive right to distill and peddle their aqua vitae for medicinal purposes within Edinburgh.
Glenlivet, or Gleann-liobh-aite in Gaelic, means “valley of the smooth flowing one.
The brewing and distilling industry in the USA organised dozens of anti-prohibition or pro-moderation counter-lobbies. Known as the “wets” as opposed to the pro-prohibition “drys,” the groups drew extensive support from Irish and German communities in the U.S., both of which were heavily represented in the brewing and distilling trades.
Prohibition had plenty of loopholes. There was a broad exemption for alcoholic beverages used in religious rituals, a factor that led to a dramatic rise in self-proclaimed priests organising their own congregations.
Prohibition had two other unintended consequences. The number of arrests from the violation of Prohibition skyrocketed, overwhelming the court system and resulting in multi-year long waits before cases could go to trial. In response, prosecutors introduced the then novel idea of the plea bargain to clear the backlog of cases.
The second unintended consequence was more far reaching. Taxes on alcoholic beverages had funded between 30% and 40% of federal spending. States relied on alcohol taxes, on average, for more than 50% of their expenditures. New York State, for example, derived more than 75% of its tax revenue from taxes on alcoholic beverages. Prohibition eliminated a significant source of tax revenue. The result is that the federal government decided to extend the personal income tax, originally instituted on a temporary basis to fund WW I expenditures, for the foreseeable future. Many states adopted their own income taxes to fill the deficit produced by Prohibition.
The Phylloxera boom would produce a corresponding bust. At the heart of that bust was the case of the infamous Pattison brothers.
Robert Pattison started in the Scotch whisky business by leasing the Teaninch Distillery from 1850 until 1869. In 1887, with his brother Walter and a number of other partners, he formed a blending company in Leith under the name Pattison, Elder and Co, and, at the peak of the Phylloxera boom, went public.
In 1896, the company became a distiller as well. The Pattisons now went on an acquisitions binge that saw the company, Pattison Ltd., acquire half of the Glenfarclas distillery, the Ardgowan distillery, and a substantial part of the Aultmore-Glenlivet and Oban distilleries.
This expansion came against a background of easy credit from the banks and heightened investor interest in the Scotch industry.
In the 1890s alone, 33 new malt distilleries were built and even more distilleries were expanding their capacity.
At one point the company gave away 500 African grey parrots, which had been trained to shout out “buy Pattison whisky” and “Pattison whisky is the best” to their retail customers; the first example of in-store interactive advertising.
By 1899, however, the company fell apart. The collapse of Pattison Ltd. was just the most visible aspect of a much broader industry problem of increasing overproduction and over investment.
In 1898 Scotch whisky production had peaked at roughly 35.8 million gallons versus demand of 22.3 million gallons. Excess production had grown from two million gallons in 1891 to thirteen and a half million by 1898.
A new challenge emerged from Irish distillers. They argued that the blending of malt and grain whisky was not true whisky and should be banned. The Irish challenge prompted the establishment of a Royal Commission to investigate the industry and to determine once and for all “what exactly was whisky?” In 1909, after 18 months of hearings, the Royal Commission issued an exhaustive report confirming that the blending of malt and grain whisky constituted “real whisky” and recommending that these blended whiskies should continue to be produced and sold.
No sooner had this latest challenge to the Scotch whisky industry been averted, World War I would set the industry back for the better part of two decades.
The big Irish distillers opposed the Spirits Act of 1860, sparking a long running debate on what exactly was whisky. Notwithstanding the opposition of the big distillers, however, Ireland was producing a lot of grain whiskeys, and many Irish merchants and exporters began to dilute their whiskey, often excessively, by blending grain whiskey into their pot still whiskey. The issue was finally settled by a 1908 Royal Commission that concluded that blends of grain and malt whisky were in fact whisky.
The Spirits Act of 1860, also called the Scotch Whisky Act of 1860, is wrongly attributed to William Ewart Gladstone. He was the Chancellor of the Exchequer in Henry Temple's Govt in 1860.
The Spirits Act of 1860 had been crucial to the fortunes of the Scotch whisky industry, which boasted 111 operational distilleries in 1868, as it allowed for the first time the blending of spirits under bond without payment of duty, the storage of blended spirits in vats, and the filling of casks with blended spirit in bond.
Gladstone's budget of 1860 was introduced on 10 February along with the Cobden–Chevalier Treaty between Britain and France that would reduce tariffs between the two countries.
Blending of malt whiskies had been permitted in bond on payment of duty and holding fees since 1823. Bonded warehouses could be set up under supervision of the Town Clerk and required retention of barrels of spirits for two years, quickly changed to three.
Very few traders paid heed to this Act, with average retention time being as low as three months. The trader's word had to be accepted as to age and quality.
Blending of Grain whiskies with Malt whiskies was permitted in 1860, but limited to distillers only. The end result was a much milder and flavoursome spirit. The Irish malt whisky industry opposed the introduction of Grain whisky, refusing to even call it whisky.
The initial purpose of blending had been to reduce the cost of whisky, but it was soon discovered that in the hands of a skilful practitioner, a very drinkable and consistent product could be created.
Since most grocers and vintners were also dealers in spirits, they raised an outcry and were permitted to blend Grain and Malt whiskies in bond starting 1863 in an extension to the Cobden–Chevalier Treaty.
Further legislation during the 1860s aided the cause of blending, namely the fact that from 1864 spirit strength could be reduced using water in approved warehouses, and 1867 saw bottling whisky for domestic consumption in bonded warehouses.
A growing number of large distilleries in the Lowlands made grain spirit on an industrial scale, and one effect of the incipient blending boom, which would really take off during the 1870s, was a growing interest in malt whiskies produced in what we now call the Speyside region of production in north-east Scotland, but what was usually referred to in the 19th century as ‘Glenlivet.’
Apart from the famous Glenlivet itself, the area already had a reputation for fine whisky-making, being home to distilleries such as Aberlour, Cardhu, Glenfarclas, Glen Grant, Glenlivet, Macallan, Mortlach and Strathisla.
Speyside whiskies soon found favour among blenders, with commensurate expansion of distilling interests.
Campbeltown also grew steadily and in 1868, Benmore distillery became the 19th distillery to be established in the remote Argyllshire port. It was built by Glasgow-based distillers and blenders Bulloch Lade & Co, and boasted an annual output of 125,000 gallons (568,000 litres), making it one of the larger distilleries in the royal burgh.
In Edinburgh, the Caledonian distillery, which had been established in 1855 to distil grain whisky on a grand scale, was augmented by the installation in 1867 of two large pot stills alongside its existing Coffey apparatus, with the intention of making 'Irish-style whisky of the Dublin variety.'
Such a development was doubtless due in part to the large numbers of Irish nationals who migrated to work in Scotland and England as the economy flourished during the 1860s.
There was also a widespread appetite for Irish whiskey among the British public in the years before blended Scotch really established itself, due to its uniformity of character compared to the output of Scotland’s pot stills.
In Ireland, the blending revolution lagged behind that of Scotland, with many of the largest and most powerful distilling enterprises refusing to admit that ‘Irish’ whisky could be anything other than ‘pure pot still’ – made from a mash comprising malted and unmalted barley, distilled in a conventional copper pot still.
Aqua vitae (‘water of life’ in Latin) was the generic term for distilled spirits throughout the Roman Empire, widely used during the Middle Ages and the Renaissance and translated into many languages. In Gaelic, it was uisge beatha, in Irish uisce beatha.
Whisky connoisseur Charles MacLean says that this was Anglicised from uiskie (c.1618) to whiskie (1715) to whisky (1746). F Paul Pacult, author of ‘A Double Scotch’, 2005, says that Aqua Vitae ultimately became Whisky in 1736.
The spelling Whiskey is found equally common in those days. In fact, the Hansard of 1896 uses the term Whiskey. Whisky or whiskey is by convention, not law: the Royal Commission on Whiskey and Other Potable Spirits (1908/09) spelt both Irish and Scotch with an ‘e’ throughout.
Gavin Smith writes in his A-Z of Whisky: "The first use of Scotch with the sense of specifically relating to whisky occurs in 1855, 'while malt liquors give our Scotch and Irish whiskies'”…
Silly rules of thumb like ‘countries without an e in their name…,etc. can be discarded.
is usually a time for celebration in the whisky world –Fèis Ìle, the Islay Festival of Malt and Music, a week-long celebration of Scotland’s most distillery-packed island, with whisky, music, dancing and more is held at the end of May.
In the long drawn out battle with the virus, the distilleries have again taken the party online– it’s time for The 2nd Virtual Fèis Ìle.
Festival week (Saturday-Saturday: a long week) is usually very simple: there are nine distilleries on Islay, and each gets a day of celebration – newcomers Kilchoman and Ardnahoe share the Wednesday.
Every year, Douglas Laing releases a new Big Peat whisky for the Fèis Ìle festival and the tradition was continued in 2020 with the new Big Peat 8 Years Old A846.
The A846 is a “legendary” road that links whisky fans to distilleries across the Scottish island of Islay before steering up through Jura.
The Big Peat 8 Years Old A846 is aged for eight years and bottled at 46% ABV.
In 1878, a polemical piece of writing called Truths about Whisky, was commissioned and published by the four most influential Irish distilling houses, Messrs John Jameson & Sons, William Jameson & Co, John Power & Son, and George Roe & Co, all based in Dublin.
George Roe’s establishment – had an annual capacity of some nine million litres. Even today, that would place it among the most productive handful of Scotland’s malt distilleries.
In total, 23 Irish distilleries were operational during 1868, ranging geographically from Bushmills on the north Antrim coast via Belfast and Londonderry to Cork in the south, Dublin in the east, and Limerick and Galway in the west.
Irish independence in 1922 hurt Irish whisky exports badly. Following independence, Irish distillers lost access to markets in the British Empire.
Before Prohibition, Irish whiskey remained the best-selling imported whiskey by the United States. Prohibition overturned Irish whiskey’s century long dominance of the American whiskey market in favour of the Scots.
Canada went through a similar experience with Prohibition as the U.S. The Dominion Alliance, an umbrella organisation of Canadian temperance groups, advocated for provincial wide bans on the consumption of alcohol.
During World War I many provinces banned the manufacture of “intoxicating” beverages as part of the war effort and then extended the ban following the end of the war.
Prohibition decimated the Irish whiskey industry. Many distilleries closed.
The period marked the beginning of an industry wide consolidation that would continue until the 1970s, a period that is sometimes referred to as the lost century of Irish whiskey.
The Chivas 100 Malts bottling: One hundred of Scotland's finest malts were vatted together to create the Chivas Century of Malts. It was released in 1995 and contains some of the rarest malts like Craigduff, Glenisla peated Glen Keith. A little accompanying booklet by Jim Murray describes all of the 100 distilleries in brief.
The 100 distilleries are Aberfeldy, Aberlour, Allt a `Bhainne, Ardbeg, Auchentoshan, Auchroisk, Aultmore, Balblair, Balmenach, Balvenie, Banff, Ben Nevis, Benriach, Benrinnes, Benromach, Blair Athol, Bowmore, (Royal) Brackla, Braeval, Brechin, Bunnahabhain, Caol Ila, Caperdonich, Clynelish, Convalmore, Cragganmore, Craigduff, Craigellechie, Dailuaine, Dallas Dhu, Dalmore, Dalwhinnie, Deanston, Dufftown, Fettercairn, Glen Albyn, Glenallachie, Glenburgie, Glencadam, Glen Craig, Glen Elgin, Glen Esk, Glenfarcles, Glenfiddich, Glengarioch, Glenglassaugh, Glen Grant, Glengoyne, Glenisla, Glen Keith, Glenkinchie, The Glenlivet, Glenlochy, Glenlossie, Glen Mhor, Glen Moray, Glenrothes, Glen Scotia, Glen Spey, Glentauchers, Glenturret, Glenugie, Glenury Royal, Highland Park, Imperial, Inchgower, Inchmurrin, Inverleven, Isle of Jura, Kinclaith, Knockando, Ladyburn, Lagavulin, Laphroaig, Ledaig, Linkwood, Littlemill, Longmorn, Macallan, Macduff, Mannochmore, Miltonduff, Mortloch, Mosstowie, Ord, Pittyvaich, Pulteney, Rhosdhu, Scapa, Speyburn, Springbank, Strathisla, Strathmill, Tamdhu, Tamnavulin, Teaninich, Tomatin, Tomintoul, Tormore and Tullibardine.
Glenfiddich, arguably the first single malt to be sold in its own right, was also the first to be sold in airport retail shops.
July 27th is National Scotch Day.
Babute distillery is one of many lost distilleries in Argyll that was operational briefly in late 18th century.
Gallowhill Lowland Single Malt Scotch Whisky Distillery is a here-and-gone Paisley distillery, open from 1798 to 1799.
It was run by a partnership of James MacFarlane and Elizabeth Harvie, of the Harvies who operated Dundashill and Yoker distilleries in Glasgow.
The distillery sat in the Gallowhill area of Paisley, north of the town centre on Brewster Avenue, today part of a large housing estate not far from the M8 motorway and Glasgow Airport.
220 years ago, the area would have been very largely rural. Back then, a burn, now long culverted and vanished, probably flowed from Gallowhill down to the River White Cart.
Haig Whisky is the oldest of all Scotch whiskies and may even be the oldest whisky in the world.
Haig Gold Label, the flagship blend of John Haig & Co. was not just Britain’s most popular whisky, it was the first spirit to smash the million case barrier.
It dates back to the twilight years of the 19th century, and before long the packaging had settled on a dumpy, dark brown bottle with a plain white label and a string of medals at the bottom.
By 1939, Haig was Britain’s best-selling Scotch.
Alongside its deluxe Dimple expression, it was especially popular in Britain. By the millennium its UK sales, together with Dimple Haig, had crashed to just 7,500 cases.
The recipe includes Lowland malts like Glenkinchie with a heavy reliance on Cameronbridge grain.
‘D’ye ken John Haig?’ asked the early adverts, and the slogan was emblazoned on the mainsail of a yacht that would sail up and down the south coast of England to stoke up demand.
This gave way to the long-running ‘Don’t be vague, ask for Haig’ slogan.
John Haig set up the Kilbagie distillery in the 18th century, although his family were noted distillers some time before that.
His great-great-grandfather was busted in 1655 for distilling on the Sabbath.
His grandson (also called John) founded the Cameronbridge grain distillery in 1824.
Noted members of the Haig clan include WWI Field Marshal Douglas Haig, who was so magnificently lampooned by Stephen Fry in Blackadder Goes Forth.
Kelso Lowland Single Malt Scotch Whisky Distillery was a Borders distillery at Kelso in Roxburghshire that distilled from 1825-47.
Precisely locating Kelso distillery is difficult. One source places it at Rosebank – a mansion and former estate on the north bank of the Tweed on the outskirts of town where now a bridge on the main A698 road crosses the river.
Old maps show no buildings at Rosebank that might be, or might have been, the distillery.
Some way upriver, opposite an island called Kelso Anna, there is a pend with steps down towards the Tweed called Distillery Lane. It leads down to Chalkheugh Terrace and seems the more likely location.
Kelso distillery was opened and licensed to John Mason in 1825.
In 1830 it became a partnership of Mason & Nichol, which lasted until 1833 when John Mason became a sole trader again. Kelso continued under him until 1837 when he was sequestrated.
Of all the old blends, Mackie’s Ancient Scotch could be one of the most precious for its link to the mythical Malt Mill distillery.
Sir Peter Mackie, famously described as ‘one-third genius, one-third megalomaniac and one-third eccentric,’ gave his name to this precious blend.
He owned the Islay distillery of Lagavulin, and was agent for its neighbour, Laphroaig.
Losing the contract for Laphroaig after a bitter dispute, he built a replica distillery in the grounds of Lagavulin and called it Malt Mill. It was designed to make precisely the same style of whisky as Laphroaig – a feat it never really achieved.
The whisky produced at Malt Mill disappeared entirely into Mackie’s blends, particularly White Horse. Or did it?
The distillery is named on bottles of Mackie’s Ancient Scotch, although there is no mention of it being a ‘blend’ or ‘blended’… could it contain single malt from Malt Mill?
Little is known of Mackie’s blend that occasionally surfaces on auction websites, although there were two versions of the whisky.
In the UK there was Mackie’s Ancient Scotch, bottles of which do tantalisingly mention Malt Mill beneath the brand owner, White Horse Distillers Ltd.
The bottling for the US market, called Mackie’s Ancient Brand, does not.
Assuming they are the same whisky, it must date from some time between 1908 when Malt Mill was fired into life, and 1962 when it closed for good.
Whisky writer Serge Valentin has described Mackie’s Ancient Brand as ‘the peatiest blend I have ever tried,’ and speculated that ‘there was quite possibly more than 50% Malt Mill’ in the blend.
Auchmedden distillery (also spelled Auch Madden, Auch Medden and Auchmeddin), an Aberdeenshire distillery, was based on a farm now called Mains of Auchmedden, west of Aberdour Bay, above the picturesque harbour village of Pennan and in the shadow of the ruined Auchmedden castle. The property belonged to the Baird family from 1568, but it was acquired by the Earls of Aberdeen, Gordons, in the mid 18th century.
Two events, the Phylloxera epidemic at the end of the nineteenth century and the imposition of Prohibition in the United States in the early twentieth century, proved pivotal in the growth of the Scotch whisky industry, and led to its ascendency and its current dominance of the spirits market.
In France, production and quality wine were at a peak by the mid-1800s when the first of three tragedies that would cripple the wine industry, and its related brandy industry, struck. The combined effect proved devastating.
The first blow was Odium—specifically uncinula necator—a fungus that causes powdery mildew on grapes. Originating in North America, certain varieties of European wine grapes proved to be particularly susceptible to it. The disease was crippling, but not devastating, it would significantly reduce wine production. This mildew was brought under control in less than a decade.
Just as vintners breathed a sigh of relief the second and even more crippling North American invader—the Phylloxera epidemic—hit them. Phylloxera was caused by a tiny insect, an aphid, sometimes referred to as the grape louse, which attacked the roots of the domesticated, Vitis vinifera, grapevines in Europe.
Native to North America, Phylloxera had not been a problem to European wine makers, notwithstanding the fact that samples of American grape varieties had been exported to Europe for centuries. The advent of steamships completely transformed the potential threat. With fast steamships cutting transatlantic travel to two weeks, insect pests could now survive a transatlantic voyage.
Beginning in 1863, in the French province of Languedoc, French vintners began noticing that a mysterious blight was killing their vines. It was not until 1868 that the grape Phylloxera aphid was discovered as the source of the epidemic, and it was not until 1870 that the solution was discovered.
In that 15-year period, some 40 percent of France’s vineyards were destroyed and the industry was set back for decades. There was worse to come. “Downy” mildew, the third tragedy to hit the European wine industry, came while the French were still looking for a cure for Phylloxera.
Downy mildew was a parasitic fungus that attacked the leaves of grape plants, eventually destroying the leaf tissue of the infected plant. This third plague was remedied at amazing speed, but the damage done by three consecutive blights was catastrophic. In roughly 30 years, wine production in France fell three quarters, and 75 to 85 percent of Europe’s vineyards were obliterated.
It took the French wine and brandy industry almost thirty years to recover. During that period, French Cognac production virtually ceased. Scotch whisky was on its upward incline.
Auchmedden distillery was operated by William Grant – one of countless William Grants in the history of distilling – from 1826-33.
Cabrach Distillery was a farm distillery in the Cabrach, Aberdeenshire, one of few legally sanctioned sites in the area. In the 1800's, the Cabrach was notorious for its illicit distilling of whisky and its ability to evade customs and excise raids due to its inaccessible and inhospitable lands. Some claim the Cabrach as one of the birthplaces of Scottish malt whisky.
Taking its name from the region, Cabrach distillery stood at Haddoch farm, about half a mile north of Upper Cabrach village. The Cabrach Trust was set up to enable the regeneration of this remote upland area. Located in rural Moray, in Northeast Scotland, the Cabrach, is defined as one of the 30 most remote regions in Scotland. A new distillery is planned for this site.
The Cabrach Trust plans to convert the steading buildings at Inverharroch Farm into a historic distillery and heritage centre which will showcase the rich culture and heritage of this haunting and mysterious landscape.
Ardbeg, established in 1815, has led an on and off existence for over 180 years since.
It was not until the brand was purchased by The Glenmorangie Company in 1997 that the Distillery was saved from extinction.
The legacy of the whisky was safeguarded in 2000 by the formation of the Ardbeg Committee, made up of thousands of Ardbeg followers worldwide who are keen to ensure that “the doors of Ardbeg never close again”.
Today there are more than 100,000 members of the Ardbeg Committee in over 130 countries.
Ardbeg is the world’s most highly awarded smoky single malt whisky. Since 2008, Ardbeg has won more than 50 gold and double gold medals in key whisky competitions.
In 1853, when Commodore Matthew Perry sailed his big black ships to Edo harbor, forcing the reluctant samurai rulers to open Japan to trade, he brought with him a few barrels of whisky to keep himself and his crew warm on the long voyage across the Pacific.
He also presented the Emperor a 110-gallon barrel of his finest whisky.
Circa 1875, the Japanese began importing whisky, and local brewers also started making their own versions. This early “whisky” was actually just alcohol with a similar colour to whisky.
The problem today has assumed huge proportions. A large amount of the liquor isn’t actually made in Japan. Some of it isn’t whisky at all.
Unlike most whisky-producing countries, Japan has few rules about what constitutes whisky, let alone what makes it Japanese. Companies can buy spirits in bulk from abroad, bottle and label it “Japanese whisky,” and ship it back out.
Imported by the metal barrel, Scotch or Canadian whisky is watered down, mixed with ethanol and sold as Japanese whisky.
The first modern Japanese whisky distilleries, including Yamazaki, didn’t open until the 1920s.
While they were modeled on Scottish operations and often produced high-quality spirits, they did little to change the overall character of Japanese whisky, which, following World War II, was aimed at everyday salary-men looking for a quick drink after work.
The Japanese government introduced formal definitions for domestic whisky in 1989, but by then the industry was dominated by a few big distilling companies that wanted to keep the rules loose.
After 1989, for example, whisky sold domestically had to contain at least 10% aged malt whisky; the rest could be unaged alcohol, typically made from imported molasses.
Interest in Japanese whisky began to pick up in the early 2000s, snowballing through the next 15 years as the industry’s premium brands, like Hibiki and Yamazaki, racked up global critical acclaim.
Analysts point to fast-growing imports of Scotch and Canadian whisky into Japan in recent years, even as the retail sales of those whiskies remain flat — implying that most of the imported spirit is being bought by distilleries and relabelled as Japanese.
The Japan Spirits & Liqueurs Makers Association announced a new set of industry-wide regulations on 16 February 2021, effective 01 Apr 2021. However, whisky brands have until 31st March 2024 to adhere to them.
The only raw ingredients allowed for use in production are malted grains, other cereal grains, and water extracted in Japan. Malted grains must always be used. Fermentation, distillation, and saccharification must take place in a distillery located in Japan, with the alcohol volume of the distillate not allowed to go above 95% in strength.
Wood casks with a maximum capacity of 700 litres must be used for the maturation of the distilled product and have to be matured in Japan for a minimum of 3 years. Bottling must take place in Japan, and the whisky has to have a minimum ABV of 40%.
Plain caramel colouring (also known as E150a) can be added; this is a common practice in whisky around the world.
Scotch Whisky exports to the US were valued at £1.07bn in 2019 – the industry’s first billion pound market.
In the International Whisky Competition 2021, highlighting the best whiskies for 2021, Scotland has – unsurprisingly – managed to lock out the Top 3 spots with the Ardbeg Uigeadail officially crowned the King of the Casks, Glenmorangie Vintage 1997 in second place (95.1 points), followed by Dewar’s Double Double 32 YO in third (95 points).
Taiwan has been staking their claim, placing fourth with the Kavalan Artist Series: Paul Chiang Peated Malt Single Cask Strength Single Malt Whisky (94.6 points), and placing in three other spots within the Top 15.
Best blended whisky (all categories, all countries), all three top spots were bagged by Dewar. 1st Place: Dewar’s Double Double 32 Year Old; 2nd Place: Dewar’s Double Double 21 Year Old; and 3rd Place: Dewar’s Double Double 27 Year Old.
Illicit distillers and whisky smugglers played a constant battle of cat and mouse with excisemen, or gaugers. The canny Scots came up with a variety of creative ways of hiding their precious bounty, including transporting it in coffins!
Illicit stills were common all over Scotland. In Edinburgh their smoke was disguised by the thick sooty chimney smoke that characterised the era. One such distillery was discovered in the lower cellar of the Tron Kirk on the Royal Mile – not a very reputable sideline for a place of worship!
Robert Burns, Scotland’s Bard became an exciseman after falling on hard times in 1788. He took up the post of Excise Officer for Dumfries; in February 1792 he was promoted to the Dumfries Port Division, an appointment that carried a salary of £50 per annum. The pair of pistols which he carried for his personal protection can still be seen today in the National Museum of Scotland.
The continued flouting of the law prompted the Duke of Gordon, on whose land some of the illicit whisky was being produced- with his prior knowledge and tacit permission- to propose in the House of Lords that the Government should make it profitable to produce whisky legally.
In 1823 the Excise Act was passed, which authorised the distilling of whisky in return for a licence fee of £10, and a set payment per gallon of proof spirit.
Smuggling disappeared almost completely over the next decade, paving the way for the Scottish whisky industry we know today.
It’s worth noting that many present day distilleries stand on sites used by the smugglers over two centuries ago – a modern day continuation of a by-gone practice.
In 1831 Aeneas Coffey invented the Patent Still which enabled a continuous process of distillation to take place, leading to the production of grain whisky, a less intense spirit than the previous malt whisky.
This invention was first exploited by Edinburgh distillers Andrew Usher & Co who, in 1860, blended malt and grain whisky together for the first time to produce a lighter flavoured whisky - extending the appeal of Scotch Whisky to a wider market.
In the 1880s the vineyards of France were devastated by the Phylloxera beetle, which wiped out the crops for wine and brandy production. Their disaster was the Scots fortune however - by the time the French industry recovered, Scottish whisky had taken the place of brandy as the preferred spirit.
Since then, Scottish whisky, especially blended whisky, has gone from strength to strength. The tipple is enjoyed worldwide, supports tens of thousands of jobs in Scotland and plays an important part in the Scottish tourism sector.
With its proximity to the shore, Leith was Edinburgh city's whisky district. Having been a centre for the storage of wine and brandy in the 16th century, with access to as many as 100 bonded warehouses, in the early 1820’s Leith was granted one of only six licences issued to ports in Scotland allowing them to store whisky under bond.
The Phylloxera beetle, which had ravaged crops for wine and brandy in France in the 1880’s, meant that the warehouses of Leith that had previously housed this product, were now lying empty. Seeing a gap in the market, whisky makers quickly moved in.
The Vaults in Leith, home to the Scotch Malt Whisky Society, was originally a wine warehouse dating back to the 18th century.
Many of the whisky industry’s most famous brand names started out as licensed grocers who began to blend whisky in the 19th century.
One such was George Ballantine, who opened his first shop in the bustling trade district of Cowgate, which is situated under South Bridge.
Ballantine’s reputation soon grew, as did his success. He soon moved to smarter premises in nearby Candlemaker Row, then later to a prestigious location just off fashionable Princes Street.
Today, Ballantine’s is the second biggest selling Scotch whisky worldwide.
Today there are the still the remains of long-gone distilleries across Edinburgh, with the buildings taking on a new lease of life.
The Caledonian Distillery, Easter Dalry Wynd. Situated close to Haymarket Station, The Caledonian Distillery was built in 1855. The distillery closed its doors in 1988 with much of it being renovated and transformed into housing. Today, its 300ft chimney stack remains as a reminder of the building’s history.
Edinburgh distillery stands in Sciennes in the city of Edinburgh. In 1849, Alexander Pearson remodelled a brewery that was built in 1430 and established this distillery. The distiilery was called West Sciennes distillery in those days.
The owner changed several times. Also the name changed from Newington (1851-56) to Glen Sciennes (1856-59). After being taken over by Andrew Usher & Co. in 1859, it was renamed Edinburgh Distillery. It closed in 1925 and is thought to be the last distillery in Edinburgh to have produced single malt.
Dean Distillery, Dean Village. Smaller than the city’s other distilleries, Dean Distillery opened in 1881 and was housed in a converted flour mill on the Water of Leith. Closed in 1922, part of the building remains today and is used as offices.
Brothers John and Andrew Usher were born to the whisky trade. Their father, Andrew Usher Sr, had started out as a spirits dealer in Edinburgh in 1813 and the two brothers became partners in the family business, buying the afore-mentioned Glen Sciennes Distillery in 1859.
During the 1860s, the brothers began promoting new whisky brands for the flourishing UK market. Pioneers of creating blended whisky, they were also among the first to recognise the enormous opportunities for exporting whisky around the world.
The brothers left quite a legacy in Edinburgh – one that you can still smell on the city’s streets.
Andrew Usher never saw the hall that took his name, dying in 1898, 16 years before his dream was realised. The Usher Hall was opened by his widow in 1914 and remains one of the most impressive venues in the city. Despite being built upon the proceeds of Scotch whisky, the hall did not have a bar until the 1980’s!
Holyrood Distillery: Edinburgh’s first single malt distillery for almost 100 years is set within a 180-year-old building next to Holyrood Park and within easy walking distance of the city centre, Holyrood Distillery opened its doors to the public for the first time in July 2019.
Glenkinchie Distillery, situated just 15 miles from Edinburgh in the rolling farmland of East Lothian, houses a museum about malt whisky production, an illicit still, a large scale model of a distillery and various other whisky-related displays to grab your attention.
White Horse is a mildly smoky Blended Scotch today. First produced by James Logan Mackie in 1861, it was particularly noted for its free use of the heavily smoked Lagavulin single malt Scotch whisky.
The name "White Horse" comes from an ancient inn in Edinburgh's Canongate.
The White Horse Blended Scotch Whisky of today contains 40 percent malts including Talisker and Linkwood.
In the late 1960s and early 1970s, the advertising slogan of White Horse Whisky was "you can take a white horse anywhere", accompanied by a white horse in various settings, such as a garden party.
During the Prohibition era in the USA (1920-33), there was a loop-hole in the law which allowed import and production of liquor for ‘medicinal and sacramental’ purposes. White Horse whisky could be imported as a medicinal spirit. So was Laphroaig.
Despite its smokiness, Ardbeg is renowned for its delicious sweetness, a phenomenon that has affectionately become known as ‘the peaty paradox’.
In a change from the usual one-off Committee Releases, Ardbeg 8 Years Old will be around for a while – not forever, but long enough to give you more than one chance to get hold of a bottle.
The spooky ageing warehouse of Highland Park Distillery in the Orkney Islands is believed to house the ghost of Eunson Magnus, a long-deceased Orkney man.
An aged ex-Sherry whisky is new territory for Ardbeg, so they wanted some opinions, producing the 8 YO For Discussion expression July 2021 for that express purpose. The Ardbeg Committee’s experienced palates are expected to provide the said opinion.
Ardbeg is the world’s most highly awarded smoky single malt whisky this century. Since 2008, Ardbeg has won more than 50 gold and double gold medals in key whisky competitions.
Ian Hunter was the last of the Johnston family to own and manage the Laphroaig distillery, between 1908 and 1944.
In 2019, Laphroaig released a new Scotch whisky, The Ian Hunter Story Book One: Unique Character in a novel manner, in the form of a heavy tome that, after a few pages, revealed a neat slot with a bottle holding liquid 30 years old and at 46.7% ABV nestled therein. It was also the first chapter of a series of rare and collectable aged whiskies that honour the legacy of Ian Hunter.
15 such volumes are planned for annual release, covering the history behind Laphroaig and the characters that created it.
They will all be 30 YO or older, unchillfiltered, 70 Cl and bottled at around the 47% ABV mark.
Over time, the original smokiness of Laphroaig’s bottlings, including this 30 YO whisky has become less of an assault on the senses.
The second release of Ian Hunter’s series has come in 2021. Book Two: Building An Icon is at 48.2% ABV.
Book Three: Source Protector 70 Cl ABV 49.9% will be a 33 Year Old, bottled at 49.9% ABV.
Indian Amrut is not the only Fusion Whisky, just the first. The Glover Fusion Whisky will be the second.
The second title in the fusion whisky series, The Kincardine, is a 7 YO blended malt whisky at 52.9% ABV and a fusion of the Indian Amrut single malt whisky and Scotch from Glen Elgin and Macallan distilleries.
The E&K 5 YO Blended Malt 57.8% ABV is the third, a fusion of Scotch whisky from Ardmore and Glenrothes distilleries and malt whiskies from Amrut Distillery in India.
The Glover Fusion Whisky Ltd. was originally formed as a small enterprise for Thomas Blake Glover, TBG & Co. To honour his achievements and role in the historical relationship between Scotland and Japan, independent bottler, Adelphi Distillery Ltd., was asked to create a blend of Japanese and Scotch malt whiskies.
Adelphi was offered the chance to select a single refill ex-sherry hogshead from one of the few remaining casks from Hanyu Distillery. It was shipped to England for marrying with a carefully determined volume of Scotch whisky from two single casks: 35% from an American oak ex-sherry hogshead distilled at Longmorn, and a minor percentage from a Spanish oak ex-sherry butt distilled at Glen Garioch.
The final ratio was assessed through extensive trial vattings by Alex Bruce and Charles MacLean. It was launched as a 22 year old malt whisky in 2015 at an ABV of 53.1%.
The Winter Queen is the next in the series of iconic blends from Fusion Whisky and Adelphi, created in honour of the Scottish princess, Elizabeth Stuart. It is a blend of Scotch malt whisky from Longmorn and Glenrothes distilleries and malt whisky from Zuidam Distillery in the Netherlands at 52.9% ABV.
The Brisbane 5 YO Blended Malt 57.5% ABV is a fusion of Scotch malt whisky from two Spanish oak ex-sherry hogsheads distilled at Glen Garioch, Highland, part of an ex-sherry butt distilled at Glen Grant, Speyside and three ex-Apera casks distilled at Starward Distillery, Melbourne.
The Glover 5th Edition Fusion by Adelphi 4 YO Cask Strength 54.7% ABV contains two of the most exciting single malts in the world: Chichubu from Japan and Adelphi's own Ardnamurchan Distillery.
Today, Jameson is the best-selling Irish whiskey in world.
By the beginning of the 20th century, Irish whiskey was firmly positioned as the best-selling whisky in the world. Its global market share has been estimated at around 70%.
It was the best-selling imported whisky in the U.S., outselling both Canadian whisky and the then fledgling Scotch whisky industry. Irish whiskey even outsold Scotch whisky in England.
The “big four” Dublin based distillers, John Jameson, John Power, William Jameson and George Roe, dominated the whisky trade with an annual capacity of over five million gallons of whisky a year.
By the end of the century, roughly 40% of Dublin’s work force was employed in the brewing and distilling industry.
Derry, Cork and Belfast were also major distillery centres.
Ardbeg 8 Years Old for Discussion is the answer to the question ‘what if, in an alternative universe, Ardbeg Ten Years Old was not the distillery’s “flagship” aged expression?’
Macduff Highland Single Malt Scotch whisky distillery has a classic, clean and functional Delme-Evans design, with the stillhouse being the most intriguing part of the engineering.
In here are five stills – two wash and three spirit – all of which have upward-tilting lyne arms that have a right angled kink in them.
The spirit stills also have horizontal shell and tube condensers. The character is nutty (slightly sulphury at new make stage), with quick mashing, short fermentation and cold condensers. It is this last technique which adds weight to the spirit. It could well be that the kink in the lyne arm helps create just enough reflux to contribute a balancing fruitiness.
Macduff whisky is bottled by its owner as either Glen Deveron or The Deveron.
Between 1966 and 1972, it became part of William Lawson, the whisky arm of Martini & Rossi.
Passport is a Speyside-influenced blended Scotch whose key markets are Brazil, Angola, Mexico, India, Russia and Eastern Europe.
The blend recipe for Passport was developed by Chivas Brothers’ blender Jimmy Lang during the 1960s.
It was a classical Chivas blend in that it embraced the company’s Speyside single malts, including Strathisla and Glen Keith. Indeed, Glen Keith was long promoted as the ‘Home of Passport’, with a banner replicating the bottle label displayed in the distillery entrance.
During the 1970s malt from the newly-built Allt-a-Bhainne and Braes of Glenlivet (now Braeval) distilleries began to appear in the Passport recipe.
Jimmy Lang served as master blender for Seagram’s Scottish subsidiary Chivas Brothers 1971 - 1989.
As well as his role in the creation of Passport, Lang developed the 100 Pipers blend and was responsible for Seagram’s key Scotch brands Chivas Regal and Royal Salute.
Roseisle Speyside Single Malt Scotch whisky distillery is a ‘flexible’ distillery. Six of its seven pairs of stills can switch between stainless steel or standard (copper) shell and tube condensers.
If a light grassy spirit is required, long fermentation (in excess of 90 hours) is used, along with slow distillation with air rests, and condensing in the copper condensers.
If a heavy style is needed then the stainless steel condensers will be used. The lack of extended copper ‘conversation’ will add the requisite weight to the spirit.
A nutty (malty) style could also be produced by shortening mashing and fermentation regimes.
The grassy style which is currently produced is different noticeably to that from other Diageo sites such as Glen Ord or Royal Lochnagar.
Cork’s West Cork Distillers, which owned the North Mall and Midleton distilleries, the latter the predecessor to Irish Distillers Ltd (IDL) New Middleton distillery where Jameson whiskey is produced today, had a capacity of 1.5 million gallons.
Derry’s Watts distillery, where the Tyrconnell brand of whiskey was produced, had a capacity of two million gallons.
Belfast’s Royal Irish Distillers had a capacity of 2.5 million gallons and produced Dunville’s, the best-selling Irish whiskey in the U.S. They also had the largest inventory of aging whiskey in Great Britain.
The Tyrconnell brand is produced today at the Cooley distillery, a subsidiary of Beam Suntory, while the Dunville brand is produced by the Echinville distillery.
By comparison, most Scotch whisky distilleries had a capacity of less than 100,000 gallons. The Glenlivet distillery, the largest Scottish distillery at the time, had a capacity of 200,000 gallons.
Robert Burns, Scotland’s bard, in his late eighteenth century poem Scotch Drink, called the native whisky of Scotland “. . . my Muse! guid auld Scotch Drink . . .”
The greatest threat of violence to legal distillers from smugglers in the Glenlivet area existed when shipments of legal whisky wended their way south to Perth and Dundee through the desolate glens and hillsides. The most dangerous was the “Spittal of Glenshee.”
In 1868, the laird of Aberlour[fellow legitimate distiller James Gordon], presented George Smith with a pair of hair-trigger pistols for ten guineas.
George Smith came to be known later on in life as “Old Minmore.”
The real Glenlivet. became the subject of a popular verse: Glenlivet it has castles three Drumin, Blairfeldy, and Deskie, And also one distillery More famous than the castles three.
James Chivas was well aware of the already legendary malt whisky made at George Smith’s Drumin Glenlivet Distillery, the one people called “the real Glenlivet.” James, therefore, made the stocking of this top-notch malt whisky a priority and a personal mission.
In 1975, Chivas Brothers was instructed to remove the Royal Warrant from Chivas Regal by that year’s end, 132 years after the first appointment.
Beyond the direct positive effect of the Royal Appointments, the queen’s influence and powerful persona encouraged the evolution of a whole new stratum of customers for Stewart & Chivas.
Stewart & Chivas and their famous victuals had become such a phenomenon that by the 1860s their business reached far south into England as the nobles returned home in the autumn.
The affluent English likewise brought with them a fervent, unquenchable thirst for the whisky of Scotland, but made it clear to James that they fancied a tamer, smoother whisky than that offered by most of the Highland malt distillers.
James spent more time in his office mixing various sample whiskies in an attempt to find a proprietary blend worthy of the Stewart & Chivas name as well as a blend that would fulfill the desires of the moneyed English.
On the heels of the implementation of the landmark Illicit Distillation (Scotland) Act of 1822 and the Excise Act of 1823, an explosion of licit malt distilleries mushroomed all over Scotland.
Following the path of George Smith’s Drumin Glenlivet Distillery, other fabled malt whisky distilleries like Macallan, Fettercairn, Longrow, Balmenach, and Mortlach, also began in 1824.
Ben Nevis, Port Ellen, Strathisla, Kippen, Glencadam, and Glenury opened in 1825.
Aberlour and Pulteney opened in 1826.
In 1835, only one single malt distillery, Lochruan, was licensed.
The Highlands’ notoriously combustible Era of Smuggling was largely doused by 1840, to the relief and gratification of both Parliament and the Highland land barons. The near two-century-long epidemic of illicit whisky making had been eradicated through the slow-dripping antidote of legislation.
George offered customers two varieties of Drumin Glenlivet at different “proof” levels in the 1830s and 1840s, ~65% & 72% ABV.
In the nineteenth century, all malt whiskies, including George’s prized Drumin Glenlivet, were dispensed straight from the barrel to the goblet without any reduction in strength.
The English invented the idea of proof in the seventeenth century for the purpose of assigning accurate duties according to alcoholic potency. The higher the alcoholic content, the stiffer the duties.
From the mid-1600s to 1818, excise officials routinely determined the alcoholic strength of beverages by mixing a portion with gunpowder, lighting it and gauging the intensity, the colour and the duration of the flame.
In 1816, Bartholomew Sikes, an excise official, perfected the hydrometer, a device that measured the specific gravity of liquids. From 1818 on, excise officials calculated alcoholic strength with a hydrometer.
To the British, a “proof spirit” contains 57.1 % alcohol and 42.9 % water.
In the US, proof signifies 50 % alcohol, 50 % water, a much simpler set up.
George’s popular frontline Drumin Glenlivet whisky, sold at a per gallon price of 10 shillings, registered at 11 % higher than proof, which probably meant that it hovered at from 60 to 65 % alcohol. This robust whisky, hardly a timid wallflower, was George’s best seller and was almost certainly cut with water by the majority of malt whisky drinkers.
For people with even stronger constitutions and perhaps cast-iron intestines, he also sold a flamethrower, high-octane version of Drumin Glenlivet at what was depicted as “25 % over proof” for 12 shillings and sixpence per gallon. About 70-71% ABV.
Actor Humphrey Bogart commented during a slump in his film career, “I never should have switched from Scotch to martinis.”
Entertainer and famed Scotch admirer Joe E. Lewis quipped, “Whenever someone asks me if I want water with my Scotch, I say ‘I’m thirsty, not dirty.’”
Since the first half of the nineteenth century, the Scotch whisky industry’s visionary, if pragmatic, captains piggybacked its exportation onto a never-before-seen juggernaut, the rapidly expanding British Empire.
George Smith stopped for a night in a heavily frequented inn in Spittal of Glenshee and saw one nasty smuggler named Shaw and his band of thugs eyeing him. George dozed off into a light sleep, both pistols cocked and ready, one in each hand. Shaw apparently pulled out a large butcher knife, leaned over George and softly uttered, “This gully [knife] is for your bowels.” A fully awake George uncovered the pistol in his right hand and aimed it directly at Shaw’s forehead, saying, “And this for a hole between your eyes.” George then discharged the pistol in his left hand into the fireplace across the room, causing Shaw to flee.
The most significant outcome of first Stein’s and later Coffey’s system started to take shape in the late 1840s and 1850s when pioneering whisky blenders, such as Andrew Usher, John Haig, John Walker, Matthew Gloag, George Ballantine, William Teacher, John Dewar, and Francis and Walter Berry, began combining the ethereal whiskies from column stills with meatier, more charismatic Highland malt whiskies from pot stills.
Royal Warrants had expiration dates, which may explain why some of the Warrants first granted Stewart & Chivas and then Chivas Brothers appear to be renewed.
Following the landmark Illicit Distillation (Scotland) Act of 1822 and the Excise Act of 1823, an explosion of licit malt distilleries mushroomed all over Scotland. Between 10 October 1823 and 9 August 1824, no fewer than 79 new stills were commissioned. The number of licensed distilleries in operation grew swiftly from 111 in 1823 to 263 by 1825.
In 1860, Guinness’s Extra Double Stout sold for 4 shillings, 6 pence per bottle; rum ranged from 9 to 14 shillings per gallon, while brandy garnered a steep 32 shillings per gallon because of stiff duties. Ordinary Highland malt whisky sold for 6 shillings 6 pence per gallon; finer malt whisky at 11 percent over proof brought in 8 shillings per gallon; and the malt whisky from George Smith’s new Glenlivet distillery at Minmore, considered Scotland’s crème de la crème, sold for 20 to 22 shillings per gallon.
James married an attractive young woman Joyce Clapperton at the mature age of 44. They had 4 children, Julia, Alexander, Williamina and Charles James.
Entrepreneurs William Hespeler and George Randall established the Granite Mills & Waterloo Distillery in Waterloo, Ontario, Canada- the company that Canadian whisky magnate Joseph Emm Seagram would purchase in 1883, marking the official beginning of the Seagram legacy in the annals of beverage alcohol.
In December 1882, Charles James Joyce Chivas married Emma Grosskopf in his adopted US city of Milwaukee.
Charles James Joyce Chivas was paid a monthly retainer as part of his father’s Will.
The water for the distillery came from a pristine subterranean source, called Josie’s Well, the same water source used in the distillery today.
In 1863, the Strathspey Railway opened a station in the village of Ballindalloch, a mere eight miles from Minmore. A train traveled daily from Ballindalloch south to the town of Tomintoul. Casks of The Glenlivet were soon being transported to the railway station at Ballindalloch on wagons. Running southeast to northwest, the Strathspey Railway also connected the hamlets of Boat of Garten and Craigellachie.
By the last quarter of the 1800s, Scotch whisky was available in most ports of call around the world.
Today, Scotch whisky can be found in over 200 nations.
There are ~137 distilleries in operation in Scotland today.
The last ten NEW distilleries are crowd-funded.
Numerous entities are promoting investment in whisky in Scotland and the UK.
Greater Scotland includes the 787 islands of the Inner Hebrides, Outer Hebrides, the Orkneys, and the Shetlands.
Of these rugged and windswept islands, 130 are inhabited. Six of the inhabited islands—Arran, Islay, Skye, Mull, Orkney, and Jura—currently produce single malt whisky.
Ben Nevis in the western Highlands is Scotland’s highest peak at 1,344 metres.
Today, only one percent of Scotland’s primeval forest remains. Deforestation likewise indirectly affected the Scotch industry, in that, with the forests gone, the main source of fuel in prehistoric Scotland became peat.
Scotland has no shortage of peat since peat bogs still cover an estimated 810,000 hectares (over 2 million acres) of the nation’s surface.
The Guild of Barber-Surgeons was a powerful professional entity in Edinburgh at the turn of the sixteenth century. Their mission, as royally sanctioned by the King’s “The Seal of Cause,” was to maintain and promote the highest standards of surgical practice.
The Guild of Barber-Surgeons was so highly regarded, in fact, that in 1505 King James IV bestowed on them the exclusive right to distill and peddle their aqua vitae for medicinal purposes within Edinburgh.
Glenlivet, or Gleann-liobh-aite in Gaelic, means “valley of the smooth flowing one.
The brewing and distilling industry in the USA organised dozens of anti-prohibition or pro-moderation counter-lobbies. Known as the “wets” as opposed to the pro-prohibition “drys,” the groups drew extensive support from Irish and German communities in the U.S., both of which were heavily represented in the brewing and distilling trades.
Prohibition had plenty of loopholes. There was a broad exemption for alcoholic beverages used in religious rituals, a factor that led to a dramatic rise in self-proclaimed priests organising their own congregations.
Prohibition had two other unintended consequences. The number of arrests from the violation of Prohibition skyrocketed, overwhelming the court system and resulting in multi-year long waits before cases could go to trial. In response, prosecutors introduced the then novel idea of the plea bargain to clear the backlog of cases.
The second unintended consequence was more far reaching. Taxes on alcoholic beverages had funded between 30% and 40% of federal spending. States relied on alcohol taxes, on average, for more than 50% of their expenditures. New York State, for example, derived more than 75% of its tax revenue from taxes on alcoholic beverages. Prohibition eliminated a significant source of tax revenue. The result is that the federal government decided to extend the personal income tax, originally instituted on a temporary basis to fund WW I expenditures, for the foreseeable future. Many states adopted their own income taxes to fill the deficit produced by Prohibition.
The Phylloxera boom would produce a corresponding bust. At the heart of that bust was the case of the infamous Pattison brothers.
Robert Pattison started in the Scotch whisky business by leasing the Teaninch Distillery from 1850 until 1869. In 1887, with his brother Walter and a number of other partners, he formed a blending company in Leith under the name Pattison, Elder and Co, and, at the peak of the Phylloxera boom, went public.
In 1896, the company became a distiller as well. The Pattisons now went on an acquisitions binge that saw the company, Pattison Ltd., acquire half of the Glenfarclas distillery, the Ardgowan distillery, and a substantial part of the Aultmore-Glenlivet and Oban distilleries.
This expansion came against a background of easy credit from the banks and heightened investor interest in the Scotch industry.
In the 1890s alone, 33 new malt distilleries were built and even more distilleries were expanding their capacity.
At one point the company gave away 500 African grey parrots, which had been trained to shout out “buy Pattison whisky” and “Pattison whisky is the best” to their retail customers; the first example of in-store interactive advertising.
By 1899, however, the company fell apart. The collapse of Pattison Ltd. was just the most visible aspect of a much broader industry problem of increasing overproduction and over investment.
In 1898 Scotch whisky production had peaked at roughly 35.8 million gallons versus demand of 22.3 million gallons. Excess production had grown from two million gallons in 1891 to thirteen and a half million by 1898.
A new challenge emerged from Irish distillers. They argued that the blending of malt and grain whisky was not true whisky and should be banned. The Irish challenge prompted the establishment of a Royal Commission to investigate the industry and to determine once and for all “what exactly was whisky?” In 1909, after 18 months of hearings, the Royal Commission issued an exhaustive report confirming that the blending of malt and grain whisky constituted “real whisky” and recommending that these blended whiskies should continue to be produced and sold.
No sooner had this latest challenge to the Scotch whisky industry been averted, World War I would set the industry back for the better part of two decades.
The big Irish distillers opposed the Spirits Act of 1860, sparking a long running debate on what exactly was whisky. Notwithstanding the opposition of the big distillers, however, Ireland was producing a lot of grain whiskeys, and many Irish merchants and exporters began to dilute their whiskey, often excessively, by blending grain whiskey into their pot still whiskey. The issue was finally settled by a 1908 Royal Commission that concluded that blends of grain and malt whisky were in fact whisky.
The Spirits Act of 1860, also called the Scotch Whisky Act of 1860, is wrongly attributed to William Ewart Gladstone. He was the Chancellor of the Exchequer in Henry Temple's Govt in 1860.
The Spirits Act of 1860 had been crucial to the fortunes of the Scotch whisky industry, which boasted 111 operational distilleries in 1868, as it allowed for the first time the blending of spirits under bond without payment of duty, the storage of blended spirits in vats, and the filling of casks with blended spirit in bond.
Gladstone's budget of 1860 was introduced on 10 February along with the Cobden–Chevalier Treaty between Britain and France that would reduce tariffs between the two countries.
Blending of malt whiskies had been permitted in bond on payment of duty and holding fees since 1823. Bonded warehouses could be set up under supervision of the Town Clerk and required retention of barrels of spirits for two years, quickly changed to three.
Very few traders paid heed to this Act, with average retention time being as low as three months. The trader's word had to be accepted as to age and quality.
Blending of Grain whiskies with Malt whiskies was permitted in 1860, but limited to distillers only. The end result was a much milder and flavoursome spirit. The Irish malt whisky industry opposed the introduction of Grain whisky, refusing to even call it whisky.
The initial purpose of blending had been to reduce the cost of whisky, but it was soon discovered that in the hands of a skilful practitioner, a very drinkable and consistent product could be created.
Since most grocers and vintners were also dealers in spirits, they raised an outcry and were permitted to blend Grain and Malt whiskies in bond starting 1863 in an extension to the Cobden–Chevalier Treaty.
Further legislation during the 1860s aided the cause of blending, namely the fact that from 1864 spirit strength could be reduced using water in approved warehouses, and 1867 saw bottling whisky for domestic consumption in bonded warehouses.
A growing number of large distilleries in the Lowlands made grain spirit on an industrial scale, and one effect of the incipient blending boom, which would really take off during the 1870s, was a growing interest in malt whiskies produced in what we now call the Speyside region of production in north-east Scotland, but what was usually referred to in the 19th century as ‘Glenlivet.’
Apart from the famous Glenlivet itself, the area already had a reputation for fine whisky-making, being home to distilleries such as Aberlour, Cardhu, Glenfarclas, Glen Grant, Glenlivet, Macallan, Mortlach and Strathisla.
Speyside whiskies soon found favour among blenders, with commensurate expansion of distilling interests.
Campbeltown also grew steadily and in 1868, Benmore distillery became the 19th distillery to be established in the remote Argyllshire port. It was built by Glasgow-based distillers and blenders Bulloch Lade & Co, and boasted an annual output of 125,000 gallons (568,000 litres), making it one of the larger distilleries in the royal burgh.
In Edinburgh, the Caledonian distillery, which had been established in 1855 to distil grain whisky on a grand scale, was augmented by the installation in 1867 of two large pot stills alongside its existing Coffey apparatus, with the intention of making 'Irish-style whisky of the Dublin variety.'
Such a development was doubtless due in part to the large numbers of Irish nationals who migrated to work in Scotland and England as the economy flourished during the 1860s.
There was also a widespread appetite for Irish whiskey among the British public in the years before blended Scotch really established itself, due to its uniformity of character compared to the output of Scotland’s pot stills.
In Ireland, the blending revolution lagged behind that of Scotland, with many of the largest and most powerful distilling enterprises refusing to admit that ‘Irish’ whisky could be anything other than ‘pure pot still’ – made from a mash comprising malted and unmalted barley, distilled in a conventional copper pot still.
Aqua vitae (‘water of life’ in Latin) was the generic term for distilled spirits throughout the Roman Empire, widely used during the Middle Ages and the Renaissance and translated into many languages. In Gaelic, it was uisge beatha, in Irish uisce beatha.
Whisky connoisseur Charles MacLean says that this was Anglicised from uiskie (c.1618) to whiskie (1715) to whisky (1746). F Paul Pacult, author of ‘A Double Scotch’, 2005, says that Aqua Vitae ultimately became Whisky in 1736.
The spelling Whiskey is found equally common in those days. In fact, the Hansard of 1896 uses the term Whiskey. Whisky or whiskey is by convention, not law: the Royal Commission on Whiskey and Other Potable Spirits (1908/09) spelt both Irish and Scotch with an ‘e’ throughout.
Gavin Smith writes in his A-Z of Whisky: "The first use of Scotch with the sense of specifically relating to whisky occurs in 1855, 'while malt liquors give our Scotch and Irish whiskies'”…
Silly rules of thumb like ‘countries without an e in their name…,etc. can be discarded.
is usually a time for celebration in the whisky world –Fèis Ìle, the Islay Festival of Malt and Music, a week-long celebration of Scotland’s most distillery-packed island, with whisky, music, dancing and more is held at the end of May.
In the long drawn out battle with the virus, the distilleries have again taken the party online– it’s time for The 2nd Virtual Fèis Ìle.
Festival week (Saturday-Saturday: a long week) is usually very simple: there are nine distilleries on Islay, and each gets a day of celebration – newcomers Kilchoman and Ardnahoe share the Wednesday.
Every year, Douglas Laing releases a new Big Peat whisky for the Fèis Ìle festival and the tradition was continued in 2020 with the new Big Peat 8 Years Old A846.
The A846 is a “legendary” road that links whisky fans to distilleries across the Scottish island of Islay before steering up through Jura.
The Big Peat 8 Years Old A846 is aged for eight years and bottled at 46% ABV.
In 1878, a polemical piece of writing called Truths about Whisky, was commissioned and published by the four most influential Irish distilling houses, Messrs John Jameson & Sons, William Jameson & Co, John Power & Son, and George Roe & Co, all based in Dublin.
George Roe’s establishment – had an annual capacity of some nine million litres. Even today, that would place it among the most productive handful of Scotland’s malt distilleries.
In total, 23 Irish distilleries were operational during 1868, ranging geographically from Bushmills on the north Antrim coast via Belfast and Londonderry to Cork in the south, Dublin in the east, and Limerick and Galway in the west.
Irish independence in 1922 hurt Irish whisky exports badly. Following independence, Irish distillers lost access to markets in the British Empire.
Before Prohibition, Irish whiskey remained the best-selling imported whiskey by the United States. Prohibition overturned Irish whiskey’s century long dominance of the American whiskey market in favour of the Scots.
Canada went through a similar experience with Prohibition as the U.S. The Dominion Alliance, an umbrella organisation of Canadian temperance groups, advocated for provincial wide bans on the consumption of alcohol.
During World War I many provinces banned the manufacture of “intoxicating” beverages as part of the war effort and then extended the ban following the end of the war.
Prohibition decimated the Irish whiskey industry. Many distilleries closed.
The period marked the beginning of an industry wide consolidation that would continue until the 1970s, a period that is sometimes referred to as the lost century of Irish whiskey.
The Chivas 100 Malts bottling: One hundred of Scotland's finest malts were vatted together to create the Chivas Century of Malts. It was released in 1995 and contains some of the rarest malts like Craigduff, Glenisla peated Glen Keith. A little accompanying booklet by Jim Murray describes all of the 100 distilleries in brief.
The 100 distilleries are Aberfeldy, Aberlour, Allt a `Bhainne, Ardbeg, Auchentoshan, Auchroisk, Aultmore, Balblair, Balmenach, Balvenie, Banff, Ben Nevis, Benriach, Benrinnes, Benromach, Blair Athol, Bowmore, (Royal) Brackla, Braeval, Brechin, Bunnahabhain, Caol Ila, Caperdonich, Clynelish, Convalmore, Cragganmore, Craigduff, Craigellechie, Dailuaine, Dallas Dhu, Dalmore, Dalwhinnie, Deanston, Dufftown, Fettercairn, Glen Albyn, Glenallachie, Glenburgie, Glencadam, Glen Craig, Glen Elgin, Glen Esk, Glenfarcles, Glenfiddich, Glengarioch, Glenglassaugh, Glen Grant, Glengoyne, Glenisla, Glen Keith, Glenkinchie, The Glenlivet, Glenlochy, Glenlossie, Glen Mhor, Glen Moray, Glenrothes, Glen Scotia, Glen Spey, Glentauchers, Glenturret, Glenugie, Glenury Royal, Highland Park, Imperial, Inchgower, Inchmurrin, Inverleven, Isle of Jura, Kinclaith, Knockando, Ladyburn, Lagavulin, Laphroaig, Ledaig, Linkwood, Littlemill, Longmorn, Macallan, Macduff, Mannochmore, Miltonduff, Mortloch, Mosstowie, Ord, Pittyvaich, Pulteney, Rhosdhu, Scapa, Speyburn, Springbank, Strathisla, Strathmill, Tamdhu, Tamnavulin, Teaninich, Tomatin, Tomintoul, Tormore and Tullibardine.
Glenfiddich, arguably the first single malt to be sold in its own right, was also the first to be sold in airport retail shops.
July 27th is National Scotch Day.
Babute distillery is one of many lost distilleries in Argyll that was operational briefly in late 18th century.
Gallowhill Lowland Single Malt Scotch Whisky Distillery is a here-and-gone Paisley distillery, open from 1798 to 1799.
It was run by a partnership of James MacFarlane and Elizabeth Harvie, of the Harvies who operated Dundashill and Yoker distilleries in Glasgow.
The distillery sat in the Gallowhill area of Paisley, north of the town centre on Brewster Avenue, today part of a large housing estate not far from the M8 motorway and Glasgow Airport.
220 years ago, the area would have been very largely rural. Back then, a burn, now long culverted and vanished, probably flowed from Gallowhill down to the River White Cart.
Haig Whisky is the oldest of all Scotch whiskies and may even be the oldest whisky in the world.
Haig Gold Label, the flagship blend of John Haig & Co. was not just Britain’s most popular whisky, it was the first spirit to smash the million case barrier.
It dates back to the twilight years of the 19th century, and before long the packaging had settled on a dumpy, dark brown bottle with a plain white label and a string of medals at the bottom.
By 1939, Haig was Britain’s best-selling Scotch.
Alongside its deluxe Dimple expression, it was especially popular in Britain. By the millennium its UK sales, together with Dimple Haig, had crashed to just 7,500 cases.
The recipe includes Lowland malts like Glenkinchie with a heavy reliance on Cameronbridge grain.
‘D’ye ken John Haig?’ asked the early adverts, and the slogan was emblazoned on the mainsail of a yacht that would sail up and down the south coast of England to stoke up demand.
This gave way to the long-running ‘Don’t be vague, ask for Haig’ slogan.
John Haig set up the Kilbagie distillery in the 18th century, although his family were noted distillers some time before that.
His great-great-grandfather was busted in 1655 for distilling on the Sabbath.
His grandson (also called John) founded the Cameronbridge grain distillery in 1824.
Noted members of the Haig clan include WWI Field Marshal Douglas Haig, who was so magnificently lampooned by Stephen Fry in Blackadder Goes Forth.
Kelso Lowland Single Malt Scotch Whisky Distillery was a Borders distillery at Kelso in Roxburghshire that distilled from 1825-47.
Precisely locating Kelso distillery is difficult. One source places it at Rosebank – a mansion and former estate on the north bank of the Tweed on the outskirts of town where now a bridge on the main A698 road crosses the river.
Old maps show no buildings at Rosebank that might be, or might have been, the distillery.
Some way upriver, opposite an island called Kelso Anna, there is a pend with steps down towards the Tweed called Distillery Lane. It leads down to Chalkheugh Terrace and seems the more likely location.
Kelso distillery was opened and licensed to John Mason in 1825.
In 1830 it became a partnership of Mason & Nichol, which lasted until 1833 when John Mason became a sole trader again. Kelso continued under him until 1837 when he was sequestrated.
Of all the old blends, Mackie’s Ancient Scotch could be one of the most precious for its link to the mythical Malt Mill distillery.
Sir Peter Mackie, famously described as ‘one-third genius, one-third megalomaniac and one-third eccentric,’ gave his name to this precious blend.
He owned the Islay distillery of Lagavulin, and was agent for its neighbour, Laphroaig.
Losing the contract for Laphroaig after a bitter dispute, he built a replica distillery in the grounds of Lagavulin and called it Malt Mill. It was designed to make precisely the same style of whisky as Laphroaig – a feat it never really achieved.
The whisky produced at Malt Mill disappeared entirely into Mackie’s blends, particularly White Horse. Or did it?
The distillery is named on bottles of Mackie’s Ancient Scotch, although there is no mention of it being a ‘blend’ or ‘blended’… could it contain single malt from Malt Mill?
Little is known of Mackie’s blend that occasionally surfaces on auction websites, although there were two versions of the whisky.
In the UK there was Mackie’s Ancient Scotch, bottles of which do tantalisingly mention Malt Mill beneath the brand owner, White Horse Distillers Ltd.
The bottling for the US market, called Mackie’s Ancient Brand, does not.
Assuming they are the same whisky, it must date from some time between 1908 when Malt Mill was fired into life, and 1962 when it closed for good.
Whisky writer Serge Valentin has described Mackie’s Ancient Brand as ‘the peatiest blend I have ever tried,’ and speculated that ‘there was quite possibly more than 50% Malt Mill’ in the blend.
Auchmedden distillery (also spelled Auch Madden, Auch Medden and Auchmeddin), an Aberdeenshire distillery, was based on a farm now called Mains of Auchmedden, west of Aberdour Bay, above the picturesque harbour village of Pennan and in the shadow of the ruined Auchmedden castle. The property belonged to the Baird family from 1568, but it was acquired by the Earls of Aberdeen, Gordons, in the mid 18th century.
Two events, the Phylloxera epidemic at the end of the nineteenth century and the imposition of Prohibition in the United States in the early twentieth century, proved pivotal in the growth of the Scotch whisky industry, and led to its ascendency and its current dominance of the spirits market.
In France, production and quality wine were at a peak by the mid-1800s when the first of three tragedies that would cripple the wine industry, and its related brandy industry, struck. The combined effect proved devastating.
The first blow was Odium—specifically uncinula necator—a fungus that causes powdery mildew on grapes. Originating in North America, certain varieties of European wine grapes proved to be particularly susceptible to it. The disease was crippling, but not devastating, it would significantly reduce wine production. This mildew was brought under control in less than a decade.
Just as vintners breathed a sigh of relief the second and even more crippling North American invader—the Phylloxera epidemic—hit them. Phylloxera was caused by a tiny insect, an aphid, sometimes referred to as the grape louse, which attacked the roots of the domesticated, Vitis vinifera, grapevines in Europe.
Native to North America, Phylloxera had not been a problem to European wine makers, notwithstanding the fact that samples of American grape varieties had been exported to Europe for centuries. The advent of steamships completely transformed the potential threat. With fast steamships cutting transatlantic travel to two weeks, insect pests could now survive a transatlantic voyage.
Beginning in 1863, in the French province of Languedoc, French vintners began noticing that a mysterious blight was killing their vines. It was not until 1868 that the grape Phylloxera aphid was discovered as the source of the epidemic, and it was not until 1870 that the solution was discovered.
In that 15-year period, some 40 percent of France’s vineyards were destroyed and the industry was set back for decades. There was worse to come. “Downy” mildew, the third tragedy to hit the European wine industry, came while the French were still looking for a cure for Phylloxera.
Downy mildew was a parasitic fungus that attacked the leaves of grape plants, eventually destroying the leaf tissue of the infected plant. This third plague was remedied at amazing speed, but the damage done by three consecutive blights was catastrophic. In roughly 30 years, wine production in France fell three quarters, and 75 to 85 percent of Europe’s vineyards were obliterated.
It took the French wine and brandy industry almost thirty years to recover. During that period, French Cognac production virtually ceased. Scotch whisky was on its upward incline.
Auchmedden distillery was operated by William Grant – one of countless William Grants in the history of distilling – from 1826-33.
Cabrach Distillery was a farm distillery in the Cabrach, Aberdeenshire, one of few legally sanctioned sites in the area. In the 1800's, the Cabrach was notorious for its illicit distilling of whisky and its ability to evade customs and excise raids due to its inaccessible and inhospitable lands. Some claim the Cabrach as one of the birthplaces of Scottish malt whisky.
Taking its name from the region, Cabrach distillery stood at Haddoch farm, about half a mile north of Upper Cabrach village. The Cabrach Trust was set up to enable the regeneration of this remote upland area. Located in rural Moray, in Northeast Scotland, the Cabrach, is defined as one of the 30 most remote regions in Scotland. A new distillery is planned for this site.
The Cabrach Trust plans to convert the steading buildings at Inverharroch Farm into a historic distillery and heritage centre which will showcase the rich culture and heritage of this haunting and mysterious landscape.
Ardbeg, established in 1815, has led an on and off existence for over 180 years since.
It was not until the brand was purchased by The Glenmorangie Company in 1997 that the Distillery was saved from extinction.
The legacy of the whisky was safeguarded in 2000 by the formation of the Ardbeg Committee, made up of thousands of Ardbeg followers worldwide who are keen to ensure that “the doors of Ardbeg never close again”.
Today there are more than 100,000 members of the Ardbeg Committee in over 130 countries.
Ardbeg is the world’s most highly awarded smoky single malt whisky. Since 2008, Ardbeg has won more than 50 gold and double gold medals in key whisky competitions.
In 1853, when Commodore Matthew Perry sailed his big black ships to Edo harbor, forcing the reluctant samurai rulers to open Japan to trade, he brought with him a few barrels of whisky to keep himself and his crew warm on the long voyage across the Pacific.
He also presented the Emperor a 110-gallon barrel of his finest whisky.
Circa 1875, the Japanese began importing whisky, and local brewers also started making their own versions. This early “whisky” was actually just alcohol with a similar colour to whisky.
The problem today has assumed huge proportions. A large amount of the liquor isn’t actually made in Japan. Some of it isn’t whisky at all.
Unlike most whisky-producing countries, Japan has few rules about what constitutes whisky, let alone what makes it Japanese. Companies can buy spirits in bulk from abroad, bottle and label it “Japanese whisky,” and ship it back out.
Imported by the metal barrel, Scotch or Canadian whisky is watered down, mixed with ethanol and sold as Japanese whisky.
The first modern Japanese whisky distilleries, including Yamazaki, didn’t open until the 1920s.
While they were modeled on Scottish operations and often produced high-quality spirits, they did little to change the overall character of Japanese whisky, which, following World War II, was aimed at everyday salary-men looking for a quick drink after work.
The Japanese government introduced formal definitions for domestic whisky in 1989, but by then the industry was dominated by a few big distilling companies that wanted to keep the rules loose.
After 1989, for example, whisky sold domestically had to contain at least 10% aged malt whisky; the rest could be unaged alcohol, typically made from imported molasses.
Interest in Japanese whisky began to pick up in the early 2000s, snowballing through the next 15 years as the industry’s premium brands, like Hibiki and Yamazaki, racked up global critical acclaim.
Analysts point to fast-growing imports of Scotch and Canadian whisky into Japan in recent years, even as the retail sales of those whiskies remain flat — implying that most of the imported spirit is being bought by distilleries and relabelled as Japanese.
The Japan Spirits & Liqueurs Makers Association announced a new set of industry-wide regulations on 16 February 2021, effective 01 Apr 2021. However, whisky brands have until 31st March 2024 to adhere to them.
The only raw ingredients allowed for use in production are malted grains, other cereal grains, and water extracted in Japan. Malted grains must always be used. Fermentation, distillation, and saccharification must take place in a distillery located in Japan, with the alcohol volume of the distillate not allowed to go above 95% in strength.
Wood casks with a maximum capacity of 700 litres must be used for the maturation of the distilled product and have to be matured in Japan for a minimum of 3 years. Bottling must take place in Japan, and the whisky has to have a minimum ABV of 40%.
Plain caramel colouring (also known as E150a) can be added; this is a common practice in whisky around the world.
Scotch Whisky exports to the US were valued at £1.07bn in 2019 – the industry’s first billion pound market.
In the International Whisky Competition 2021, highlighting the best whiskies for 2021, Scotland has – unsurprisingly – managed to lock out the Top 3 spots with the Ardbeg Uigeadail officially crowned the King of the Casks, Glenmorangie Vintage 1997 in second place (95.1 points), followed by Dewar’s Double Double 32 YO in third (95 points).
Taiwan has been staking their claim, placing fourth with the Kavalan Artist Series: Paul Chiang Peated Malt Single Cask Strength Single Malt Whisky (94.6 points), and placing in three other spots within the Top 15.
Best blended whisky (all categories, all countries), all three top spots were bagged by Dewar. 1st Place: Dewar’s Double Double 32 Year Old; 2nd Place: Dewar’s Double Double 21 Year Old; and 3rd Place: Dewar’s Double Double 27 Year Old.
Illicit distillers and whisky smugglers played a constant battle of cat and mouse with excisemen, or gaugers. The canny Scots came up with a variety of creative ways of hiding their precious bounty, including transporting it in coffins!
Illicit stills were common all over Scotland. In Edinburgh their smoke was disguised by the thick sooty chimney smoke that characterised the era. One such distillery was discovered in the lower cellar of the Tron Kirk on the Royal Mile – not a very reputable sideline for a place of worship!
Robert Burns, Scotland’s Bard became an exciseman after falling on hard times in 1788. He took up the post of Excise Officer for Dumfries; in February 1792 he was promoted to the Dumfries Port Division, an appointment that carried a salary of £50 per annum. The pair of pistols which he carried for his personal protection can still be seen today in the National Museum of Scotland.
The continued flouting of the law prompted the Duke of Gordon, on whose land some of the illicit whisky was being produced- with his prior knowledge and tacit permission- to propose in the House of Lords that the Government should make it profitable to produce whisky legally.
In 1823 the Excise Act was passed, which authorised the distilling of whisky in return for a licence fee of £10, and a set payment per gallon of proof spirit.
Smuggling disappeared almost completely over the next decade, paving the way for the Scottish whisky industry we know today.
It’s worth noting that many present day distilleries stand on sites used by the smugglers over two centuries ago – a modern day continuation of a by-gone practice.
In 1831 Aeneas Coffey invented the Patent Still which enabled a continuous process of distillation to take place, leading to the production of grain whisky, a less intense spirit than the previous malt whisky.
This invention was first exploited by Edinburgh distillers Andrew Usher & Co who, in 1860, blended malt and grain whisky together for the first time to produce a lighter flavoured whisky - extending the appeal of Scotch Whisky to a wider market.
In the 1880s the vineyards of France were devastated by the Phylloxera beetle, which wiped out the crops for wine and brandy production. Their disaster was the Scots fortune however - by the time the French industry recovered, Scottish whisky had taken the place of brandy as the preferred spirit.
Since then, Scottish whisky, especially blended whisky, has gone from strength to strength. The tipple is enjoyed worldwide, supports tens of thousands of jobs in Scotland and plays an important part in the Scottish tourism sector.
With its proximity to the shore, Leith was Edinburgh city's whisky district. Having been a centre for the storage of wine and brandy in the 16th century, with access to as many as 100 bonded warehouses, in the early 1820’s Leith was granted one of only six licences issued to ports in Scotland allowing them to store whisky under bond.
The Phylloxera beetle, which had ravaged crops for wine and brandy in France in the 1880’s, meant that the warehouses of Leith that had previously housed this product, were now lying empty. Seeing a gap in the market, whisky makers quickly moved in.
The Vaults in Leith, home to the Scotch Malt Whisky Society, was originally a wine warehouse dating back to the 18th century.
Many of the whisky industry’s most famous brand names started out as licensed grocers who began to blend whisky in the 19th century.
One such was George Ballantine, who opened his first shop in the bustling trade district of Cowgate, which is situated under South Bridge.
Ballantine’s reputation soon grew, as did his success. He soon moved to smarter premises in nearby Candlemaker Row, then later to a prestigious location just off fashionable Princes Street.
Today, Ballantine’s is the second biggest selling Scotch whisky worldwide.
Today there are the still the remains of long-gone distilleries across Edinburgh, with the buildings taking on a new lease of life.
The Caledonian Distillery, Easter Dalry Wynd. Situated close to Haymarket Station, The Caledonian Distillery was built in 1855. The distillery closed its doors in 1988 with much of it being renovated and transformed into housing. Today, its 300ft chimney stack remains as a reminder of the building’s history.
Edinburgh distillery stands in Sciennes in the city of Edinburgh. In 1849, Alexander Pearson remodelled a brewery that was built in 1430 and established this distillery. The distiilery was called West Sciennes distillery in those days.
The owner changed several times. Also the name changed from Newington (1851-56) to Glen Sciennes (1856-59). After being taken over by Andrew Usher & Co. in 1859, it was renamed Edinburgh Distillery. It closed in 1925 and is thought to be the last distillery in Edinburgh to have produced single malt.
Dean Distillery, Dean Village. Smaller than the city’s other distilleries, Dean Distillery opened in 1881 and was housed in a converted flour mill on the Water of Leith. Closed in 1922, part of the building remains today and is used as offices.
Brothers John and Andrew Usher were born to the whisky trade. Their father, Andrew Usher Sr, had started out as a spirits dealer in Edinburgh in 1813 and the two brothers became partners in the family business, buying the afore-mentioned Glen Sciennes Distillery in 1859.
During the 1860s, the brothers began promoting new whisky brands for the flourishing UK market. Pioneers of creating blended whisky, they were also among the first to recognise the enormous opportunities for exporting whisky around the world.
The brothers left quite a legacy in Edinburgh – one that you can still smell on the city’s streets.
Andrew Usher never saw the hall that took his name, dying in 1898, 16 years before his dream was realised. The Usher Hall was opened by his widow in 1914 and remains one of the most impressive venues in the city. Despite being built upon the proceeds of Scotch whisky, the hall did not have a bar until the 1980’s!
Holyrood Distillery: Edinburgh’s first single malt distillery for almost 100 years is set within a 180-year-old building next to Holyrood Park and within easy walking distance of the city centre, Holyrood Distillery opened its doors to the public for the first time in July 2019.
Glenkinchie Distillery, situated just 15 miles from Edinburgh in the rolling farmland of East Lothian, houses a museum about malt whisky production, an illicit still, a large scale model of a distillery and various other whisky-related displays to grab your attention.
When prohibition ended and Americans were once again able to quench their thirst for whiskey, Irish distillers lacked the stocks to meet this new, now legal, demand. The Scot’s had plenty of whisky, and they leveraged their stocks and their reputation for quality into a dominant position in the American whiskey market at the expense of the Irish distillers.Daftmill is one of the very few truly self-sufficient distillery in Scotland.
At the end of the 19th century, Dailuaine was the largest single malt distillery in Speyside and also one of the most innovative in terms of design.
A small percentage of their farm crop (around 100 tons) is diverted for their own use. The process water comes from their own artesian well, and the draff produced after mashing is then fed to their prize beef herd.
Only 20,000 litres are produced during two x three-month seasons, one starting after the end of the busy spring period on the farm and stopping before harvest, the other during the fallow winter period between November and February.
These sixth-generation farmers reckon that they are only the third family to have farmed Daftmill in 1,000 years of existence.
It was only in 2003 that the idea of whisky making began to form in the minds of the owners.
It is the first member of the now burgeoning small-scale distilling movement in Scotland.
None of the maturing stock has yet been released, though samples from casks show that it is mature, balanced with a gentle herbal note, and very much ready for sale. Rarely seen as a single malt bottling (the occasional Flora & Fauna from owner Diageo, (sporadic independent offerings), Dailuaine is one of the many hard-working distilleries which quietly provide fillings for blends.
It produces a heavy ‘meaty’ make given its long fermentation, rapid distillation and the use of stainless steel in the condensers to cut down on copper interaction. That Flora & Fauna bottling (from ex-Sherry casks) shows this mix of richness and sweetness at its best.
A complete rebuild in 1884 saw the installation of Scotland’s first pagoda on a kiln whose pitch was deliberately steep to minimise the contact time between peat smoke and drying malt, one of the clearest indications of how the old ‘Strathspey’ style was changing.
In 1898, it merged with Talisker to form Dailuaine-Talisker Distilleries Ltd.
Dallas Dhu Distillery designed by Charles Doig is now little more than a museum.
Dallas Dhu Speyside single malt Scotch whisky is rarely seen, but when it does emerge from the shadows it shows a sweet fruited edge, some honey, oiliness and a wisp of peat smoke.
Andrew Usher II donated
£100,000 to Edinburgh city specifically to fund the new concert hall, named
after him, on 23 June 1896. He died before it opened.
He is buried in the Grange
Cemetery, Edinburgh with his first wife, Elizabeth Langmuir Miller (1826-1876);
his second wife, Marion Blackwood Murray (1847-1925) and several of their
children.
His city centre family
house is now a converted pub (named the Pear Tree and Andrew Usher & Co)
located near the University of Edinburgh.
There are over 300,000 varieties of barley but only a
few are suitable for malt whisky production.
Charles Joughin, the baker on-board the doomed Titanic,
trod water for three hours before being rescued. He claimed he hadn’t succumbed
to the cold due to the amount of whisky he had drunk prior to the accident,
while the ship was sinking.
In 1956, Whisky replaced William in the NATO phonetic
alphabet.
The year 1994 marked 500 years since the first written
reference to Scotch whisky was penned. Many producers released anniversary
bottlings.
In Victorian times, some Scottish distilleries allowed
workers to stop for a dram each time a bell rang.
Scotch exports earned £139 every second in 2017.
Distilled alcoholic beverages made from gluten grains
are gluten-free due to distillation removing gluten proteins.
Andrew Usher, the son of an Edinburgh-based spirits
dealer, pioneered Scotch blending in 1860.
The process of blending
for consistency itself was actually ‘borrowed’ from cognac blenders who had
been doing this for years with strikingly consistent results.
They, the Andrew Usher father and son, ended up buying all of Glenlivet’s output to create their blend as well as
owning the Edinburgh Distillery.
In 1859 the Usher brothers bought
the Glen Sciennes distillery, renaming it the Edinburgh distillery and securing
a supply of their own single malt. A massive warehousing and bottling complex –
said to be the biggest in the UK – was built nearby at St Leonard’s.
Nikola Tesla drank whisky every day because he
thought that it would make him live for 150 years.
The revolving mechanism that drags heavy copper chains
around the base of a still to prevent sticking or scorching is called a
rummager.
A cooper’s apprentice must work accompanied for four
years before being allowed to tackle their own barrel.
Robert Burns once had the job of exciseman and wrote
fondly of whisky in his poetry.
One large oak tree is said to yield enough wood for
approximately three 60-gallon casks.
In order to finish the screenplay for the Blue Dahlia,
writer Raymond Chandler drank whisky for eight days while being supervised by
six secretaries, a nurse and a doctor.
At the time of writing, there are 127 distilleries
licensed to produce Scotch whisky.
The combination of beer and whisky is known as a
‘boilermaker’ in America, where blue-collar labourers regarded it as an
effective pick-me-up after a shift down in the mines.
The Keeper of the Quaich is awarded to those who make
an outstanding contribution to the Scotch whisky industry for at least five
years and outstanding Keepers may progress to become Masters of the Quaich.
After Prohibition ended, 69-year-old James B. Beam got
his distillery up and running in just 120 days.
Jack Daniel’s is Tennessee
whiskey, not bourbon.
During the malting process, the barley was
traditionally turned with a shovel to promote even malting and reduce the
tangling of barley sprouts. As a result of this repetitive motion maltsters
suffered a condition which caused one arm to hang lower than the other – known
as monkey shoulder.
When Norman Lamont was Chancellor in the early 1990s,
the bag which was waved at photographers outside No 11 contained a bottle of
Highland Park, while the speech itself was carried in a plastic bag by his
then-aide, William Hague.
A royal footman who poured whisky into the Queen’s
corgis’ water bowl as a party trick was demoted and had his salary cut.
The Suntory Yamazaki distillery’s first master
distiller, Masataka Taketsuru, studied in Scotland before deciding to bring the
craft home to Japan.
In June 1875, a bonded warehouse in the Liberties
caught fire, and rivers of burning whiskey flowed through the streets of Dublin
like lava. Titled The Great Dublin Whiskey Fire, the disaster resulted in the
tragic loss of 13 lives and 1,900 casks of whiskey.
George Washington was the only founding father to
commercially operate a distillery. It was one of the biggest distilleries of
its time, but was unfortunately destroyed by a fire a few years after opening.
Ireland’s Old Bushmills Distillery claims to be the
country’s oldest legally functioning distillery. Operations on the present site
date back to 1276 by some accounts.
Pot still whiskey is made by combining both malted and
unmalted barley in the mashbill, prior to fermentation, and then distilling in
traditional copper pot stills.
The monopoly once in sole charge of producing Finnish
alcohol (including whisky) was also responsible for the production of Molotov
cocktails for its military.
Banff is the most onomatopoeic Scotch distillery and among the least lucky!
On the night of 16 August 1941, Banff distillery was strafed and bombed by the Luftwaffe. A warehouse exploded, sending casks flying into the air and a river of whisky flooding out over the fields and into the river. There was considerable devastation and tales of drunken cows that were incapable of being milked the next day.
Clynelish’s is one of a number of ‘Clearance’ distilleries (Talisker is another example) which appeared in the earlier part of the 19th century. Some landowners forcibly moved tenant farmers from their ancestral lands. The most brutal of these perpetrators were The Duchess and Duke of Sutherland. The Duke established a distillery which he called Clynelish. All were staffed by former farmers who were paid in coin which could only be redeemed at the company’s shops – whose profits went to the Duke. The distillery built a reputation only in 1896 when blenders Ainslie & Heilbron bought it in partnership with John Risk, who was to become the outright owner in 1912. By the end of the century it had become the most highly-priced single malt.
In 2017 Scottish scientists powered a car using a
biofuel derived from whisky residue.
The Wash Act of 1784 divided Scotland into two areas,
Highlands and Lowlands with an imaginative line from Greenock to Dundee.
The Small Stills Act of 1816 abolished the distinction between the industries in the Highlands and the Lowlands. In addition the Act legalised stills holding 48 gallons and above, as well as a weaker wash. This Act, allowed the smaller producers to operate legally and increase the number of the legal distilleries from 36 in 1816 to 125 three years later.
The Excise Act of 1823 which gave a lot of incentives like tax-free warehousing and free export, multiplied the legal distilleries and reduced the illegal trade. By the end of 1825, the licensed distilleries under the new Act were doubled from 111 to 263.
The first license under the new law was obtained by Captain George Smith, the founder of The Glenlivet Distillery.
In 1830, the Irishman Aeneas Coffey, a former Inspector General of Excise, patented his improved column still. The efficiency of the technique and the smooth characteristics of the grain whisky have changed the drinking map of the world during the next centuries.
The magic formula which helped the whisky to conquer the British elite and the world in the following years was the blending of the rougher malt whiskies with the softer grain whiskies and prolonging the maturation process.
Banff is the most onomatopoeic Scotch distillery and among the least lucky!
On the night of 16 August 1941, Banff distillery was strafed and bombed by the Luftwaffe. A warehouse exploded, sending casks flying into the air and a river of whisky flooding out over the fields and into the river. There was considerable devastation and tales of drunken cows that were incapable of being milked the next day.
Clynelish’s is one of a number of ‘Clearance’ distilleries (Talisker is another example) which appeared in the earlier part of the 19th century. Some landowners forcibly moved tenant farmers from their ancestral lands. The most brutal of these perpetrators were The Duchess and Duke of Sutherland. The Duke established a distillery which he called Clynelish. All were staffed by former farmers who were paid in coin which could only be redeemed at the company’s shops – whose profits went to the Duke. The distillery built a reputation only in 1896 when blenders Ainslie & Heilbron bought it in partnership with John Risk, who was to become the outright owner in 1912. By the end of the century it had become the most highly-priced single malt.
Before they started blending and selling Scotch, the
Chivas brothers ran a grocery in Aberdeen, Scotland. It was first opened by a John Forrest 1801; the brothers teamed up in 1857 and start producing whisky then, almost half a century later.
Bailey’s Irish Cream – a blend of cream and Irish
whiskey – did not come into existence until 1974. It was the first Irish cream
to be commercialised.
The record for most expensive whisky cocktail ever sold is a
refresh of the traditional Manhattan made with a 55-year-old Macallan served at
Dubai’s Skyview Bar. Costing £4,632, the posh concoction was stirred with a
very special oak stick from a cask of Macallan. It was also served with ice
made from the same water used to produce the single malt whisky it contains.
PM Henry J Temple’s Govt permitted the blending of malt and grain whisky in bond by 1860 under the Scotch Whisky Act. Gladstone, his Chancellor of the Exchequer was responsible for pushing it through.
This Act, when published, was limited to distillers only.
It took a further three years till grocers could carry out such blending on premises and sale under their own label legally, under an Extension to the French Treaty Act 1863.
In these three years, many other grocers got into the business full time—John Walker, George Ballantine, Peter Thomson of Beneagles, William Teacher and the Berry brothers are good examples. Matthew Gloag III of the Famous Grouse followed later.
The Chivas Brothers company came into being only in 1857, when John Chivas joined his elder brother James in his grocery, wine shop and luxury goods emporium in Aberdeen.
The Forbes-Mackenzie Act permitting vatting of whiskies when in a bonded warehouse was passed in 1853. A larger variety of blended malts were now available to vendors to sell.
In 1915, when WW I was on, the whisky industry came under governmental pressure to help defray finances. David Lloyd George, the teetotaler Chancellor of the Exchequer, attempted to double the duty on spirits. He backed down after the whisky industry agreed to release its wares only after a minimum of three years’ maturation.
In those days, most whisky was bottled at between 15 and 22 degrees under UK proof as it was then known (48.6-44.6% abv in today’s terms).
In 1915, the Government Control Board permitted whisky to be sold at 35 degrees under proof (37.2% abv).
The same year, the Board tried to further reduce the strength of their spirit sold in military bases and urban areas to 50 degrees under proof (28.6% abv). The whisky industry protested and reached a compromise which standardised the strength of whisky everywhere in the UK at 42.9% abv (25 degrees under proof).
On 01 February 1917, the Government, with Lloyd George as Prime Minister, ruled that whisky had to be sold at no more than 30 degrees under proof (40% abv).
The aromatic complexity of a whisky is markedly different between 40% and 43%.
Sanity was restored by PM Ramsay MacDonald in 1929, who allowed registered Scotch Whisky to be sold at any strength up to cask strength, usually 63-65%, with increased duty for higher strength expressions.
The strength of whisky everywhere in the UK was standardised at 42.8% abv. Distillers had the option to use 40% abv if so desired.
Ballantine’s is comprised of some 50 single malts – mostly from Miltonduff and Glenburgie – and four grain whiskies.
The brand’s flagship blend – Ballantine’s Finest – was launched in 1910. Interestingly, the flagship brands of both Johnnie Walker & and Chivas Regal, viz., Johnnie Walker Black Label & Chivas Regal 25 YO were launched in 1909.
The business was sold to Barclay and McKinlay in 1919, who retained the Ballantine’s brand name in favour of Talisker.
In 1935, the group was sold to Canadian distiller Hiram Walker-Gooderham & Worts.
Hiram Walker began purchasing several distilleries, including Miltonduff and Glenburgie – both in 1936, and built the mammoth Dumbarton complex, which housed the largest grain distillery in Europe at that time.
In 2002, the Dumbarton plant was closed down and production shifted to Strathclyde grain distillery, although a large bonded warehouse complex and bottling plant still exist in Dumbarton.
The core portfolio consists of Finest, Limited, 12, 17, 21, 30 and 40-year-olds, while a lime-flavoured extension, Ballantine’s Brasil, was launched in 2013.
After a successful trial at Inverleven, the malt whisky distillery within the firm’s Dumbarton distillery complex in Dumbarton, it was decided to install a Lomond wash and spirit still at Glenburgie in Moray in 1958.
Christened Glencraig, its newmake spirit was distinct from Glenburgie’s, and gave Hiram Walker another malt for its blends without having to invest in a whole new distillery.
Glencraig was produced throughout the 1960s and ‘70s at Glenburgie on Speyside as a blending malt on a pair of Lomond stills.
While independent bottlings of Glencraig occasionally appear, it was never intended as a single malt in its brief life.
The Lomond stills were abandoned at Glenburgie in 1981.
The real Glen Isla is one of the famous Angus glens than runs north to the ski resort of Glenshee. On the other hand, the eponymous malt whisky was a short-lived experiment to produce a smoky Speyside malt at Glen Keith – the Speyside distillery Seagram built next to its Stathisla distillery in Keith in the late 1950s.
Glen Keith was experimental from the start, testing out triple distillation and gas-fired direct heating for its stills.
Among very rare bottlings of Glenisla, hardly any peat was found in a 1977 release from Signatory.
This was because Glenisla was peated in a very peculiar way. Under Seagram, Chivas Brothers had been sending 45-gallon drums of peated water from Stornaway to Glen Keith, where it was run through an angled condenser to concentrate the phenols. Apparently it was added 10 gallons at a time to the wash charge and its impact on the whisky must have been considerably less than using well-peated malt in the traditional way.
Glenisla was only produced in the 1970s, and then only for a couple of years.
The whisky was blended away, most notably in Chivas’ Century of Malts (a vatting of 100 different malt whiskies) in the 1990s.
Mosstowie was one of a handful of short-lived malt whiskies produced on Lomond stills within another distillery – in this case Miltonduff, near Elgin.
Lomond stills, compared to traditional pot stills, were a lot more versatile – you could adjust the position of the lyne arm and the number of rectifying plates in the neck to vary the amount of reflux and thus heaviness of the spirit.
It was deemed perfect for the company’s flagship blend – Ballantine’s Finest, and so Lomond stills were installed at Hiram Walker’s Inverleven, Glenburgie, Scapa and Miltonduff distilleries.
The whisky produced using Miltonduff’s Lomond stills was named Mosstowie, and while the majority was used for the Ballantine’s blend, there have been occasional independent bottlings as a single malt.
Seagram’s 100 Piper’s blend was once a popular brand in the UK, and claimed to be the fourth most popular Scotch in Scotland in 1988. Four years later it was decided to co-opt a famous Scottish regiment into the brand and rechristen it the ‘100 Pipers of the Black Watch,’ just in the UK.
There was just one piper on the label, and in due course the brand became simply The Black Watch blend.
This Act, when published, was limited to distillers only.
It took a further three years till grocers could carry out such blending on premises and sale under their own label legally, under an Extension to the French Treaty Act 1863.
In these three years, many other grocers got into the business full time—John Walker, George Ballantine, Peter Thomson of Beneagles, William Teacher and the Berry brothers are good examples. Matthew Gloag III of the Famous Grouse followed later.
The Chivas Brothers company came into being only in 1857, when John Chivas joined his elder brother James in his grocery, wine shop and luxury goods emporium in Aberdeen.
The Forbes-Mackenzie Act permitting vatting of whiskies when in a bonded warehouse was passed in 1853. A larger variety of blended malts were now available to vendors to sell.
In 1915, when WW I was on, the whisky industry came under governmental pressure to help defray finances. David Lloyd George, the teetotaler Chancellor of the Exchequer, attempted to double the duty on spirits. He backed down after the whisky industry agreed to release its wares only after a minimum of three years’ maturation.
In those days, most whisky was bottled at between 15 and 22 degrees under UK proof as it was then known (48.6-44.6% abv in today’s terms).
In 1915, the Government Control Board permitted whisky to be sold at 35 degrees under proof (37.2% abv).
The same year, the Board tried to further reduce the strength of their spirit sold in military bases and urban areas to 50 degrees under proof (28.6% abv). The whisky industry protested and reached a compromise which standardised the strength of whisky everywhere in the UK at 42.9% abv (25 degrees under proof).
On 01 February 1917, the Government, with Lloyd George as Prime Minister, ruled that whisky had to be sold at no more than 30 degrees under proof (40% abv).
The aromatic complexity of a whisky is markedly different between 40% and 43%.
Sanity was restored by PM Ramsay MacDonald in 1929, who allowed registered Scotch Whisky to be sold at any strength up to cask strength, usually 63-65%, with increased duty for higher strength expressions.
The strength of whisky everywhere in the UK was standardised at 42.8% abv. Distillers had the option to use 40% abv if so desired.
Ballantine’s is comprised of some 50 single malts – mostly from Miltonduff and Glenburgie – and four grain whiskies.
The brand’s flagship blend – Ballantine’s Finest – was launched in 1910. Interestingly, the flagship brands of both Johnnie Walker & and Chivas Regal, viz., Johnnie Walker Black Label & Chivas Regal 25 YO were launched in 1909.
The business was sold to Barclay and McKinlay in 1919, who retained the Ballantine’s brand name in favour of Talisker.
In 1935, the group was sold to Canadian distiller Hiram Walker-Gooderham & Worts.
Hiram Walker began purchasing several distilleries, including Miltonduff and Glenburgie – both in 1936, and built the mammoth Dumbarton complex, which housed the largest grain distillery in Europe at that time.
In 2002, the Dumbarton plant was closed down and production shifted to Strathclyde grain distillery, although a large bonded warehouse complex and bottling plant still exist in Dumbarton.
The core portfolio consists of Finest, Limited, 12, 17, 21, 30 and 40-year-olds, while a lime-flavoured extension, Ballantine’s Brasil, was launched in 2013.
After a successful trial at Inverleven, the malt whisky distillery within the firm’s Dumbarton distillery complex in Dumbarton, it was decided to install a Lomond wash and spirit still at Glenburgie in Moray in 1958.
Christened Glencraig, its newmake spirit was distinct from Glenburgie’s, and gave Hiram Walker another malt for its blends without having to invest in a whole new distillery.
Glencraig was produced throughout the 1960s and ‘70s at Glenburgie on Speyside as a blending malt on a pair of Lomond stills.
While independent bottlings of Glencraig occasionally appear, it was never intended as a single malt in its brief life.
The Lomond stills were abandoned at Glenburgie in 1981.
The real Glen Isla is one of the famous Angus glens than runs north to the ski resort of Glenshee. On the other hand, the eponymous malt whisky was a short-lived experiment to produce a smoky Speyside malt at Glen Keith – the Speyside distillery Seagram built next to its Stathisla distillery in Keith in the late 1950s.
Glen Keith was experimental from the start, testing out triple distillation and gas-fired direct heating for its stills.
Among very rare bottlings of Glenisla, hardly any peat was found in a 1977 release from Signatory.
This was because Glenisla was peated in a very peculiar way. Under Seagram, Chivas Brothers had been sending 45-gallon drums of peated water from Stornaway to Glen Keith, where it was run through an angled condenser to concentrate the phenols. Apparently it was added 10 gallons at a time to the wash charge and its impact on the whisky must have been considerably less than using well-peated malt in the traditional way.
Glenisla was only produced in the 1970s, and then only for a couple of years.
The whisky was blended away, most notably in Chivas’ Century of Malts (a vatting of 100 different malt whiskies) in the 1990s.
Mosstowie was one of a handful of short-lived malt whiskies produced on Lomond stills within another distillery – in this case Miltonduff, near Elgin.
Lomond stills, compared to traditional pot stills, were a lot more versatile – you could adjust the position of the lyne arm and the number of rectifying plates in the neck to vary the amount of reflux and thus heaviness of the spirit.
It was deemed perfect for the company’s flagship blend – Ballantine’s Finest, and so Lomond stills were installed at Hiram Walker’s Inverleven, Glenburgie, Scapa and Miltonduff distilleries.
The whisky produced using Miltonduff’s Lomond stills was named Mosstowie, and while the majority was used for the Ballantine’s blend, there have been occasional independent bottlings as a single malt.
Seagram’s 100 Piper’s blend was once a popular brand in the UK, and claimed to be the fourth most popular Scotch in Scotland in 1988. Four years later it was decided to co-opt a famous Scottish regiment into the brand and rechristen it the ‘100 Pipers of the Black Watch,’ just in the UK.
There was just one piper on the label, and in due course the brand became simply The Black Watch blend.
In a study published by the journal Chem, researchers
used fluorescent dyes to map age, area of origin and taste of drams from the
US, Scotland and Ireland. They hope to harness these findings and develop a
method of detecting counterfeit whisky and other alcohol.
During the 1860s, when
blending grain and malt whiskies was legalised, the Ushers began promoting new
whisky brands for the growing UK market.
They were among the first
to recognise the enormous opportunities for exporting Scotch around the world,
particularly to the US and in the vast territories of the British Empire. Their
most successful brand was Usher’s Old Vatted Glenlivet (also known as OVG).
OVG was once a vatted malt
– a mix of single malt whiskies – but by the 1880s it was most certainly what a
blended Scotch. The recipe consisted of just over 12% Smith’s Glenlivet, a very
small quantity of Royal Brackla (the Ushers owned a share in that business) and
some additional malt whisky from their Edinburgh distillery. The vast bulk of
the blend – two-thirds – was made up of inexpensive grain whisky from the
Caledonian distillery in Edinburgh.
Laphroaig hired Scotland’s first ever female distillery manager, Bessie Williamson, in 1954. Rachel Barrie (Bowmore Distillery) was the second female
master whisky blender and has paved the way for even more women joining the
industry.
After the introduction of taxes on distilling in
Scotland in the 17th century, illicit distillers had to go to great lengths to
avoid the taxman. There are accounts of barrels being hidden in surprising
places including beneath broody hens, in funeral corteges and barrels being
‘nursed’ by breastfeeding mothers.
Iceland is home to just two whisky distilleries, both
of which use sheep manure in place of coal/peat as a fuel for kilning barley.
The world’s most high-profile whisky collection of Scotch whisky known
is The Diageo Claive Vidiz Whisky Collection with a staggering 3,384 bottles.
Hotel Skansen, Öland,
Sweden holds the Guinness World Record for the most varieties of whisky
commercially available; 1,179 varieties available for purchase, over 10,000
bottles total.
Octogenarian Italian
collector Valentino Zagatti collected 2,951 rare bottles over the last 60 years
before selling it to investment firm Scotch Whisky International. It has the
world’s oldest bottle dating from 1843.
Lion’s Whisky is the home
of Diego Sandrin’s gargantuan collection of between 20-25,000 bottles on
display. The best 1,000 are with Sandrin, away from the public eye.
The record for the smallest bottle goes to White Horse,
who produced a bottle containing just 1.3 millilitres of whisky.
The record for the largest bottle of whisky goes to the
distillers of Famous Grouse, who created 1.7-metre bottle containing 228 litres
of whisky.
Kikori is a Japanese whisky made from 100 per cent
rice.
You can earn an academic degree in distilling.
The pepper mash in Tabasco sauce is aged in Jack
Daniel’s barrels before it is then made into the sauce distributed all over the
world.
One of the oldest bottles of Scotch whisky, the Old
Vatted Glenlivet 1862, was opened in 2017. Drops of the rare whisky were
captured inside 50 Swiss watches, the most expensive of which cost more than
£35,000.
For many whisky producers, the size and shape of the
still is as important a factor as barley, yeast or water to the character of
the spirit.
The Guinness World Record for the oldest bottle of
whisky in the world belongs to the Glenavon Special Liqueur Whisky. Bottled
between 1851 and 1858, it sold at auction for an astounding £14,850.
Glenfiddich means ‘valley of the deer’.
Canadian whisky was once known as ‘brown vodka’.
The Royal Brackla Distillery in Nairn, Scotland is
situated in the Cawdor Estate, the home of the fictional Thane of Cawdor,
Macbeth, in Shakespeare’s play.
In 1774, the regulated volume for the wash and liquor stills
was increased to 480 and 120 gallons respectively, which was the first victory
of the tax-paying producers over the home distillers.
Home distilling
was banned in 1781.
The Small Stills Act of 1816 abolished the distinction between the industries in the Highlands and the Lowlands. In addition the Act legalised stills holding 48 gallons and above, as well as a weaker wash. This Act, allowed the smaller producers to operate legally and increase the number of the legal distilleries from 36 in 1816 to 125 three years later.
The Excise Act of 1823 which gave a lot of incentives like tax-free warehousing and free export, multiplied the legal distilleries and reduced the illegal trade. By the end of 1825, the licensed distilleries under the new Act were doubled from 111 to 263.
The first license under the new law was obtained by Captain George Smith, the founder of The Glenlivet Distillery.
The Usher firm registered
Usher’s Old Vatted Glenlivet as a trademark in 1879. Then, with John G Smith of
The Glenlivet Distillery (owner of the single-word trademark ‘Glenlivet’), they
attempted to establish exclusive rights to the name of this historic whisky
region in connection with their brands.
In the UK, Smith went to
the High Court of Justice in 1882 to demand the removal from the Register of
Trademarks of other existing trade names that contained the word ‘Glenlivet’.
They were met with a
furious legal counter-attack. They questioned Ushers’ right to use the word in
the name of a product that was a blended Scotch and contained only a relatively
small proportion of Glenlivet whisky: they pointed out that the whisky trade
had long used the word to denote a whisky from the Glenlivet region – even
Usher had done so before Smith’s Glenlivet distillery was founded.
The Smith-Usher gambit
ended in failure. Using the word in addition to the names of their distilleries
(e.g. Benrinnes Glenlivet and Macallan Glenlivet) was legalised.
During Prohibition (1920–33), Bill McCoy fell on hard times and took to rum running on his schooner Henry L. Marshall. As he prospered, he bought a bigger schooner, the Arethusa.
He is credited with inventing the "burlock" – a package holding six bottles jacketed in straw, three on the bottom, then two, then one, the whole sewed tightly in burlap. It was compact and easy to handle and stow.
Bill McCoy pioneered a method of packing liquor(burlock) and could store up to 5,000 cases on the Arethusa. The expression “The Real McCoy” was used by fellow bootleggers to describe unadulterated spirits, particularly Scotch, because of the pride McCoy took in maintaining the quality of the name-brand liquors he transported.
Placing the schooner under British registry to avoid being US jurisdiction, Bill renamed the vessel Tomoka (after the river that runs through his hometown Holly Hill).
When the Coast Guard discovered McCoy, he established the system of anchoring large ships off the coast in international waters and selling liquor to smaller ships that transferred it to the shore. McCoy also smuggled liquor and spirits from the French islands of Saint-Pierre and Miquelon located south of Newfoundland.
On November 23, 1923, the U.S. Coast Guard Cutter Seneca, had orders to capture Bill McCoy and the Tomoka, even if in international waters. When the Tomoka was boarded under cover of the Seneca's guns, he immediately set sail and ran away with the boarding party – one lieutenant, one bos'n and thirteen seamen – and only upon their pleas did he heave to and put them back on the Seneca. He surrendered after the Seneca had fired four-inch shells at him.
The Chivas Brothers company came into being only in 1857, when John Chivas joined his elder brother James in his grocery, wine shop and luxury goods emporium in Aberdeen.
Mysteries surround Loch Ardnahoe: no one is quite sure how deep it is, while others say there’s a ghost of a charging white steed that rises out of the Loch on a full moon.
Ardnahoe is the 9th Islay distillery.
Ardnahoe – which means “Height of the Hollow” in Scottish Gaelic and gives Ardnahoe Distillery its name, is situated on the North-East coast of Islay, equidistant between Caol Ila and Bunnahabhain Distilleries.
Aber Falls Distillery (Aberfall Distyllfa Whisgi)in Abergwyngregyn, Wales, launched its first 100% Welsh single malt whisky on 17 May 2021.
Their copper stills are appropriately named Golchi, meaning wash in English and Gwirod, meaning spirit.
Douglas Laing & Co, the family firm behind the “Remarkable Regional Malts” Scotch Whisky range, unleashed Timorous Beastie “Meet the Beast”, a limited edition of the sleekit dram to amplify the flavour experience of their Highland Malt brand end May 2021.
Offered at a natural cask strength of 54.9% and matured exclusively in ex-American Bourbon barrels, the spirit is said to be a “massive amplification” of the original.
Douglas Laing’s Remarkable Regional Malts, the Ultimate Distillation of Scotland’s Malt Whisky Regions, encompasses The Epicurean Lowland Malt Scotch Whisky, Timorous Beastie (Highlands), Scallywag (Speyside), The Gauldrons (Campbeltown), Rock Island (Islands) and Big Peat (Islay). Beyond its Blended Malts expertise, the award-winning Douglas Laing portfolio also includes Provenance, Premier Barrel, Old Particular, Xtra Old Particular and XOP Black, collectively known as the firm’s “Exceptional Single Casks”.
In 2019, Laphroaig released a new Scotch whisky, The Ian Hunter Story Book One: Unique Character. It was presented in a novel manner, in the form of a heavy tome that, after a few pages, revealed a neat slot with a bottle holding liquid 30 years old nestled therein.
It was also the first chapter of a series of rare and collectable aged whiskies that honour the legacy of Ian Hunter. He was the last of the Johnston family to own and manage the Laphroaig distillery, between 1908 and 1944.
15 such books are planned. Each release is to contain an aged Laphroaig, set into a crafted book that would document a part of Ian’s legacy. Every year, a new chapter would be told, uncovering the history behind Laphroaig and the characters who created it.
Indian Amrut Fusion is not the only fusion whisky. The Glover Fusion Whisky Ltd. was originally formed as a small enterprise- TBG & Co- with the aim of producing a Scotch whisky to raise awareness of entrepreneur Thomas Blake Glover’s role in shaping modern Japan and celebrate Scotland’s historical, economical, cultural and social links to Japan.
5 blended malts have been made with Scotch and Japanese single malts, two with India’s Amrut single malts and one each with Australia and Holland.
Although the profile of Caol Ila as a single malt has been enhanced in recent years, the main function of the distillery is still the production of malt whiskies for the Johnnie Walker blends. Among single malt whisky lovers, Caol Ila is known as a relatively clean peated whisky - but the whisky that is used for blends is actually UNPEATED.
Caol Ila is the largest distillery on Islay by far, producing roughly a quarter of all the malt whisky that is distilled on the isle of Islay. As such, Caol Ila's capacity dwarfs better known malt whisky brands like Longmorn, Glenfarclas and Laphroaig and Lagavulin.
The 'Classic Malts' range of Diageo used to contain only six different single malts (Cragganmore, Dalwinnie, Glenkinchie, Lagavulin, Oban & Talisker).
In 2005, Cardhu, Clynelish and Glen Elgin were added.
During Prohibition (1920–33), Bill McCoy fell on hard times and took to rum running on his schooner Henry L. Marshall. As he prospered, he bought a bigger schooner, the Arethusa.
He is credited with inventing the "burlock" – a package holding six bottles jacketed in straw, three on the bottom, then two, then one, the whole sewed tightly in burlap. It was compact and easy to handle and stow.
Bill McCoy pioneered a method of packing liquor(burlock) and could store up to 5,000 cases on the Arethusa. The expression “The Real McCoy” was used by fellow bootleggers to describe unadulterated spirits, particularly Scotch, because of the pride McCoy took in maintaining the quality of the name-brand liquors he transported.
Placing the schooner under British registry to avoid being US jurisdiction, Bill renamed the vessel Tomoka (after the river that runs through his hometown Holly Hill).
When the Coast Guard discovered McCoy, he established the system of anchoring large ships off the coast in international waters and selling liquor to smaller ships that transferred it to the shore. McCoy also smuggled liquor and spirits from the French islands of Saint-Pierre and Miquelon located south of Newfoundland.
On November 23, 1923, the U.S. Coast Guard Cutter Seneca, had orders to capture Bill McCoy and the Tomoka, even if in international waters. When the Tomoka was boarded under cover of the Seneca's guns, he immediately set sail and ran away with the boarding party – one lieutenant, one bos'n and thirteen seamen – and only upon their pleas did he heave to and put them back on the Seneca. He surrendered after the Seneca had fired four-inch shells at him.
The Chivas Brothers company came into being only in 1857, when John Chivas joined his elder brother James in his grocery, wine shop and luxury goods emporium in Aberdeen.
Mysteries surround Loch Ardnahoe: no one is quite sure how deep it is, while others say there’s a ghost of a charging white steed that rises out of the Loch on a full moon.
Ardnahoe is the 9th Islay distillery.
Ardnahoe – which means “Height of the Hollow” in Scottish Gaelic and gives Ardnahoe Distillery its name, is situated on the North-East coast of Islay, equidistant between Caol Ila and Bunnahabhain Distilleries.
Aber Falls Distillery (Aberfall Distyllfa Whisgi)in Abergwyngregyn, Wales, launched its first 100% Welsh single malt whisky on 17 May 2021.
Their copper stills are appropriately named Golchi, meaning wash in English and Gwirod, meaning spirit.
Douglas Laing & Co, the family firm behind the “Remarkable Regional Malts” Scotch Whisky range, unleashed Timorous Beastie “Meet the Beast”, a limited edition of the sleekit dram to amplify the flavour experience of their Highland Malt brand end May 2021.
Offered at a natural cask strength of 54.9% and matured exclusively in ex-American Bourbon barrels, the spirit is said to be a “massive amplification” of the original.
Douglas Laing’s Remarkable Regional Malts, the Ultimate Distillation of Scotland’s Malt Whisky Regions, encompasses The Epicurean Lowland Malt Scotch Whisky, Timorous Beastie (Highlands), Scallywag (Speyside), The Gauldrons (Campbeltown), Rock Island (Islands) and Big Peat (Islay). Beyond its Blended Malts expertise, the award-winning Douglas Laing portfolio also includes Provenance, Premier Barrel, Old Particular, Xtra Old Particular and XOP Black, collectively known as the firm’s “Exceptional Single Casks”.
In 2019, Laphroaig released a new Scotch whisky, The Ian Hunter Story Book One: Unique Character. It was presented in a novel manner, in the form of a heavy tome that, after a few pages, revealed a neat slot with a bottle holding liquid 30 years old nestled therein.
It was also the first chapter of a series of rare and collectable aged whiskies that honour the legacy of Ian Hunter. He was the last of the Johnston family to own and manage the Laphroaig distillery, between 1908 and 1944.
15 such books are planned. Each release is to contain an aged Laphroaig, set into a crafted book that would document a part of Ian’s legacy. Every year, a new chapter would be told, uncovering the history behind Laphroaig and the characters who created it.
Indian Amrut Fusion is not the only fusion whisky. The Glover Fusion Whisky Ltd. was originally formed as a small enterprise- TBG & Co- with the aim of producing a Scotch whisky to raise awareness of entrepreneur Thomas Blake Glover’s role in shaping modern Japan and celebrate Scotland’s historical, economical, cultural and social links to Japan.
5 blended malts have been made with Scotch and Japanese single malts, two with India’s Amrut single malts and one each with Australia and Holland.
Although the profile of Caol Ila as a single malt has been enhanced in recent years, the main function of the distillery is still the production of malt whiskies for the Johnnie Walker blends. Among single malt whisky lovers, Caol Ila is known as a relatively clean peated whisky - but the whisky that is used for blends is actually UNPEATED.
Caol Ila is the largest distillery on Islay by far, producing roughly a quarter of all the malt whisky that is distilled on the isle of Islay. As such, Caol Ila's capacity dwarfs better known malt whisky brands like Longmorn, Glenfarclas and Laphroaig and Lagavulin.
The 'Classic Malts' range of Diageo used to contain only six different single malts (Cragganmore, Dalwinnie, Glenkinchie, Lagavulin, Oban & Talisker).
In 2005, Cardhu, Clynelish and Glen Elgin were added.
In 1826, Scotsman Robert Stein invented a basic column still. It is used to distill Irish whisky.
In 1830, the Irishman Aeneas Coffey, a former Inspector General of Excise, patented his improved column still. The efficiency of the technique and the smooth characteristics of the grain whisky have changed the drinking map of the world during the next centuries.
Around 1850, London based Andrew Usher & Co began
to sell a blended whisky called "Old vatted Glenlivet whisky", which
was a mixture of Glenlivet whisky with other malt whiskies. The idea came from
Usher wife, Margaret Balmer who was a talented blender of drinks.
Due to the vine aphid called phylloxera, which had
destroyed most of France's vineyards during the period 1868-1895, production of
Cognac fell by more than two thirds and whisky consumption gain a massive boost.
The magic formula which helped the whisky to conquer the British elite and the world in the following years was the blending of the rougher malt whiskies with the softer grain whiskies and prolonging the maturation process.
The first companies which was the pioneers of this
change were Andrew Usher & Co, Mackinlay's, Phipson's Black Dog, John Walker, John Haig, John Dewars, James Buchanan with
Black & White and James L. Mackie with White Horse.
Some of the key players of the whisky industry nowadays
used to be whisky dealers and wine merchants back in 19th century like Chivas
Brothers with Chivas Regal and Matthew Gloag & Sons with Famous Grouse.
Johnnie Walker used captains of passenger ships as his sales agents.
Johnnie Walker used captains of passenger ships as his sales agents.
In 1916, the British Government introduced measures to
reduce the whisky production including the reduction of the regulated alcohol
content for domestic sales from 43% to 40% and the increase of the minimum
maturation period for at least 3 years.
In 1917, during World War I, malt whisky production was forced to shut down due to shortage in the supply of grains.
During the 1920s, the alcohol prohibition in the United States and the Great Depression led to decline of production and increase in illegal alcohol trading.
In 1877, The Distillers Company (DCL), a company which played an important role in the evolution of the whisky industry was formed by a group of Scottish column still distillers. DCL is now part of Diageo.
In 1898, Pattison, Elder & Co, a blending company which had penetrated the whisky market for almost a decade with aggressive marketing and financing, filed bankruptcy. This fact created financial problems to a lot of distilleries which used to be their suppliers and created a crash in the whisky industry.
Britain's involvement in World War II played a significant role in spreading the whisky in Europe, America and Asia.
In 1962, Grants decide to start selling the 8 Year Old Glenfiddich "straight malt" which was the pioneer for the rebranding of Single Malt Whisky.
In China, Scotch drinkers like to mix their scotch with green tea, in Japan with water and ice, in Spain and France with cola and in the UK, with a little bit of water.
In 1917, during World War I, malt whisky production was forced to shut down due to shortage in the supply of grains.
During the 1920s, the alcohol prohibition in the United States and the Great Depression led to decline of production and increase in illegal alcohol trading.
On December 5, 1933, president Roosevelt ended the
alcohol prohibition with the legendary phrase: "What America needs now is
a drink"!
In 1877, The Distillers Company (DCL), a company which played an important role in the evolution of the whisky industry was formed by a group of Scottish column still distillers. DCL is now part of Diageo.
In 1898, Pattison, Elder & Co, a blending company which had penetrated the whisky market for almost a decade with aggressive marketing and financing, filed bankruptcy. This fact created financial problems to a lot of distilleries which used to be their suppliers and created a crash in the whisky industry.
In 1917, during World War I, malt whisky production was
forced to shut down due to shortage in the supply of grains.
During the 1920s, the alcohol prohibition in the United
States and the Great Depression led to decline of production and increase in
illegal alcohol trading.
Britain's involvement in World War II played a significant role in spreading the whisky in Europe, America and Asia.
The first new distillery built since 1900 was the Glen Keith Distillery in 1957, by Chivas Brothers.
In 1962, Grants decide to start selling the 8 Year Old Glenfiddich "straight malt" which was the pioneer for the rebranding of Single Malt Whisky.
In China, Scotch drinkers like to mix their scotch with green tea, in Japan with water and ice, in Spain and France with cola and in the UK, with a little bit of water.
Scotch whisky sells nearly 5 times more than regular
whisky.
An urban legend in Scotland states that there are
certain chemicals in whisky that only people that are genetically capable of
discerning them can taste, and this usually tastes like a ‘burnt donkey/ass’.
In 1962, Grants decided to start selling the 8 Year Old Glenfiddich "straight malt" which was the pioneer for the re-branding of Single Malt Whisky.
In English pubs, ale is ordered by pints and quarts. So
in old England, when customers got unruly, the bartender would yell at them to “Mind
your own pints and quarts.” This is where we get the phrase: 'mind your P's and
Q's'.In 1962, Grants decided to start selling the 8 Year Old Glenfiddich "straight malt" which was the pioneer for the re-branding of Single Malt Whisky.
In
1774, the regulated volume for the wash and liquor stills was increased to 480
and 120 gallons respectively, which was the first victory of the tax-paying
producers over the home distillers. In 1781, home distilling was banned.
The
Small Stills Act of 1816 abolished the distinction between the industries in
the Highlands and the Lowlands. In addition the Act legalized stills holding 48
gallons and above, as well as a weaker wash. This Act, allowed the smaller
producers to operate legally and increase the number of the legal distilleries
from 36 in 1816 to 125 three years later.
The
Excise Act of 1823 which gave a lot of incentives like tax-free warehousing and
free export, multiplied the legal distilleries and reduced the illegal trade.
By the end of 1825, the licensed distilleries under the new Act were doubled
from 111 to 263.
The
first license under the new law was obtained by Captain George Smith, the
founder of The Glenlivet Distillery.
In
1826, Robert Stein invented a basic column still.
In
1830, the Irishman Aeneas Coffey, a former Inspector General of Excise,
patented his improved column still. The efficiency of the technique and the
smooth characteristics of the grain whisky have changed the drinking map of the
world during the next centuries.
In 1740 Admiral Vernon of the British fleet decided to
water down the navy's rum. The sailors weren't too pleased and
called Admiral Vernon "Old Grog," after the woollen *grogram coats he wore.
'Grog' soon began to mean the watered down drink itself. When you were
drunk on this grog, you were 'groggy', a word still in use today.
*Grogram : A coarse, often stiffened fabric made of
silk, mohair, wool, or a blend of them.
A beer lover or enthusiast is called a cerevisaphile.
Collecting beer mats is called tegestology.
The oldest brewery in the United States is supposedly Yuengling in Pottsville, Pennsylvania - founded in 1829.
Beer Ads on television started in the 1940s. One of the first cheeky / funny beer ads was
Carling's: 'Hey Mabel--Black Label'. The
ad ran for 20 years from 1951; at the end of the advert, the barmaid winked at
the audience as she responded to: 'Hey Mabel--Black Label'.
There are only 12 Master Blenders of whisky in the entire world.
Unopened, a bottle of scotch can last more than 100 years.
2020 should see 124 malt and 4 grain distilleries in operation.
A proof gallon is a gallon
of liquid containing 50 percent alcohol by volume.
An aged female soothsayer cursed the parsimonious laird of the Isle of Jura distillery, Archibald Campbell, on eviction and prophesized that the last of the Campbell family to finally depart from the island would have only one eye and all of his earthly belongings would be carried in a cart pulled by a lone white horse. In 1938, Charles Campbell fell on hard times. Blind in one eye as a result of a World War I injury, he was seen walking his white horse and all his possessions to the pier, leaving Jura for good.
A beer lover or enthusiast is called a cerevisaphile.
Collecting beer mats is called tegestology.
The oldest brewery in the United States is supposedly Yuengling in Pottsville, Pennsylvania - founded in 1829.
Isle of Jura Single Malt
has brought out four expressions of its malt, each of which bear the unique
symbols associated with the legend of its birth, and with a bit of the island’s
history thrown in for good measure.
Origin 10, which sports
the Celtic symbol for birth, beginnings, and the forces of nature is, quite
literally, the whisky that started it all.
Next, Superstition is
adorned with a silver Egyptian “ankh.” Pour the whisky with the ankh in the
center of your palm to bring good fortune.
Prophecy, named after a
three hundred year old Diurach prophecy, wears the symbol of an all- seeing
eye.
There are only 12 Master Blenders of whisky in the entire world.
Four bottles of Johnnie
Walker are consumed every second.
Unopened, a bottle of scotch can last more than 100 years.
2020 should see 124 malt and 4 grain distilleries in operation.
Pattison and Co., a whisky
company of the 1890s spent heavily on advertising their brands of blended
whisky like “The Doctor” and “The Gordon.” The latter featured Major General
Charles Gordon, of Khartoum fame, in formal uniform on the label.
At one point, Pattison and
Co. gave away 500 African grey parrots, which had been trained to shout out
“buy Pattison whisky” and “Pattison whisky is the best” to their retail
customers; the first example of in-store interactive advertising.
Between 1898 and 1924, 77
distillers went bust.
The Volstead Act (Prohibition Act) had broad
exemptions for the use of ethanol or grain alcohol for “fuel, dye and other
lawful industries and practices, such as religious rituals.” In addition, ten
licenses were authorized for the production of “medicinal whiskey”, but only
six companies applied for them. These were: Brown-Foreman, Glenmore (now owned
by Sazerac), Schenley, Stitzel Distillery (predecessor of Stitzel-Weller and
now both owned by Diageo), Frankfort Distilleries (now Four Roses), and American
Medicinal Spirits (AMS which became National Distilleries then, eventually,
part of Beam and now part of Suntory).
In 1927, records from the
Ontario provincial government show that boats carrying a total of 3,388,016
gallons of “hard liquor” had left Windsor, Ontario for Detroit. In that year,
US agents were able to seize only a paltry 148,211 gallons—roughly four percent
of what was shipped.
An aged female soothsayer cursed the parsimonious laird of the Isle of Jura distillery, Archibald Campbell, on eviction and prophesized that the last of the Campbell family to finally depart from the island would have only one eye and all of his earthly belongings would be carried in a cart pulled by a lone white horse. In 1938, Charles Campbell fell on hard times. Blind in one eye as a result of a World War I injury, he was seen walking his white horse and all his possessions to the pier, leaving Jura for good.
Is that ghostly old woman satisfied with the array of whisky now on the island? Locals say she hasn’t yet returned. However, if she ever does, a bottle of a 16 YO, the locals’ favourite, is kept hidden in a secret cave and it has her name written all over it.
Major James Grant was the
first man in the Highlands to own a car and his Glen Grant was also the first
distillery to have a light bulb illuminate its rooms.
Bruichladdich and Arran Bere Barley is an idiosyncratic barley variety that has survived in some of Scotland’s remotest outposts for up to 6,000 years, nearly became extinct 20 years ago, and is now undergoing a resurgence.
The distillation process, the key segment of whisky production was invented around four thousand years ago in the ancient civilizations of Babylon and Mesopotamia.
It’s a common misconception that single malt whisky is the product of one cask. In fact, it is the product of a single distillery and may actually come from several casks therein, a blend of malts of that specific distillery.
Bruichladdich and Arran Bere Barley is an idiosyncratic barley variety that has survived in some of Scotland’s remotest outposts for up to 6,000 years, nearly became extinct 20 years ago, and is now undergoing a resurgence.
The distillation process, the key segment of whisky production was invented around four thousand years ago in the ancient civilizations of Babylon and Mesopotamia.
First detailed description
of distillation came from ~100AD, when Greeks distilled sea water into drinking
water.
There are over 5000 types
of Single Malt Whisky.
A Quart is the original British measure of volume in their whisky bottles. This was equal to roughly 1.132 L, one fourth of one Imperial Gallon(~4.55L). Johnnie Walker's older whisky bottles are often found in Duty Free stores with a volume of 1.125L.
Whisky can exceptionally
well withstand cold temperatures. Heroic Polar Explorers carried whisky on
their journey to the South Pole, and whisky remained liquid even at -30 degrees
Celsius.
Whisky can age only in
wooden casks. In glass bottles it can survive for 100 years, but it will not
change its flavour.
The colour of the whisky comes
from oak casks (also around 60% of its flavour), and from a small amount of
caramel colouring.
85% of the Single Malt
Whiskies comes from Scotland.
Whisky and rum represented
majority of drinks that were used on the ships during the famous “Golden Age of
the Piracy”.
Five largest regional made
whiskies are Scotch Whisky, Irish Whiskey, Indian Whisky, Kentucky Bourbon and
Canadian Whisky.
To this day Irish and
Scotts have disputes about who was first to make whisky.
It’s a common misconception that single malt whisky is the product of one cask. In fact, it is the product of a single distillery and may actually come from several casks therein, a blend of malts of that specific distillery.
The reason so many
distilleries rely on local employees – often generations of families – is
because it’s reckoned that such workforces produce crucially consistent styles.
World Whisky Day is on the
third Saturday in May each year.
Efforts began as early as the 1960’s to eliminate the confusing fractions brought about by the pint, quart, and US/Imperial gallon measurements and by the late 1970’s efforts were underway to convert liquor bottle sizes to the metric system. They managed in both the UK and the US, thank goodness.
Eden Mill became Scotland's first combined brewery and distillery when they began the production of Scotch whisky and gin in 2014.
By 2010 only Tamdhu still used Saladin boxes for malting, in which a lot of malt can be produced in one batch since the malt layer can be up to 1 metre high. Tamdhu produced the malt for Macallan, Glenrothes and other distilleries in the corporate group.
Distilleries with their own maltings are: Balvenie, Bowmore, Glen Garioch, Glen Ord, Highland Park, Laphroaig, Speyburn, Kilchoman, Laphroaig, Benriach and Springbank.
The Athenaeum Hotel in London sells a whisky called “The Athenaeum Speyside Blended Malt Scotch Whisky”. The label mentions that the whisky also contains Highland whisky. This is indefensible, but their argument is that The Macallan is geographically as Speyside as you can get, but the distillery uses “Highland” on the label.
In America, “Whiskey” is the most common spelling, but well-known brands like Maker’s Mark or George Dickel use the “whisky” spelling. The official US regulations for distilled spirits use “whisky” throughout.
The distillation process,
the key segment of whisky production, was invented around four thousand years
ago in the ancient civilizations of Babylon and Mesopotamia.
First detailed description
of distillation came from ~100AD, when Greeks distilled sea water into drinking
water.
There are over 5000 types
of Single Malt Whisky.
Moderate use of whisky can
bring many benefits to the human metabolism. It can prevent stroke, dementia,
heart attack, clotted arteries, increase good cholesterol and fight against
cancer cells.
Whisky can exceptionally
well withstand cold temperatures. Heroic Polar Explorers carried whisky on
their journey to the South Pole, and whisky remained liquid even at -30 degrees
Celsius.
Scotch whisky is mostly distilled
twice, Irish whisky thrice.
Whisky can age only in
wooden casks. In glass bottles it can survive for 100 years, but it will not
change its flavour.
Colour of the whisky comes
from oak casks (also around 60% of its flavour), and from a small amount of
caramel colouring.
85% of the Single Malt
Whiskies comes from Scotland.
Whisky and rum represented
majority of drinks that were used on the ships during the famous “Golden Age of
the Piracy”.
Five largest regional made
whiskies are Scotch Whisky, Irish Whiskey, Indian Whisky, Kentucky Bourbon and
Canadian Whisky.
To this day Irish and
Scotts have disputes about who was first to make whisky.
It’s a common
misconception that single malt whisky is the product of one cask. In fact, it
is the product of a single distillery and may actually come from several casks
therein, a blend of malts of that specific distillery.
The reason so many
distilleries rely on local employees – often generations of families – is
because it’s reckoned that such workforces produce crucially consistent styles.
A ‘Fifth’ is an American
term for one fifth of one US Gallon, some 3780 ml, which works out to 755 ml.
Efforts began as early as the 1960’s to eliminate the confusing fractions brought about by the pint, quart, and US/Imperial gallon measurements and by the late 1970’s efforts were underway to convert liquor bottle sizes to the metric system. They managed in both the UK and the US, thank goodness.
The Great Gorbals Disaster
1906- one of the colossal washbacks in the Adelphi/ Ardnamurchin distillery
owned by DCL collapsed, engulfing the neighbouring street in a tidal wave of
alcohol and resulting in fatalities.
In 1993 Jamie Walker revived
the Adelphi name as an independent bottler in order to explore the mysteries of
malt whisky and to make a limited number of rare, well-aged and top quality
malt whiskies available to the discerning whisky enthusiast. Charles Maclean is now
Adelphi's "Chief Nose"
First Spirit produced at Ardnamurchan
Distillery in 2014.
The history of distilling
on the Ballindalloch Estate dates back to the 1820’s when a distillery was
built at Delnashaugh, above the junction of the rivers Avon and Spey. Ballindalloch
is a small & picturesque distillery in Speyside.
Dornoch distillery is a
crowd funded project near the Dornoch Castle hotel.
Eden Mill became Scotland's first combined brewery and distillery when they began the production of Scotch whisky and gin in 2014.
By 2010 only Tamdhu still used Saladin boxes for malting, in which a lot of malt can be produced in one batch since the malt layer can be up to 1 metre high. Tamdhu produced the malt for Macallan, Glenrothes and other distilleries in the corporate group.
The malt from such
maltings costs the distilleries up to 50% more than industrially produced malt
from specialised large-scale maltings (e.g. Port Ellen).
Distilleries with their own maltings are: Balvenie, Bowmore, Glen Garioch, Glen Ord, Highland Park, Laphroaig, Speyburn, Kilchoman, Laphroaig, Benriach and Springbank.
Scotland's oldest
continuously operating distillery is Strathisla Distillery. It is the home of
the Chivas blended whisky brand and it used to be called Miltown Distillery
until 1870.
The Athenaeum Hotel in London sells a whisky called “The Athenaeum Speyside Blended Malt Scotch Whisky”. The label mentions that the whisky also contains Highland whisky. This is indefensible, but their argument is that The Macallan is geographically as Speyside as you can get, but the distillery uses “Highland” on the label.
In America, “Whiskey” is the most common spelling, but well-known brands like Maker’s Mark or George Dickel use the “whisky” spelling. The official US regulations for distilled spirits use “whisky” throughout.
A new whisky crisis looms
– Scotch distillers are running out of names. The Glenlivet Founder’s Reserve NAS
was introduced to celebrate 1 million sold cases in the past 12 months. But
there is already a Founder’s Reserve by Glen Garioch on the market. Astonishingly,
Glenlivet had already launched a whisky named Founder’s Reserve in 2011 to
commemorate their distillery expansion.
Glenlivet 12 has been
discontinued in a number of markets. It will be replaced by the recently
introduced Founder’s Reserve.
Diageo has put their plans
for certain distillery expansions on hold, including Teaninich, Mortlach and
Clynelish.
The last runnings of the distillation, called feints, are led back into the wash still.
Only Glenfiddich,
Springbank and Bruichladdich have their own bottling plants. All other
distilleries ship their casks to the big bottlers in Glasgow, Edinburgh or
Perth.
Usually between 30,000 and
60,000 bottles of the standard single malt whiskies are bottled in one batch,
depending on the capacity of the freight vehicle. Sales aren’t so high yet that
an automated bottling line for just one single malt whisky would be profitable.
This remains reserved for the big blended whiskies.
Pure alcohol tastes like
alcohol. A single malt whisky gets its taste from the heavier oils and fats and
the lighter esters and other flavour carriers from the wash. The further you
distill a whisky, the more it will lose its individual character.
During distillation, the
unique shape of the pot stills is the main contributing factor to the taste of
a whisky.
The last runnings of the distillation, called feints, are led back into the wash still.
Sizes of casks for maturation:
- 1 Quarter cask = 33 us. gal. (125 Litres)
- 1 Barrel = 41.7 us. gal. (158 Litres)
- 1 ASB = American standard barrel = 52.8 us. gal. (200 Litres)
- 1 Hogshead = 66 us. gal. (250 Litres)
- 1 Butt = 132 us. gal. (500 Litres)
- Puncheons (or Pungeons) and pipes 158.5 – 184.9 us. gal.: (600 – 700 litres) are used only rarely.
Perthshire's famous seven
small-scale farm distilleries were:
Cragganmore means "large rock" in Gaelic.
The Glen Garioch 46YO is the oldest official bottle from the distillery.
- Ballechin Distillery between 1810 and 1927
- Blair Athol, originally Aldour
- Glenturret, originally Hosh
- Auchnagie
- Aberfeldy
- Deanston
- Edradour
All the 750,000 litres of
spirit produced by Aberargie is likely to be destined for single malt sales,
but in 2014, Morrison & Mackay resurrected the Old Perth Scotch Blended
Malt Brand.
With just a 1,000-litre
wash still and a 500-litre spirit still, both of the alembic style, Strathearn
harks back to the small-scale, farm-based distilleries of yesteryear. Its
limited single malt releases to date have been snapped up eagerly by consumers
and collectors alike.
Glenfiddich 50 YO: The 50 year-old Glenfiddich was
created from two separate casks, dating back to 1955, which were married for
half a year before being bottled. Only 500 bottles were produced, and only 50
bottles are being released per year, over a 10 year period.
Long gone, Ballechin’s
neighbour distillery Edradour began issuing a Whisky named
"Ballechin" in their honour.
Ballechin failed because a
water dispute cutoff their supply of spring water.
Cragganmore means "large rock" in Gaelic.
Cragganmore still uses the
rather rare worm tubs to cool their Whisky after distillation.
In November 1972, Glen
Garioch released its first single malt in 180 years. Previously the Whisky was
used in blends like VAT 69, Grant's Standfast, Bell's and Drambuie liqueur. It
is pronounced Glen Geery.
In 1982, Glen Garioch
became the first distillery ever to use North Sea gas for heating.
The Glen Garioch 46YO is the oldest official bottle from the distillery.
Edradour was originally
called Glenforres when it was built in 1825.
Sotheby’s announced it will present “The Ultimate Whisky Collection” on September 27, 2019 in what it is calling “the most valuable collection of whisky ever to be sold at auction.”The collection is expected to fetch about £4 million.
Cask #263 yielded only 40
bottles and The Macallan commissioned two leading pop artists, Valerio Adami
and Peter Blake, to design the labels for just 24 bottles, equally split
between the pair.
Independent whisky bottler Douglas Laing & Co has moved into distilling with the acquisition of Perthshire-based single malt Scotch producer Strathearn Distillery.
Established in 1948, Douglas Laing’s Scotch whisky portfolio includes brands such as Xtra Old Particular (XOP), Old Particular, Timorous Beastie, Scallywag, Rock Oyster, Big Peat and The King of Scots.
Drams from Glenury Royal
are rare, but can be found, while bottlings from the now demolished distillery
come under the Garron and Downie brands.
Each Glenlivet gets its own colour.
Initially triple distilled, Talisker reverted to double distillation in 1928.
In 1960, a fire destroyed the stillhouse. The five stills lost in the fire were replaced by replicas still heated by coal in two years.
The
water used for production of Talisker Malts, from Cnoc nan Speireag (Hawk Hill), flows over peat
which adds additional complexity to the whisky.
Exports
of Scotch whisky reached a record level – well over £4.36bn in 2017.
More
than £25 million was spent on Scotch whisky in UK auctions alone during 2017,
and that figure is sure to reach even greater heights when full 2018 numbers
are released.
60-year-old
Macallan featuring labels designed by artists Peter Blake and Valerio Adami set
auction records – but they were all capped by the £1.2m spent in November on a
bottle hand-painted by Irish artist Michael Dillon.
In 2017, a year littered with auction records and with high-end whisky release prices reaching ever more stratospheric heights, it was refreshing to see one single malt – Craigellachie, with its ‘free’ 51-year-old release in October – taking a more philanthropic attitude.
Even
more distilleries are set to open, not to mention plans to expand production at
a number of established facilities, such as LVMH’s Ardbeg, Glenmorangie and
relative newcomer Eden Mill.
Among
the highlights, there was news of a ‘Whisky Galore’ distillery for South Uist and
Gordon & MacPhail’s new venture at Craggan on Speyside.
There
are plans to resurrect whisky-making at Rosebank and Brora (with Port Ellen to
follow), and a project to bring Dallas Dhu back into production.
On
the flipside, the last of Glenugie’s remaining warehouse buildings was
earmarked for demolition.
The
millions being invested in whisky aren’t just about distillation, however: as
record numbers of tourists flock to visitor centres and tours, Diageo announced
plans to spend £150m on upgrading its facilities, including a new Johnnie
Walker attraction in Edinburgh and ambitious plans for distilleries including
Caol Ila and Glenkinchie.
Despite
becoming the number one Scotch whisky magazine online in the world with 2.5
million users, Scotchwhisky.com is closing down due lack of finance.
In
June 1967 a parcel of Sherry casks was filled with Laphroaig new make spirit
and sold to Cadenhead. One was bottled at 15 years old, and ended up being
labelled and imported by one Silvano S Samaroli from Italy. These were recently
auctioned at £61,000 per bottle.
Samaroli
also produced the ‘Flowers’ series, a small batch of single malts all released
at 46% ABV showcasing uncommon distilleries such as Coleburn and Teaninich.
Adelphi launched a Sherried,
13-year-old Benrinnes; a 10-year-old Bunnahabhain; a bizarre nine-year-old Caol
Ila and a blended malt comprising whisky from unnamed Dufftown distilleries.
Scotch whisky makers are
facing the prospect of paying a 25% tariff on exports of single malt to the US
from 18 Oct 2019.
According to the Scotch
Whisky Association (SWA), single malt represents more than half the total value
of UK products on the tariff list, at more than US $420m.
The EU had imposed a 25%
tariff on imports of US whiskey earlier, leading to a drop in imports of US
whiskey by 21%.
Blended Scotch is not
(yet) subject to tariffs; the US is responsible for 22% of global Blended Scotch
whisky imports by value, and 11% by volume.
Amidst continued
uncertainty over the timing, nature and impact of Brexit, the last thing Scotch
whisky distillers need is a blow to the industry’s most lucrative export
destination.
Whyte & Mackay is to
give away 1,500 bottles of its Whyte & Mackay Rare 50 Year Old 44.6% ABV
Blended Scotch, created to mark the company’s 175th anniversary, as part of a
promotional competition. This is open to residents of only GB, Scotland & Wales
only. NI is excluded.
Ardbeg has revived on 01
Oct 2019 its peatiest expression, Ardbeg Supernova, four years after the fourth
and ‘final’ release of the cult whisky for sale to members of the Ardbeg Committee.
Royal Brackla is to
relaunch its core range of whiskies next year with new 12-, 18- and 21-year-old
single malts, each finished in different ex-Sherry casks. These will be at 46%
ABV as against 40% the last time.
The Clynelish distillery uses water piped down from Clynemilton Burn.
The primary single malts in Chivas Regal are Strathisla, Braeval and Allt-a-Bhainne. The Glenlivet 12 YO also features in the mix.
Many more tidbits and fun facts are located here (tidbits) and here (fun facts). Or you could just scroll down to those posts.
The Tobermory distillery
is the only distillery on the island of Mull, due north of Islay and the isle
of Jura, and was initially named Ledaig.
The brand name “Tobermory”
is used for all their unpeated malt whisky, while the peated whisky (35 ppm) is
sold as “Ledaig.”
The malt whisky produced
on Mull is first shipped to the Deanston distillery on the mainland for filling
into casks and then transported onward to the Bunnahabhain Distillery on Islay
for maturation.
Tobermory is a distillery
that is often affected by drought, which dries up its water source, as happened
in both 2012 and 2013. The distillery shuts down for up to two months in a
drought-affected year.
Highland Park is one of
the few distilleries to malt its own barley, using locally cut peat. Part of
its flavour comes from the heather used on the peat fire to help dry the malt,
which imparts a delicate touch, resulting in the unique taste of all Highland
Park expressions with no semblance with Islay malts.
In 1984, Highland Park was
the only whisky ever to have scored a rating of 100 percent by the regular
tasting team of The Scotsman. It has received unparalleled encomiums.
Noted whisky critic
Michael Jackson called Highland Park, “The greatest all-rounder in the world of
malt whisky.”
The Tobermory, Ledaig,
Black Bottle, Bunnahabhain, and Deanston brands are now all owned by Burn
Stewart. They have upgraded the range and raised the ABV to 46.3%. They have
also developed new glass bottles and now advertise that they no longer
chill-filter their brands.
The Arran markets whiskies
‘finished’ in Marsala and Moscatel de Seutbal casks.
The original Jura
distillery of 1810, the only one on Jura Island, was closed in 1918 and rebuilt
in 1963 by whisky blender and merchant Charles Mackinlay & Co.
Indian business tycoon
Vijay Mallya bought Whyte & Mackay in May 2007 for USD 1.2 billion. This
put the Dalmore, Fettercairn, Isle of Jura and Tamnavulin distilleries under
Indian control.
Ben Nevis produces 12
different varieties of blended whisky, the most famous being Long John; named
after the nickname of the first owner John McDonald.
Long John has now been
bought by Pernot Ricard. Its reviews are excellent.
The Clynelish distillery uses water piped down from Clynemilton Burn.
The primary single malts in Chivas Regal are Strathisla, Braeval and Allt-a-Bhainne. The Glenlivet 12 YO also features in the mix.
One malt whisky from
Springbank became a legend: it was matured in ex-rum casks from the Caribbean
and took on a green colour.
The Angel’s Share fluid
level decreases by 2% each year. Of this, the alcohol content of the whisky is
0.2% to 0.6%.
Only Glenfiddich,
Springbank and Bruichladdich have their own bottling plants. All other distilleries
ship their casks to the big bottlers in Glasgow, Edinburgh or Perth.
Usually between 30,000 and
60,000 bottles of the standard single malt whiskies are bottled in one batch.
Independent bottlers such
as Gordon & MacPhail or Douglas Laing buy new make from the distilleries
and then mature it on their own. They generally bottle the whisky straight from
the cask. Each of these bottles contains a one-of-a-kind single malt whisky.
These single malt whiskies
taste differently from year to year, or even from cask to cask. Also the
alcohol content can vary greatly. Sometimes it’s at cask strength or reduced to
46%, 43% or 40%.
Independent bottlers rarely
chill-filter their whiskies.
Since 18 October 2019, a
25% tariff has been implemented on various goods when exported from the EU to
the US. Wine and several spirits including single malt whisky, are affected.
Over the next 12 months,
exports of Scotch single malt are expected to decline by 20% and will become
less competitive in the US market.
This tariff was lifted
soon after Trump was beaten by Joe Biden in the Presidential Elections in the USA in 2020.
The US imported Scotch
whisky worth £1 billion in 2018. 33% of the imported Scotch whisky was single
malt.
Aultmore is one of the many victims of the infamous Pattison crash.
Another of Speyside’s
workhorses, Allt-a-Bhainne was one of the first distilleries designed to be
operated by one person.
Allt-a-Bhainne is only
very occasionally seen as a single malt bottling, that too as independent
bottling.
Allt-á-Bhainne,
(pronounced Ollt-err-VANE) founded in 1975 by Chivas Brothers Ltd. The unusual
name is derived from the Gaelic, ‘Allt a’bhainne’ meaning ‘burn of milk’.
The brand is used in the
Chivas Regal, Passport and 100 Pipers blended scotch whiskies.
Today there are
no original bottlings of Allt-A-Bhainne.
The Allt-A-Bhainne
distillery is merely the production stage for the distillation.
There have
never been any malting floors at Allt-A-Bhainne distillery.
The distillery has pagoda
shaped kiln tops, but they have never served any function.
The malt from the Knockdhu
distillery was originally re-named an Cnoc in 1993 to avoid confusion with
Knockando, but the name only took hold after new owners Inver House, who bought
the distillery in 2001, had relaunched the an Cnoc brand in 2003.
Knockdhu itself was
founded in 1894 after the discovery of several springs on the nearby Knock
hill. The knock hill is known to locals as anCnoc, from the Gaelic for black
hill.
Ailsa Bay was built within
Girvan grain distillery in 2007 to produce malt whisky for William Grant's
range of blends.
One heavily peated NAS
single malt is on offer. It is definitely an eight YO +
Aultmore distillery was
completed in 1896, and was powered by a water wheel until 1898 when a steam
engine was fitted.
This engine was in almost
continuous use for nearly 70 years,and was only decommissioned in 1969 when
electricity was finally introduced to the distillery.
Aultmore is one of the many victims of the infamous Pattison crash.
The Foggie Moss conceals Aultmore
whisky’s water source & filters it through gorse & heather for
increased purity.
The vast majority of the Aultmore
single malt goes into blends. The only official bottling at present is a 12
year-old expression released in 2004.
In late 2014 Bacardi chose
Aultmore as one of the five distilleries to be part of their The Last Great
Malts-campaign.
GlenDronach is a lot older
than the label says.
The distillery was closed
from 1996 until 2001, and that gap of six years forces GlenDronach to use older
whisky than necessary. It's 12 YO of 2013 is mostly 18 YO.
There is a worry that in a
couple of years, when they can finally release whiskies with accurate age
statements, they may not be able to produce the same top quality as they do
now.
Hazelburn distillery,
established in 1825, closed down in 1930. Nowadays the distillery lives on
through the namesake triple-distilled spirit produced by Springbank.
Springbank has a capacity
of 750,000 liters of alcohol per annum. About ten percent is dedicated to
Hazelburn.
20% of the Dornoch Firth
land area is covered by Scotland's 'National Scenic Areas (NSA)' - areas which
are considered nationally important for their scenic quality.
Auchentoshan, meaning
`Corner of the field’ in Gaelic, produces a delicate, smooth and light single
Malt Whisky the subtle aroma and flavour of which is achieved by Triple
Distillation.
Auchentoshan is one of the
last active distilleries in the Lowlands.
Edradour returned to the
Glenforres name as Glenforres-Glenlivet after being acquired by William
Whiteley company in the 1920s to produce malt fortheir King's Ransom blend. It
is now back to Edradour.
Almost all of Balmenach's
sherry-matured malt goes to blends, including Johnnie Walker. Diageo had
released some Balmenach as part of their Flora & Fauna range, but this was
discontinued. There have been occasional independent bottlings.
Balmenach distillery is
nestled at the bottom of the Haughs of Cromdale in the Spey valley, where, on 30
April 1690, an army of Jacobite soldiers was ambushed by dragoon guards during
their sleep. Many were slain and the remaining fled nearly naked, effectively
ended the Jacobite rising in the Highlands.
In the early 1800 three
brothers crossed these hills from Tomintoul and set up a farm. One of them was
a James McGregor who also set up an illicit still on the site. Shortly after
the licensing act was introduced James McGregor obtained a license for his distillery
formally establishing it in 1824.
As is predominant of Inver
House Distillers, traditional machinery and methods are used to this day.
Balmenach uses a cast iron
mash tun mashing slightly more than 8 tonnes every 7.5 hours. The wash is
fermented in six Douglas Fir washbacks for a minimum of 50 hours before it is
sent to the stillhouse for distillation.
The original distillery ran in tandem with the new distillery under the names of Clynelish A and Clynelish B.
The first Banff was built
in Inverboyndie, Speyside in 1824 by James Mckilligan & Co.and changed
hands three times before closing in 1862 when with James Simpson & Son, who
moved site close by and restarted in 1863.
This new distillery
started well, but much of the equipment and distillery buildings were destroyed
by a fire in 1877. However, the warehouses and malting floor survived, and the
distillery was up and running again only six months later.
Due to the prevailing poor
economic climate pre and during WW II, the distillery was closed down by its
owners, with only the warehouses being used to mature stock. It was still
closed in 1941 when a lone German bomber took out warehouse No. 12.
Hundreds of barrels of
whisky ignited and contents were distributed into the local fields, rivers and
water courses, where several ducks were reported to have died from alcohol
poisoning.
Local cows were unable to
be milked for several days afterwards as they were unable to stand up. A
fireman who saved some whisky in his helmet during the rescue operation and
tried to distribute it among his colleagues was taken to court for petty
pilfering.
One famous release from
Bowmore is the Black Bowmore series: a collection of five sherry cask matured
single malts that are almost black in colour and have become some of the most
coveted whiskies ever released.
The first distillery on
Islay to receive a licence, Bowmore was officially founded in 1779. It is likely
that the founder, David Simpson, had been distilling in Bowmore since shortly
after his arrival on Islay in 1766.
The distillery now known
as Brora started life in 1819 when it was founded by the Marquis of Stafford,
later known as the Duke of Sutherland.
This notorious character
is more famous in Scotland for his part in the Highland Clearances, when he
evicted around 15,000 crofters from his land in order to farm sheep.
The Marquis started the
distillery to provide a market for his barley and to put the local moonshiners
out of business.
The distillery was
originally called Clynelish.
The malt produced at
Clynelish was sold only to private customers and not to any blender at all.
After WW II, demand from
blenders for Clynelish malt was extremely high, so to increase capacity, new
owners DCL built another distillery adjacent to the existing one in 1967-68 and
called that also Clynelish to cash in on that name.
The original distillery ran in tandem with the new distillery under the names of Clynelish A and Clynelish B.
This was not acceptable to
the Customs Authorities or the SWA.
The original distillery
was closed down in 1969 and then reopened bearing the name Brora. It then
operated intermittently, producing heavily peated (around 40ppm) whisky for
blending purposes.
In 1983, Brora shut down
fore good, though existing barrels are released as official bottlings every now
and then at astounding prices.
James Buchanan formed his own whisky company in 1884 after five years with blender Charles Mackinlay & Co. His flagship whisky was The Buchanan Blend, a light, smooth unpeated expression designed specifically to appeal to the English palate.
The expression, which initially incorporated Dalwhinnie, Clynelish and Glendullan malts, was named the Buchanan Blend and became an instant hit in London.
It was picked up by the Members Bar at the House of Commons in London. Buchanan renamed the blend Buchanan’s House of Commons Finest Old Highland whisky, and presented it in a dark glass bottle with a striking white label.
Before long, drinkers began ordering ‘that Black & White whisky’, and in 1902 the name was officially changed again to Black and White.
The brand was exported across the world, and in 1907, it was being ordered by the emperor of Japan.
By 1909, it had become the most popular blend in England.
While under the auspices of the DCL during the 1920s, the Black & White terriers began featuring more heavily in the brand’s advertising, quickly becoming iconic ambassadors for Buchanan’s flagship blend.
In 2013 the brand was given a contemporary makeover, and the terriers made the move onto the bottle’s label for the first time.
It is the fastest rising standard Blended Scotch over the last decade.
James Buchanan formed his own whisky company in 1884 after five years with blender Charles Mackinlay & Co. His flagship whisky was The Buchanan Blend, a light, smooth unpeated expression designed specifically to appeal to the English palate.
The expression, which initially incorporated Dalwhinnie, Clynelish and Glendullan malts, was named the Buchanan Blend and became an instant hit in London.
It was picked up by the Members Bar at the House of Commons in London. Buchanan renamed the blend Buchanan’s House of Commons Finest Old Highland whisky, and presented it in a dark glass bottle with a striking white label.
Before long, drinkers began ordering ‘that Black & White whisky’, and in 1902 the name was officially changed again to Black and White.
The brand was exported across the world, and in 1907, it was being ordered by the emperor of Japan.
By 1909, it had become the most popular blend in England.
While under the auspices of the DCL during the 1920s, the Black & White terriers began featuring more heavily in the brand’s advertising, quickly becoming iconic ambassadors for Buchanan’s flagship blend.
In 2013 the brand was given a contemporary makeover, and the terriers made the move onto the bottle’s label for the first time.
It is the fastest rising standard Blended Scotch over the last decade.
Bunnahabhain distillery was
built in 1881. Its name comes from the Gaelic, Bunnahabhain (Bu-na-ha-venn),
meaning ‘mouth of the river’, a reference to the Margadale, the river supplying
water to the distillery.
These waters do not run
through peat beds as at other distilleries on the Island. Most Bunnahabhain
whiskies are very lightly peated, if at all, at around 02 ppm. Special NAS/12 YO peated whiskies
are also produced here.
Abhainn Dearg Distillery
(pronounced Aveen Jarræk), or Red River in English, on the Isle of Lewis is the
first legal whisky distillery in the Outer Hebrides in almost two hundred
years.
Feints
contain the fusel oils responsible for headaches. Since the feints are cut off
rather early, people usually don’t get headaches after enjoying single malt
whisky.
The well known flagship
whiskies Hibiki 17 and Hakushu 12 are slated to be discontinued by parent
company Suntory.
The central problem with
the Japanese whisky industry: Supply is not meeting demand.
In the Highball cocktail,
Kakubin was the whisky of choice. Yamazaki and Hakushu stocks were earmarked
for Kakubin, putting pressure on single malts, which unfortunately couldn’t
cope with demand.
Japanese drinkers like
mixing their whisky with soda water.
A canned version of
Suntory's highball also made its way into supermarkets and homes, sparking a
new wave of consumer demand which pushed distillery stocks to their limit.
A 2014 TV show created an
explosion in domestic sales. TV show Massan was an enormous hit. It tells the
love story between two characters strongly based on one of Japanese whisky's
founders, Masataka Taketsuru of Nikka, and Rita Cowan, considered the "mother
of Japanese whisky."
Japanese whiskies may
contain non-Japanese whisky - and it's 100% legal.
Currently 27 Japanese
firms are importing bulk Scotch. SWA figures reveal that in the past five years
there has been a four-fold increase in bulk shipments to Japan. In 2017, bulk
blended malt exports rose to 1.4 million litres (+17% YOY), while bulk grain
shipments reached 1.7m litres.
Some of the above may be
destined for low-level blends, some however, seems destined to reappear on the
world market as ‘Japanese’ whisky.
Ben Nevis distillery,
owned by Nikka, ships a lot of whisky to Japan that's then used in Japanese
blends.
While Japan was preoccupied
with Scotch single malts, the UK, other parts of Asia and Europe were
developing a penchant for Japanese whisky.
A total of 14 products
were delisted in all markets and comprised all single malt Yoichi and Miyagikyo
whiskies, the Tsuru 17 Years Old ceramic bottle, Tsuru 17 Years Old glass
decanter, G&G White, Black Nikka 8 Year Old and Malt Club.
Irish pot stills were
large pieces of sheet metal copper riveted together. They were mostly fired by
coal. Cleaning them was a pain.
There was a separate room
below the pot stills used to fire the pot.
The workers had a bell and
a string to communicate with the stillman above in this very loud and busy
environment.
The big stills of the
distilleries needed cooling after the lyne arm. This could be either done by a
steady flow of cold water or by providing a large enough heat sink in the form
of a big tub.
Bushmills and New Midleton
use triple distillation.
Irish whiskey, mainly
grain and blended whiskey, is also produced on column stills. High quality Malt
whiskey is still produced on pot stills only.
A single malt Scotch Whisky
gets its taste from the heavier oils and fats and the lighter esters and other
flavour carriers from the wash.
The more you distill a
whisky, the more it loses its individual character.
During distillation, the
unique shape of the pot stills is the main contributing factor to the taste of
a whisky.
A long and slim shape
produces soft new make (e.g. Glenmorangie), while a short, squat shape produces
strong, intense flavours (e.g. Lagavulin).
The intensity of the
heating is also important for the taste. If you heat too vigorously, many
accompanying substances and fusel oils will get into the whisky, which will not
be as smooth had it been distilled slowly.
The wash stills usually
have a capacity of 20,000 to 30,000 litres, while the spirit stills generally
2/3s that volume.
Pot stills are replaced
after 15 to 25 years, by when the thickness of the wall of the copper pot
decreases to 4 to 5 mm.
The final exiting new make
is run through a case usually made from glass and polished brass, the spirit
and sample safe.
The stillman checks the
quality and runs the spirit back into the still or into the spirit receiver
using valves and levers. This is done only by visual inspection and
instruments. A stillman cannot taste the spirit!
Foreshots take about 30
minutes to run through. The middle cut is then extracted for about 3 hours. The
last run of the distillation, called feints, is led back into the spirit still.
Feints contain higher
concentrations of propanol, isopropanol and fusel oils.
The success of Johnnie
Walker White Walker and the Game of Thrones malts boosted sales for Diageo,
Scotland’s largest distiller, last year.
In its 2018/19 end of year
financial results, Diageo claimed the special editions boosted sales for its
Scotch brands, with Johnnie Walker up 7%, and its single malts up 12%.
Diageo’s entire Scotch
whisky portfolio, which accounts for a quarter of its income and also includes
the J&B, Buchanan’s and Old Parr blends, saw sales increase by 6% during
the year.
The group claimed that the
launch of Johnnie Walker White Walker in North America, where sales of the
brand increased 6%, ‘recruited new consumers in Scotch’, while ‘Asia Pacific,
North America and Europe benefitted from the launch of the Game of Thrones
Single Malt Scotch Whisky Collection’.
However the launches
failed to offset a continued decline for Scotch whisky in Europe, where sales
of Diageo’s blended Scotch J&B fell by 10%.
Johnnie Walker A Song of
Ice and A Song of Fire are two limited edition blends inspired by mystical beasts in the
show: the Direwolves that served the House of Stark, and the dragons commanded
by Daenerys Targaryen, the ‘Mother of Dragons’.
In June 1967 a parcel of
Sherry casks was filled with Laphroaig new make spirit. No one present realised
that it would eventually command a price of £61,000 for a single bottle at auction.
Independent bottler
William Cadenhead bottled one, at 15 years and ended up being labelled and
imported by one Silvano S Samaroli from Italy.
Silvano Samaroli, who
passed away in February 2018, had also signed the bottle, making the item a
‘one of a kind whisky collectable’.
Another Samaroli bottling,
a Bowmore 1966 Bouquet, sold for £51,611.
Sotheby’s announced it will present “The Ultimate Whisky Collection” on September 27, 2019 in what it is calling “the most valuable collection of whisky ever to be sold at auction.”The collection is expected to fetch about £4 million.
The auction is led by The
Macallan 1926 from Cask #263 called “The Holy Grail of Whisky” at an estimated
£350,000 to 450,000. The bottle actually set a new world record after fetching
£1.5 million (US$1.9m) at the auction.
The Ultimate Whisky
Collection comprises what is undoubtedly the most comprehensive catalogue of
whisky ever to be offered by a single owner in a single auction.
Two more bottles were sold
individually and given private labels, one of which was hand-painted by Dillon.
The remaining 14 bottles
were adorned with a Fine & Rare label and are the oldest in the Fine &
Rare series by age and vintage.
A bottle of The Macallan
Valerio Adami 1926 60-year-old Scotch whisky once held the world record for
most expensive whisky sold at auction after fetching £848,750 (US$1.1m) at a
Bonhams sale in Edinburgh last year.
Family-owned spirits
producer William Grant & Sons has launched three “experimental” whiskies
from its Kininvie distillery, including a single malt, single grain and blended
Scotch, at ABVs of 46,46.2 & 42.8% respectively.
The three whiskies are
available to purchase online in the UK and in France. Each whisky carries an
RRP of £35 (US$43).
Independent whisky bottler Douglas Laing & Co has moved into distilling with the acquisition of Perthshire-based single malt Scotch producer Strathearn Distillery.
Highland single malt
whisky distillery Strathearn began production in 2013 and is a “pioneer of the
craft distilling scene”. The site, which also produces Scottish gin and rum,
encompasses distillation, warehouses and bottling.
The acquisition comes as
Douglas Laing progresses with the build of its £10.7 million (US$14m)
distillery in Glasgow. Clutha Distillery’s signature whisky, which will bear
the same name, will be a “high-end single malt with a heavy Sherry influence”.
Douglas Laing & Co has
reported double-digit growth for a fifth consecutive year.
Established in 1948, Douglas Laing’s Scotch whisky portfolio includes brands such as Xtra Old Particular (XOP), Old Particular, Timorous Beastie, Scallywag, Rock Oyster, Big Peat and The King of Scots.
Lowland distillery
Daftmill is side-stepping ‘bottle flippers’ by offering its 2008 vintage single
cask expression by the dram in select Scottish bars.
Berry Bros & Rudd and
Daftmill have teamed up to sell Daftmill Single Cask 2008 #68 in 25ml measures at
£10 (US$13). Bottles will not be available to buy.
Described as a first for
the industry, the expression will only be available to buy at venues operated
by Scottish chain The Independent Whisky Bars of Scotland.
Fifteen alcohol trade
groups have sent a letter to the US administration and European Commission
calling for an urgent end to 25% tariffs on EU goods, including single malt Scotch,
which could result in the loss of 8,000 jobs.
Edrington-owned Scotch
brand Highland Park has brought together three master whisky makers to
collaborate on single malt release Triskelion.
Edrington has launched a
refreshed packaging design for its Smoky Black expression, which champions the
black grouse. A new ad for Smoky Black in the UK features a grouse as it takes
a midnight stroll in the mountains. In the clip, a full moon is revealed upon
which the grouse is transformed into a “darker and smokier feathered version”.
Ian Macleod Distillers’
Smokehead Islay Scotch brand would make a macabre addition to any Halloween
party.
Elegant, slightly oily and
fragrant, think Oolong tea with a little smoke, Glenury Royal is a lesser
spotted malt, though occasionally bottles do appear from independent bottlers.
Two releases under the Diageo Rare Malts range showed tropical fruit
characters.
Even rarer are the
distillery’s own bottlings which came out under the names Garron and Downie.
The ‘Royal’ suffix was added in its earliest incarnation, thanks to then owner
Captain William Barclay being a personal friend of King William IV.
William Grant & Sons have
changed the appearance of its standard Glenfiddich range. Glenfiddich 12 and
Glenfiddich 15 are the first that to be introduced in a new design. Glenfiddich
18 is to follow next year (2020).
The Glenfiddich logo, a
golden stag, is now printed directly on the glass. It is embedded in a
"V", cut in the shape of the glass, standing for Valley of the Deer.
The typical triangular bottle shape of the Glenfiddich Single Malt is
preserved, though it is a bit more rounded; the bottle looks a little slimmer
with more distinctly cut shoulders.
Glenfiddich’s packaging
and bottles have changed a great deal over the years. But this is hardly
surprising. As the founder of the single malt category, Glenfiddich has always
been at the forefront of development and has never been scared to make bold,
eye-catching changes.
The new 12-year-old
Glenfiddich is called "Our Original Twelve", the new 15-year-old
"Our Solera Fifteen". The company hasn’t given information on the
re-design of the 18-year-old Small Batch Glenfiddich yet.
The Highland Park
Valfather completes the 2017 Viking Legend trilogy, along with the Highland
Park Valkyrie and the Highland Park Valknut. This third and final Viking Legend
edition focusses on the Norse godfather Odin himself and at 47% ABV, Valfather
presents the highest alcohol content of the trio.
For the Viking Legend
trilogy single malts, a larger proportion of heavily peated malt was used than usual.
And among the whiskies of the Viking Legend series, Valfather is the smokiest,
according to Highland Park.
The Talisker Bodega 41
Years is the oldest official single malt ever released by the distillery on the
Scottish Isle of Skye.
The Talisker Bodega 40
Year Old was launched last year, matured in Amontillado sherry casks, the Talisker
Bodega 41 Years in Manzanilla sherry casks. All sherry casks came from the
famous sherry producer Delgado Zuleta, one of the oldest bodegas in the Marco
de Jerez region.
New design for The
Glenlivet: The Scottish single malt whisky is more modern, fresher and younger.
All editions of the
standard range will appear in clear glass bottles in the future, so that we
have to bid goodbye to the classic green of Glenlivet 12 Year Old.
Each Glenlivet gets its own colour.
Each edition got a special
colour code, which is reflected both in the bottle capsule, a part of the
bottle label and the colour of the bottle box. Fans of the Glenlivet 12 Year
Old have been given the concession to retain the green, but it is not quite the
common bottle green, but a fresher, slightly lighter shade.
A new and eye-catching
element on the labels and packaging is an imprinted emblem showing Glenlivet
founder George Smith.
For the Glenlivet Founders
Reserve, it is colour-fitted, for the other three bottlings it is printed in gold.
In 2004, the Glengyle
Distillery in Campbeltown restarted producing Single Malts.
The primary product of the
distillery was the 12-year-old slightly smoky Kilkerran.
Under the "Peat in
Progress" portfolio, Glengyle produced heavily peated Kilkerran bottles at
60.9% ABV, no E150A colour and without chill-filtration.
The release of a new
Kilkerran Cask Strength 8 Years has been announced recently, bottled at 57.1%
ABV and fully matured in re-charred Oloroso sherry casks.
Douglas Laing has released
a Caol Ila 8yo 2010 bottling as part of the Old Particular Elements Collection.
A British distillery, the Cooper
King Distillery opened in Yorkshire on 11 June 2018.
The distillery uses 100%
green energy and the whisky will be based only on local barley. The malt for
the Cooper King Single Malt Whisky will be produced at Warminster Maltings as a
traditional floor malting.
Robert Louis Stevenson
defined Talisker in 1880 as: “The King o’drinks as I conceive it.”
Hugh
MacAskill arrived on Skye from the smaller island of Eigg in 1825. After a
survey, he asked his brother Kenneth to join him and together, they built Talisker Distillery in 1830 at Carbost on the shore of
Loch Harport, despite opposition from the local clergy.
Alexander
Grigor Allan and Roderick Kemp bought shares in the distillery in 1880, In
1892, Roderick Kemp sold his share of Talisker, using the money to buy Macallan.
In
1898, Allan merged with Thomas MacKenzie to form Dailuiane-Talisker Distillery
Co. Ltd. Talisker was one of the best-selling single malt whiskies in the
country.
In
1916, the death of Thomas MacKenzie gave John Walker & Sons and John Dewar
& Sons the chance to form a consortium and take over.
Initially triple distilled, Talisker reverted to double distillation in 1928.
In 1960, a fire destroyed the stillhouse. The five stills lost in the fire were replaced by replicas still heated by coal in two years.
The
malt is peated to a phenol level of approximately 18–22 parts per million
(ppm), which is a medium peating level.
 |
Talisker House & Pershal More
|
In the Octave series, Independent
Bottler Duncan Taylor has used Octave barrels, which, at 50 litres are only a
fraction of the size of common barrels. As a result, the whisky has more
contact with the barrel surface and has matured more intensely.
This Royal Brackla was
bottled exclusively for Whisky.de. This bottling was limited to 108 bottles! The
ripening in the Octave barrel took five months.
For Taliskravaganza 2014, Retailer
K&L Wines featured the exclusive Talisker "The Speakeasy" 5 year
old single cask single malt at 45.8% ABV.
Apparently The Laing
Whisky Company was permitted by Diageo to bottle both a 5 year old under their
own Premier Barrel label and this 5 year old single-retailer exclusive.
Kilchoman has produced 3-6
year old single malts that were ready for the market as ultra-young malts. Whatever the secret is, the Kilchomans seem
more rounded and mature than their age.
The Maltman Linkwood 11
years old 2007 is a younger Speyside single malt from the Linkwood distillery
bottled by the independent bottler The Maltman (Meadowside Blending). Matured
in a bourbon cask, the limited single cask release of 302 bottles was bottled
in March 2019 at natural cask strength of 52.1% ABV, non chill filtered and
with no added colour.
Finlaggan single malt is
named after Finlaggan Castle, the seat of the feudal Lord of the Isles in the
loch of the same name in northern Islay. Finlaggan is a mystery malt and the
identity of the producing distillery is jealously guarded by the brand owners,
The Vintage Malt Whisky Company.
Glen Albyn was founded in
Inverness in 1846 by James Sutherland, the Mayor. Work was
completed and the license awarded in 1847, but the distillery ran into
difficulties (including a fire in 1849 which necessitated rebuilding work for
around a year) and fell silent in 1855. It was put up for sale, but no buyer
was ever found and finally it was converted into a flour mill in 1866.
A new Glen Albyn was built
in 1883-84 by Gregory & Co., but it is uncertain if this was on the same
site as the original distillery buildings.
John Birnie, the
distillery manager left in a huff in 1892 after being refused a share in the
distillery by Gregory & Co. He immediately founded his own distillery, Glen
Mhor, in partnership with John Mackinlay of Charles Mackinlay & Co, of
Black Dog fame.
Their taking over of Glen
Albyn from Gregory & Co - nearly thirty years after Birnie left - must have
been sweet revenge.
Glen Albyn was among
several to close in 1983. The buildings were demolished three years later and
the site is now a shopping complex.
The world’s
first regulated whisky investment fund was launched in 2018. Single Malt Fund
allows investors to buy a small part of a bigger collection of rare and
limited-edition whiskies.
There was a
whisky rebellion in Pennsylvania in 1794 due to whisky taxing. The tax was
eventually repealed in 1802.
The first Scottish distillery to install a Coffey Still
was the Grange Distillery, which fell silent in 1851.
There are over 300,000 varieties of barley but only a
few are suitable for malt whisky production.
In
Victorian times, some Scottish distilleries allowed workers to stop for a dram
each time a bell rang.
Distilled
alcoholic beverages made from gluten grains are gluten-free due to distillation
removing gluten proteins.
Nikola
Tesla drank whisky every day because he thought that it would make him live for
150 years.
The
combination of beer and whisky is known as a ‘boilermaker’ in America,
where blue-collar labourers regarded it as an effective pick-me-up after a
shift down in the mines.
After
Prohibition ended in the USA, 69-year-old James B. Beam got his distillery up
and running in just 120 days.
The Dublin Inferno, at its
peak, measured 2ft wide, 6 inches deep and stretched more than 400m
down one side of Mill Street.
Caps,
porringers, and other vessels were in great requisition to scoop up the liquor
as it flowed from the burning premises, and some were observed to take off
their boots and use them as drinking cups.
None of the
deceased perished in the flames, nor did they die of smoke inhalation - each
succumbed to alcohol poisoning from drinking “freely of the derelict whiskey”.
George Washington was the only
founding father to commercially operate a distillery. It was one of the biggest
distilleries of its time, but was unfortunately destroyed by a fire a few years
after opening.
Ireland’s Old Bushmills
Distillery claims to be the country’s oldest legally functioning distillery.
Operations on the present site date back to 1276 by some accounts.
Pot still whiskey is made by
combining both malted and unmalted barley in the mashbill, prior to
fermentation, and then distilling in traditional copper pot stills.
The monopoly once in sole charge
of producing Finnish alcohol (including whisky) was also responsible for the
production of Molotov cocktails for its military.
Bailey’s Irish Cream – a blend of
cream and Irish whiskey – did not come into existence until 1974. It was the
first Irish cream to be commercialised.
The record for most expensive
whisky cocktail sold is a refresh of the traditional Manhattan made with a
55-year-old Macallan served at Dubai’s Skyview Bar. Costing £4,632, the posh
concoction was stirred with a very special oak stick from a cask of Macallan.
It was also served with ice made from the same water used to produce the single
malt whisky it contains.
In a study published by the
journal Chem, researchers used fluorescent dyes to map age, area of
origin and taste of drams from the US, Scotland and Ireland. They hope to
harness these findings and develop a method of detecting counterfeit whisky and
other alcohol.
In 2017 Scottish scientists
powered a car using a biofuel derived from whisky residue.
Rachel Barrie was the first
female master whisky blender and has paved the way for even more women joining
the industry.
The record for the largest bottle
of whisky goes to the distillers of Famous Grouse, who created 1.7-metre bottle
containing 228 litres of whisky.
Jack Daniel ran away from his
stepmother at the age of six and learned to distil whisky from a Lutheran
minister.
Cadenhead’s Whisky Shop on Canongate, when owned by the Cadenhead family, was Scotland’s oldest independent bottler. It was taken over by J & A Mitchell & Co. Ltd., in 1972. The name remains unchanged, even though Mitchell & Co. bottle and sell Springbank, Longrow, and Hazelburn single malt whiskies, along with Campbeltown Loch and Mitchell’s 12 YO. Its unique selling point is that customers can have a custom bottle poured straight from a cask and labeled with their name. When sealed it has a label with the “born on date.” Since whisky stops aging as soon as it leaves the wooden barrel each bottle is a unique expression, www.wmcadenhead.com or in London www.whiskytastingroom.com.
There are over 25 descriptive terms for the colour of whisky.
Whisky gains as much as 60% of its flavour from the type of cask used in the ageing process.
There are currently 133 operational distilleries across Scotland, 8 grain and 125 malt.
Diageo invested £10 million in its state of the art Cambus Cooperage to make it a completely up to date operation combining innovation with traditional skills.
Some 20 million casks, over
500 million cases, are maturing in warehouses in Scotland. This represents the
equivalent of approximately 10 billion bottles of Scotch after bottling.
Scotch is sold in more than 200 markets globally.
Total amount of Scotch released for sale to the UK market was 90m bottles of 70 cl. each.
Scotch sells three times its nearest foreign whisky rival.
The industry generated about £3 billion in tax revenue to the UK government.
Scotch whisky accounts for a quarter of UK food and drink exports.
Export of Scotch whisky has increased by 87% in the past decade.
A closed bottle of Scotch can be kept for 100 years+ and will still be good to drink.
After opening, a half-full bottle of Scotch whisky will remain good for six to eight months.
The most expensive bottle of Scotch whisky today is Isabella’s Islay ($6.2 Million).
The oldest Scotch whisky on the market is the Aisla T’Orten 107 Years old, distilled in 1906 and available for $ 1.43 million (£870,000). Probably an April Fool's Day prank.
The highest price paid at an auction for a Scotch Whisky is £288,000 (for a 64-year-old 42.5 % Macallan malt whisky).
Glenfiddich is the largest selling single malt in the world, followed by the Glenlivet.
Johnnie Walker Red label is the world's largest selling Scotch whisky.
The Famous Grouse is the most popular Scotch whisky in the UK.
Glenmorangie is the largest selling malt whisky in Scotland.
The Glenlivet is the most popular single malt Scotch whisky in the US.
Experts advise you to drink Single Malt whisky neat or with a tiny bit of water. The water supposedly ‘Releases the Serpent’ from the whisky.
If there is a serpent, there is also an Angel. As it ages, 2.0-2.5 % of the whisky maturing in a barrel is lost to evaporation every year. Distillers refer to this as the ‘angel’s share’.
But the Devil has the last word. Besides the loss due to ageing as stated earlier, the term also includes the fact that the larger the barrel used to mature whisky, the more the spirit that is absorbed by the wood and lost, called by distillers the ‘Devil’s Cut’. The professional term for it remains INDRINK.
Maturation of the new make has to be done in a wooden oak cask not exceeding 700 L capacity.
The most expensive first world country in which to buy Scotch is New Zealand. In the EU, Austria and Switzerland are the most expensive.
Although their proof differs, standard drinks of beer, wine and spirits (liquor) contain an equivalent amount of alcohol – 0.6 ounces each. They’re all the same to a breathalyzer.
Glenturret is the oldest distillery in Scotland (1775), followed by Bowmore (1779).
Glenturret, Oban and Glenlivet are the three oldest malt whiskies currently sold.
William Lawson’s blended Scotch, a relatively unknown brand, is a bestseller in Russia.
18,000 litres of Scotch whisky worth over $800,000 (£ 500,000) were accidentally flushed down the drain at the Dumbarton bottling plant of Chivas Brothers in March 2013.
There are a total of 133 distilleries in Scotland, 125 malt and 8 grain or multipurpose, according to the research briefings and fact sheets presented to the UK Parliament.
In the UK, the six most popular Scotch blended Whiskies are The Famous Grouse, Bell’s, William Grant’s, Teacher’s, J&B and High Commissioner.
LVMH’s Glenmorangie distillery is one of the smallest in the Highlands and employs just sixteen craftsmen – ‘The Sixteen Men of Tain’ - who have become synonymous with the Glenmorangie brand all over the world.
Edradour was the smallest distillery in Scotland - Three people run the entire operation.
Strathearn distillery claims to hold that distinction. It is temporarily closed today.
Loch Ewe is the smallest distillery in Scotland; the owner is a one-man show.
Releases of Scotch whisky from bond for sale in the UK in the first half totaled 37.3 million bottles, down about 5.5% on the corresponding figure of 39.5 million in the opening six months of 2012. The SWA blamed the domestic excise duty regime, and called for UK Government help in this regard.
The fastest growing Scotch whisky in the world over the last five years was Black Dog. Not any more after a lawsuit was filed against Diageo and USL for falsification and fabrication of facts. Read about The Black Dog at https://noelonwhisky.blogspot.com/2017/02/the-intriguing-history-of-black-dog_10.html / You may have noticed the totally changed gold-coloured and black cover describing its history.
The Australian Wine Research Institute has introduced a measure called a standard drink. In Australia, a standard drink contains 10 g (12.67 ml) of alcohol, the amount that an average adult male can metabolize in one hour.
Japanese owned Tomatin is the largest capacity distillery in Scotland.
Haig’s Pinch (Dimple) is the fourth largest blended Deluxe Scotch whisky in the world.
Persian overlords were required to rule twice on a case; once when stone cold sober and again when intoxicated, in the belief of ‘in vino veritas’.
UK Whisky Cheaper in Europe: The price of a bottle of whisky, including the Excise Duty, has been subject to Value Added Tax since 1973. The EU mandated size of the Scotch bottle is 70 cl or 700 ml, minimum 40 per cent ABV. In a single European market, Scotch actually costs less in Europe than in the UK. A 70cl of the average blended Scotch whisky might sell for £10.70 in the UK. Tax would take £7.07 or 66% of the retail price. In 10 out of 15 European countries, lower taxes mean that the same bottle is sold for less. Look at the list below:
Spain about £4.50 about 40%
Italy about £4.85 about 40%
Greece about £ 5.50 about 44%
Germany about £6.40 about 49%
France about £6.60 about 55%
Andorra about £ 3.75, about 35%
Age Mentioned on a Blended Whisky Label: A blended whisky contains anywhere from 15 to 50 different malt whiskies. The skill of the blender is to create character and consistency in the product – and to choose only the whiskies that complement each other. The age of the blended Whisky mentioned on the bottle refers to the youngest whisky in the blend. If it says 10 years it means that the youngest Whisky has been matured for a minimum period of 10 years in oak casks. The same holds good for Single Malt Whiskies as well.
Dewar’s Adds Honey to Scotch: Bacardi, in an attempt to woo the younger generation, unveiled a brand called Dewar’s Highlander Honey, which the company describes as a Scotch whisky “infused with Scottish heather honey filtered through oak cask wood.” The Scotch Whisky Association argues that this Dewar’s product is not Scotch whisky and that under EU law, it has to be sold under the sales description ‘Spirit Drink’. The label may refer to Scotch whisky as one of its constituents.
The first malt whisky ever to be exported to Australia was the Dalmore, in 1870.
The Dalmore is the only distillery permitted to source Matusalem sherry wood casks for finishing its single malt at Gonzalez Byass.
Cadenhead’s Whisky Shop on Canongate, when owned by that family, was Scotland’s oldest independent bottler till taken over by J & A Mitchell & Co. Ltd. in 1972. The name remains unchanged, even though Mitchell & Co bottle and sell Springbank, Longrow and Hazelburn Single Malt whiskies, along with Campbeltown Loch and Mitchell's 12 year old. Its USP is that customers can have a bottle poured straight from a cask and labelled with a person’s name. When sealed it has a label with the ‘born on date’, as whisky stops aging as soon as it leaves the wooden barrel so each bottle is a unique blend.
The source of the name Auchentoshan is Gaelic. It means 'corner of the field'.
Auchentoshan was probably started by Irish settlers, led by the MacBeathas.
Some sources claim that these Irish whisky distillers brought the Irish custom of triple distillation with them. Auchentoshan uses triple distillation.
Antique records from the year 1800 mention an (illegal) Duntocher distillery, which may have been a predecessor to the legal Auchentoshan distillery. A license for distillation was obtained in 1823.
The ‘e’ in whiskey: Scotch whisky is always spelled without an ‘e’? Four other nations, Ireland (since 1960), Peru, Mexico and most but not all brands in the United States call their similar spirits Whiskey. Be sure you never add the ‘e’ when writing to a Scotsman.
Bruichladdich’s The Octomore 08.3 is “the most heavily peated Octomore to date”, containing barley peated to 309 ppm. Octomore 2009 Edition 06.3, peating level is 258 ppm.
For over 220 years, Highland Park has smoked its barley over 4,000-year-old peat, hand-cut from Hobbister Moor, just 11 km from the distillery. From the heathery Fogg layer down through the dense, compacted Yarphie to the ancient coal-like Moss, the core of their peat dates back 4,000 years.
The GlenAllachie has released inaugural bottlings with its first ever Wine Cask Series.
After initial aging in American Oak ex-bourbon barrels, the whisky was transferred into the adroitly chosen wine casks to undergo almost two years of additional maturation: an 11-year-old Grattamacco Cask Finish, a 12-year-old Sauternes Cask Finish, and a 13-year-old Rioja Cask Finish.
The GlenAllachie launched its first ever blended Scotch whisky, White Heather 21 Year Old, early 2021.
The name comes from a blended whisky brand that was discontinued back in the 1980s, which was acquired by The GlenAllachie Distillers Company in 2017.
Aucherachan Distillery, a Speyside Single Malt Scotch whisky distillery went alternatively by Achorachan, Achorechan and Acherachan – such was the quality of spelling in the late 18th century – but also Glenlivat (sic).
As with so many early licensed distilleries, struggling against illegal distillers and heavy taxation, Auchorachan had mixed fortunes and several owners. However, in its day it played an important role in the history of Glenlivet and the whisky industry.
The distillery was originally registered in the 1780s under William Gordon, who died in 1790.
Aucherachan distillery was briefly operational in the following decade but then lay unused for around 40 years until Captain William Grant (not of Glenfiddich fame) re-opened it in 1833.
The distillery is noted as ‘operating’ in 1851, but after Captain Grant suffered a serious fall in 1854 the business began to suffer, although some claim his misfortunes were down to the work of some angry fairies.
2018 was a year littered with auction records, particularly for 60-year-old Macallan featuring labels designed by artists Sir Peter Blake and Valerio Adami – but they were all capped by the £1.2m spent in November on a bottle hand-painted by Irish artist Michael Dillon.
Japanese whisky is sought-after as never before, from the hordes of Highballs consumed in the bars of Tokyo to the cult bottlings of Karuizawa and Hanyu breaking auction records on a regular basis.
But there’s a dark side to this surge in interest. As stocks dwindle, bottlings such as Hakushu 12 and Hibiki 17 have been forced to withdraw from the market – and yet there is an apparently never-ending stream of new brands entering the fray.
The withdrawals came about because the rules governing Japanese whisky are so loose that all manner of hybrid and adulterated products can legally claim to be ‘Japanese whisky’, even though they are arguably neither of those things.
It doesn’t take much to stoke up a storm in the fevered world of social media, but Johnnie Walker’s US launch of a ‘female’ version, The Jane Walker Edition, prompted a backlash even before its release.
Speyside’s Kininvie distillery has released three new ‘experimental’ whiskies from its new innovation arm Kininvie Works, including a rye whisky, triple distilled malt and single-distillery blended Scotch.
Kininvie Works’ three whiskies, code-named KVSM001, KVSG002 and KVSB003, are the result of three different trials run by the William Grant & Sons-owned distillery.
Each code refers to the distillery (KV), spirit type (SM, SG, SB) and batch number (001).
KVSM001 is a triple-distilled single malt, the first of its kind released by Kininvie, which usually produces a double-distilled spirit.
KVSG002 is technically a single grain Scotch whisky distilled in copper pot stills using a combination of malted barley and malted rye. Distillers used a mash containing 11% malted rye, maturing the resulting spirit in virgin American oak casks for three years. The final product, which is bottled at 47.8% abv, is said to have ‘a distinguished toffee flavour along with the classic spiciness associated with rye’.
KVSB003 is a blend of double distilled malt whisky, and the Kininvie single grain malted rye and barley mash. All components of KVSB003 have been produced on-site.
Kininvie is situated on the same property as Balvenie distillery.
The launch of Kininvie Works marks a departure from the single malt brand’s focus on luxury whisky, which in recent years has included the release of the distillery’s ‘first drops’, a series of 25-year-old single casks sold for around £400 per 35cl bottle.
Bruichladdich Bere Barley is an idiosyncratic barley variety that has survived in some of Scotland’s remotest outposts for up to 6,000 years, nearly became extinct 20 years ago, and is now undergoing a resurgence.
In celebration of London Cocktail Week’s 10th anniversary in 2019, the Speyside single malt brand The Glenlivet created a range of edible/drinkable cocktail capsules in collaboration with Alex Kratena and Monica Berg of London’s Tayēr + Elementary, rated one of the world’s best bars after just nine months of operation, and capsule designer Notpla.
Three original cocktails ‘inspired by the elements and flavours of The Glenlivet Founder’s Reserve’ – Citrus, Wood and Spice – are filled into a biodegradable casing made from seaweed extract (called ‘oohos’) and presented to patrons in a bespoke gold box.
Ardnahoe – which means “Height of the Hollow” in Scottish Gaelic and gives Ardnahoe Distillery its name, is situated on the North-East coast of Islay, equidistant between Caol Ila and Bunnahabhain Distilleries.
Ardnahoe Distillery is the ninth malt whisky distillery on the world-renowned whisky island of Islay.
They draw the water to produce Ardnahoe spirit from Loch Ardnahoe nearby.
Loch Ardnahoe offers extremely soft water that has been filtered through peat and rock for thousands of years.
Mysteries surround Loch Ardnahoe: no one is quite sure how deep it is, while others say there’s a ghost of a charging white steed that rises out of the Loch on a full moon.
Tomintoul entered the Guinness Book of World Records by producing the largest bottle of whisky in the world, containing 105.3 litres of 14 year old Tomintoul malt whisky.
All about Royal Salute:
In 1953, Princess Elizabeth ascended the throne. An exquisite blend was created using whisky from Strathisla, the oldest working distillery in the Scottish Highlands. It was given the name Royal Salute – after the famous 21-gun-salute.
To this day, Royal Salute has marked each significant event in the lives of the British Monarchy and is unique in having only ever used whiskies aged at least 21 years in its blends.
All Royal Salute whiskies are at 40% ABV in 70 cl bottles.
Over the decades, Royal Salute master blenders have collected and stored whiskies of immense distinction behind locked doors in legendary storehouses across Scotland.
Sandy Hyslop is the fifth Master Blender in the history of Royal Salute.
The Signature Blend 21 YO: This blended Scotch whisky started it all – a whisky fit for a queen. This is a classic, unchanged since 1953, with a flavour and fragrance that is unforgettable.
The Malts Blend 21 YO: Royal Salute’s first malts-only blend, it harmonises 21 precious single malts, each matured for a minimum of 21 years, from the five regions of Scotland.
The Lost Blend 21 YO: At the heart of The Lost Blend are rare whiskies rescued from distilleries that have vanished into the mist. Many of these whiskies are lost forever and finding a Royal Salute Lost Blend may be beyond the pale.
In the Royal Salute vaults lie its own “crown jewels” – rare and precious whiskies, under lock and key. This whisky features the finest blends, aged for 25 years or more, and expertly combined to create an exceptional liquid with a glorious flavour. The Treasured Blend is available exclusively in travel retail.
The Polo Estancia Edition 21 YO: The first edition of a new collection which aims to celebrate iconic polo destinations, The 21-Year-Old Polo Estancia Edition pays homage to what is universally known as the ‘home of polo’ – Argentina. It is a bespoke 21-year-old blend fully finished in the finest Argentinian Malbec casks.
The Malbec: Argentinian Malbec wine is characterised by its deep colour and intense fruity flavours. The Polo Estancia blend was fully finished in top of the range Malbec wine casks from the high altitude ‘boutique terroir’ of Cafayate.
The Finish: A meticulous process that requires a talented Master Blender to reach the exact desired profile and ensure the strength of flavours of the Malbec do not overpower the more delicate aged notes within the Royal Salute whiskies.
The Inspired Blends comprise of the Union of the Crowns, Stone of Destiny and 62 Gun Salute.
Royal Salute Union of the Crowns: This 32 YO celebrates a remarkable coming together – the Union of the Crowns, which saw Ireland, Scotland and England united by the British monarchy. This blend is itself a powerful union of precious whiskies from all five regions of Scotland, aged for 32 years or more.
Stone of Destiny: The bedrock of the British monarchy, the Stone of Destiny has been the coronation seat of kings and queens for centuries. The Stone of Destiny comprises an extraordinary collection of rare and fine whiskies, all matured for at least 38 years.
62 Gun Salute: The spectacular 62-gun salute is the highest ceremonial honour, reserved for the most significant royal occasions. 62 Gun Salute is presented in a midnight blue, hand-crafted Dartington Crystal decanter, adorned with 24-carat gold and crowned with a cut crystal stopper, complete with a book describing the creation of the blend. The whiskies used to make the blend are aged for at least 40 years. It was launched in June 2010, for the Queen’s birthday celebrations. The few bottles available have 50 YO malt and grain whiskies.
Royal Salute 29 Year Old PX Sherry Cask Finish: A limited-edition 29-year-old blended whisky from Royal Salute, matured exclusively in Pedro Ximénez sherry casks. 70 cl at 40% ABV.
The first blended grain whisky in the Royal Salute portfolio, the Snow Polo Edition evokes the spirit of the spectacular sport from which it takes its name. It is carefully crafted to a higher than usual ABV of 46.5% to match the exact latitude of St Moritz, the Swiss resort where snow polo was first played against the backdrop of pristine, white mountain peaks.
The Royal Wedding Edition: This expression commemorates the wedding of HRH Prince Henry to Ms Meghan Markle. Every whisky in this exquisite blend has been matured entirely in American oak casks as a tribute to Ms Meghan Markle’s American origins. Only 70 bottles were made, in individually numbered, hand-blown crystal decanters and presented in a handcrafted American oak box.
The Peats Beast family has grown. Along with the Standard 46% single malt whisky un-chillfltered, no additives, no colouring, the range now includes: a batch strength version finished for 9 months in Pedro Ximinez casks.
Timorous Beastie represents “ultimate distillation of the Highlands” in a small batch marriage of Single Malts distilled at Glengoyne, Glen Garioch, Blair Athol and Strathearn Distilleries, amongst others.
Douglas Laing & Co, the family firm behind the “Remarkable Regional Malts” Scotch Whisky range, unleashed Timorous Beastie “Meet the Beast”, a limited edition of the sleekit dram to amplify the flavour experience of their Highland Malt brand end May 2021.
Established in 2014 by Douglas Laing & Co, Timorous Beastie represents “ultimate distillation of the Highlands” in a small batch marriage of Single Malts distilled at Glengoyne, Glen Garioch, Blair Athol and Strathearn Distilleries, amongst others.
8 DOORS :
8 Doors Distillery at John O’Groats, Highlands. The name is inspired by the legend surrounding Jan De Groot- the man that John O’Groats takes its name from. In particular, the house with eight doors that he built on the site which is now marked by a mound near the John O’Groats house hotel, very close to the distillery.
Macallan: Macallan is likely derived from the Gaelic magh, which translates to fertile ground and ellan, which is a reference to an Irish-born monk 8th century Christian monk named St. Fillan.
The first licensee after the passage of the 1823 Excise Act was Jane Macgregor of Littlemill Distillery.
Famously the first legal Scottish distillery in Speyside after owner George Smith obtained the first licence to distil following the Excise Act of 1823, Glenlivet became synonymous with best quality.
The company was forced to take legal action in the 1880s to prevent its rivals passing off their own wares as 'the Real Stuff'.
Despite the Smith family winning the exclusive right for their product to be known as 'The' Glenlivet, dozens of other distilleries persisted with the Glenlivet suffix (e.g. Macallan Glenlivet) for decades afterwards.
The ongoing Cellar Collection was created to showcase some of the superb older malts in the distillery's archives.
Some extremely old sherried vintages going back to the 1930s have been bottled by Gordon & Macphail.
The Glen of the river Livet is rather remote. The journey from the nearest settlement, Elgin, is a short drive north through the picturesque Cairngorm mountains today.
In the 1800s it was a daunting journey. Illicit distilleries flourished here, and gaugers were rather apprehensive of the trek.
In the year of the Excise Act, 1823, over 14,000 prosecutions were sought and Highland farmers brought to their knees.
The purity of the clear spring water flowing down the mountains into the Livet, and feeding Josie's Well, The Glenlivet's water source, ensured that the quality of spirit made by George Smith was excellent.
King George IV’s famous request of a glass of Glenlivet during his state visit to Edinburgh in 1823 made Glenlivet the best known brand.
George Smith’s application for Speyside's first license to legally distil whisky was seen as a serious betrayal by his neighbours. The family and distillery were always under armed guard.
In his own words, “The laird of Aberlour had presented me with a pair of hair trigger pistols worth ten guineas, and they were never out of my belt for years.”
The Glenlivet has often had a starring role on the silver screen. The whisky has appeared in films such as Anchorman, Grosse Pointe Blank, Birdcage and The Mummy.
Traditionally the majority of the spirit was aged in Oloroso casks, however since the recommencement of production in 2002 bourbon casks have been used, meaning that future releases will have a different flavour profile to the batches being released today.
The Glenlivet has often had a starring role on the silver screen. The whisky has appeared in films such as Anchorman, Grosse Pointe Blank, Birdcage and The Mummy.
Glendronach was founded in
1826 by James Allardice (also spelt Allardyce and Allardes), and almost
completely destroyed by fire a decade later.
The single malt product was
called the 'Guid GlenDronach' single malt.
Allardice is rumoured to
have ensured the popularity of his whisky in Edinburgh in the 1840s by selling
it through local prostitutes.
In 1920, the distillery
was bought for £9000 by Charles Grant, whose father had founded Glenfiddich.
The distillery was taken
over by Teacher's (for which blend the Glendronach malt was already a vital
ingredient) in 1960.
This was the period
Teacher’s Highland Cream reached its zenith.
Glendronach was mothballed
in 1996.
The distillery became
active again in 2002, but with changed malting.
In 2005, Pernod closed the
distillery again to convert some of Scotland's last direct coal-fired stills to
indirect steam-heated coils.
There are now no
distilleries in Scotland using direct coal-fired stills.
In 2008, Pernod sold
Glendronach to a consortium headed by Billy Walker & the BenRiach
Distillery Company became the new owner.
The cask type used at
Glendronach has changed in the last few years.
Traditionally the majority of the spirit was aged in Oloroso casks, however since the recommencement of production in 2002 bourbon casks have been used, meaning that future releases will have a different flavour profile to the batches being released today.
It is believed that the
new owners will begin using sherry casks again.
Dalmore managed to generate lots of free publicity with hefty price tags on many of their older releases, but some of those bottles remained unsold and kept gathering dust on the shelves of luxury liquorists around the world.
James Ainslie & Co. was founded as a wine and spirit merchant in Leith, Edinburgh in 1868. A very successful company, it purchased the Clynelish distillery in 1896 and completely re-built it within two years.
All Bacardi products carry an age statement and are caramel-free.
In 2004, the Glengyle Distillery in Campbeltown
restarted producing Single Malts.
The primary product of the distillery was the
12-year-old slightly smoky Kilkerran.
Under the "Peat in Progress" portfolio, Glengyle
produced heavily peated Kilkerran bottles at 60.9% ABV, no E150A colour and
without chill-filtration.
A new Kilkerran Cask Strength 8 Years has been released
recently, bottled at 57.1% ABV and fully matured in re-charred Oloroso sherry
casks.
Douglas Laing has released a Caol Ila 8yo 2010 bottling
as part of the Old Particular Elements Collection.
A British distillery, the Cooper King Distillery opened
in Yorkshire on 11 June 2018.
The distillery uses 100% green energy and the whisky
will be based only on local barley. The malt for the Cooper King Single Malt
Whisky will be produced at Warminster Maltings as a traditional floor malting.
Robert Louis Stevenson defined Talisker in 1880 as:
“The King o’drinks as I conceive it.”
Hugh MacAskill arrived on
Skye from the smaller island of Eigg in 1825. After a survey, he asked his
brother Kenneth to join him and together, they built Talisker
Distillery in 1830 at Carbost on the shore of Loch Harport, despite opposition
from the local clergy.
Alexander Grigor Allan and
Roderick Kemp bought shares in the distillery in 1880, In 1892, Roderick Kemp sold
his share of Talisker, using the money to buy Macallan.
In 1898, Allan merged with
Thomas MacKenzie to form Dailuiane-Talisker Distillery Co. Ltd. Talisker was
one of the best-selling single malt whiskies in the country.
In 1916, the death of
Thomas MacKenzie gave John Walker & Sons and John Dewar & Sons the
chance to form a consortium and take over.
Initially triple distilled,
Talisker reverted to double distillation in 1928.
In
1960, a fire destroyed the stillhouse. The five stills lost in the fire were
replaced by replicas still heated by coal in two years. In 1987, the distillery
changed over to steam heating.
The malt is peated to a
phenol level of approximately 18–22 parts per million (ppm), which is a medium
peating level.
The water used for
production of Talisker Malts, from Cnoc nan Speireag
(Hawk Hill), flows over peat which adds additional complexity to the whisky.
Many centuries ago, the
Lord of the Isles ruled Scotland from the stronghold of Finlaggan Castle on
Islay.
Finlaggan single malt is
named after Finlaggan Castle, the seat of the feudal Lord of the Isles in the
loch of the same name found in the north of Islay.
Finlaggan is a mystery
malt and the identity of the producing distillery is, as you'd expect, jealously
guarded by the brand owners, The Vintage Malt Whisky Company.
Forties Single Malt Whisky
is an unspecified Speyside single malt brand set up to honour the 20th
anniversary of the Forties Oil Field founded in 1975.
Old Fettercairn was
established in 1824,having been only the second distillery to become legal
after the Excise Act of the previous year.
Founder Sir Alexander
Ramsey ran into financial difficulty and was forced to sell the distillery and
the Fasque estate on which it was located in 1830 to a merchant named John
Gladstone, who ran both until his death in 1851.
The elder of Gladstone's
sons, Thomas took over the stewardship of the estate and the distillery, which
was let to sitting tenants.
Younger brother William
was a politician, and Prime Minister four times. When Chancellor of the Exchequer in 1860 in PM JH Temple's govt,
William passed legislation alleviating the taxes on the
whisky industry.
Punch magazine celebrated the occasion with the cartoon of The Dancey Man.
In 1887 the distillery's
tenant David Durie left after a dispute over the lease.
Shortly after this
event, Fettercairn caught fire and had to be rebuilt. Thomas Gladstone died
during the rebuild and his son Sir John Gladstone formed the Fettercairn
Distillery Co. to take over the running of the distillery in 1890.
The new company did well
initially but suffered, along with the rest of the industry, due to the
Pattison crash, following which an increase in license and duty in 1909 drove
the company close to bankruptcy. John bought out his partners in 1912 to keep
the company afloat.
The First World War and
Prohibition proved a tribulation too far for the struggling distillery. By 1923
John Gladstone's company was in liquidation.
A new leaseholder took over the following
year, but lasted only until 1927, when the company folded.
After staying silent for
over a decade while the Factor, James Mann, sought buyers, Fettercairn was
eventually rescued from demolition in 1938 when it was bought by Joseph Hobbs
of Train & McIntyre, a subsidiary of National Distillers of America.
Thereafter, Fettercairn
changed hands several times, before falling under the control of Whyte &
Mackay in 1973.
W&M were themselves
taken over and sold a few times throughout the next three decades and are now,
at the time of writing, under the control of Philippines-based Emperador Inc.
(a subsidiary of the Alliance Global Group holding company).
Whyte & Mackay's
self-branded whisky holds about 3 per cent of the UK whisky market.
In 1974 Whyte & Mackay
was bought by 'Lonhro' who sold it to the Brent Walker Group plc. in 1988.
In 1990, Whyte &
Mackay Distillers was purchased by American Brands, and renamed to JBB Greater
Europe plc. in 1995.
This company was bought by
another company with the name Kyndal International Ltd. in 2001, who shortly
afterwards decided to change their name to...Whyte & Mackay Ltd!
The shift of focus from
quality to luxury worked out beautifully for some brands like Macallan; it
didn't work too well for the Dalmore distillery and its products.
Dalmore managed to generate lots of free publicity with hefty price tags on many of their older releases, but some of those bottles remained unsold and kept gathering dust on the shelves of luxury liquorists around the world.
There are 14 dunnage
warehouses on the distillery grounds with room for 32,000 casks of whisky.
The Fettercairn distillery
had stainless steel condensers during most of the 20th century - as well as a
cast iron mash tun.
The cooling 'system' of
the spirit stills is quite unique: they simply run cold water along the sides
of the stills.
United Spirits seemed just
as eager to maximise their profits as competitors like Bacardi and Diageo. For
one thing, they removed the age statement from their standard expression when
they changed it from 'twelve years' to 'Fior' – allowing them to use casks of
younger whisky for that bottling. At the same time they also reduced the ABV of
their whisky from 43% to 42%.
In 1995 the stainless
steel condensers were replaced by condensers that were made out of copper -
which is much more common.
In the past Fettercairn
used to produce a peaty version of their spirit as well, at a phenol level of
55 PPM.
Glen Deveron is the name
given to official bottlings of single malt from Macduff.
A comparatively new
distillery, Macduff was founded in 1962 by a consortium of local businessmen.
The distillery was taken over by William Lawson's, who produced the famous blend
of the same name.
Lawson's became part of
Martini-Rossi in the early 1980s, the latter itself being taken over by Bacardi
in 1993.
Macduff distillery is now
run under Bacardi's subsidiary Dewar's.
The spirit from Macduff
distillery has been subject to a number of experiments over the years, being
the first distillery to use a metal mash-tun or steam heating.
Official bottlings have
been released under the name of Glen Deveron, while independent bottlings use
the Macduff name.
A 'First Class' malt much
loved by blenders, Glen Elgin was for years most often tasted in the blended
Scotch, White Horse.
Glen Elgin’s designer, the
renowned Elgin architect Charles Doig, made an apocalyptic prediction in 1900
that this would be the last distillery built on Speyside for fifty years. Even
this turned out to be conservative; it was actually 60 years before Tormore
became the next.
Glen Elgin’s site had
partly been chosen for its ability to make use of abundant water supplies from
the Glen Burn to drive a turbine that provided most of the power needed to run
the machinery. As a result, electricity from the national supply was not needed
until 1950.
Glen Elgin™ became
available as a single malt in 1975 and exports of a 12 year-old expression,
mainly to Italy and Japan, began in 1977.
Glen Flagler Single Malt
Whisky is an incredibly rare Lowland single malt produced at the Moffat grain
distillery in Airdrie. The whisky was only made between 1964 and 1985;
unsurprisingly, bottles are much sought-after.
Glen Garioch was founded
in 1797, making it one of Scotland's oldest distilleries still in production.
The distillery takes its
name from the Valley of the Garioch, traditionally the finest barley growing
area of Scotland.
Glen Garioch (pronounced
Geery in the ancient Doric dialect still spoken in these parts) has been making
its mighty malt in the quaint and historic market town of Oldmeldrum.
Glen Garioch is renowned
for its ageing potential thanks to some superlative older bottlings through the
years.
Curiously, the distillery
was originally named ‘Glengarioch’, but its single malt scotch whisky has long
been known as ‘Glen Garioch’.
Oldmeldrum was formerly
‘Old Meldrum’. Why this should be is still a mystery.
Old Meldrum itself derives
from the Gaelic Meal-drum, meaning ‘a ridge’, which describes its situation
perfectly, overlooking the rolling country of the Garioch.
Glen Garioch is itself no
stranger to peat, with the peating level varying throughout its long lifetime.
Older Glen Gariochs from the 1970s seem to be the most heavily-peated.
After acquisition by Suntory,
the whiskies became fruitier and less phenolic.
In 1886, William Sanderson
of Leith, of VAT 69 fame, purchased a 50% interest in the distillery.
In 1972, Glen Garioch
became the first distillery in Scotland to gas fire its stills.
In November 1972, Glen
Garioch was marketed for the first time as a single malt.
Previously, Glen Garioch
only blended into brands like Bell’s, Grant’s Standfast and Drambuie.
All Glen Garioch
expressions are produced at 48% ABV or higher, and unchill-filtered.
Glen Garioch became the heart malt for the famous blend
VAT 69, contributing to the accolade bestowed by The War Office Times and Naval
Review as "the finest whisky sold at the present time".
Sanderson seems to have been keen on abbreviations: as
well as VAT 69, he offered A.M. and P.M. (for drinking before and after lunch),
S.V.G. (‘Specially Vatted Glen Garioch’), O.B.G. (‘Old Best Glen Garioch’),
I.M. (with a preponderance of Islay Malt).
In 1932/33, only 15 malt distilleries were in
production compared to 94 two years earlier.
1968 Glen Garioch was mothballed on account of
"chronic water shortages” and sold to Morrison Bowmore.
Manager Joe Hughes, with the help of Alec ‘Digger’
Grant (the father of Glen Garioch’s current manager), discovered a spring on a
neighbouring farm. ‘The Silent Spring of Coutens Farm’ could neither be seen
nor heard, but it flowed in sufficient abundance to increase production
ten-fold.
In 1995, Glen Garioch temporarily closed but not before
producing its Vintage 1995, the last Glen Garioch to be made with smoked
barley.
Abbotshaugh distillery (1825-28), located in the grounds of an abbey, is one of 18 lost distilleries in the Falkirk area.
The Iona brand was created around 1905 and was immediately widely advertised in the UK national and local (West of Scotland) press.
Mansfield Brewery Company, now a
subsidiary of Marstons, created the Ben Royal blended Scotch.
A 12-year-old expression
in a ceramic decanter, launched in 1977 to commemorate the Queen’s Jubilee,
regularly appears at auction.
Viet Nguyen Dinh Tuan of
Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam has been confirmed by Guinness World Records as the
owner of the most valuable whisky collection in the world.
The world-beating
collection has been valued by the world’s leading rare whisky valuation experts
at Rare Whisky 101 at a ‘hammer price’ of £10,770,635 (£13,032,468 adding 21%
buyer’s premium if the collection were sold through a UK auctioneer such as
Sotheby’s).
The collection comprises
535 of the world’s rarest, oldest and finest bottles of Scotch and Japanese
whisky, including one of the world’s only complete Macallan Fine & Rare
collections, including the now iconic 1926 Fine & Rare.
Only 40 bottles of
the Macallan 1926 were ever released. Mr Viet owns three.
The 1926 Macallan Fine and
Rare is also the world’s most expensive bottle of whisky having sold recently
for a hammer price of £1,200,000 (£1,452,000 including buyer’s premium).
Viet’s collection also
holds one of only 12 bottles of the oldest Bowmore ever released, which also
happens to be both the most expensive Bowmore and the most expensive Islay malt
in the world, with a similar bottle fetching £300,000 (hammer price) at auction
recently.
The collection also
includes one of only 24 bottles of 1919 vintage Springbank. A similar bottle
sold recently for £220,000 (hammer price) making it the world’s most expensive
bottle of Springbank.
He owns all three variants
of the legendary Macallan 1926 bottling (the Fine & Rare label, the Peter
Blake label and the Valerio Adami label).
Tamnavulin is the only
distillery to sit on the banks of the whisky’s most famous river, the Livet.
Eight of Speyside’s finest
single malt whiskies have been shortlisted by a panel of leading whisky experts
as finalists in the international Spirit of Speyside Whisky Awards.
The current stills Talisker uses
are exact reconstructions of the old ones and the system still uses worm tubs
instead of modern condensers, since these are believed to deliver a fuller
flavour.
In the worm tubs, the pipes are looped so the alcohol
vapour is already in the midst of condensing before reaching the worm tubs.
Redevelopment of the
Rosebank Distillery under new owners, Ian Macleod Distillers has started today,
26 Nov 2019.
Rosebank has been dormant
for 25 years. It ceased production in 1993 and was converted to a restaurant.
Rosebank was often
referred to as the ‘King of the Lowlands’.
Every apprentice cooper at
the Balvenie is welcomed by his Tarred & Feathered Ceremony-dumped into a
puncheon and covered over with coal, tar, black powder, etc. No real feathers,
though.
There are only 200 coopers
in Scotland.
Ian Millar has built over
250,000 barrels since 29 April 1969.
The construction of the
Lochranza distillery on the Isle of Arran in 1994 was temporarily halted when a
pair of golden eagles built their nest on a cliff near the distillery, since
golden eagles are a protected species. Construction of the distillery was
completed in 1995.
The Isle of Arran was at
various times home to more than 50 illicit distilleries, with the only licenced
whisky-making facility at Lagg operating from 1825 to 1837. It reopened in
2019.
The first release was a
three-year-old in 1998, and for several years the distillery was notable for
the number of relatively youthful cask finishes produced.
Until
recently, a proportion of the casks were stored in the warehouses of
Springbank, due to a lack of room in the distillery, and the legal
impossibility of extending the current warehouses at the Arran distillery.
The Arran distillery is a
patron of the World Robert Burns Federation and as such has created a Robert
Burns single malt and Robert Burns blended whisky in honour of Scotland's
national poet. They are the only whisky distillery to be able to use the image
and signature of Robert Burns on their packaging.
The whisky of Arran is
mostly used to produce their single malt whisky, but a small proportion also
goes into the production of their range of blended whiskies: Lochranza Blend,
Robert Burns Blend and Arran Gold Single Malt Whisky Cream Liqueur.
The Arran Distillery at
Lochranza was one of the first of a spate of new distilleries that have opened
in Scotland in the last 25 years in response to the growing demand for single
malt whisky. It opened in 1995 and launched its first 10yr old single malt in
March 2006.
The first peated Arran
single malt (called Machrie Moor) has been available since 8 December 2010.
Isle of Arran has now been
in existence for long enough to offer an 18-year-old core expression, though
10, 12 and 14-year-olds are also available, along with a number of cask
finishes and regular limited releases.
Lagg distillery will take
care of all the company’s peated whisky requirements.
Abbotshaugh distillery (1825-28), located in the grounds of an abbey, is one of 18 lost distilleries in the Falkirk area.
House of Burn distillery
was opened by Andrew McAra & Co. in 1825 and distilled for a year until the
partnership developed into McAra & Stirling. The new company ran the
distillery until its sequestration in 1827.
The House of Burn
distillery was a close neighbour of Clathick distillery at Monzievaird,
Perthshire.
The House of Muir was one
of Midlothian’s fleeting distilleries that distilled between 1795-98 at the House of Muir Farm, north of Penicuik
and near Milton Bridge.
Glasson's Penrith
Breweries were run by a Cumbria-based brewer that created the blended Scotch
whisky brand, The Glenlivet-Blend.
The 1940s Glenlivet-Blend
was named after the Glenlivet area, rather than the Glenlivet distillery, and
was likely sold to its chain of tied public houses.
Glasson’s was formed as a
limited company in Penrith, Cumbria in 1898, where it operated the Union Court
Brewery, but had been brewing in the area since at least 1847.
During the early 20th
century Glasson’s Penrith Breweries acquired several business in the local
area, including Penrith Middlegate Brewery in 1906; Brampton Old Brewery Co in
1926; Carrick, Riddell & Co in 1940; and wine and spirits merchant James F
Dixon in 1947.
The company, along with
its 110 tied public houses, was taken over by Dutton’s Blackburn Brewery in
1959-60, when brewing operations ceased. In 1978, Dutton’s was acquired by
Whitbread PLC.
Although an obscure brand
today, the old Iona blend, with its Auchentoshan associations, was heavily
marketed in its day.
Not to be confused with
the recent Iona bottling of Tobermory malt, it is safe to say that Auchentoshan
malt would have provided the heart to this less-than-Hebridean dram.
Widely advertised in the
south of England during its heyday and a common sight in pubs, clubs and
restaurants, Iona finally disappeared in the 1960s.
Brewers George and John
MacLachlan operated the Castle Brewery in 1888 at Maryhill and later built
another at Duddingston near Edinburgh.
In 1903 the company moved
into distilling by acquiring Auchentoshan distillery.
The Iona brand was created around 1905 and was immediately widely advertised in the UK national and local (West of Scotland) press.
The Iona brand was also
supplied to the House of Lords.
Perhaps the most memorable
advertising tagline for the blend was: ‘Once taken, never forsaken’.
In 1920, The Graphic
carried a fulsome testimonial that ‘those who seek a tonic beverage of the
highest standard will find it in Iona, combining as it does characteristic
quality with distinctive flavour’.
By the mid-1930s the sell
had become a little harder with one long-running advert in the Motherwell Times
proclaiming that Iona was available at 10½ years of age, 30º under proof (70º
proof) and 12/6d a bottle.
The brand was still
available in the 1950s but extremely hard to come by.
In 1964 G&J MacLachlan
sold Auchentoshan distillery to J&R Tennent, which in turn became part of
brewer Charrington united Breweries.
The distillery was sold
again in 1969 to wine & spirit merchant Eadie Cairns Ltd.
A Alexander & Co., a Leith-based
Scotch whisky blender was most famous for its Dandie Dinmont brand, named after
a breed of small Scottish dogs, one of which features on the label.
The company also marketed Alexander's
Blended Scotch Whisky.
Following WW I, the business was acquired by Charles Mackinlay & Co.
Andrew Dewar Rattray set
up in business in Glasgow during 1868, blending and retailing Scotch whisky
& acting as an agent for Stronachie distillery.
The firm was sold to the
whisky broker William Walker, but was brought back into family ownership by Tim
Morrison in 2002.
In 2004, Tim Morrison,
formerly of Morrison Bowmore Distillers, revived the Dewar Rattray company,
first established by his ancestor Andrew Dewar Rattray.
Dewar Rattray also
operates the Whisky Experience and Shop in Kirkoswald, Ayrshire, which offers a
variety of sampling experiences as well as a wide range of whiskies for sale.
His aim was to bottle
single cask, single malt whisky. The firm has received planning permission to
develop a distillery and visitor centre beside the River Clyde in Glasgow.
The firm also developed
Stronachie, a new single malt ex-Benrrinnes distillery on Speyside, and
intended to replicate whisky produced at the old Stronachie distillery, located
on the old Perthshire/Kinross-shire border.
Morrison also established
the Cask Collection label for single cask bottlings, and in 2011 the peated
blended malt Cask Islay was released, transformed into a single malt two years
later.
2012 saw the release of a
five-year-old blend named Bank Note, a year after the Whisky Experience and
Shop opened in Kirkoswald.
The firm now makes and
markets Bank Note Blended Scotch Whisky, Cask Islay Islay Single Malt Scotch
Whisky, Glenburn Blend Blended Scotch Whisky and Stronachie Speyside Single
Malt Scotch Whisky.
A Gillies & Co
Distillers is a Glasgow-based blender, bottler and owner of Glen Scotia
distillery in Campbeltown, founded by Sir Maurice Bloch, founder of whisky
blender and broker Bloch Brothers.
The firm acquired the Glen
Scotia distillery in 1955 from Hiram Walker, which had itself acquired the
distillery 12 months earlier from Bloch Bros.
In the same year the
company bought the disused warehouses of Ardlussa and Glen Nevis distilleries
in Campbeltown. The two neighbouring distilleries both closed in 1923, though
their warehouses were combined in 1936 by Glen Nevis and Ardlussa Warehouses as
a blending and bottling facility.
Richard Paterson began his
illustrious whisky blending career with A. Gillies & Co in Glasgow in 1966.
At that time, the company
was ‘an old-fashioned firm involved in broking, blending and distilling.’
The company was based out
of Renfield Street in Glasgow & operated the Glen Scotia distillery and a
whisky warehousing and bottling site in Campbeltown.
The latter was created
from the merger of Glen Nevis and Ardlussa’s disused warehouses.
A. Gillies & Co’s
former office on Renfield Street is now the location of a sandwich shop.
Its main Scotch whisky
brands included the Old Court, Scotia Royale and Royal Culross blends, Glen
Scotia single malt, Burberrys Blended Scotch Whisky as well as the Old Governor
and the Old Worthy Blended Scotch Whisky brands.
Located in Milnathort, A.
A. Muirhead was an early 20th century blender with a focus on brands that
reflected the Scottish countryside.
His brands included
Muirhead’s Finest Old, Tally Ho, Strathfillan, and – Muirhead’s most famous
brand – the King James VI 1603 blend. All of these whiskies were bottled at 40%
ABV.
AB Grant & Co is a defunct
blending, bottling and distilling company that once operated Bladnoch and
Bruichladdich.
Operating ex-Glasgow and
London they manufactured the Gold Label, Special Vat and Talloch Blended Scotch
Whisky brands.
Abbey Whisky is a Dunfermline
based independent bottler and online whisky shop, dedicated to sourcing rare
and high-end whiskies.
Founded in 2008, it began
to bottle its own single malts under The Rare Cask label in 2012.
In addition Abbey offers a
trio of bottlings titled ‘The Secret Casks’, a series of unnamed single malts
at 30, 40 and 50 years of age.
Abbey has also teamed up
with some of Scotland’s best distilleries to bring out Abbey Whisky Cask
Exclusives, including the coveted GlenDronach Cask 33 and most recently
Cask 3400, as well as a highly praised Kilchoman single cask.
Aberdeen Asset Management
is a global asset manager with Scotch whisky connections and own-label
bottlings to its name.
It has been the title
sponsor of the Scottish Open Golf Tournament and sponsored a whisky lounge at
the 2016 World Economic Forum in Davos.
At the turn of the 20th
century the company has also had a 12-year-old Speyside single malt bottled as
a hospitality gift for current or potential clients.
Aberdeen Whisky Company
primarily dealt in blended Scotch for the export market with brands that
included the Clan Cream, Bag Pipe Player and Old Aberdeen blends, and Royal
Deeside vatted malt.
Both a NAS and
eight-year-old version of Royal Deeside were produced, with the brand named
after the area alongside the River Dee that is home to Balmoral Castle.
Headquartered at the site
of the old Coleburn distillery since 2014, which it owns, Aceo Independent
Bottlers makes use of the plant’s former warehouses for its own cask storage,
and offers services including brokering of casks, storage and a full bottling
and labelling service.
The Adelphi company traces
its origins back to 1825 and the establishment of Adelphi distillery in the
Gorbals district of Glasgow.
Adelphi was founded by
brothers Charles and David Gray, who changed its name to Loch Katrine Adelphi in
1870 after a vast pipeline was created to carry water from Loch Katrine to the
city of Glasgow.
Distilling ceased during
the first decade of the 20th century after the distillery was acquired by the
Distillers Company Ltd in 1902.
The Adelphi Distillery Ltd
name was revived in 1993 by Jamie Walker, the great-grandson of former
distillery owner Archibald Walker.
Adelphi Distillery Ltd is
owned by Donald Houston and Keith Falconer.
Houston is laird of the
Ardnamurchan Estate in the West Highlands of Scotland, and it is on his land
that Adelphi built its own distillery.
The company specialises in
single cask bottlings, which are offered without chill-filtration or the
addition of colour. Some 50 casks are bottled each year, and the ‘Fascadale’
name recurs on small-batch bottlings from unspecified island distilleries at a
variety of ages.
Adelphi distillery –
opened in 2014 – has the capacity to produce up to 450,000 litres of spirit per
year, some of which will eventually make its way into Fascadale and other house
expressions, while quantities will also be used for reciprocal trading.
1906 saw the Great Gorbals
Disaster - one of the colossal washbacks in the distillery collapse,
engulfing the neighbouring street in a tidal wave of alcohol and resulting in
fatalities. Malt distilling ceased on site. Grain distilling and cask
maturation continued till 1932.
James Ainslie & Co. was founded as a wine and spirit merchant in Leith, Edinburgh in 1868. A very successful company, it purchased the Clynelish distillery in 1896 and completely re-built it within two years.
After the Pattison crash
of 1898, the distillery was sold to concentrate on blending.
They marketed Ainslie's Blended
Scotch Whisky, King's Legend Blended Scotch Whisky and Real McTavish Blended
Scotch Whisky.
Alambic Classique, based
in Bad Wörishofen in Germany, bottles single cask and small batch single malts
under the Rare & Old, Special Vintage and Double Matured selections,
including a significant number of 1972 Ledaigs and some very old Ben Nevis
expressions.
Founded in Germany, Aldi
is a budget supermarket with an award-winning selection of Scotch whisky
bottlings.
Aldi’s own-label Scotch
whisky brands include the Highland Black and Highland Earl blends, Glen Orrin
blended malt, Glen Marnoch, a single malt with expressions from Islay, the
Highlands and Speyside at a variety of ages, and an unbranded single grain
Scotch whisky.
Its releases have also
included the remarkably good-value Glenbridge 40-year-old single malt, launched
in 2011 for just £49.99.
Established in 1965,
Alexander Dunn & Co Ltd operated principally in export markets, offering
Slaintheva 12-year-old blended Scotch whisky in standard bottles and 1.75-litre
‘kingnums,’ with the purchaser’s name inscribed by hand on the label.
It also produced what was
verified by the Guinness Book of Records as the smallest bottle of whisky in
the world, containing 1/20th of a fluid ounce.
Alexander Murray & Co
bottles single cask single malts at both cask strength and 40% ABV, as well as
blended whiskies of varying ages, some of which are released under the Kirkland
Signature label.
It also produces the
Monumental Blended Scotch, which is available as an 18- and 30-year-old, and in
2015 became the first to release a malt whisky finished in ex-beer casks.
The Polly’s Casks bottling
contains Tullibardine single malt finished in Firestone Walker’s Double DPA
beer casks.
Alexander Weine & Destillate
is a Swiss importer and merchant of wine and spirits, founded in October 1989.
It purchased a couple of
not-yet-whisky casks from Bruichladdich in 2006. The first barrel was bottled
in 2011, called SwissLink 1. The next independent bottling, named SwissLink 2,
was offered in 2013.
A strong demand for its
own label bottlings led the company to bottle SwissLinks 3-6 within a short
timeframe, with whiskies from Caperdonich, Clynelish, Longmorn and Bowmore. Its
last offering was bottled in 2014: SwissLink 8, another of its original
Bruichladdich barrels, this time a Port Charlotte.
Tobacconist and luxury
goods retailer Alfred Dunhill released Dunhill Old Master in the 1970s,
primarily for export. Bottled at 43.0% ABV, it was a Blended Scotch Whisky.
Allied Breweries began to
purchase whisky companies and distilleries to move into the whisky business in
1969.
The first Scotch whisky
company purchased by Allied Breweries was Stewart & Sons of Dundee Ltd., a
successful business with a number of well-known brands including the Stewart’s
Cream of the Barley blend.
This was followed in 1976
by the acquisition of William Teacher & Sons Ltd., which was at the time
the largest independent Scotch whisky company still controlled by descendants
of the founder.
Allied Distillers Ltd. was
formed in 1976 to control the purchase of licences to the distilleries of
Ardbeg, Balblair, Glenmacadam, Miltonduff-Glenlivet, Pulteney and
Glenburgie-Glenlivet along with the brands of George Ballantine & Son Ltd.
Allied Domecq handled a
rapidly growing spirits portfolio, which included Teacher’s, Ballantine’s
and Laphroaig. Its business strategy resulted in Allied Domecq becoming the
world’s second-largest spirits group in 1994.
It was acquired in 2005 by
the French drinks giant Pernod Ricard.
It was earlier known as Allied
Domecq and the owner of Long John as well.
Rosebank is regarded as
one of the finest and most mellow Lowland malt.
It is a triple-distilled
malt, which creates its meadow flower bouquet, gentle fruits and fresh citrus notes.
Rosebank distillery is
built beside the Forth & Clyde, the waterway which links Scotland’s east
and west coasts, and therefore its two main cities, Glasgow and Edinburgh.
Lombard Brands, the Isle of Man-based spirit and wine merchant owned by the Lombard-Chibnall family, introduced Anchor Bay in 2001 alongside Golden Harvest and Smoking Ember as part of the Illustration Malts series.
The series concept was to introduce three differing styles of blended malt whisky that could be consumed before, during and after dinner. Anchor Bay with its light blend of Speyside malts, was aimed at the aperitif end of the spectrum.
Only Anchor Bay survives today.
Auchnagie blended malt is a considered recreation of the style of whisky thought to have been produced by the lost Perthshire distillery of the same name.
The blended malt is one of several homages to lost distilleries to be introduced by The Lost Distillery Company. With its citrus, black pepper and cereal notes, the expression is as close as we’ll get to tasting the real thing.
Auchnagie is available in three expressions as part of TLDC’s Classic, Archivist and Vintage series.
Auld Acrimony, a 12-year-old Highland blended malt, was produced during the late 19080s/ early 1990s by Grant and Webster Distillers exclusively for British supermarket chain, Safeway. Available only at auctions today.
Born on the island of Islay, blended malt Big Peat is a smoky, oily whisky, with sweetness from Caol Ila, the fruitiness of Bowmore, a medicinal quality from Ardbeg and an earthy tone from Port Ellen.
A medium-weight single malt, Aberlour’s character balances malt, fruit and a distinctive blackcurrant note. It is a whisky which gains in weight and toffee-like sweetness as it matures and has sufficient depth to be able to cope with Sherry cask maturation.
Aberlour’s cult following is for the small batch, 100% Sherry-matured, cask-strength variant A’Bunadh which has run since 2000.
Aberlour was one of the first distilleries to offer a ‘bottle your own’ whisky to visitors.
The first distillery in the village of Aberlour was established in 1825 by James Gordon and Peter Weir. Weir withdrew in 1826.
The distillery was leased in 1826 and ran until 1833, when the co-lessees James and John Grant left to build their own distillery, Glen Grant, in Rothes.
The current distillery was the brainchild of James Fleming who built it in 1879 using water from St. Drostan’s Well, named after an early Columban monk, which is situated on the site.
Like many Victorian distilleries, it burnt down in 1879 and had to be rebuilt. Robert Thorne bought the distillery in 1892.
It burnt down again in 1898 and had to be rebuilt.
Achenvoir was a lost Islay distillery that was open only briefly in the 1810s. No farms or crofts named Achenvoir are listed currently or historically on Islay, so the exact location of the distillery remains a mystery.
Achlatt is one of countless lost Perthshire distilleries, near Moulin, Pitlochry.
Ailsa Bay is a case study in how style is not dictated solely by geographical location.
Ailsa Bay is in the Lowlands, on the Clyde coast.
Its eight stills however produce a wide variety of styles of makes.
This flexibility is deliberate as the distillery was built to both replace ‘Balvenie-style’ malt for Grant’s blends and offer other flavour possibilities. Given this, not surprisingly, the stills are shaped the same as Balvenie’s.
Four different characters are made: estery, nutty, fruity and heavily peated.
During World War II, when the distillery was on short-term working, locals used to smuggle wash up the Aberlour burn and distil illicitly under the Linn Falls.
The distillery became part of Campbell Distillers in 1945, passing into the Pernod Ricard stable in 1974, the year after it had been expanded from two to four stills and wholly modernised internally.
Its ownership has long given it a strong following in France.
It is now part of Pernod’s whisky division, Chivas Brothers.
There is a long history of malt distilleries being built within grain plants: Inverleven at Dumbarton (1959-1991), Ben Wyvis at Invergordon (1965-1977), Glen Flager and Killyloch at Garnheath (1965-1985), and Ladyburn at Girvan (1966-1976).
All of them were built by blending firms and came into being at a time when an increase in production was deemed necessary. All then closed when a downturn in demand occurred.
A slightly different dynamic prompted William Grant & Sons in 2007 to build Ailsa Bay on the same Girvan site where Ladyburn had once stood. This time not only were the Grant’s blends (the Family Reserve range and Clan MacGregor), both growing, but so was demand for its two flagship malts Glenfiddich and Balvenie.
Pressure on the latter was the main reason for the construction of this eight still, 5m litres per annum capacity site. After eight years of production, Ailsa Bay's first official bottling as a single malt was a no-age-statement heavily peated whisky released in February 2016.
The expression unleashed the full flexibiility of Ailsa Bay's production set up, combining innovative techniques in the way of spirit cut points, vatting, maturation and even 'sweetness measurement'.
Ainslie's is the proprietary brand of what became Ainslie & Heilbron (Distillers) Ltd, an old DCL subsidiary.
Ainslie’s was bottled as an ‘Old Liqueur Whisky’ soon after Leith-based wine and spirit merchant James Ainslie & Co. bought Clynelish (the original one, also known as Brora) at the end of the 19th century.
Early bottlings were likely to have featured some Brora malt whisky, though exactly how much is uncertain.
The Ainslie’s brand has featured many blended expressions over the years, including King’s Legend, Royal Edinburgh Specially Selected De Luxe, plus a handful of regional single malt bottlings from unnamed distilleries.
The Exceptional series by Sutcliffe & Son, a subsidiary of US producer Craft Distillers, consists of three expressions: The Exceptional Blend, Grain and Malt, of which several editions have been released over the years.
The editions are designed to vary from batch to batch, with no two the same owing to the variety of whiskies and casks used.
Although each is bottled without an age statement, the constituent whiskies are listed on the back of each label.
The first release, which came in 2013, was The Exceptional Grain, followed by The Exceptional Malt in June 2015 and The Exceptional Blend in 2016.
A Vietnamese collector, Viet Nguyen Dinh Tuan, has been confirmed by Guinness World Records as the proud owner of the most valuable whisky collection.
He has amassed 535 old and rare Scotch whiskies in 20 years, which has been valued at a ‘hammer price’ of £10,770,635 (£13,032,468 adding 21% buyers premium if the collection were sold through a UK auctioneer such as Sotheby’s), by valuation firm Rare Whisky 101.
The collector’s hoard includes the 1926 Macallan Fine and Rare – the world’s most expensive bottle of whisky – which fetched £1,200,000 (£1,452,000 including buyer’s premium), in a sale at auction house Sotheby’s last month. Only 40 bottles of The Macallan’s 1926 were ever released. Viet owns three.
The collector also owns one of only 12 bottles of the oldest Bowmore ever released, which also happens to be both the most expensive Bowmore and the most expensive Islay malt in the world. A similar sold for £300,000 at auction.
In another case, a private 3,900 bottle whisky collection, thought to be the largest to be sold at auction with several bottles valued at over £1 million, will go under the hammer next year at Perthshire-based Whisky Auctioneer.
Called ‘The Perfect Collection’, the bottles were amassed by the late Richard Gooding, an American private whisky collector from Colorado, who spent over 20 years travelling around the world to source the spirits.
It is collectively estimated to achieve an auction price of between £7 and £8 million.
Until recently, the bottles were housed in Gooding’s ‘pub’ – a dedicated room in his family home.
The collection includes highly sought-after bottlings from The Macallan, Bowmore and Springbank, some of which are valued at over £1 million.
It is reported that the collection includes the largest selection of The Macallan ever to go to auction, including the 1926 Valerio Adami (estimated hammer price: £700,000 – £800,000) and 1926 Fine & Rare 60 Year Old bottlings (estimated hammer price: £1,000,000 – £1,200,000).
Other rare whiskies in the collection include bottlings from some now closed distilleries, including Old Orkney from Stromness Distillery and Dallas Dhu, some of which have never appeared at auction before.
Other highlights include Ardbeg 1967 Signatory Vintage 30-Year-Old / Dark Oloroso Butt #578 (estimated hammer price: £3,000 – £5,000); Bowmore 1964 Black Bowmore 29-Year-Old 1st Edition (estimated hammer price: £12,000 – £17,000); Bowmore 1967 Largiemeanoch 12-Year-Old (estimated hammer price: £10,000 – £15,000); Glenfiddich 1936 Peter J Russell (estimated hammer price: £3,000 – £5,000); Glenfiddich 1937 Rare Collection 64-Year-Old (estimated hammer price: £50,000 – £60,000); Glenfiddich Pure Malt circa 1950s (estimated hammer price: £3,000 – £4,000); Highland Park 1958 40-Year-Old 75cl / US Import (estimated hammer price: £3,000 – £5,000); Springbank 1919 50-Year-Old (estimated hammer price: £180,000 – £220,000); The Balvenie 1937 Pure Malt 50-Year-Old 75cl / Milroy’s of Soho (estimated hammer price: £18,000 – £23,000); and The Macallan 50-Year-Old Lalique Six Pillars Collection (estimated hammer price: £90,000 – £100,000).
Abhainn Dearg was The Isle of Lewis’ only legal distillery, in its capital Stornoway (and named after it), but only ran for two years in the 1850s. After that, Lewisians had to import their Scotch from the mainland, or maybe source it from illicit local operations.
In 2008, Marko Tayburn built a distillery at Abhainn Dearg [Red River] on the western coast of the island making this officially the most remote whisky-making site in Scotland.
He designed and built the stills himself, modelling them on an old illicit still he had discovered.
In December 2018 the distillery launched its first 10-year-old single malts – the oldest whisky to be produced by a legal distillery in the Outer Hebrides.
In 2010,he launched his first single malt, the 3 YO Spirit of Lewis.
It wasn’t until Matthew Gloag III inherited the business from William in 1896 that the company registered its first blended Scotch, the Brig o’ Perth.
A year later, The Famous Grouse was released at the same time as The Grouse Brand.
Originally, The Famous Grouse was priced lower than the Grouse Brand. In a little over 10 years, the reverse would be true thanks to the popularity of The Famous Grouse.
When US Prohibition came into force in January 1920, the company’s distribution to markets close to the United States such as Canada, Latin America and the West Indies suddenly shot up.
When William Gladstone passed a law allowing Scotch Whisky to be matured tax-free until ready for sale in 1860, Punch magazine celebrated with the cartoon of the Dancey Man.
The Loch Katrine Adelphi Distillery was built in 1826 by Charles and David Gray on the banks of the River Clyde just south of Victoria Bridge on the northern edge of the Gorbals.
In 1880, ownership of Adelphi changed to Messrs A Walker and Co, owners of two existing distilleries in Liverpool and Limerick. Walker and Co injected new capital and expand the works to include the making of grain spirit as well as malt. A new Coffey Still installed.
1971: Demolition of the Loch Katrine Adelphi Distillery.
1984: Glasgow Central Mosque erected on former site of Adelphi Distillery.
1994: Jamie Walker acquires copyright for Punch Magazine’s cartoon of William Gladstone and The Dancey Man is officially adopted as Adelphi’s mascot.
2014 : First spirit produced at Ardnamurchan Distillery. Ardnamurchan Distillery officially opened by HRH The Princess Royal on 25th July 2014.
2016: The first bottling is released, the Ardnamurchan 2016 AD. 2500 bottles available to the world and it was sold out overnight.
2017: Second bottling released, the Ardnamurchan 2017 AD. Again, there were 2500 bottles and was well received around the world.
If some shipments made their way into the States, then so be it.
Gordon & MacPhail announced the release of an 80-year-old Glenlivet in September 2021. This will be the oldest single malt whisky ever to be bottled: It will be part of the Generations Series.
On February 3, 1940, cask number 340 was placed in Gordon & MacPhail's warehouse by George Urquhart and his father John. On February 5th, 2020 it was decided that the moment of truth had come and this Glenlivet Single Malt Scotch Whisky would be bottled.
The yield of the cask will 250 decanters at 44.9 % ABV.
Such a unique whisky deserves a unique decanter with unique packaging. Gordon & MacPhail has asked internationally renowned architect and designer Sir David Adjaye OBE to design the decanter and an oak box for the Generations 80 Years.
The Generations 80 Years will be unveiled in September 2021.
Decanter number 1 will be auctioned by Sotheby’s in October. The proceeds will be donated to the Scottish charity Trees for Life, whose mission is to return the lost wild glory of the Caledonian forests.
The second batch Glenmorangie’s Cadboll Estate 15-year-old limited edition single estate whisky 43% ABV was released in June 2021.
Airdrie, also known as Tobermore, was a successful and relatively long-surviving distillery. Airdrie is listed under six owners over a 60-year lifespan from around the 1780s to 1852.
It is possible that some owners or operators may have changed the company name on one or more occasions.
Airdry was an elusive North Lanarkshire distillery, possibly the precursor to East Monkland distillery, which sat close to the Monkland Canal and River Calder. However, older maps show no distillery in that area.
Some grain whisky from the lost North of Scotland distillery was bottled under the name ‘Alloa’.
Although there was an Alloa distillery, this whisky actually came from the lost North of Scotland grain distillery in Tullibody, three miles west of the town. The whisky produced there was intended for blends but some 40-year-old casks from 1964 have been bottled by Hart Bros and the German independents Jack Weibers Whisky World and Alambic Classique.
Also known as the Grange distillery, it fell silent in 1851 and is buried under Diageo’s Carsebridge site in Alloa.
In 1958 George Christie set up the North of Scotland distillery just down the road on the site of the old Knox Forth Brewery to give blenders another source of grain whisky.
For a year it also produced a malt whisky called Strathmore from a pair of pot stills, but it seems Christie decided the future lay in grain whisky.
A few old casks evaded the blenders and were acquired after the millennium by a handful of independent bottlers, which released the whisky under the name Alloa. Other well-aged expressions have since been released by indie bottlers as North of Scotland grain whisky.
The North of Scotland distillery was eventually closed in 1980, with the silent site sold onto the DCL in 1982.
Hedonism Lowland Blended Grain Scotch Whisky’s creator John Glaser dreamed of creating a Scotch that showed off the spectrum of flavour grain whisky is capable of. As the spirit is naturally mellower than malt whisky, Glaser chose a variety of styles and levels of maturity to create layers of flavour and complexity, which journey through vanilla cream, toasted coconut and soft toffee.
Named after the Roland TR-808 Drum Machine – one of the first affordable and widely available drum machines launched in the early 1980s – 8O8 blended grain is aimed at an entirely non-traditional market sector: the young, club and cocktail set.
The series concept was to introduce three differing styles of blended malt whisky that could be consumed before, during and after dinner. Anchor Bay with its light blend of Speyside malts, was aimed at the aperitif end of the spectrum.
Only Anchor Bay survives today.
Auchnagie blended malt is a considered recreation of the style of whisky thought to have been produced by the lost Perthshire distillery of the same name.
The blended malt is one of several homages to lost distilleries to be introduced by The Lost Distillery Company. With its citrus, black pepper and cereal notes, the expression is as close as we’ll get to tasting the real thing.
Auchnagie is available in three expressions as part of TLDC’s Classic, Archivist and Vintage series.
Auld Acrimony, a 12-year-old Highland blended malt, was produced during the late 19080s/ early 1990s by Grant and Webster Distillers exclusively for British supermarket chain, Safeway. Available only at auctions today.
Born on the island of Islay, blended malt Big Peat is a smoky, oily whisky, with sweetness from Caol Ila, the fruitiness of Bowmore, a medicinal quality from Ardbeg and an earthy tone from Port Ellen.
A medium-weight single malt, Aberlour’s character balances malt, fruit and a distinctive blackcurrant note. It is a whisky which gains in weight and toffee-like sweetness as it matures and has sufficient depth to be able to cope with Sherry cask maturation.
Aberlour’s cult following is for the small batch, 100% Sherry-matured, cask-strength variant A’Bunadh which has run since 2000.
Aberlour was one of the first distilleries to offer a ‘bottle your own’ whisky to visitors.
The first distillery in the village of Aberlour was established in 1825 by James Gordon and Peter Weir. Weir withdrew in 1826.
The distillery was leased in 1826 and ran until 1833, when the co-lessees James and John Grant left to build their own distillery, Glen Grant, in Rothes.
The current distillery was the brainchild of James Fleming who built it in 1879 using water from St. Drostan’s Well, named after an early Columban monk, which is situated on the site.
Like many Victorian distilleries, it burnt down in 1879 and had to be rebuilt. Robert Thorne bought the distillery in 1892.
It burnt down again in 1898 and had to be rebuilt.
Achenvoir was a lost Islay distillery that was open only briefly in the 1810s. No farms or crofts named Achenvoir are listed currently or historically on Islay, so the exact location of the distillery remains a mystery.
Achlatt is one of countless lost Perthshire distilleries, near Moulin, Pitlochry.
Ailsa Bay is a case study in how style is not dictated solely by geographical location.
Ailsa Bay is in the Lowlands, on the Clyde coast.
Its eight stills however produce a wide variety of styles of makes.
This flexibility is deliberate as the distillery was built to both replace ‘Balvenie-style’ malt for Grant’s blends and offer other flavour possibilities. Given this, not surprisingly, the stills are shaped the same as Balvenie’s.
Four different characters are made: estery, nutty, fruity and heavily peated.
During World War II, when the distillery was on short-term working, locals used to smuggle wash up the Aberlour burn and distil illicitly under the Linn Falls.
The distillery became part of Campbell Distillers in 1945, passing into the Pernod Ricard stable in 1974, the year after it had been expanded from two to four stills and wholly modernised internally.
Its ownership has long given it a strong following in France.
It is now part of Pernod’s whisky division, Chivas Brothers.
There is a long history of malt distilleries being built within grain plants: Inverleven at Dumbarton (1959-1991), Ben Wyvis at Invergordon (1965-1977), Glen Flager and Killyloch at Garnheath (1965-1985), and Ladyburn at Girvan (1966-1976).
All of them were built by blending firms and came into being at a time when an increase in production was deemed necessary. All then closed when a downturn in demand occurred.
A slightly different dynamic prompted William Grant & Sons in 2007 to build Ailsa Bay on the same Girvan site where Ladyburn had once stood. This time not only were the Grant’s blends (the Family Reserve range and Clan MacGregor), both growing, but so was demand for its two flagship malts Glenfiddich and Balvenie.
Pressure on the latter was the main reason for the construction of this eight still, 5m litres per annum capacity site. After eight years of production, Ailsa Bay's first official bottling as a single malt was a no-age-statement heavily peated whisky released in February 2016.
The expression unleashed the full flexibiility of Ailsa Bay's production set up, combining innovative techniques in the way of spirit cut points, vatting, maturation and even 'sweetness measurement'.
Ainslie's is the proprietary brand of what became Ainslie & Heilbron (Distillers) Ltd, an old DCL subsidiary.
Ainslie’s was bottled as an ‘Old Liqueur Whisky’ soon after Leith-based wine and spirit merchant James Ainslie & Co. bought Clynelish (the original one, also known as Brora) at the end of the 19th century.
Early bottlings were likely to have featured some Brora malt whisky, though exactly how much is uncertain.
The Ainslie’s brand has featured many blended expressions over the years, including King’s Legend, Royal Edinburgh Specially Selected De Luxe, plus a handful of regional single malt bottlings from unnamed distilleries.
The Exceptional series by Sutcliffe & Son, a subsidiary of US producer Craft Distillers, consists of three expressions: The Exceptional Blend, Grain and Malt, of which several editions have been released over the years.
The editions are designed to vary from batch to batch, with no two the same owing to the variety of whiskies and casks used.
Although each is bottled without an age statement, the constituent whiskies are listed on the back of each label.
The first release, which came in 2013, was The Exceptional Grain, followed by The Exceptional Malt in June 2015 and The Exceptional Blend in 2016.
A Vietnamese collector, Viet Nguyen Dinh Tuan, has been confirmed by Guinness World Records as the proud owner of the most valuable whisky collection.
He has amassed 535 old and rare Scotch whiskies in 20 years, which has been valued at a ‘hammer price’ of £10,770,635 (£13,032,468 adding 21% buyers premium if the collection were sold through a UK auctioneer such as Sotheby’s), by valuation firm Rare Whisky 101.
The collector’s hoard includes the 1926 Macallan Fine and Rare – the world’s most expensive bottle of whisky – which fetched £1,200,000 (£1,452,000 including buyer’s premium), in a sale at auction house Sotheby’s last month. Only 40 bottles of The Macallan’s 1926 were ever released. Viet owns three.
The collector also owns one of only 12 bottles of the oldest Bowmore ever released, which also happens to be both the most expensive Bowmore and the most expensive Islay malt in the world. A similar sold for £300,000 at auction.
In another case, a private 3,900 bottle whisky collection, thought to be the largest to be sold at auction with several bottles valued at over £1 million, will go under the hammer next year at Perthshire-based Whisky Auctioneer.
Called ‘The Perfect Collection’, the bottles were amassed by the late Richard Gooding, an American private whisky collector from Colorado, who spent over 20 years travelling around the world to source the spirits.
It is collectively estimated to achieve an auction price of between £7 and £8 million.
Until recently, the bottles were housed in Gooding’s ‘pub’ – a dedicated room in his family home.
The collection includes highly sought-after bottlings from The Macallan, Bowmore and Springbank, some of which are valued at over £1 million.
It is reported that the collection includes the largest selection of The Macallan ever to go to auction, including the 1926 Valerio Adami (estimated hammer price: £700,000 – £800,000) and 1926 Fine & Rare 60 Year Old bottlings (estimated hammer price: £1,000,000 – £1,200,000).
Other rare whiskies in the collection include bottlings from some now closed distilleries, including Old Orkney from Stromness Distillery and Dallas Dhu, some of which have never appeared at auction before.
Other highlights include Ardbeg 1967 Signatory Vintage 30-Year-Old / Dark Oloroso Butt #578 (estimated hammer price: £3,000 – £5,000); Bowmore 1964 Black Bowmore 29-Year-Old 1st Edition (estimated hammer price: £12,000 – £17,000); Bowmore 1967 Largiemeanoch 12-Year-Old (estimated hammer price: £10,000 – £15,000); Glenfiddich 1936 Peter J Russell (estimated hammer price: £3,000 – £5,000); Glenfiddich 1937 Rare Collection 64-Year-Old (estimated hammer price: £50,000 – £60,000); Glenfiddich Pure Malt circa 1950s (estimated hammer price: £3,000 – £4,000); Highland Park 1958 40-Year-Old 75cl / US Import (estimated hammer price: £3,000 – £5,000); Springbank 1919 50-Year-Old (estimated hammer price: £180,000 – £220,000); The Balvenie 1937 Pure Malt 50-Year-Old 75cl / Milroy’s of Soho (estimated hammer price: £18,000 – £23,000); and The Macallan 50-Year-Old Lalique Six Pillars Collection (estimated hammer price: £90,000 – £100,000).
Abhainn Dearg was The Isle of Lewis’ only legal distillery, in its capital Stornoway (and named after it), but only ran for two years in the 1850s. After that, Lewisians had to import their Scotch from the mainland, or maybe source it from illicit local operations.
In 2008, Marko Tayburn built a distillery at Abhainn Dearg [Red River] on the western coast of the island making this officially the most remote whisky-making site in Scotland.
He designed and built the stills himself, modelling them on an old illicit still he had discovered.
In December 2018 the distillery launched its first 10-year-old single malts – the oldest whisky to be produced by a legal distillery in the Outer Hebrides.
In 2010,he launched his first single malt, the 3 YO Spirit of Lewis.
It wasn’t until Matthew Gloag III inherited the business from William in 1896 that the company registered its first blended Scotch, the Brig o’ Perth.
A year later, The Famous Grouse was released at the same time as The Grouse Brand.
Originally, The Famous Grouse was priced lower than the Grouse Brand. In a little over 10 years, the reverse would be true thanks to the popularity of The Famous Grouse.
When US Prohibition came into force in January 1920, the company’s distribution to markets close to the United States such as Canada, Latin America and the West Indies suddenly shot up.
When William Gladstone passed a law allowing Scotch Whisky to be matured tax-free until ready for sale in 1860, Punch magazine celebrated with the cartoon of the Dancey Man.
The Loch Katrine Adelphi Distillery was built in 1826 by Charles and David Gray on the banks of the River Clyde just south of Victoria Bridge on the northern edge of the Gorbals.
In 1880, ownership of Adelphi changed to Messrs A Walker and Co, owners of two existing distilleries in Liverpool and Limerick. Walker and Co injected new capital and expand the works to include the making of grain spirit as well as malt. A new Coffey Still installed.
1971: Demolition of the Loch Katrine Adelphi Distillery.
1984: Glasgow Central Mosque erected on former site of Adelphi Distillery.
1994: Jamie Walker acquires copyright for Punch Magazine’s cartoon of William Gladstone and The Dancey Man is officially adopted as Adelphi’s mascot.
2014 : First spirit produced at Ardnamurchan Distillery. Ardnamurchan Distillery officially opened by HRH The Princess Royal on 25th July 2014.
2016: The first bottling is released, the Ardnamurchan 2016 AD. 2500 bottles available to the world and it was sold out overnight.
2017: Second bottling released, the Ardnamurchan 2017 AD. Again, there were 2500 bottles and was well received around the world.
If some shipments made their way into the States, then so be it.
Gordon & MacPhail announced the release of an 80-year-old Glenlivet in September 2021. This will be the oldest single malt whisky ever to be bottled: It will be part of the Generations Series.
On February 3, 1940, cask number 340 was placed in Gordon & MacPhail's warehouse by George Urquhart and his father John. On February 5th, 2020 it was decided that the moment of truth had come and this Glenlivet Single Malt Scotch Whisky would be bottled.
The yield of the cask will 250 decanters at 44.9 % ABV.
Such a unique whisky deserves a unique decanter with unique packaging. Gordon & MacPhail has asked internationally renowned architect and designer Sir David Adjaye OBE to design the decanter and an oak box for the Generations 80 Years.
The Generations 80 Years will be unveiled in September 2021.
Decanter number 1 will be auctioned by Sotheby’s in October. The proceeds will be donated to the Scottish charity Trees for Life, whose mission is to return the lost wild glory of the Caledonian forests.
The second batch Glenmorangie’s Cadboll Estate 15-year-old limited edition single estate whisky 43% ABV was released in June 2021.
Airdrie, also known as Tobermore, was a successful and relatively long-surviving distillery. Airdrie is listed under six owners over a 60-year lifespan from around the 1780s to 1852.
It is possible that some owners or operators may have changed the company name on one or more occasions.
Airdry was an elusive North Lanarkshire distillery, possibly the precursor to East Monkland distillery, which sat close to the Monkland Canal and River Calder. However, older maps show no distillery in that area.
Some grain whisky from the lost North of Scotland distillery was bottled under the name ‘Alloa’.
Although there was an Alloa distillery, this whisky actually came from the lost North of Scotland grain distillery in Tullibody, three miles west of the town. The whisky produced there was intended for blends but some 40-year-old casks from 1964 have been bottled by Hart Bros and the German independents Jack Weibers Whisky World and Alambic Classique.
Also known as the Grange distillery, it fell silent in 1851 and is buried under Diageo’s Carsebridge site in Alloa.
In 1958 George Christie set up the North of Scotland distillery just down the road on the site of the old Knox Forth Brewery to give blenders another source of grain whisky.
For a year it also produced a malt whisky called Strathmore from a pair of pot stills, but it seems Christie decided the future lay in grain whisky.
A few old casks evaded the blenders and were acquired after the millennium by a handful of independent bottlers, which released the whisky under the name Alloa. Other well-aged expressions have since been released by indie bottlers as North of Scotland grain whisky.
The North of Scotland distillery was eventually closed in 1980, with the silent site sold onto the DCL in 1982.
Hedonism Lowland Blended Grain Scotch Whisky’s creator John Glaser dreamed of creating a Scotch that showed off the spectrum of flavour grain whisky is capable of. As the spirit is naturally mellower than malt whisky, Glaser chose a variety of styles and levels of maturity to create layers of flavour and complexity, which journey through vanilla cream, toasted coconut and soft toffee.
Named after the Roland TR-808 Drum Machine – one of the first affordable and widely available drum machines launched in the early 1980s – 8O8 blended grain is aimed at an entirely non-traditional market sector: the young, club and cocktail set.
There are records of a
family called Stark distilling on the wider site as early as 1798.
In 1817, a distillery
named Rosebank was operational for two years.
In 1827, the Stark family
re-emerged to operate the Camelon distillery which sat on the opposite bank of
the canal.
In 1840 Camelon’s maltings
were converted by James Rankine into the new Rosebank.
In 1861, the Camelon
distillery buildings were demolished and a new maltings was built to supply
Rosebank.
It ran continuously, bar a
brief wartime hiatus, until 1993 when it closed because the owners, UDV,
refused to upgrade its effluent treatment plant.
The current owner is Ian
Macleod Distillers, who bought it from Diageo in 2017.
Abbot's Choice Blended
Scotch Whisky uses Linkwood as its central malt.
The brand was originally
called ‘McEwan’s Whisky – the Abbot’s Choice.’
Abbot’s Choice was
established in Leith in 1863. The firm owned other blended whiskies including
King George IV and Chequers, now inherited by Diageo.
A set of ceramic monks are
part of the massive collection at Edinburgh’s Scotch Whisky Experience amassed
by the Brazilian businessman, Claive Vidiz.
The ‘Abbot’s Choice’
trademark was registered in the USA in 1953, and lapsed in 1995.
Abbotshaugh Distillery,
which produces Lowland Single Malt Scotch Whisky, was located in the grounds of
an abbey that has long since vanished.
It was possibly on or
beside West Mains of Abbotshaugh, a farm close to the Forth-Clyde Canal that
had opened in 1790.
Abbotshaugh distillery
opened in 1825, but closed in 1828.
Aberargie Distillery,
which produces Lowland Single Malt Scotch Whisky, is technically a Lowland
distillery (it misses the Highland line by a few miles).
Aberargie uses Golden
Promise barley – grown entirely on its own farms – for an inherent waxiness to
the new make, while the distillery is set up to nurture a fruity quality, with
a smoky characteristic from the occasional peated run.
Maturation will take place
in a mixture of first-fill ex-Sherry butts, first-fill ex-Bourbon barrels from
Woodford Reserve, and second-fill Sherry/Bourbon casks, further enhancing the
rich Aberargie whisky style.
Every drop of spirit
produced at the distillery is destined for Aberargie single malt, although some
may be commandeered as fillings for Morrison & Mackay’s Bruadar whisky
liqueur.
Aberargie marks a return
to distilling for the Morrison family.
Whisky broker Stanley P.
Morrison had owned Bowmore during the 1960s, his distilling, blending and
brokering business forming the basis for Morrison Bowmore, now owned by Beam
Suntory.
In 2005 the Morrison
family – led by Stanley’s son Brian, and grandson Jamie – secured a majority
stake in the Scottish Liqueur Centre in Bankfoot, Perth, where it nurtured the
Bruadar and Columba Cream liqueur brands.
The group – later renamed
Morrison & Mackay – moved into blending and bottling Scotch whiskies under
the Carn Mor range, and re-established the Old Perth brand in 2014.
At the time of Old Perth’s
creation, the business had sought to move its operation to larger premises.
The Morrison family owned
a 300-acre farm in the nearby village of Aberargie, where they had been growing
barley for maltsters for a number of years.
In early 2014 Morrison
& Mackay’s plans to build a blending and bottling hall on the farm were
approved.
Along with the designs
were plans for an adjacent, yet separate distillery to be owned and operated
solely by the Morrison family under The Perth Distilling Company.
Due to the Morrisons’
majority stake in Morrison & Mackay, they were able to proceed with both
builds simultaneously.
Ground broke on the
project in June 2016, and following distilling trials in October 2017,
Aberargie distillery’s first cask was filled on 1 November.
Aberfeldy Highland Single
Malt Scotch Whisky is the heart of all Dewar’s brands of whisky.
Aberfeldy’s characteristic
honeyed note is the result of very long fermentation, coupled with slow
distillation.
It was the sons in John
Dewar & Sons, John Jr and Thomas, who made the family firm a globally
recognised name.
Dewar’s joined John Walker
and Buchanan’s to create DCL in 1925 and by 1973 the Aberfeldy site had doubled
its capacity to its present size.
It changed ownership in
1998, when, fearing monopoly, the UK Monopolies Board forced the newly formed
Diageo to offload some of its brands and attendant capacity. The Dewar estate plus
Aberfeldy, Aultmore, Craigellachie and Royal Brackla were bought for £1.1bn by
Bacardi-Martini.
Aberfeldy launched its
first single malt in 1999, moving up from being a 100% output to the Dewar
Blends.
Bacardi is pushing its
weight in the single malt Scotch whisky category with regular releases of expressions
from its five malt distilleries, Royal Brackla, Aberfeldy, Aultmore,
Craigellachie & Macduff.
Earlier, these malts were
only being used for Dewar’s or William Lawson blends.
All Bacardi products carry an age statement and are caramel-free.
Aultmore will be available
as a 46% ABV, non-chill-filtered whisky free of caramel colouring. The range
will consist of a 12 and 25 year-old due as well as a 21-year-old as a travel
retail exclusive.
An 18 year old Aultmore was
launched in 2015 as part of John Dewar & Sons' Last Great Malts ranges.
Aultmore is known locally
as “a nip of the Buckie Road.” The distillery’s water filters down through the
misty, mysterious area called the Foggie Moss.
The meatiest, most
sulphurous of the range, Craigellachie will be released as a 13-, 17- and
23-year-old with a 19-year-old going into travel retail. There will also be an
11-year-old bottling exclusively for the nearby, recently refurbished
Craigellachie Hotel.
Craigellachie expressions
carry trend-busting unusual year age statements, all being odd numbers.
Liquid from Macduff was
previously used for Glen Deveron single malt, which goes under a different name
as Diageo owns the Macduff International trademark.
In travel retail,
Bacardi’s Glen Deveron Royal Burgh range will continue to exist, but in
domestic markets, the whisky will become known simply as Deveron.
Chivas Regal signed a three-year sponsorship deal with the British Premier League football team Manchester United in August 2018.
As a follow up in October 2019, it has created a special Manchester United-themed 13 year old blended Scotch whisky in honour of former team manager Sir Alex Ferguson.
Partly matured in ex-rye casks, this expression has been created exclusively for the US where Manchester United is said to have over eight million fans.
Some grain whisky from the lost North of Scotland distillery in Tullibody north of Alloa township was bottled under the name ‘Alloa’.
The whisky produced there was intended for blends.
Some 40-year-old casks from 1964 have been bottled by Hart Bros and the German independents Jack Weibers Whisky World and Alambic Classique.
Way back in 1795 a certain Alexander Glen was running the Alloa distillery.
Also known as the Grange distillery, it fell silent in 1851 and is buried under Diageo’s Carsebridge site in Alloa.
In 1958 George Christie set up the North of Scotland distillery just down the road on the site of the old Knox Forth Brewery to give blenders another source of grain whisky.
For a year it also produced a malt whisky called Strathmore from a pair of pot stills, but it seems Christie decided the future lay in grain whisky.
A few old casks evaded the blenders and were acquired after the millennium by a handful of independent bottlers, which released the whisky under the name Alloa.
Other well-aged expressions have since been released by indie bottlers as North of Scotland grain whisky.
The North of Scotland distillery was eventually closed in 1980, with the silent site sold onto the DCL in 1982.
The warehouses were absorbed by the Cambus grain distillery.
AD Rattray is a family-run independent bottler and retailer, with plans to create its own distillery.
In the late 1800s, A Dewar Rattray was an agent for Stronachie distillery.
In 2004 Tim Morrison, formerly of Morrison Bowmore Distillers, revived the Dewar Rattray company first established by his ancestor Andrew Dewar Rattray, to bottle single cask, single malt whisky.
The firm also developed Stronachie, a single malt sourced from Benrrinnes distillery on Speyside, and intended to replicate whisky produced at the now long lost Stronachie distillery, located on the old Perthshire/Kinross-shire border.
Andrew Dewar Rattray set up in business in Glasgow during 1868, trading as an importer of French wines, Italian spirits and olive oil, as well as blending and retailing Scotch whisky.
Ultimately the firm was sold to the whisky broker William Walker, but was brought back into family ownership by Tim Morrison, who created the ‘new’ Stronachie in 2002.
Morrison also established the Cask Collection label for single cask bottlings, and in 2011 the peated blended malt Cask Islay was released, being transformed into a single malt two years later.
2012 saw the release of a five-year-old blend named Bank Note.
Another of Speyside’s workhorses, Allt-a-Bhainne was one of the first distilleries designed to be operated by one person.
All the equipment is contained in a single room with the mash tun at one end and four stills at the other.
Originally designed to produce a light, estery malt for blending requirements, in recent years it has also occasionally produced a heavily-peated variant.
Allt-a-Bhainne is only very occasionally seen as a single malt bottling.
Its modernist design singles Allt-a-Bhainne out as an oddity within Speyside.
It was built by Seagram in 1975 during a period of growing optimism in the Scotch industry when the Canadian firm (which at that time owned Chivas Regal) was increasing its production capacity.
It has had a chequered history with periods of being placed into mothballs (the most recent being between 2003 and 2005).
With global demand rising, owner Chivas Brothers has it in full production once more.
Altduanalt was a short-lived distillery in the village of Rhu, on the east shore of Gareloch.
Altduanalt was licensed in 1833 to Messrs Paul & Hunter but seems to have closed that same year.
The distillery at Rhu, then spelled Row, in Dunbartonshire is mysterious and hard to locate.
Ambassador, the ‘world’s lightest Scotch’ was a blended whisky with a large following in the US.
Ambassador is a discontinued export blend first created by Glasgow blender Taylor & Ferguson Ltd, which was a big success in the US but unknown elsewhere.
With Benriach, the name itself means ‘speckled mountain’.
Scotch whisky lost a decade of growth in 2020 to Covid and US tariffs.
Global exports of Scotch whisky fell by more than £1.1bn during 2020. The export figures are the lowest they have been in a decade, hit by the combined impact of Covid-19 and the 25% tariff in the United States.
The 25% tariff on Single Malt that the industry is forced to pay to the US is in large part a result of a continuing dispute between the EU, UK and US governments over subsidies granted to Airbus and Boeing.
The export value of Scotch whisky exports fell 23% by value to £3.8bn.
The number of 70cl bottles exported fell by 13% to the equivalent of 1.14bn.
The closure of hospitality and travel restrictions impacting airport retail globally saw export values fall in 70% of Scotch whisky’s global markets compared to 2019.
The impact of tariffs by the USA on imports of single malt Scotch whisky has caused the most significant losses.
The United States is Scotch whisky’s most valuable market, valued at over £1bn in 2019 when it accounted for a fifth of global exports.
Exports of Scotch whisky to the US fell by 32% to £729m, a loss of £340m compared to 2019.
The SWA celebrated with a silent song and dance when Trump lost the US Presidency and President Biden scrapped Trump’s cursed tariff early 2021.
Export volume of Scotch whisky in 2020 was the equivalent of 1.14bn 70cl bottles, down 12.6% compared with 2019.
Exports have fallen in 127 of 179 global markets.
Sales to the European Union saw sales figures dropping by 15%.
There are signs that as pandemic restrictions ease up, sales could see a potential quick rebound.
Sales figures from Pernod Ricard, which owns brands including Chivas Regal and Glenlivet, show that eastern European and Asian sales of Scotch have seen significant growth compared to the first half of 2020.
Over the years it was available as De Luxe, De Luxe 8-year-old, 12-year-old and Royal 12- and 25-year-old.
It is likely that the constituent malts included Scapa and Glen Scotia at some point due to the brand’s ownership.
It is not known what its make-up was and is very much an auction item now.
Taylor & Ferguson Ltd was incorporated as a blender in 1931 and its history is entwined with two distilling companies, one Scottish and the other Canadian.
The company’s major brand was Ambassador blended Scotch, and as blending company Bloch Brothers expanded its business after WWII, Taylor & Ferguson Ltd was absorbed.
Ambassador was then bottled for export either under the Bloch Brothers name, or Taylor & Ferguson’s.
In 1954 Bloch Brothers was acquired by Canadian group Hiram Walker & Sons after the Bloch brothers decided that distilling was not for them. A failed attempt to resurrect Glengyle distillery in Campbeltown had affected them and they were both getting on in life.
The tagline on the 1970s labels was ‘Scotch at its World’s Lightest’.
Anchor Bay is the last remaining whisky in Lombard Brands’ dinner-oriented Illustration Malts series.
A blend of Speyside malts bottled at 40% ABV, Anchor Bay is a light, finessed whisky with a fresh, vanilla nose. It’s designed as an aperitif dram owing to its light body and good balance.
It was introduced as part of owner Lombard Brands’ Illustration Malts series, and is currently available in Russia, Europe and the UK.
Lombard Brands is the Isle of Man-based spirit, wine merchant and bottler owned by the Lombard-Chibnall family.
While the Lombard-Chibnall family can trace its roots in alcoholic beverages back some 300 years, it wasn’t until the mid-1960s that Lombard Brands was founded by its current CEO, Margaret Lombard-Chibnall.
Originally a supplier of bulk whisky for blenders, Lombard moved into blending and bottling its own whiskies, the first of which was Lombard Gold Label, their flagship blend.
With a considerable expertise in laying down commissioned single malt reserves since the 1960s, Lombard drew heavily on its own stocks to create Gold Label.
Anchor Bay is the last remaining whisky in Lombard Brands’ dinner-oriented Illustration Malts series.
A blend of Speyside malts bottled at 40% abv, Anchor Bay is a light, finessed whisky and designed as an aperitif dram owing to its light body and good balance.
Anchor Bay was introduced in 2001 alongside Golden Harvest and Smoking Ember as part of the Illustration Malts series.
The series concept was to introduce three differing styles of malt whisky that could be consumed before, during and after dinner.
Unlike its two Illustration stablemates, which were discontinued in 2013, Anchor Bay was redeveloped and remains available as a solo artist.
Lombard Gold Label was the first Scotch whisky brand to be released by the Isle of Man-based blender and bottler Lombard Brands in the 1970s.
Described as ‘big and chewy’ with a ‘peaty aroma’, the 40% abv blended Scotch reflects Lombard’s desire to ‘recreate the pre-war image of whisky, and re-establish traditional whisky values’.
The economy blended Scotch whisky produced by Lombard Brands is the Golden Piper.
Although kitsch in design, Golden Piper is a relatively modern blended Scotch whisky produced as part of Lombard Brands’ core range.
The 43% abv, no-age-statement expression is bottled under Lombard’s Isle of Man retailer outlet, Whisky Shack, and exported to the US and Equador.
Its whisky components originate from the Highlands, and the blend is described as peppery, creamy, long and warm.
Golden Piper was first introduced in 2011 to the US market as an economy brand.
Whisky Shack launched the brand in the UK in April 2017.
Abhainn Dearg Distillery, an Island Single Malt Scotch Whisky, is the first legal distillery in the Outer Hebrides in 200 years.
The Isle of Lewis’ only legal distillery, in its capital Stornoway (and named after it), only ran for two years in the 1850s. After that, Lewisians had to import their Scotch from the mainland, or maybe source it from illicit local operations.
In 2008, Marko Tayburn built a distillery at Red River [Abhainn Dearg] on the western coast of the island making this officially the most remote whisky-making site in Scotland till displaced from that perch by the Isle of Barra distillery in 2020.
Tayburn designed and built the stills himself, modelling them on an old illicit still he had discovered.
The stills have elongated necks which look a little like witches’ hats and thin descending lyne arms which run into external worm tubs. A mix of unpeated and peated spirit is made.
In December 2018 the distillery launched its first 10-year-old single malts – the oldest whisky to be produced by a legal distillery in the Outer Hebrides.
Anchor Bay was the last remaining whisky in Lombard Brands’ dinner-oriented Illustration Malts series.
Lombard Gold Label is the flagship blend from Isle of Man blender and bottler, Lombard Brands.
Lombard Gold Label is the first Scotch whisky brand to be released by the Isle of Man-based blender and bottler Lombard Brands in the 1970s.
Following 300 years in the wine and spirit trade, Lombard Gold Label was the family's first whisky brand. Aimed at a pre-war standard of excellence, the finest whiskies of Scotland, are hand selected and blended together.
Described as ‘big and chewy’ with a ‘peaty aroma’, the 40% ABV blended Scotch reflects Lombard’s desire to ‘recreate the pre-war image of whisky, and re-establish traditional whisky values’.
While the Lombard-Chibnall family can trace its roots in alcoholic beverages back some 300 years, it wasn’t until the mid-1960s that Lombard Brands was founded by its current CEO, Margaret Lombard-Chibnall.
Select distilleries were commissioned to produce ‘new fill’ and from date of distillation, Lombard took full control over the maturation of its stocks.
Originally a supplier of bulk whisky for blenders, Lombard diversified into blending and bottling its own whiskies, the first of which was Lombard Gold Label. Bottling and blending is within the central region of Scotland.
Lombard continues to invest heavily in the Scotch Whisky industry.
The formidable and expanding portfolio of Blended Scotch Whiskies is a perfect complement to its rare, single cask, single malts. Today, Lombard is in a stronger position than ever to meet the increasing global demand for its whiskies.
Early records (Edward the Confessor 1042-1066) show the family deriving from the village of Chebenhale. At this time, the Chibnall name was ‘de Chebenhale’. In 1351, the English king, John I, bought a cottage in Chebenhale as a pied-a-terre. The royal connection is shown in the family Coat of Arms by a Ducal crown which is engrossed on the dragon's neck – a sign of royal blood !
In 1762, records showed the Chibnall family owning a Wine Merchants, a cooperage business and the local pub. Several predecessors were Wine merchants, but interests expanded via marriage, to cork plantations in Portugal and a cork manufacturing business in London called G. Lombard.
The company has more than 50 years experience of bottling Scotch Whisky.
Lombard’s Golden Piper, like the bagpipes, originates in the Highlands where the character of its whiskies are often a reflection of the wild and rugged landscapes.
Lombard Storm Malt Whisky is a single cask single malt whisky, taken as new make from a coastal distillery.
Dailuaine was built by a farmer called William Mackenzie in 1851. Following the founder's death in 1865 his wife Jane leased the distillery to a banker called James Fleming, who went into business with Mackenzie's son in 1879. After rebuilding work in 1884, Dailuaine became one of the largest distilleries in the Highlands at the time.
The Ancnoc brand came into existence just a few short years after Inver House Distillers bought Knockdhu distillery from United Distillers in 1988.
While its Highland home is more than 100 years old, Ancnoc only came into being in the early 1990s and is flourishing under the guidance of Inver House.
The retention of Knockdhu’s two originally-designed pot stills means Ancnoc’s signature fruity, citric and honeyed flavour is very similar in style to the whisky produced by the distillery more than 100 years ago.
Ancnoc is matured in a mixture of ex-Bourbon and Sherry casks, while the final whisky is free of chill filtration and added colour, lending weight to the malt’s light fruitiness.
Having brought the distillery out of mothballs in the February following its purchase, Inver House set about establishing a brand for its first Scotch whisky plant. It was felt that the distillery name was too confusingly similar to Speyside distillery Knockando, and so Ancnoc [meaning black hill] was chosen as the brand to represent its single malt.
The original Annandale Distillery was built in 1830 by former Elgin-based excise officer George Donald, who named the site after the valley in which it is situated.
Using water from the Middleby Burn for the whisky and the Guillielands Burn for cooling and power, the distillery produced single malt whisky for 90 years.
The first official bottling of Ancnoc was released in 1993, although the brand never really took off until 2003 when it was relaunched with a 12-year-old bottling as its flagship.
In the years that followed a series of vintages and age statements were released, and by 2013 the core range consisted of the 12-year-old alongside a 16, 18, 22 and 35-year-old.
A number of expressions appeared in the Peter Arkle collection – a collaboration with the renowned illustrator who designed the packaging – which was launched as a limited edition range in 2012.
While Knockdhu’s malt is renowned for its light, fruity style, the distillery has been producing a small amount of peated spirit for several years, which was finally released as part of a new collection in 2014. The peaty range comprises of Rutter, Flaughter, Tushkar and Cutter, all of which are named after peat-cutting tools and have been matured in ex-Bourbon casks for between eight and 12 years.
Ancnoc notes the phenol content of all four, which ranges between 11 and 20ppm, as a first, based on the new make itself rather than in the barley.
Annandale’s two signature single malt whiskies won’t be mature until at least 2018, although fans can still pick up a cask in the meantime.
The modern Annandale distillery produces two types of single malt whisky, both matured in American oak barrels – an unpeated spirit that’s described as “smooth and sophisticated”, while a peated version is depicted as “strong and powerful”.
The contrasting styles are a reflection of the Lowlands’ peated whisky past, and its modern reputation as a region that produces softer styles.
Donald ran the distillery until 1883 when it passed to John S. Gardner & Son, the namesake of which kept cows, pigs and horses on-site, feeding the animals on the draff and leftover grain from the distillery. Under Gardner’s tenure the distillery underwent a modest expansion, and at the height of its production was making 28,000 gallons of spirit annually.
In 1896, John Walker & Sons purchased the site for £2000, but the now renowned whisky group had grander ideas up its sleeve. In 1919 the company decided to abandon Annandale to concentrate on developing its signature blended whisky, Johnnie Walker. By 1921 the distillery was closed, its fittings stripped for use elsewhere.
In 2007, the site was purchased by the Annandale Distillery Company, led by husband-and-wife owners David Thomson and Teresa Church. The duo set about painstakingly returning the site to its former glory over a seven-year period that cost in the region of £10.5 million.
Production of two significant whisky styles began in November 2014, named Man O’ Words after the poet Robert Burns, and Man O’Sword after Scottish warrior Robert the Bruce.
Casks of both are available to purchase before the spirit is mature enough to be called whisky.
The Annandale Distillery Company put a price tag of £1 million on the first cask filled on 15 November 2014.
The Antiquary is a historic Victorian blend identifiable by its unique gemstone-shaped bottle.
Named after the 1816 gothic novel by Sir Walter Scott, The Antiquary is a Victorian blend with Edinburgh roots that is under Japanese ownership.
Early bottles featured a caricature of one of Scott’s main characters (likely the antiquary himself, Jonathan Oldbuck) on the label.
Today The Antiquary is sold as a no-age-statement, 12-year-old and 21-year-old, as well as a limited edition 35-year-old. A high proportion of Highland and Speyside malts (45%) provide typical citrus and vanilla notes, while a dash of Islay malt accounts for its light smokiness.
The unique diamond-esque bottle shape, which is now synonymous with the brand, was introduced in the mid-20th century and has been retained through subsequent changes in ownership.
James Hardie set up as a tea, wine and spirits merchant in Picardy Place, Edinburgh in 1861. His sons John and William soon joined him in the business and like so many other merchants in the city, moved into blending in 1880 as J&W Hardie Ltd.
The business established its own steady supply of grain whisky as one of the founding shareholders in Edinburgh’s North British distillery in 1887. The following year the brothers registered one of their blends – The Antiquary – as a brand.
J&W Hardie sold The Antiquary brand in 1917 to J&G Stewart, which was itself taken over by the DCL in the same year as recovery of a pending loan.
The brand and its founder were reunited when, in 1948, J&W Hardie was also absorbed by the DCL and the licence for The Antiquary returned to its original producer.
By the early 1980s The Antiquary had become a global sensation, widely available in countries such as Venzuela, Paraguay, Italy, France, Spain, Portugal, Japan and Andorra.
In 1996 J&W Hardie was bought by the Tomatin Distillery Co. Ltd, which had been under Japanese ownership since 1985. The move signalled the owner’s confidence in entering the premium blended Scotch whisky market with an established and reputable brand.
The Antiquary was given a makeover in 2015 to modernise the brand for a younger audience and highlight its unique bottle shape.
Today the blend counts France, Portugal, Russia, Angola, the UK and the US among its most successful markets.
Ardincaple, an Islands Single Malt Scotch Whisky, was a short-lived distillery on the Island of Seil, south of Oban. The distillery was licensed for just one year in 1798 to Duncan Anderson.
Ardincaple is a mansion, still inhabited today, in extensive grounds at Clachan-Seil in the north-west of the island. Its distillery was one of many such sites established in the grounds of castles and country houses in the 18th and 19th century, although Ardincaple’s was rather short-lived.
Ardiseer Distillery was one of countless short-lived distilleries in Inverness-shire, also known as Ardersier.
Pinpointing Ardiseer distillery’s location is difficult, it would logically have sat beside one of the two burns that converge just south of the village, before flowing into the firth.
A large Victorian distillery, Ardmore has a heft and scale which is surprising given its rural surroundings. It is also a rarity in terms of style – a peated Highland malt.
It was the second-last distillery to retain coal fires under its stills.
The peatiness (it comes across as woodsmoke) is balanced by a gentle apple/floral lift, the product of a regime which insists on clear wort and very long fermentation in wooden washbacks.
The fires which once raged under the stills added a heavy, mid-palate weight, as did the downward facing lyne arms.
When the fires came out, the distillery team spent seven months creating new steam coils with kinks in them to replicate the ‘hot spots’ in the stills which had contributed this flavour.
Since the steam has come in, an unpeated variant, called Ardlair after a nearby stone circle, has also been made.
In 1898, Adam Teacher, son of Glasgow blender William Teacher, decided that the family firm needed its own malt whisky distillery.
The site he chose, on the outskirts of the village of Kennethmont in rural Aberdeenshire, had water, peat and home-grown barley.
Ardmore has remained in the Teacher’s stable ever since, providing smoke and also top notes to a blend which still sells over a million cases globally.
Its main markets today are India and Brazil.
In 2014, it became part of the new Beam Suntory portfolio.
The Ardmore Triple Wood is a complex and rewarding travel retail exclusive Highland malt. Triple matured in American Oak barrels, quarter casks and puncheons, this non-chill filtered expression at 46% ABV, is rich in traditional Highland peat smoke notes.
Ardnahoe distillery has Scotland’s longest lyne arms at 24.5ft.
Everything at Ardnahoe is set up to produce a heavily peated, richly fruity spirit with a creamy, slightly oily consistency.
Barley is peated to 40ppm. The fermentation is long, lasting between 60 and 70 hours to allow the yeast to produce fuller fruit flavours. In the still house, the two copper pot stills are run slow, allowing for greater copper contact as the spirit travels through the lanky lyne arms and into 77 metres of copper coiling in the worm tub condensers.
Legal distilling was unknown on the remote Ardnamurchan peninsula until independent bottler Adelphi opened its distillery there in 2014.
This is not the first distillery to bear the Adelphi name.
The original was built in the Gorbals district of Glasgow in 1826, passing into the hands of Archibald Walker in 1880, making the firm the only distiller to make whisky in Scotland, Ireland and England.
One of many small licensed distilleries that sprang up in Perthshire over the decades, Ardtalnaig was located in the village of the same name, probably next to the Allt a Chilleine river that flowed into Loch Tay.
Ardtalnaig distillery was licensed to Alexander McDougall & Co. in 1830. Two further owners took on the distillery before it closed for good in 1840.
Arbikie has already secured a reputation as one of Scotland’s most experimental distilleries, despite holding back from releasing a whisky for 14 years.
Its whiskies – traditionally Highland in style with a coastal flair – will only be released at ages 14, 18 and 21 years old, with each bearing the vintage of its distillation and the field in which the barley was grown. That means its first release won't likely be until at least 2029.
the 2,100-acre estate is owned and operated by three brothers who first conceived the idea of building a distillery on the property over a few drinks on a night out in New York.
Their concept was to produce the finest malt whisky in Scotland using a farm-to-bottle process – they also own the fields and water source.
This is not the first time distilling has occurred at Arbikie. The family believe there to have been a distillery operational in the area as far back as 1720, although the earliest record of a site is a map from 1794.
In Sep 2015, master distiller Kirsty Black was producing single malt spirit, which will be laid down for a minimum of 14 years before being bottled as whisky.
Arbikie plans to build its own maltings before 2018, ‘closing the circle’ on its farm-to-bottle process.
It currently sources malted barley from Glenesk maltings in Montrose, just 7.5 miles down the road.
In the 1920s, the Lawson family took over Ardbeg before DCL and Canada’s Hiram Walker acquired significant minority stakes in 1959.
A rise in demand for peated whisky saw production increase in the 1960s and 1970s, with demand necessitating that the distillery bring in peated malt from Port Ellen from 1974.
or aficionados, the end of Ardbeg’s self-sufficiency was the end of an era – and a style. Seven years later, Ardbeg’s kiln was finally extinguished.
Hiram Walker took full control in 1979, buying out DCL’s 50% share for £300,000, and everyone else’s holdings at the same time. By that time, blends were once again on the slide and, to compensate for the drop in demand for smoky malt, an unpeated make (Kildalton) began to be produced.
In 1997, it was taken over by Glenmorangie, which paid £7m for the distillery and stock – or what there was of it.
The stock profile meant that its first age statement release was a 17-year-old, while it would take until 2008 for its own Ardbeg 10-year-old to appear.
From 2004, however, there had been incremental releases: ’Very Young’, ‘Still Young’ and ‘Almost There’ showed the work in progress.
The portfolio still concentrates on no-age-statement releases, some exclusively from (now very rare) old stock, others from new, some from a mix. Different oaks have also been used as part of a general improvement in the quality of casks used.
The range has been bolstered in recent years by the addition of core expressions Ardbeg An Oa (NAS) in 2017 and Ardbeg Traigh Bhan 19 Year Old two years later.
In the early 1890s, shortly after Charles Doig had installed the industy's first ever pagoda-style distillery roof at Dailuaine, the partnership between Mackenzie and Fleming was rearranged, taking the name Dailuaine-Glenlivet.
The Dailuaine-Glenlivet was a principal component of the Mackenzie produced Phipson Black Dog.
By 1916, the company had not only merged with Talisker and Imperial, but also acquired the Bon Accord grain distillery in Aberdeenshire, renaming it North of Scotland.
After WWI, the Dailuaine-Talisker Company (as it was then known) was fully acquired by DCL in 1925.
Today, Dailauine is one of the largest distilleries in Diageo's portfolio in terms of potential production capacity. It needs to be - the malt produced at Dailuaine is a key ingredient in the Johnnie Walker stable, with only 2% of production being retained as a single malt. Despite being a very well-respected single malt, Dailuaine has never been a part of Diageo's Classic Malts range, and very few official bottlings have been released.
For the same reason, independent bottlings are few and far between. The Flora and Fauna 16 year-old bottling remains the main expression, and is much-praised for its assertive, sweet, richly-sherried profile.
All Banker Distillery products are 3 Year Olds.
Banker Distillery’s Ruby Collection is a 3 Year Old Blended Grain Scotch Whisky.
Banker Distillery’s Amber Collection is a 3 Year Old Blended Scotch Whisky influenced with Malt (10%).
Its Emerald Collection is a 3 Year Old Scotch Blended Malt Whisky.
In the 1960s Abbot’s Choice ceramic monks filled with Scotch sold as far afield as Peru. Today, the blend based on Linkwood, lives on as an occasional oddity in whisky auctions.
The White Horse Blended Scotch had the smoky Lagavulin as one of its constituents.
Consequent to a drop in demand for smoky malt, Ardbeg introduced an unpeated make called Kildalton.
Ardincaple Distillery was a short lived Islands Single Malt Scotch Whisky. Today, Ardincaple is a mansion, still inhabited today, in extensive grounds at Clachan-Seil in the north-west of the island, near Oban. Its distillery was one of many such sites established in the grounds of castles and country houses in the 18th and 19th century, although Ardincaple’s didn’t last long.
Ardmore’s peatiness comes across as woodsmoke and is balanced by a gentle apple/floral lift, the product of a regime which insists on clear wort and very long fermentation in wooden washbacks.
When steam replaced coal, an unpeated variant called Ardlair- after a nearby stone circle- has also been made.
One of many small licensed distilleries that sprang up in Perthshire over the decades, Ardtalnaig was located in the village of the same name, probably next to the Allt a Chilleine river that flowed into Loch Tay.
It was possibly also called Lochtayside.
Arngibbon distillery operated in Kippen, Stirlingshire, for six short years in the early 19th century. Arngibbon itself was an estate of at least four farms and one country house, located southwest of Arnprior.
Arngibbon distillery was first licensed to John Morrison in 1825, but was closed in 1831.
Although the Arran distillery is relatively new (production started in 1995), the island in the Firth of Clyde has a long history of whisky-making.
A fertile place, the farmers in the south of the island had plenty of raw materials to work with, and when home distillation and small stills were effectively banned in the late 18th century, they simply went underground.
A buzzing island with over 50 whisky distilleries, the island of Arran was home to only one until recently, which claims its water, sourced from Loch Na Davie, is the purest in Scotland.
As an island whisky, it might be thought that Arran would always have been peaty. Instead, it started as a non-smoky ‘Highland-style' malt. Like any new build distillery, the equipment is in an easily managed single tier space with a small semi-lauter mashtun, wooden washbacks and two pairs of small stills.
A legal distillery ran at Lagg from 1825, but it closed in 1837.
Bottling started with a limited edition three-year-old in 1998 and the range has continued to expand, although today there are fewer ‘finished’ variants than in the past.
A peated expression, ‘Machrie Moor’, has also been introduced.
Parent company Isle of Arran Distillers opened a second distillery, Lagg, in the south of the island in 2019, then revamped the Arran range with clean, modern packaging plus the introduction of new core expressions.
Ascot House was an export-only blended Scotch produced by Kintocher Whisky Co Ltd, a trading subsidiary of the Rum Company Ltd of Basel. Its main market was Italy.
Its core expression did not carry an age statement, although a 12-year-old was also produced.
Ascot House was produced during the 1960s and is now extremely rare.
The Rum Company of Basel (now based in Reinach) owned Kintocher Whisky Co though its Glasgow-based subsidiary Acredyke Whisky Ltd of Bothwell Street, which was registered in August 1960. Kintocher Whisky Co. was struck off the companies register in 1985.
Auchentoshan’s claim to fame is that it is the only distillery in Scotland which exclusively uses triple distillation.
Legal whisky-making started here on the banks of the Clyde in 1817 when the Duntocher distillery was built by John Bulloch. Like many early start-ups it had a chequered early history and Bulloch went bankrupt soon after.
It wasn’t to put his family off however. His grandson co-founded one of the 19th century’s most famous blending and broking firms, Bulloch Lade.
The wash still operates as per normal, while the spirit coming from the intermediate still is split into two, with only the high-strength ‘heads’ being carried forward for the final distillation. The low-strength ‘tails’ are mixed with the next distillation from the wash still.
The ‘heads’ are then mixed with the ‘feints’ from the previous spirit still distillation and a cut with an average strength of 81% is taken.
A short fermentation gives Auchentoshan a cereal note which acts as a grounding flavour during maturation as well as balancing the high-toned citric notes.
Its high strength means that it can easily be overpowered by oak. Consequently, the older the expression, the more ‘relaxed’ the wood influence is.
Over the years Scotch whisky has been bottled in everything from miniature golf bags to models of Nessie and Big Ben.
According to the yellow, parchment-style labels of Abbot’s Choice, John McEwan & Co was established in Leith in 1863. The firm owned other blended whiskies including King George IV and Chequers, all of which have since been inherited by Diageo.
The brand was originally called ‘McEwan’s Whisky – the Abbot’s Choice,’ and dates from some time before World War II.
Among its European markets was Italy where it was imported by the Brescia-based firm of Samaroli, while it was also exported to Latin America. Abbotshaugh is one of 18 lost distilleries in the Falkirk area.
Abbotshaugh was located in the grounds of an abbey that has long since vanished. It was possibly on or beside West Mains of Abbotshaugh, a farm close to the Forth-Clyde Canal that had opened in 1790.
Abbotshaugh distillery opened in 1825, licensed to the Abbotshaugh Distillery Co. However, the site closed in 1828 when Mr A McFarlane, a major investor, withdrew from the venture.
Technically a Lowland distillery, Aberargie eschews regional style with its rich and fruity whisky.
Its sole use of Golden Promise barley – grown entirely on its own farms – gives an inherent waxiness to the new make spirit, while the distillery is set up to nurture a fruity quality, with a smoky characteristic from the occasional peated run.
Aberargie is designed as a ‘barley to bottle’ operation – every process bar the malting will take place on-site.
Every drop of spirit produced at the distillery is destined for Aberargie single malt, although some may be commandeered as fillings for Morrison & Mackay’s Bruadar whisky liqueur.
Aberargie marks a return to distilling for the Morrison family.
Whisky broker Stanley P. Morrison had owned Bowmore during the 1960s, his distilling, blending and brokering business forming the basis for Morrison Bowmore, now owned by Beam Suntory.
In 2005 the Morrison family – later renamed Morrison & Mackay – moved into blending and bottling Scotch whiskies under the Carn Mhor range, and re-established the Old Perth brand in 2014.
The Morrison family secured a majority stake in the Scottish Liqueur Centre in Bankfoot, Perth, where it nurtured the Bruadar and Columba Cream liqueur brands. A separate distillery to be owned and operated solely by the Morrison family, The Perth Distilling Company will include all three brands.
One of the sweetest single malts, Aberfeldy’s characteristic honeyed note is the result of very long fermentation, coupled with slow distillation.
John Dewar & Sons is typical of many of the blending firms which were founded in the 19th century.
Dewar himself, though born in humble surroundings in a croft at Shenvail, became a wine merchant in Perth and by the middle of the century had started to blend whisky. It was however his sons, John Jr and Thomas (Tommy), who made the family firm a globally recognised name.
In the 1890s, they decided to go into whisky production and built a distillery at Aberfeldy, only two miles from where their father had been born.
The site had originally been a brewery and some distillation had taken place in the early part of the century.
Fed by the Pitilie Burn [where gold is still panned], Aberfeldy became the malt at the heart of the firm’s blends.
A private railway line linked the plant with the firm’s operational hub in Perth.
Dewar’s joined DCL in 1925 and in 1973 the Aberfeldy site doubled in capacity to its present size.
In 1998, the Dewar’s estate [the blends, plus Aberfeldy, Aultmore, Craigellachie and Royal Brackla] were bought for £1.1bn by Bacardi-Martini.
The value of Scotch Whisky exports to the US grew from £280m in 1994 to over £1bn in 2018.
By value, 33% of Scotch Whisky exports to the US in 2018 were Single Malts (a value of £344 million, or $463 million).
The US market accounted for 22% of global value, and 10.7% of global volumes of Scotch Whisky exports in 2018.
Global exports of Scotch Whisky fell by more than £1.1bn during 2020. The export figures are the lowest they have been in a decade, as the combined impact of Covid-19 and the 25% tariff in the United States hit distillers hard.
In 2020, the export value of Scotch Whisky exports fell 23% by value to £3.8bn. The number of 70cl bottles exported fell by 13% to the equivalent of 1.14bn.
The value and volume of exports to most of Scotch Whisky’s top 10 markets fell as countries went into lockdown to combat the spread of Covid-19 during 2020. The closure of hospitality and travel restrictions impacting airport retail globally saw export values fall in 70% of Scotch Whisky’s global markets compared to 2019.
Exports to the EU 27, the industry’s largest regional export market, fell by 15%.
It is the continued impact of tariffs by the USA on exports of Single Malt Scotch Whisky thereto that has caused the most significant losses. The United States is Scotch Whisky’s most valuable market, valued at over £1bn in 2019 when it accounted for a fifth of global exports.
In 2020, exports of Scotch Whisky to the US fell by 32% to £729m, a loss of £340m compared to 2019, and accounting for around one third of total global export losses.
The SWA celebrated with a silent song and dance when prize goof Diaper Don lost the US Presidency and the new President scrapped Trump’s cursed tariff early 2021.
The 25% tariff on Single Malt that the industry is forced to pay to the US is in large part a result of a continuing dispute between the EU, UK and US governments over subsidies granted to Airbus and Boeing.
The Scotch Whisky industry has now paid over half a billion pounds in tariffs on behalf of the UK government because of the subsidies that the government granted to the aerospace sector in breach of World Trade Organisation rules.
Export volume of Scotch Whisky in 2020 was the equivalent of 1.14bn 70cl bottles, down 12.6% compared with 2019.
Exports have fallen in 127 of 179 global markets.
Exports by value are now at their lowest level since 2010 when £3.48bn was exported.
Scotch Whisky exports to the US were valued at £1.07bn in 2019 – the industry’s first billion pound market.
Compared to Scotch Whisky, other spirits categories, including tequila, mezcal, Cognac and American whiskey, performed positively in the US market during 2020.
The Scotch Whisky industry directly employs about 11,000 people in Scotland, and many more indirectly through its supply chain. Over 7,000 of these jobs are in rural areas of Scotland.
An advertisement in the 1867 Aberdeen Journal illustrated Glenlivet’s popularity: “Glenlivat Whisky. Mr Sheed begs to call attention to his large stock of matured old and very old Glenlivat (sic) Whisky from the celebrated distillery of Mr George Smith, which is acknowledged to be the finest spirit made, and unrivalled in the trade. Forwarded, in cask or in bottle, to all parts of the United Kingdom and abroad free of duty.”
Whisky distilleries in neighbouring districts like Morayshire, however, were unrepentant about copying the flavour traits of The Glenlivet.
New Speyside distilleries were often merely imitators; at Craigellachie, for instance, ‘The Glenlivet’ characteristics, which were much admired, were reproduced—namely, the ‘pineapple’ flavour which was the original old Glenlivet style from the sma’ still days.
Chivas Regal signed a three-year sponsorship deal with the British Premier League football team Manchester United in August 2018.
As a follow up in October 2019, it has created a special Manchester United-themed 13 year old blended Scotch whisky in honour of former team manager Sir Alex Ferguson.
Partly matured in ex-rye casks, this expression has been created exclusively for the US where Manchester United is said to have over eight million fans.
Some grain whisky from the lost North of Scotland distillery in Tullibody north of Alloa township was bottled under the name ‘Alloa’.
The whisky produced there was intended for blends.
Some 40-year-old casks from 1964 have been bottled by Hart Bros and the German independents Jack Weibers Whisky World and Alambic Classique.
Way back in 1795 a certain Alexander Glen was running the Alloa distillery.
Also known as the Grange distillery, it fell silent in 1851 and is buried under Diageo’s Carsebridge site in Alloa.
In 1958 George Christie set up the North of Scotland distillery just down the road on the site of the old Knox Forth Brewery to give blenders another source of grain whisky.
For a year it also produced a malt whisky called Strathmore from a pair of pot stills, but it seems Christie decided the future lay in grain whisky.
A few old casks evaded the blenders and were acquired after the millennium by a handful of independent bottlers, which released the whisky under the name Alloa.
Other well-aged expressions have since been released by indie bottlers as North of Scotland grain whisky.
The North of Scotland distillery was eventually closed in 1980, with the silent site sold onto the DCL in 1982.
The warehouses were absorbed by the Cambus grain distillery.
AD Rattray is a family-run independent bottler and retailer, with plans to create its own distillery.
In the late 1800s, A Dewar Rattray was an agent for Stronachie distillery.
In 2004 Tim Morrison, formerly of Morrison Bowmore Distillers, revived the Dewar Rattray company first established by his ancestor Andrew Dewar Rattray, to bottle single cask, single malt whisky.
The firm also developed Stronachie, a single malt sourced from Benrrinnes distillery on Speyside, and intended to replicate whisky produced at the now long lost Stronachie distillery, located on the old Perthshire/Kinross-shire border.
Andrew Dewar Rattray set up in business in Glasgow during 1868, trading as an importer of French wines, Italian spirits and olive oil, as well as blending and retailing Scotch whisky.
Ultimately the firm was sold to the whisky broker William Walker, but was brought back into family ownership by Tim Morrison, who created the ‘new’ Stronachie in 2002.
Morrison also established the Cask Collection label for single cask bottlings, and in 2011 the peated blended malt Cask Islay was released, being transformed into a single malt two years later.
2012 saw the release of a five-year-old blend named Bank Note.
Another of Speyside’s workhorses, Allt-a-Bhainne was one of the first distilleries designed to be operated by one person.
All the equipment is contained in a single room with the mash tun at one end and four stills at the other.
Originally designed to produce a light, estery malt for blending requirements, in recent years it has also occasionally produced a heavily-peated variant.
Allt-a-Bhainne is only very occasionally seen as a single malt bottling.
Its modernist design singles Allt-a-Bhainne out as an oddity within Speyside.
It was built by Seagram in 1975 during a period of growing optimism in the Scotch industry when the Canadian firm (which at that time owned Chivas Regal) was increasing its production capacity.
It has had a chequered history with periods of being placed into mothballs (the most recent being between 2003 and 2005).
With global demand rising, owner Chivas Brothers has it in full production once more.
Altduanalt was a short-lived distillery in the village of Rhu, on the east shore of Gareloch.
Altduanalt was licensed in 1833 to Messrs Paul & Hunter but seems to have closed that same year.
The distillery at Rhu, then spelled Row, in Dunbartonshire is mysterious and hard to locate.
Ambassador, the ‘world’s lightest Scotch’ was a blended whisky with a large following in the US.
Ambassador is a discontinued export blend first created by Glasgow blender Taylor & Ferguson Ltd, which was a big success in the US but unknown elsewhere.
With Benriach, the name itself means ‘speckled mountain’.
Scotch whisky lost a decade of growth in 2020 to Covid and US tariffs.
Global exports of Scotch whisky fell by more than £1.1bn during 2020. The export figures are the lowest they have been in a decade, hit by the combined impact of Covid-19 and the 25% tariff in the United States.
The 25% tariff on Single Malt that the industry is forced to pay to the US is in large part a result of a continuing dispute between the EU, UK and US governments over subsidies granted to Airbus and Boeing.
The export value of Scotch whisky exports fell 23% by value to £3.8bn.
The number of 70cl bottles exported fell by 13% to the equivalent of 1.14bn.
The closure of hospitality and travel restrictions impacting airport retail globally saw export values fall in 70% of Scotch whisky’s global markets compared to 2019.
The impact of tariffs by the USA on imports of single malt Scotch whisky has caused the most significant losses.
The United States is Scotch whisky’s most valuable market, valued at over £1bn in 2019 when it accounted for a fifth of global exports.
Exports of Scotch whisky to the US fell by 32% to £729m, a loss of £340m compared to 2019.
The SWA celebrated with a silent song and dance when Trump lost the US Presidency and President Biden scrapped Trump’s cursed tariff early 2021.
Export volume of Scotch whisky in 2020 was the equivalent of 1.14bn 70cl bottles, down 12.6% compared with 2019.
Exports have fallen in 127 of 179 global markets.
Sales to the European Union saw sales figures dropping by 15%.
There are signs that as pandemic restrictions ease up, sales could see a potential quick rebound.
Sales figures from Pernod Ricard, which owns brands including Chivas Regal and Glenlivet, show that eastern European and Asian sales of Scotch have seen significant growth compared to the first half of 2020.
Over the years it was available as De Luxe, De Luxe 8-year-old, 12-year-old and Royal 12- and 25-year-old.
It is likely that the constituent malts included Scapa and Glen Scotia at some point due to the brand’s ownership.
It is not known what its make-up was and is very much an auction item now.
Taylor & Ferguson Ltd was incorporated as a blender in 1931 and its history is entwined with two distilling companies, one Scottish and the other Canadian.
The company’s major brand was Ambassador blended Scotch, and as blending company Bloch Brothers expanded its business after WWII, Taylor & Ferguson Ltd was absorbed.
Ambassador was then bottled for export either under the Bloch Brothers name, or Taylor & Ferguson’s.
In 1954 Bloch Brothers was acquired by Canadian group Hiram Walker & Sons after the Bloch brothers decided that distilling was not for them. A failed attempt to resurrect Glengyle distillery in Campbeltown had affected them and they were both getting on in life.
The tagline on the 1970s labels was ‘Scotch at its World’s Lightest’.
Anchor Bay is the last remaining whisky in Lombard Brands’ dinner-oriented Illustration Malts series.
A blend of Speyside malts bottled at 40% ABV, Anchor Bay is a light, finessed whisky with a fresh, vanilla nose. It’s designed as an aperitif dram owing to its light body and good balance.
It was introduced as part of owner Lombard Brands’ Illustration Malts series, and is currently available in Russia, Europe and the UK.
Lombard Brands is the Isle of Man-based spirit, wine merchant and bottler owned by the Lombard-Chibnall family.
While the Lombard-Chibnall family can trace its roots in alcoholic beverages back some 300 years, it wasn’t until the mid-1960s that Lombard Brands was founded by its current CEO, Margaret Lombard-Chibnall.
Originally a supplier of bulk whisky for blenders, Lombard moved into blending and bottling its own whiskies, the first of which was Lombard Gold Label, their flagship blend.
With a considerable expertise in laying down commissioned single malt reserves since the 1960s, Lombard drew heavily on its own stocks to create Gold Label.
Anchor Bay is the last remaining whisky in Lombard Brands’ dinner-oriented Illustration Malts series.
A blend of Speyside malts bottled at 40% abv, Anchor Bay is a light, finessed whisky and designed as an aperitif dram owing to its light body and good balance.
Anchor Bay was introduced in 2001 alongside Golden Harvest and Smoking Ember as part of the Illustration Malts series.
The series concept was to introduce three differing styles of malt whisky that could be consumed before, during and after dinner.
Unlike its two Illustration stablemates, which were discontinued in 2013, Anchor Bay was redeveloped and remains available as a solo artist.
Lombard Gold Label was the first Scotch whisky brand to be released by the Isle of Man-based blender and bottler Lombard Brands in the 1970s.
Described as ‘big and chewy’ with a ‘peaty aroma’, the 40% abv blended Scotch reflects Lombard’s desire to ‘recreate the pre-war image of whisky, and re-establish traditional whisky values’.
The economy blended Scotch whisky produced by Lombard Brands is the Golden Piper.
Although kitsch in design, Golden Piper is a relatively modern blended Scotch whisky produced as part of Lombard Brands’ core range.
The 43% abv, no-age-statement expression is bottled under Lombard’s Isle of Man retailer outlet, Whisky Shack, and exported to the US and Equador.
Its whisky components originate from the Highlands, and the blend is described as peppery, creamy, long and warm.
Golden Piper was first introduced in 2011 to the US market as an economy brand.
Whisky Shack launched the brand in the UK in April 2017.
Abhainn Dearg Distillery, an Island Single Malt Scotch Whisky, is the first legal distillery in the Outer Hebrides in 200 years.
The Isle of Lewis’ only legal distillery, in its capital Stornoway (and named after it), only ran for two years in the 1850s. After that, Lewisians had to import their Scotch from the mainland, or maybe source it from illicit local operations.
In 2008, Marko Tayburn built a distillery at Red River [Abhainn Dearg] on the western coast of the island making this officially the most remote whisky-making site in Scotland till displaced from that perch by the Isle of Barra distillery in 2020.
Tayburn designed and built the stills himself, modelling them on an old illicit still he had discovered.
The stills have elongated necks which look a little like witches’ hats and thin descending lyne arms which run into external worm tubs. A mix of unpeated and peated spirit is made.
In December 2018 the distillery launched its first 10-year-old single malts – the oldest whisky to be produced by a legal distillery in the Outer Hebrides.
Anchor Bay was the last remaining whisky in Lombard Brands’ dinner-oriented Illustration Malts series.
Lombard Gold Label is the flagship blend from Isle of Man blender and bottler, Lombard Brands.
Lombard Gold Label is the first Scotch whisky brand to be released by the Isle of Man-based blender and bottler Lombard Brands in the 1970s.
Following 300 years in the wine and spirit trade, Lombard Gold Label was the family's first whisky brand. Aimed at a pre-war standard of excellence, the finest whiskies of Scotland, are hand selected and blended together.
Described as ‘big and chewy’ with a ‘peaty aroma’, the 40% ABV blended Scotch reflects Lombard’s desire to ‘recreate the pre-war image of whisky, and re-establish traditional whisky values’.
While the Lombard-Chibnall family can trace its roots in alcoholic beverages back some 300 years, it wasn’t until the mid-1960s that Lombard Brands was founded by its current CEO, Margaret Lombard-Chibnall.
Select distilleries were commissioned to produce ‘new fill’ and from date of distillation, Lombard took full control over the maturation of its stocks.
Originally a supplier of bulk whisky for blenders, Lombard diversified into blending and bottling its own whiskies, the first of which was Lombard Gold Label. Bottling and blending is within the central region of Scotland.
Lombard continues to invest heavily in the Scotch Whisky industry.
The formidable and expanding portfolio of Blended Scotch Whiskies is a perfect complement to its rare, single cask, single malts. Today, Lombard is in a stronger position than ever to meet the increasing global demand for its whiskies.
Early records (Edward the Confessor 1042-1066) show the family deriving from the village of Chebenhale. At this time, the Chibnall name was ‘de Chebenhale’. In 1351, the English king, John I, bought a cottage in Chebenhale as a pied-a-terre. The royal connection is shown in the family Coat of Arms by a Ducal crown which is engrossed on the dragon's neck – a sign of royal blood !
In 1762, records showed the Chibnall family owning a Wine Merchants, a cooperage business and the local pub. Several predecessors were Wine merchants, but interests expanded via marriage, to cork plantations in Portugal and a cork manufacturing business in London called G. Lombard.
The company has more than 50 years experience of bottling Scotch Whisky.
Lombard’s Golden Piper, like the bagpipes, originates in the Highlands where the character of its whiskies are often a reflection of the wild and rugged landscapes.
Lombard Storm Malt Whisky is a single cask single malt whisky, taken as new make from a coastal distillery.
Dailuaine was built by a farmer called William Mackenzie in 1851. Following the founder's death in 1865 his wife Jane leased the distillery to a banker called James Fleming, who went into business with Mackenzie's son in 1879. After rebuilding work in 1884, Dailuaine became one of the largest distilleries in the Highlands at the time.
The Ancnoc brand came into existence just a few short years after Inver House Distillers bought Knockdhu distillery from United Distillers in 1988.
While its Highland home is more than 100 years old, Ancnoc only came into being in the early 1990s and is flourishing under the guidance of Inver House.
The retention of Knockdhu’s two originally-designed pot stills means Ancnoc’s signature fruity, citric and honeyed flavour is very similar in style to the whisky produced by the distillery more than 100 years ago.
Ancnoc is matured in a mixture of ex-Bourbon and Sherry casks, while the final whisky is free of chill filtration and added colour, lending weight to the malt’s light fruitiness.
Having brought the distillery out of mothballs in the February following its purchase, Inver House set about establishing a brand for its first Scotch whisky plant. It was felt that the distillery name was too confusingly similar to Speyside distillery Knockando, and so Ancnoc [meaning black hill] was chosen as the brand to represent its single malt.
The original Annandale Distillery was built in 1830 by former Elgin-based excise officer George Donald, who named the site after the valley in which it is situated.
Using water from the Middleby Burn for the whisky and the Guillielands Burn for cooling and power, the distillery produced single malt whisky for 90 years.
The first official bottling of Ancnoc was released in 1993, although the brand never really took off until 2003 when it was relaunched with a 12-year-old bottling as its flagship.
In the years that followed a series of vintages and age statements were released, and by 2013 the core range consisted of the 12-year-old alongside a 16, 18, 22 and 35-year-old.
A number of expressions appeared in the Peter Arkle collection – a collaboration with the renowned illustrator who designed the packaging – which was launched as a limited edition range in 2012.
While Knockdhu’s malt is renowned for its light, fruity style, the distillery has been producing a small amount of peated spirit for several years, which was finally released as part of a new collection in 2014. The peaty range comprises of Rutter, Flaughter, Tushkar and Cutter, all of which are named after peat-cutting tools and have been matured in ex-Bourbon casks for between eight and 12 years.
Ancnoc notes the phenol content of all four, which ranges between 11 and 20ppm, as a first, based on the new make itself rather than in the barley.
Annandale’s two signature single malt whiskies won’t be mature until at least 2018, although fans can still pick up a cask in the meantime.
The modern Annandale distillery produces two types of single malt whisky, both matured in American oak barrels – an unpeated spirit that’s described as “smooth and sophisticated”, while a peated version is depicted as “strong and powerful”.
The contrasting styles are a reflection of the Lowlands’ peated whisky past, and its modern reputation as a region that produces softer styles.
Donald ran the distillery until 1883 when it passed to John S. Gardner & Son, the namesake of which kept cows, pigs and horses on-site, feeding the animals on the draff and leftover grain from the distillery. Under Gardner’s tenure the distillery underwent a modest expansion, and at the height of its production was making 28,000 gallons of spirit annually.
In 1896, John Walker & Sons purchased the site for £2000, but the now renowned whisky group had grander ideas up its sleeve. In 1919 the company decided to abandon Annandale to concentrate on developing its signature blended whisky, Johnnie Walker. By 1921 the distillery was closed, its fittings stripped for use elsewhere.
In 2007, the site was purchased by the Annandale Distillery Company, led by husband-and-wife owners David Thomson and Teresa Church. The duo set about painstakingly returning the site to its former glory over a seven-year period that cost in the region of £10.5 million.
Production of two significant whisky styles began in November 2014, named Man O’ Words after the poet Robert Burns, and Man O’Sword after Scottish warrior Robert the Bruce.
Casks of both are available to purchase before the spirit is mature enough to be called whisky.
The Annandale Distillery Company put a price tag of £1 million on the first cask filled on 15 November 2014.
The Antiquary is a historic Victorian blend identifiable by its unique gemstone-shaped bottle.
Named after the 1816 gothic novel by Sir Walter Scott, The Antiquary is a Victorian blend with Edinburgh roots that is under Japanese ownership.
Early bottles featured a caricature of one of Scott’s main characters (likely the antiquary himself, Jonathan Oldbuck) on the label.
Today The Antiquary is sold as a no-age-statement, 12-year-old and 21-year-old, as well as a limited edition 35-year-old. A high proportion of Highland and Speyside malts (45%) provide typical citrus and vanilla notes, while a dash of Islay malt accounts for its light smokiness.
The unique diamond-esque bottle shape, which is now synonymous with the brand, was introduced in the mid-20th century and has been retained through subsequent changes in ownership.
James Hardie set up as a tea, wine and spirits merchant in Picardy Place, Edinburgh in 1861. His sons John and William soon joined him in the business and like so many other merchants in the city, moved into blending in 1880 as J&W Hardie Ltd.
The business established its own steady supply of grain whisky as one of the founding shareholders in Edinburgh’s North British distillery in 1887. The following year the brothers registered one of their blends – The Antiquary – as a brand.
J&W Hardie sold The Antiquary brand in 1917 to J&G Stewart, which was itself taken over by the DCL in the same year as recovery of a pending loan.
The brand and its founder were reunited when, in 1948, J&W Hardie was also absorbed by the DCL and the licence for The Antiquary returned to its original producer.
By the early 1980s The Antiquary had become a global sensation, widely available in countries such as Venzuela, Paraguay, Italy, France, Spain, Portugal, Japan and Andorra.
In 1996 J&W Hardie was bought by the Tomatin Distillery Co. Ltd, which had been under Japanese ownership since 1985. The move signalled the owner’s confidence in entering the premium blended Scotch whisky market with an established and reputable brand.
The Antiquary was given a makeover in 2015 to modernise the brand for a younger audience and highlight its unique bottle shape.
Today the blend counts France, Portugal, Russia, Angola, the UK and the US among its most successful markets.
Ardincaple, an Islands Single Malt Scotch Whisky, was a short-lived distillery on the Island of Seil, south of Oban. The distillery was licensed for just one year in 1798 to Duncan Anderson.
Ardincaple is a mansion, still inhabited today, in extensive grounds at Clachan-Seil in the north-west of the island. Its distillery was one of many such sites established in the grounds of castles and country houses in the 18th and 19th century, although Ardincaple’s was rather short-lived.
Ardiseer Distillery was one of countless short-lived distilleries in Inverness-shire, also known as Ardersier.
Pinpointing Ardiseer distillery’s location is difficult, it would logically have sat beside one of the two burns that converge just south of the village, before flowing into the firth.
A large Victorian distillery, Ardmore has a heft and scale which is surprising given its rural surroundings. It is also a rarity in terms of style – a peated Highland malt.
It was the second-last distillery to retain coal fires under its stills.
The peatiness (it comes across as woodsmoke) is balanced by a gentle apple/floral lift, the product of a regime which insists on clear wort and very long fermentation in wooden washbacks.
The fires which once raged under the stills added a heavy, mid-palate weight, as did the downward facing lyne arms.
When the fires came out, the distillery team spent seven months creating new steam coils with kinks in them to replicate the ‘hot spots’ in the stills which had contributed this flavour.
Since the steam has come in, an unpeated variant, called Ardlair after a nearby stone circle, has also been made.
In 1898, Adam Teacher, son of Glasgow blender William Teacher, decided that the family firm needed its own malt whisky distillery.
The site he chose, on the outskirts of the village of Kennethmont in rural Aberdeenshire, had water, peat and home-grown barley.
Ardmore has remained in the Teacher’s stable ever since, providing smoke and also top notes to a blend which still sells over a million cases globally.
Its main markets today are India and Brazil.
In 2014, it became part of the new Beam Suntory portfolio.
The Ardmore Triple Wood is a complex and rewarding travel retail exclusive Highland malt. Triple matured in American Oak barrels, quarter casks and puncheons, this non-chill filtered expression at 46% ABV, is rich in traditional Highland peat smoke notes.
Ardnahoe distillery has Scotland’s longest lyne arms at 24.5ft.
Everything at Ardnahoe is set up to produce a heavily peated, richly fruity spirit with a creamy, slightly oily consistency.
Barley is peated to 40ppm. The fermentation is long, lasting between 60 and 70 hours to allow the yeast to produce fuller fruit flavours. In the still house, the two copper pot stills are run slow, allowing for greater copper contact as the spirit travels through the lanky lyne arms and into 77 metres of copper coiling in the worm tub condensers.
Legal distilling was unknown on the remote Ardnamurchan peninsula until independent bottler Adelphi opened its distillery there in 2014.
This is not the first distillery to bear the Adelphi name.
The original was built in the Gorbals district of Glasgow in 1826, passing into the hands of Archibald Walker in 1880, making the firm the only distiller to make whisky in Scotland, Ireland and England.
One of many small licensed distilleries that sprang up in Perthshire over the decades, Ardtalnaig was located in the village of the same name, probably next to the Allt a Chilleine river that flowed into Loch Tay.
Ardtalnaig distillery was licensed to Alexander McDougall & Co. in 1830. Two further owners took on the distillery before it closed for good in 1840.
Arbikie has already secured a reputation as one of Scotland’s most experimental distilleries, despite holding back from releasing a whisky for 14 years.
Its whiskies – traditionally Highland in style with a coastal flair – will only be released at ages 14, 18 and 21 years old, with each bearing the vintage of its distillation and the field in which the barley was grown. That means its first release won't likely be until at least 2029.
the 2,100-acre estate is owned and operated by three brothers who first conceived the idea of building a distillery on the property over a few drinks on a night out in New York.
Their concept was to produce the finest malt whisky in Scotland using a farm-to-bottle process – they also own the fields and water source.
This is not the first time distilling has occurred at Arbikie. The family believe there to have been a distillery operational in the area as far back as 1720, although the earliest record of a site is a map from 1794.
In Sep 2015, master distiller Kirsty Black was producing single malt spirit, which will be laid down for a minimum of 14 years before being bottled as whisky.
Arbikie plans to build its own maltings before 2018, ‘closing the circle’ on its farm-to-bottle process.
It currently sources malted barley from Glenesk maltings in Montrose, just 7.5 miles down the road.
In the 1920s, the Lawson family took over Ardbeg before DCL and Canada’s Hiram Walker acquired significant minority stakes in 1959.
A rise in demand for peated whisky saw production increase in the 1960s and 1970s, with demand necessitating that the distillery bring in peated malt from Port Ellen from 1974.
or aficionados, the end of Ardbeg’s self-sufficiency was the end of an era – and a style. Seven years later, Ardbeg’s kiln was finally extinguished.
Hiram Walker took full control in 1979, buying out DCL’s 50% share for £300,000, and everyone else’s holdings at the same time. By that time, blends were once again on the slide and, to compensate for the drop in demand for smoky malt, an unpeated make (Kildalton) began to be produced.
In 1997, it was taken over by Glenmorangie, which paid £7m for the distillery and stock – or what there was of it.
The stock profile meant that its first age statement release was a 17-year-old, while it would take until 2008 for its own Ardbeg 10-year-old to appear.
From 2004, however, there had been incremental releases: ’Very Young’, ‘Still Young’ and ‘Almost There’ showed the work in progress.
The portfolio still concentrates on no-age-statement releases, some exclusively from (now very rare) old stock, others from new, some from a mix. Different oaks have also been used as part of a general improvement in the quality of casks used.
The range has been bolstered in recent years by the addition of core expressions Ardbeg An Oa (NAS) in 2017 and Ardbeg Traigh Bhan 19 Year Old two years later.
In the early 1890s, shortly after Charles Doig had installed the industy's first ever pagoda-style distillery roof at Dailuaine, the partnership between Mackenzie and Fleming was rearranged, taking the name Dailuaine-Glenlivet.
The Dailuaine-Glenlivet was a principal component of the Mackenzie produced Phipson Black Dog.
By 1916, the company had not only merged with Talisker and Imperial, but also acquired the Bon Accord grain distillery in Aberdeenshire, renaming it North of Scotland.
After WWI, the Dailuaine-Talisker Company (as it was then known) was fully acquired by DCL in 1925.
Today, Dailauine is one of the largest distilleries in Diageo's portfolio in terms of potential production capacity. It needs to be - the malt produced at Dailuaine is a key ingredient in the Johnnie Walker stable, with only 2% of production being retained as a single malt. Despite being a very well-respected single malt, Dailuaine has never been a part of Diageo's Classic Malts range, and very few official bottlings have been released.
For the same reason, independent bottlings are few and far between. The Flora and Fauna 16 year-old bottling remains the main expression, and is much-praised for its assertive, sweet, richly-sherried profile.
All Banker Distillery products are 3 Year Olds.
Banker Distillery’s Ruby Collection is a 3 Year Old Blended Grain Scotch Whisky.
Banker Distillery’s Amber Collection is a 3 Year Old Blended Scotch Whisky influenced with Malt (10%).
Its Emerald Collection is a 3 Year Old Scotch Blended Malt Whisky.
In the 1960s Abbot’s Choice ceramic monks filled with Scotch sold as far afield as Peru. Today, the blend based on Linkwood, lives on as an occasional oddity in whisky auctions.
The White Horse Blended Scotch had the smoky Lagavulin as one of its constituents.
Consequent to a drop in demand for smoky malt, Ardbeg introduced an unpeated make called Kildalton.
Ardincaple Distillery was a short lived Islands Single Malt Scotch Whisky. Today, Ardincaple is a mansion, still inhabited today, in extensive grounds at Clachan-Seil in the north-west of the island, near Oban. Its distillery was one of many such sites established in the grounds of castles and country houses in the 18th and 19th century, although Ardincaple’s didn’t last long.
Ardmore’s peatiness comes across as woodsmoke and is balanced by a gentle apple/floral lift, the product of a regime which insists on clear wort and very long fermentation in wooden washbacks.
When steam replaced coal, an unpeated variant called Ardlair- after a nearby stone circle- has also been made.
One of many small licensed distilleries that sprang up in Perthshire over the decades, Ardtalnaig was located in the village of the same name, probably next to the Allt a Chilleine river that flowed into Loch Tay.
It was possibly also called Lochtayside.
Arngibbon distillery operated in Kippen, Stirlingshire, for six short years in the early 19th century. Arngibbon itself was an estate of at least four farms and one country house, located southwest of Arnprior.
Arngibbon distillery was first licensed to John Morrison in 1825, but was closed in 1831.
Although the Arran distillery is relatively new (production started in 1995), the island in the Firth of Clyde has a long history of whisky-making.
A fertile place, the farmers in the south of the island had plenty of raw materials to work with, and when home distillation and small stills were effectively banned in the late 18th century, they simply went underground.
A buzzing island with over 50 whisky distilleries, the island of Arran was home to only one until recently, which claims its water, sourced from Loch Na Davie, is the purest in Scotland.
As an island whisky, it might be thought that Arran would always have been peaty. Instead, it started as a non-smoky ‘Highland-style' malt. Like any new build distillery, the equipment is in an easily managed single tier space with a small semi-lauter mashtun, wooden washbacks and two pairs of small stills.
A legal distillery ran at Lagg from 1825, but it closed in 1837.
Bottling started with a limited edition three-year-old in 1998 and the range has continued to expand, although today there are fewer ‘finished’ variants than in the past.
A peated expression, ‘Machrie Moor’, has also been introduced.
Parent company Isle of Arran Distillers opened a second distillery, Lagg, in the south of the island in 2019, then revamped the Arran range with clean, modern packaging plus the introduction of new core expressions.
Ascot House was an export-only blended Scotch produced by Kintocher Whisky Co Ltd, a trading subsidiary of the Rum Company Ltd of Basel. Its main market was Italy.
Its core expression did not carry an age statement, although a 12-year-old was also produced.
Ascot House was produced during the 1960s and is now extremely rare.
The Rum Company of Basel (now based in Reinach) owned Kintocher Whisky Co though its Glasgow-based subsidiary Acredyke Whisky Ltd of Bothwell Street, which was registered in August 1960. Kintocher Whisky Co. was struck off the companies register in 1985.
Auchentoshan’s claim to fame is that it is the only distillery in Scotland which exclusively uses triple distillation.
Legal whisky-making started here on the banks of the Clyde in 1817 when the Duntocher distillery was built by John Bulloch. Like many early start-ups it had a chequered early history and Bulloch went bankrupt soon after.
It wasn’t to put his family off however. His grandson co-founded one of the 19th century’s most famous blending and broking firms, Bulloch Lade.
The wash still operates as per normal, while the spirit coming from the intermediate still is split into two, with only the high-strength ‘heads’ being carried forward for the final distillation. The low-strength ‘tails’ are mixed with the next distillation from the wash still.
The ‘heads’ are then mixed with the ‘feints’ from the previous spirit still distillation and a cut with an average strength of 81% is taken.
A short fermentation gives Auchentoshan a cereal note which acts as a grounding flavour during maturation as well as balancing the high-toned citric notes.
Its high strength means that it can easily be overpowered by oak. Consequently, the older the expression, the more ‘relaxed’ the wood influence is.
Over the years Scotch whisky has been bottled in everything from miniature golf bags to models of Nessie and Big Ben.
According to the yellow, parchment-style labels of Abbot’s Choice, John McEwan & Co was established in Leith in 1863. The firm owned other blended whiskies including King George IV and Chequers, all of which have since been inherited by Diageo.
The brand was originally called ‘McEwan’s Whisky – the Abbot’s Choice,’ and dates from some time before World War II.
Among its European markets was Italy where it was imported by the Brescia-based firm of Samaroli, while it was also exported to Latin America. Abbotshaugh is one of 18 lost distilleries in the Falkirk area.
Abbotshaugh was located in the grounds of an abbey that has long since vanished. It was possibly on or beside West Mains of Abbotshaugh, a farm close to the Forth-Clyde Canal that had opened in 1790.
Abbotshaugh distillery opened in 1825, licensed to the Abbotshaugh Distillery Co. However, the site closed in 1828 when Mr A McFarlane, a major investor, withdrew from the venture.
Technically a Lowland distillery, Aberargie eschews regional style with its rich and fruity whisky.
Its sole use of Golden Promise barley – grown entirely on its own farms – gives an inherent waxiness to the new make spirit, while the distillery is set up to nurture a fruity quality, with a smoky characteristic from the occasional peated run.
Aberargie is designed as a ‘barley to bottle’ operation – every process bar the malting will take place on-site.
Every drop of spirit produced at the distillery is destined for Aberargie single malt, although some may be commandeered as fillings for Morrison & Mackay’s Bruadar whisky liqueur.
Aberargie marks a return to distilling for the Morrison family.
Whisky broker Stanley P. Morrison had owned Bowmore during the 1960s, his distilling, blending and brokering business forming the basis for Morrison Bowmore, now owned by Beam Suntory.
In 2005 the Morrison family – later renamed Morrison & Mackay – moved into blending and bottling Scotch whiskies under the Carn Mhor range, and re-established the Old Perth brand in 2014.
The Morrison family secured a majority stake in the Scottish Liqueur Centre in Bankfoot, Perth, where it nurtured the Bruadar and Columba Cream liqueur brands. A separate distillery to be owned and operated solely by the Morrison family, The Perth Distilling Company will include all three brands.
One of the sweetest single malts, Aberfeldy’s characteristic honeyed note is the result of very long fermentation, coupled with slow distillation.
John Dewar & Sons is typical of many of the blending firms which were founded in the 19th century.
Dewar himself, though born in humble surroundings in a croft at Shenvail, became a wine merchant in Perth and by the middle of the century had started to blend whisky. It was however his sons, John Jr and Thomas (Tommy), who made the family firm a globally recognised name.
In the 1890s, they decided to go into whisky production and built a distillery at Aberfeldy, only two miles from where their father had been born.
The site had originally been a brewery and some distillation had taken place in the early part of the century.
Fed by the Pitilie Burn [where gold is still panned], Aberfeldy became the malt at the heart of the firm’s blends.
A private railway line linked the plant with the firm’s operational hub in Perth.
Dewar’s joined DCL in 1925 and in 1973 the Aberfeldy site doubled in capacity to its present size.
In 1998, the Dewar’s estate [the blends, plus Aberfeldy, Aultmore, Craigellachie and Royal Brackla] were bought for £1.1bn by Bacardi-Martini.
The value of Scotch Whisky exports to the US grew from £280m in 1994 to over £1bn in 2018.
By value, 33% of Scotch Whisky exports to the US in 2018 were Single Malts (a value of £344 million, or $463 million).
The US market accounted for 22% of global value, and 10.7% of global volumes of Scotch Whisky exports in 2018.
Global exports of Scotch Whisky fell by more than £1.1bn during 2020. The export figures are the lowest they have been in a decade, as the combined impact of Covid-19 and the 25% tariff in the United States hit distillers hard.
In 2020, the export value of Scotch Whisky exports fell 23% by value to £3.8bn. The number of 70cl bottles exported fell by 13% to the equivalent of 1.14bn.
The value and volume of exports to most of Scotch Whisky’s top 10 markets fell as countries went into lockdown to combat the spread of Covid-19 during 2020. The closure of hospitality and travel restrictions impacting airport retail globally saw export values fall in 70% of Scotch Whisky’s global markets compared to 2019.
Exports to the EU 27, the industry’s largest regional export market, fell by 15%.
It is the continued impact of tariffs by the USA on exports of Single Malt Scotch Whisky thereto that has caused the most significant losses. The United States is Scotch Whisky’s most valuable market, valued at over £1bn in 2019 when it accounted for a fifth of global exports.
In 2020, exports of Scotch Whisky to the US fell by 32% to £729m, a loss of £340m compared to 2019, and accounting for around one third of total global export losses.
The SWA celebrated with a silent song and dance when prize goof Diaper Don lost the US Presidency and the new President scrapped Trump’s cursed tariff early 2021.
The 25% tariff on Single Malt that the industry is forced to pay to the US is in large part a result of a continuing dispute between the EU, UK and US governments over subsidies granted to Airbus and Boeing.
The Scotch Whisky industry has now paid over half a billion pounds in tariffs on behalf of the UK government because of the subsidies that the government granted to the aerospace sector in breach of World Trade Organisation rules.
Export volume of Scotch Whisky in 2020 was the equivalent of 1.14bn 70cl bottles, down 12.6% compared with 2019.
Exports have fallen in 127 of 179 global markets.
Exports by value are now at their lowest level since 2010 when £3.48bn was exported.
Scotch Whisky exports to the US were valued at £1.07bn in 2019 – the industry’s first billion pound market.
Compared to Scotch Whisky, other spirits categories, including tequila, mezcal, Cognac and American whiskey, performed positively in the US market during 2020.
The Scotch Whisky industry directly employs about 11,000 people in Scotland, and many more indirectly through its supply chain. Over 7,000 of these jobs are in rural areas of Scotland.
An advertisement in the 1867 Aberdeen Journal illustrated Glenlivet’s popularity: “Glenlivat Whisky. Mr Sheed begs to call attention to his large stock of matured old and very old Glenlivat (sic) Whisky from the celebrated distillery of Mr George Smith, which is acknowledged to be the finest spirit made, and unrivalled in the trade. Forwarded, in cask or in bottle, to all parts of the United Kingdom and abroad free of duty.”
Whisky distilleries in neighbouring districts like Morayshire, however, were unrepentant about copying the flavour traits of The Glenlivet.
New Speyside distilleries were often merely imitators; at Craigellachie, for instance, ‘The Glenlivet’ characteristics, which were much admired, were reproduced—namely, the ‘pineapple’ flavour which was the original old Glenlivet style from the sma’ still days.
George Smith’s The
Glenlivet was a raging success when first brought to the market. A host of
other distilleries in the Speyside area shamelessly tacked the word Glenlivet to
their product:
Aberlour-Glenlivet
Aultmore-Glenlivet
Balmenach-Glenlivet
Balvenie-Glenlivet
Benromach-Glenlivet
Coleburn-Glenlivet
Convalmore-Glenlivet
Cragganmore-Glenlivet
Craigellachie-Glenlivet
Dailuaine-Glenlivet
Dufftown-Glenlivet
Glenburgie-Glenlivet
Glendullan-Glenlivet
Glen Elgin-Glenlivet
Glenfarclas-Glenlivet
Glen Grant-Glenlivet
Glen Keith-Glenlivet
Glenlossie-Glenlivet
Glen Moray-Glenlivet
Glenrothes-Glenlivet
Imperial-Glenlivet
Longmorn-Glenlivet
Macallan-Glenlivet
Miltonduff-Glenlivet
Speyburn-Glenlivet
Tamdhu-Glenlivet
Scottish Judge Robert Macqueen,
circa 1750, is credited with having thriven on a " stintless regimen of
beef, brandy, and claret," being firmly persuaded that a point of law will
be more easily studied after drinking a bottle of the favourite beverage than
by abstemiousness. He was elevated to peerdom as Lord Braxfield in 1776.
The Persian judiciary were
required to first discuss and argue a case twice, first when sober and then
when fully inebriated. In vino veritas.
In 2017, the UK Supreme Court
ruled that Scotland could set a minimum price for alcohol, rejecting a
challenge by the Scotch Whisky Association (SWA).
Scotland’s national drink
in the 1700s was French Claret, preferred to the Port of the English.
For centuries, ever since
the signing of the Auld Alliance in 1295, Scotland had been importing Claret
from France. Because of the Auld Alliance, Scottish merchants had the privilege
of selecting the first choice of Bordeaux’s finest wines - a privilege which
was eagerly protected for hundreds of years, much to the annoyance of English
wine drinkers who received an inferior product.
The whisky boom of the
1960s resulted in a brief fashion for malt distilleries being ensconced within
grain distilleries: Kinclaith in Strathclyde; Glenflagler and Killyloch from
Moffat; Ben Wyvis in Invergordon; and Inverleven & Lomond in Dumbarton.
Ladyburn was another.
Ladyburn Distillery:
Lowland Single Malt Scotch Whisky: An incredibly rare whisky, Ladyburn has only
been bottled on two occasions by its owner. Independent bottlings are equally
hard to find. It appears to have been a straight down the line malt with some
delicate floral/lemon notes and a crisp finish.
Ladyburn Distillery was
built within William Grant & Sons’ Girvan grain complex in 1966, its four
stills destined to produce fillings for the Grant’s blends and also to free up
stock from Glenfiddich which was, by then, beginning to make a name for itself
as a single malt brand.
However, when the grain
side of Girvan’s operation needed to expand in 1975, Ladyburn was dismantled.
Its spirit lingers on because, in 2007, another single malt distillery opened
within Girvan – Ailsa Bay.
William Grant put his
entire life savings of £755 into the construction of Glenfiddich distillery in
1886. Five years later Balvenie was opened on the same site as Glenfiddich, and
almost a century later they were joined by Kininvie in 1990.
As Scotch whisky began an
upward trend in the early 2000s, William Grant & Sons combined malt whisky
from the three distilleries to create a new blended malt, Monkey Shoulder – one
of very few on the market at the time.
Launched in 2005, Monkey
Shoulder filled a gap in the category for a fun-yet-premium brand that
resonated with both consumers and bartenders alike.
In 2012 the brand launched
in the United States but due to its unforeseen rapid popularity in that market,
Monkey Shoulder fell into short supply for much of 2014.
Now that whisky produced
by William Grant’s Lowland distillery Ailsa Bay is mature, the group has
revealed intentions to cease communicating the provenance of Monkey Shoulder’s
malts, allowing for the potential to utilise stocks of its full malt portfolio.
In early 2016, Monkey
Shoulder was named the ‘trendiest’ Scotch whisky brand in the world in a poll
of the world’s best bars by trade title Drinks International.
By 2018, the same poll
also named Monkey Shoulder as the best-selling Scotch whisky among the world’s
leading high-end bars, usurping long-time leader Johnnie Walker from the top
spot.
Glenfiddich was the first
whisky to be marketed worldwide as a Single Malt in 1963.
An opened bottle of Scotch whisky will remain good for at least six months, provided exposure to oxygen is limited.
Some 20 million casks, the equivalent of over 500 million cases, are maturing in warehouses in Scotland. This represents the equivalent of approximately 10 billion bottles of Scotch after bottling.
Scotch is sold in more than 200 markets globally.
The total amount of Scotch released for sale to the UK market was 90 million bottles of 700 ml each.
The industry generated about five billion dollars in tax revenue to the UK government.
Scotch whisky accounts for 85 percent of Scotland’s, and a quarter of the UK’s, food and drink exports.
Export of Scotch whisky has increased by 87 percent in the past decade.
A closed bottle of Scotch can, under optimalconditions, be kept for over 100 years and will still be good to drink.
The most expensive bottle of Scotch whisky available in 2013 is Isabella’s Islay at 6.2 million dollars. The decanter comes decorated with 8,500 diamonds and 300 rubies. For the cost conscious, there is Isabella Special Edition, a bargain at only 740,000 dollars.
The oldest Scotch whisky on the market was purported to be the Aisla T’Orten, 105 years old, distilled in 1906 and available for 1.43 million dollars from the Master of Malt website. Sadly this turned out to be an April Fools’ Day inspired, promotional stunt.
The Gordon & MacPhail “Generations” series has released two 70 year old Scotch Whiskies since its debut in 2010. The first offering, a 70 YO Mortlach distilled in 1938 and bottled in 2008 was released at a special ceremony at Edinburgh Castle on May 11, 2010. The entire offering, 54 x 700 ml bottles and 162 x 200 ml bottles sold out within two weeks. The 700 ml bottle was priced at approximately 16,000 dollars.
The oldest Scotch whisky commercially available is a Gordon & MacPhail bottling of 70 YO Glenlivet, priced at approximately 20,000 dollars. Part of the “Generations” series, the whisky was distilled in 1940 and bottled in 2010. The first re-release occurred on March 8, 2011 at Edinburgh Castle. A second release was made on September 20, 2012 at the Vancouver International Airport. Drawn entirely from a single cask, number 339, decanters were released in both 200ml and 700ml sizes.
The highest price paid at an auction for a Scotch whisky is 460,000 dollars for a 64 YO, 42.5% ABV, Macallan malt whisky in a Perdue crystal decanter made by Lalique. The proceeds were earmarked for a charitable cause.
LVMH’s Glenmorangie distillery employs just sixteen craftsmen—the “Sixteen Men of Tain”—who have become synonymous with the Glenmorangie brand all over the world.
It is, however, Edradour that has the smallest number of employees—with 3 people to run the entire operation.
The Australian Wine Research Institute has introduced a measure called a standard drink. In Australia, a standard drink contains 10 g (12.67 ml) of alcohol, the amount that an average adult male can metabolize in one hour. This is roughly equivalent to one fluid ounce of 80-proof liquor. The UK has the same standard.
Japanese owned Tomatin used to be the largest capacity distillery in Scotland. At its peak it had 23 stills and a capacity of over six million gallons of spirit a year.
The Pinch (Dimple) is the fourth largest selling, blended deluxe Scotch whisky in the world.
Scotch in a can. Scotch whisky will soon be sold in a re-sealable can in the United States, putting a liquor prized for its pedigree, into a humble container known for its affordability and portability. Each can of Scottish spirits will contain 12 ounces—about six shots—of 75° proof Scotch whisky.
Experts advise you to drink single malt whisky with a small amount of water. The water supposedly “releases the serpent” from the whisky.
If there is a serpent, there is also an “angel.” As it ages, 2.0 percent to 2.5 percent of the whisky maturing in a barrel is lost to evaporation every year. Distillers refer to this as the “angel’s share.”
The Seraph didn’t like being left out. He is part of what was wrongly called The Devil's Cut, the amount of sherry/port/wines left behind in pores in barrels used for maturation. It is as high as 12%, so a 2-yr old 500 ltr sherry cask will contain ~60 ltrs of sherry to marry with the new make/whisky poured into it. That incongruity was soon rectified.
The Devil’s cut is the amount of new make (whisky under maturation) that soaks into the barrel.
The Devil’s cut is a serious matter for distillers ageing barrels indefinitely. The barrel soaks up a minuscule percentage of the new make maturing inside, which, over say, 30 years, would amount to 15% of
about 150 litres remaining in the standard barrel. That’s 22-23 litres of a £ 1,000 per bottle brand, about 30-60 bottles gone at cask strength/46% ABV.
The most expensive European Union country in which to buy Scotch is Sweden. In the UK, it is not as cheap as expected. Denmark and Switzerland are also expensive.
In other developed non-EU countries, New Zealand is the most expensive.
Although their proof differs, standard drinks of beer, wine, and spirits (liquor) contain an equivalent amount of alcohol—0.6 ounces each. They’re all the same to a breathalyzer.
Bowmore (1779) is the oldest continually operating distillery in Scotland. Glen Garioch (1784), Strathisla (1786) and Balblair (1790) are the next oldest.
Glenturret dates back to 1775, but it was inactive from 1921 to 1959. Littlemill dates back to 1772, but is now demolished.
A 10 year old Laphroaig costs around US$50. If you purchase a bottle of any of its single malts and register the bottle barcode on the Laphroaig website, you will become the proud owner of 01 sqft of land in Laphroaig’s bogs. Do carry your gum boots and raincoat if you wish to go there to stake claim with your own flag.
Laphroaig and White Horse Scotch whiskies were cleared for import by the USA during its Prohibition days (1920-33) as bottles of Medicinal Value.
William Lawson’s blended Scotch, a relatively unknown brand, is a bestseller in Russia.It has just launched a 13 YO version, wherein
the contents of the 12 YO bottle are matured for one additional year in an oak barrel that has been charred from the inside, giving it a best-selling smoky flavour.
18,000 litres of Scotch whisky, worth over 800,000 dollars, were accidentally flushed down the drain at the Dumbarton bottling plant of Chivas Brothers in March 2013.
In the UK, the five most popular blended Scotch whiskies are The Famous Grouse, William Grant’s, Bell’s, Teacher’s, and J&B Rare.
Johnnie Walker, the world’s largest selling blended Scotch whisky, is not among the top five selling brands in its home market.
UK whisky is cheaper in Europe. The price of a bottle of whisky, including the excise duty, has been subject to Value Added Tax since 1973. The EU mandated size of the Scotch bottle is 700 ml, minimum 40% ABV. Scotch actually costs less in Europe than in the UK, with the cheapest price in Spain. A 700 ml bottle of the average blended Scotch whisky might sell for around eighteen dollars in the UK. Tax would take around 12 dollars or 66 percent of the retail price. In Spain the same bottle would cost around eight dollars. Prices in France, Italy, and Germany would fall between eight dollars and twelve dollars. Duty free prices in those countries would be even cheaper.
You can watch whisky production live. Bruichladdich, a
distillery on the island of Islay, has webcams that allow you follow the whisky
making process as it happens. Go to www.bruichladdich.com/web_ cam and watch
whisky being produced live (if they are working).
Glenfiddich is the largest selling single malt in the
world, followed by Glenlivet and then The Macallan. Glenmorangie is catching up
rapidly.
Johnnie Walker Red label is the world’s largest selling
Scotch whisky.
Johnnie Walker Black label is no longer the world’s best-selling deluxe whisky. That honour goes to Grand Old Parr,
so named in 1909 after the oldest known man living in Scotland. This matter is under dispute.
The Famous Grouse is the most popular Scotch whisky in
Scotland.
Glenmorangie is the largest selling single malt whisky
in Scotland.
Aberfeldy is the “heart” of Dewar’s White Label, the
number one selling blended Scotch whisky in the US.
Cadenhead’s Whisky Shop on Canongate, when owned by the Cadenhead family, was Scotland’s oldest independent bottler. It was taken over by J & A Mitchell & Co. Ltd., in 1972. The name remains unchanged, even though Mitchell & Co. bottle and sell Springbank, Longrow, and Hazelburn single malt whiskies, along with Campbeltown Loch and Mitchell’s 12 YO. Its unique selling point is that customers can have a custom bottle poured straight from a cask and labeled with their name. When sealed it has a label with the “born on date.” Since whisky stops aging as soon as it leaves the wooden barrel each bottle is a unique expression, www.wmcadenhead.com or in London www.whiskytastingroom.com.
The source of the name Auchentoshan is Gaelic —it means
“corner of the field.”
Irish settlers probably started the distillery and they
may also be responsible for Auchentoshan’s use of triple distillation.
Antique records from the year 1800 mention an illegal
Duntocher distillery, which may have been a predecessor to the legal
Auchentoshan distillery. A license for distillation was obtained in 1823.
At least 82 nations/nation states around the globe are trying their hand at making and selling whisky. Of these countries, all but four spell Aqua Vitae ‘Whisky’. The term ‘Whiskey’ is used in Ireland(since 1960), Mexico and Peru and for most, but not all, American brands.
North Korea's Samilpo has two blends, Black Label @ 40% ABV and Red Label @ 42% ABV in 620 ml bottles that resemble the Johnnie Walker bottles, except for that odd volume. Their third brand at 45% ABV is expected soon. Other than volume and ABV, nothing is in English; whisky would then be right, since Kim loves Trump! Or would it be the concerned writer’s choice?
78/82 should be above par for concluding that the global spelling of this type of alcoholic beverage is whisky.
North Korea's Samilpo has two blends, Black Label @ 40% ABV and Red Label @ 42% ABV in 620 ml bottles that resemble the Johnnie Walker bottles, except for that odd volume. Their third brand at 45% ABV is expected soon. Other than volume and ABV, nothing is in English; whisky would then be right, since Kim loves Trump! Or would it be the concerned writer’s choice?
78/82 should be above par for concluding that the global spelling of this type of alcoholic beverage is whisky.
Be sure you never add the “e” when writing to a Scotsman. It used to be that there was a very simple way to
remember the spelling: if the spirit comes from a country without an “e” in the
spelling of its name, (e.g., Scotland, Japan, India, Canada, etc.), then its
spelled whisky, otherwise it is spelled whiskey with an “e.” With the
proliferation of whisky production around the world, however, it’s not clear if
this rule still applies.
Bruichladdich’s Octomore 8.3 of 2018-19 is the heaviest
peated whisky in the world at 309 ppm phenol.
The Macallan claims that it has achieved success and
fame through its “six pillars”: spiritual home, curiously small stills, finest
cut, exceptional oak casks, natural color, and The Macallan itself. It has released five expressions in
honor of its pillars so far, starting in 2005 —the 50, 55, 57, 60, and 62 YO
malts in a custom Lalique crystal decanter. The 62 YO was released on December
17, 2013, at a price of 26,000 US dollars.
James Bond has a well-earned reputation as a drinker,
with the vodka martini, “shaken not stirred” as his signature drink. In the
collected novels of James Bond by Ian Fleming, Bond is depicted with a drink a
total of 317 times. In 101 of those times, his drink is straight whisky. He
drinks a total of 35 glasses of saki in You Only Live Twice, and 30 glasses of
champagne in all of the other novels combined. He only calls for a vodka
martini on 19 occasions. In his most recent movie, Sky Fall, Bond drank
Macallan. He was known to have drunk Talisker in the movie Diamonds are
Forever. In the novels he usually drank Haig and Haig’s Dimple or Black and
White.
Dean Martin’s favorite Scotch was J&B
Winston Churchill was partial to Johnny Walker Red; not
surprising, he was a good friend of Sir Alexander Walker II. He liked Black Label too!
Franklin Roosevelt was also a Scotch drinker. Would you
expect anything less from the man who oversaw the repeal of prohibition? His
son, James Roosevelt, teamed up with Joseph Kennedy to obtain the US
distribution rights for Dewar’s Scotch & Cutty Sark shortly before the
repeal of Prohibition — a lucky break no doubt.
Richard Burton and Humphrey Bogart where both Scotch
drinkers. So was Lee Marvin.
Sean Connery is a devotee of Macallan, although that
didn’t stop him from doing commercials for Jim Beam.
A bottle of Glenfiddich always seems to turn up in
movies starring George Clooney.
Cary Grant was obsessed with Black and White, at least
in the movie Father Goose.
For Harrison Ford its Bruichladdich. For Peter Falk, it
was Chivas Regal. He even starred in commercials for them.
Michael Buble’s contracts require that a bottle of
Macallan or Oban be provided at each of his concerts.
Truman Capote also ordered J&B. For fellow author
Stephen King and Hunter S. Thompson it is/was Chivas Regal. George Bernard Shaw
described whisky as “liquid sunshine.”
In Uruguay, people don’t say ‘cheese’ to force a smile
for the camera – they say ‘whisky’.
World War II re-shaped the industry. Could whisky be
made when rationing? The government argued that as the country was bankrupt and
needed to earn more currency overseas, cereals would only be released if
companies agreed to export more. Whisky rationing only came to an end in 1959.
Since 1956, whisky has been the W word of choice for
the NATO phonetic alphabet. It replaced William.
There are only 12 working distilleries in Ireland,
compared to ~133 in Scotland.
John ‘Johnnie’ Walker was a grocer in Kilmarnock in the
mid-1800s who specialised in blending tea, and switched over to
blending whisky.
Saturday, May 18, 2019 was World Whisky Day. It takes
place on the third Saturday of May each year (launched in 2012).
Throughout the years, whisky has been thought to have
magic powers and hugely restorative qualities, including being splashed on to
men’s heads in an attempt to cure baldness, feet being soaked in it to prevent
blisters, given in milk to cats to help them catch more mice and even poured
around the base of trees to give them a boost.
1994 saw the 500th anniversary of Scotch Whisky
production in Scotland.
An 1896 Scotch from Ernest Shackleton’s Antartic
expedition found in 2006 is being preserved in a museum in Christchurch, NZ. It
didn’t freeze, even at -30 temperatures, and 11 full bottles were found in
crates. It will never be poured for drinking but samples have been taken and
used to recreate the taste.
The ‘cup of kindness’ mentioned in Auld Lang Syne,
written by Robert Burns, refers to whisky.
There are over 300,000 varieties of barley but only a
few are suitable for malt whisky production.
Depending on the strain of barley that is used, one
metric ton of barley can be converted into ~ 400 litres of pure alcohol (at +
95.6%).
Many Scottish distilleries now give the grain waste
produced by distilling to farmers as a nutrient-rich food supplement for
livestock.
The first Scottish distillery to install a Coffey Still
was the Grange Distillery, Alloa.
In Victorian times at some Scottish distilleries a
curious – and somewhat benevolent – rule allowed workers to stop for a dram
each time a bell rang. It rang 4 times a day!
Distillery workers have been known to take used barley
home to be packed into a drawer and stored overnight to set, then cut and taken
the next day for snack/lunch. A predecessor of the flapjack!
Coopers use more than 20 different tools to build a
whisky barrel.
The liquid maturing inside a barrel cannot be called
whisky till that barrel is opened for bottling.
It cannot be called Scotch if the barrel is opened
before 3 years have elapsed from the date of casking, as printed on the barrel.
No whisky may be made in Scotland other than Scotch.
Master Blenders may extract a 1.0 L syringe of maturing
new make for close examination. Barrels that fail-about 2.0 to 2.5%-are
withdrawn after paying holding and other taxes and most often sold as Scottish Whisky
to distillers from other countries like India.
‘Flogging a bung’ means using a mallet to pry open the
bung of the cask – bashing the barrel either side of the bung hole to loosen it
up and allow sampling.
Recently, whisky barrels have found an unusual use once
they are no longer required for maturing whisky – there is a company which now
transforms them into flooring for your home or workplace, as well as for bars
and restaurants.
There are over 25 descriptive terms for the colour of whisky.
Whisky does not mature once it has been bottled.
Most new make spirit is diluted to around 62.5% ABV
before being placed in casks to mature.
Blending was pioneered by Andrew Usher in Edinburgh in
1856.
Whisky gains as much as 60% of its flavour from the type of cask used in the ageing process.
As of November 23, 2012, Single Malt Scotch Whisky must
be bottled in Scotland.
On Sunday, Aug 12, 2012, the Guinness Book of World
Records recorded the largest bottle of whisky in the world at 228 litres.The
earliest known ‘whisky bottles’, in 1841, were re-used wine bottles, often used
by local grocers.
There are currently 133 operational distilleries across Scotland, 8 grain and 125 malt.
There are 9 distilleries (soon to be 10) on the island
of Islay.
In 1941, German U boats sank the SS Eriskay Politician
with 28,000 bottles of whisky on board.
Scotch Whisky can not only be enjoyed as a drink or
paired with food, but also in recipes including cakes, preserves and sauces –
often in place of more traditional brandy or wine.
The first distillery came into ‘official’ existence in
1824 following the Excise Act of 1823.
Scotch Whisky was so popular that people began to make
their own to avoid the tax man.
John F Kennedy’s father, Joseph Kennedy was an agent
for the first legal Scotch Whisky brand to be delivered into the US after
Prohibition. The whisky was landed in New York and Chicago the moment the law
was repealed on Dec 5, 1933.
The Ardbeg Distillery on Islay sent compounds of
unmatured malt – new make spirit – to the International Space Station (ISS) in
an unmanned cargo spacecraft on 30 October 2011. It also sent up particles of
charred oak and, once the spacecraft docked at the ISS, the two sets of
molecules were mixed.
Glenmorangie has the tallest stills in Scotland. Their
long copper necks stand at 5.14 metres, the same height as a fully grown adult
giraffe! They are not small and squat like traditional stills as the company’s
founder was a ‘canny’ Scot who bought second-hand gin stills rather than
purchase new, more expensive stills. The ones used today are exact replicas of
this original design.
The oldest recorded visitor to a Scottish distillery
was 103.
KT Tunstall was given a handmade guitar built from oak
cask staves by her favourite distillery (Talisker).
Degrees of peating are measured in ‘parts per million
phenols’, or ppm. Well-known distilleries generally range from 1-55 but, experimentally,
a ppm of 320 has been achieved on Islay.
The Quaich, a uniquely Scottish invention designed specifically for whisky, is used to offer a guest a cup of welcome and also as a farewell drink.
Scotch Whiskies contain more than double the number of flavour
components (congeners) of its nearest competitors, cognac and rum – with more
than 100 complex flavours versus 5 to 10 in vodka.
While a dram is a standard pub measure, ‘A Wee Dram’
has an altogether different definition. The term can only be applied to a
measure poured by a host, and its size is dependent not on HM weights and
measures, but on the generosity of the host.
Standard measures of Scotch Whisky (25ml) contain 55
calories and no fat.
Diageo invested £10 million in its state of the art Cambus Cooperage to make it a completely up to date operation combining innovation with traditional skills.
There are more than 500 species of oak growing
throughout the world but only a few are suitable for coopering.
The art of making barrels is one of the world’s oldest
crafts.
The Scotch Whisky production process has changed little
in the last two hundred years.
The Wine and Spirit Brand Association was formed in
1912, becoming the Whisky Association in 1917 and the Scotch Whisky Association
in 1942.
The Coffey or Patent Still has been in use since 1831.
Until 1821, glass bottles for Scotch Whisky were
free-blown.
In 1887 Josiah Arnell and Howard Ashley patented the
first bottle-blowing machine.
Scotch Whisky only began to be sold in bottles after
1860 when blending became widespread.
Glenturret’s record breaking distillery cat Towser,
caught 30,000 mice in his 24-year lifetime (1963-1987).
Scotch Whisky water source on Islay flows through rocks
thought to be 800 million years old.
The description ‘Single Malt Scotch Whisky’ must appear
exactly in that form.
In 1827, Cameronbridge became the first distillery to
produce grain whisky.
The 1915 Immature Spirits Act brought in the three year
rule for ageing whisky.
There are more than 1.5 million visits to Scotch Whisky
distilleries annually. This means they rank among many well-known UK
attractions, including Edinburgh Castle, the Scottish National Gallery, Tate
Britain, Stonehenge and London Zoo.
Elgin architect Charles Doig invented the iconic
‘pagoda’ roof which is still used in many Scotch Whisky distilleries.
Agents who bought whisky from smugglers were called
‘Blethermen’.
Cooper’s apprentices must work accompanied for 4 years
before being allowed to tackle their own barrel.
There were 400 illicit stills in Edinburgh alone in
1777.
Campbeltown could at one point boast more than 30
distilleries and proclaimed itself ‘the whisky capital of the world’; it was
nicknamed ‘Spiritville’ or ‘Whiskyopolis’.
Robert Burns was once employed in the Scotch Whisky
industry as an exciseman or ‘gauger’.
Islay peat is made up of moss, heather and seaweed
while mainland peat contains wood, bark and needles from the Caledonian pine
forests, giving two very distinct flavours.
Visitors to Scotch Whisky distilleries spend £50million
per year, an average of £32.50 per head.
The largest proportion of visitors came from Scotland
and other parts of the UK, Germany, USA and France. The source of visitors
reflects some of the largest markets for Scotch.
A crystal decanter of Macallan Imperiale ‘M’ whisky
scooped the prestigious title of world’s most expensive whisky when it sold at
auction in Hong Kong for $628,205 in 2015. The luxury decanter contains 6
litres of whisky and stands 28 inches tall.
Scotch whisky is now being sold in a can in the United
States, putting liquor prized for its pedigree into a humble container known
for its affordability and portability. Johnnie Walker has released Red Label
Blended Scotch Whisky with Soda, which will be available in both 345ml bottle
and 375ml can formats. Cola mixes are at or below 5% ABV.
Approximately 15% of blended Scotch whisky is bottled
overseas.
Glenfiddich buys German Oak casks and sends them to
Jerez, Spain. A sherry-maker is paid rent to make a 'fino' sherry in this cask
and bottle it in 2 yrs. The cask is brought back to Scotland and filled with a
brand new make of raw malted whisky and matured for 10-15 years. The end result
is an expensive Scotch whisky. Macallan does the same, except that at 10-12
years, the whisky is shifted for another 2-5 years into once-used American
bourbon casks that last held Oloroso sherry.
The end result is a bloody expensive Scotch whisky, most popular in
China for corporate gifts.
Glenmorangie is more exclusive. LMVH has its own Oak
plantation in the US, make their own bourbon barrels and pay Bourbon
manufacturers to use these casks for one-four years. Thereafter, the casks are
split open into staves and exported to Scotland to mature Glenmorangie raw
make.
Scotch is sold in more than 200 markets globally.
Total amount of Scotch released for sale to the UK market was 90m bottles of 70 cl. each.
Scotch sells three times its nearest foreign whisky rival.
The industry generated about £3 billion in tax revenue to the UK government.
Scotch whisky accounts for a quarter of UK food and drink exports.
Export of Scotch whisky has increased by 87% in the past decade.
A closed bottle of Scotch can be kept for 100 years+ and will still be good to drink.
After opening, a half-full bottle of Scotch whisky will remain good for six to eight months.
The most expensive bottle of Scotch whisky today is Isabella’s Islay ($6.2 Million).
The oldest Scotch whisky on the market is the Aisla T’Orten 107 Years old, distilled in 1906 and available for $ 1.43 million (£870,000). Probably an April Fool's Day prank.
The highest price paid at an auction for a Scotch Whisky is £288,000 (for a 64-year-old 42.5 % Macallan malt whisky).
Glenfiddich is the largest selling single malt in the world, followed by the Glenlivet.
Johnnie Walker Red label is the world's largest selling Scotch whisky.
The Famous Grouse is the most popular Scotch whisky in the UK.
Glenmorangie is the largest selling malt whisky in Scotland.
The Glenlivet is the most popular single malt Scotch whisky in the US.
Experts advise you to drink Single Malt whisky neat or with a tiny bit of water. The water supposedly ‘Releases the Serpent’ from the whisky.
If there is a serpent, there is also an Angel. As it ages, 2.0-2.5 % of the whisky maturing in a barrel is lost to evaporation every year. Distillers refer to this as the ‘angel’s share’.
But the Devil has the last word. Besides the loss due to ageing as stated earlier, the term also includes the fact that the larger the barrel used to mature whisky, the more the spirit that is absorbed by the wood and lost, called by distillers the ‘Devil’s Cut’. The professional term for it remains INDRINK.
Maturation of the new make has to be done in a wooden oak cask not exceeding 700 L capacity.
The most expensive first world country in which to buy Scotch is New Zealand. In the EU, Austria and Switzerland are the most expensive.
Although their proof differs, standard drinks of beer, wine and spirits (liquor) contain an equivalent amount of alcohol – 0.6 ounces each. They’re all the same to a breathalyzer.
Glenturret is the oldest distillery in Scotland (1775), followed by Bowmore (1779).
Glenturret, Oban and Glenlivet are the three oldest malt whiskies currently sold.
William Lawson’s blended Scotch, a relatively unknown brand, is a bestseller in Russia.
18,000 litres of Scotch whisky worth over $800,000 (£ 500,000) were accidentally flushed down the drain at the Dumbarton bottling plant of Chivas Brothers in March 2013.
There are a total of 133 distilleries in Scotland, 125 malt and 8 grain or multipurpose, according to the research briefings and fact sheets presented to the UK Parliament.
In the UK, the six most popular Scotch blended Whiskies are The Famous Grouse, Bell’s, William Grant’s, Teacher’s, J&B and High Commissioner.
LVMH’s Glenmorangie distillery is one of the smallest in the Highlands and employs just sixteen craftsmen – ‘The Sixteen Men of Tain’ - who have become synonymous with the Glenmorangie brand all over the world.
Edradour was the smallest distillery in Scotland - Three people run the entire operation.
Strathearn distillery claims to hold that distinction. It is temporarily closed today.
Loch Ewe is the smallest distillery in Scotland; the owner is a one-man show.
Releases of Scotch whisky from bond for sale in the UK in the first half totaled 37.3 million bottles, down about 5.5% on the corresponding figure of 39.5 million in the opening six months of 2012. The SWA blamed the domestic excise duty regime, and called for UK Government help in this regard.
The fastest growing Scotch whisky in the world over the last five years was Black Dog. Not any more after a lawsuit was filed against Diageo and USL for falsification and fabrication of facts. Read about The Black Dog at https://noelonwhisky.blogspot.com/2017/02/the-intriguing-history-of-black-dog_10.html / You may have noticed the totally changed gold-coloured and black cover describing its history.
The Australian Wine Research Institute has introduced a measure called a standard drink. In Australia, a standard drink contains 10 g (12.67 ml) of alcohol, the amount that an average adult male can metabolize in one hour.
Japanese owned Tomatin is the largest capacity distillery in Scotland.
Haig’s Pinch (Dimple) is the fourth largest blended Deluxe Scotch whisky in the world.
Persian overlords were required to rule twice on a case; once when stone cold sober and again when intoxicated, in the belief of ‘in vino veritas’.
UK Whisky Cheaper in Europe: The price of a bottle of whisky, including the Excise Duty, has been subject to Value Added Tax since 1973. The EU mandated size of the Scotch bottle is 70 cl or 700 ml, minimum 40 per cent ABV. In a single European market, Scotch actually costs less in Europe than in the UK. A 70cl of the average blended Scotch whisky might sell for £10.70 in the UK. Tax would take £7.07 or 66% of the retail price. In 10 out of 15 European countries, lower taxes mean that the same bottle is sold for less. Look at the list below:
Spain about £4.50 about 40%
Italy about £4.85 about 40%
Greece about £ 5.50 about 44%
Germany about £6.40 about 49%
France about £6.60 about 55%
Andorra about £ 3.75, about 35%
Age Mentioned on a Blended Whisky Label: A blended whisky contains anywhere from 15 to 50 different malt whiskies. The skill of the blender is to create character and consistency in the product – and to choose only the whiskies that complement each other. The age of the blended Whisky mentioned on the bottle refers to the youngest whisky in the blend. If it says 10 years it means that the youngest Whisky has been matured for a minimum period of 10 years in oak casks. The same holds good for Single Malt Whiskies as well.
Dewar’s Adds Honey to Scotch: Bacardi, in an attempt to woo the younger generation, unveiled a brand called Dewar’s Highlander Honey, which the company describes as a Scotch whisky “infused with Scottish heather honey filtered through oak cask wood.” The Scotch Whisky Association argues that this Dewar’s product is not Scotch whisky and that under EU law, it has to be sold under the sales description ‘Spirit Drink’. The label may refer to Scotch whisky as one of its constituents.
The first malt whisky ever to be exported to Australia was the Dalmore, in 1870.
The Dalmore is the only distillery permitted to source Matusalem sherry wood casks for finishing its single malt at Gonzalez Byass.
Cadenhead’s Whisky Shop on Canongate, when owned by that family, was Scotland’s oldest independent bottler till taken over by J & A Mitchell & Co. Ltd. in 1972. The name remains unchanged, even though Mitchell & Co bottle and sell Springbank, Longrow and Hazelburn Single Malt whiskies, along with Campbeltown Loch and Mitchell's 12 year old. Its USP is that customers can have a bottle poured straight from a cask and labelled with a person’s name. When sealed it has a label with the ‘born on date’, as whisky stops aging as soon as it leaves the wooden barrel so each bottle is a unique blend.
The source of the name Auchentoshan is Gaelic. It means 'corner of the field'.
Auchentoshan was probably started by Irish settlers, led by the MacBeathas.
Some sources claim that these Irish whisky distillers brought the Irish custom of triple distillation with them. Auchentoshan uses triple distillation.
Antique records from the year 1800 mention an (illegal) Duntocher distillery, which may have been a predecessor to the legal Auchentoshan distillery. A license for distillation was obtained in 1823.
The ‘e’ in whiskey: Scotch whisky is always spelled without an ‘e’? Four other nations, Ireland (since 1960), Peru, Mexico and most but not all brands in the United States call their similar spirits Whiskey. Be sure you never add the ‘e’ when writing to a Scotsman.
Bruichladdich’s The Octomore 08.3 is “the most heavily peated Octomore to date”, containing barley peated to 309 ppm. Octomore 2009 Edition 06.3, peating level is 258 ppm.
For over 220 years, Highland Park has smoked its barley over 4,000-year-old peat, hand-cut from Hobbister Moor, just 11 km from the distillery. From the heathery Fogg layer down through the dense, compacted Yarphie to the ancient coal-like Moss, the core of their peat dates back 4,000 years.
The GlenAllachie has released inaugural bottlings with its first ever Wine Cask Series.
After initial aging in American Oak ex-bourbon barrels, the whisky was transferred into the adroitly chosen wine casks to undergo almost two years of additional maturation: an 11-year-old Grattamacco Cask Finish, a 12-year-old Sauternes Cask Finish, and a 13-year-old Rioja Cask Finish.
The GlenAllachie launched its first ever blended Scotch whisky, White Heather 21 Year Old, early 2021.
The name comes from a blended whisky brand that was discontinued back in the 1980s, which was acquired by The GlenAllachie Distillers Company in 2017.
Aucherachan Distillery, a Speyside Single Malt Scotch whisky distillery went alternatively by Achorachan, Achorechan and Acherachan – such was the quality of spelling in the late 18th century – but also Glenlivat (sic).
As with so many early licensed distilleries, struggling against illegal distillers and heavy taxation, Auchorachan had mixed fortunes and several owners. However, in its day it played an important role in the history of Glenlivet and the whisky industry.
The distillery was originally registered in the 1780s under William Gordon, who died in 1790.
Aucherachan distillery was briefly operational in the following decade but then lay unused for around 40 years until Captain William Grant (not of Glenfiddich fame) re-opened it in 1833.
The distillery is noted as ‘operating’ in 1851, but after Captain Grant suffered a serious fall in 1854 the business began to suffer, although some claim his misfortunes were down to the work of some angry fairies.
2018 was a year littered with auction records, particularly for 60-year-old Macallan featuring labels designed by artists Sir Peter Blake and Valerio Adami – but they were all capped by the £1.2m spent in November on a bottle hand-painted by Irish artist Michael Dillon.
Japanese whisky is sought-after as never before, from the hordes of Highballs consumed in the bars of Tokyo to the cult bottlings of Karuizawa and Hanyu breaking auction records on a regular basis.
But there’s a dark side to this surge in interest. As stocks dwindle, bottlings such as Hakushu 12 and Hibiki 17 have been forced to withdraw from the market – and yet there is an apparently never-ending stream of new brands entering the fray.
The withdrawals came about because the rules governing Japanese whisky are so loose that all manner of hybrid and adulterated products can legally claim to be ‘Japanese whisky’, even though they are arguably neither of those things.
It doesn’t take much to stoke up a storm in the fevered world of social media, but Johnnie Walker’s US launch of a ‘female’ version, The Jane Walker Edition, prompted a backlash even before its release.
Speyside’s Kininvie distillery has released three new ‘experimental’ whiskies from its new innovation arm Kininvie Works, including a rye whisky, triple distilled malt and single-distillery blended Scotch.
Kininvie Works’ three whiskies, code-named KVSM001, KVSG002 and KVSB003, are the result of three different trials run by the William Grant & Sons-owned distillery.
Each code refers to the distillery (KV), spirit type (SM, SG, SB) and batch number (001).
KVSM001 is a triple-distilled single malt, the first of its kind released by Kininvie, which usually produces a double-distilled spirit.
KVSG002 is technically a single grain Scotch whisky distilled in copper pot stills using a combination of malted barley and malted rye. Distillers used a mash containing 11% malted rye, maturing the resulting spirit in virgin American oak casks for three years. The final product, which is bottled at 47.8% abv, is said to have ‘a distinguished toffee flavour along with the classic spiciness associated with rye’.
KVSB003 is a blend of double distilled malt whisky, and the Kininvie single grain malted rye and barley mash. All components of KVSB003 have been produced on-site.
Kininvie is situated on the same property as Balvenie distillery.
The launch of Kininvie Works marks a departure from the single malt brand’s focus on luxury whisky, which in recent years has included the release of the distillery’s ‘first drops’, a series of 25-year-old single casks sold for around £400 per 35cl bottle.
Bruichladdich Bere Barley is an idiosyncratic barley variety that has survived in some of Scotland’s remotest outposts for up to 6,000 years, nearly became extinct 20 years ago, and is now undergoing a resurgence.
In celebration of London Cocktail Week’s 10th anniversary in 2019, the Speyside single malt brand The Glenlivet created a range of edible/drinkable cocktail capsules in collaboration with Alex Kratena and Monica Berg of London’s Tayēr + Elementary, rated one of the world’s best bars after just nine months of operation, and capsule designer Notpla.
Three original cocktails ‘inspired by the elements and flavours of The Glenlivet Founder’s Reserve’ – Citrus, Wood and Spice – are filled into a biodegradable casing made from seaweed extract (called ‘oohos’) and presented to patrons in a bespoke gold box.
Ardnahoe – which means “Height of the Hollow” in Scottish Gaelic and gives Ardnahoe Distillery its name, is situated on the North-East coast of Islay, equidistant between Caol Ila and Bunnahabhain Distilleries.
Ardnahoe Distillery is the ninth malt whisky distillery on the world-renowned whisky island of Islay.
They draw the water to produce Ardnahoe spirit from Loch Ardnahoe nearby.
Loch Ardnahoe offers extremely soft water that has been filtered through peat and rock for thousands of years.
Mysteries surround Loch Ardnahoe: no one is quite sure how deep it is, while others say there’s a ghost of a charging white steed that rises out of the Loch on a full moon.
Tomintoul entered the Guinness Book of World Records by producing the largest bottle of whisky in the world, containing 105.3 litres of 14 year old Tomintoul malt whisky.
All about Royal Salute:
In 1953, Princess Elizabeth ascended the throne. An exquisite blend was created using whisky from Strathisla, the oldest working distillery in the Scottish Highlands. It was given the name Royal Salute – after the famous 21-gun-salute.
To this day, Royal Salute has marked each significant event in the lives of the British Monarchy and is unique in having only ever used whiskies aged at least 21 years in its blends.
All Royal Salute whiskies are at 40% ABV in 70 cl bottles.
Over the decades, Royal Salute master blenders have collected and stored whiskies of immense distinction behind locked doors in legendary storehouses across Scotland.
Sandy Hyslop is the fifth Master Blender in the history of Royal Salute.
The Signature Blend 21 YO: This blended Scotch whisky started it all – a whisky fit for a queen. This is a classic, unchanged since 1953, with a flavour and fragrance that is unforgettable.
The Malts Blend 21 YO: Royal Salute’s first malts-only blend, it harmonises 21 precious single malts, each matured for a minimum of 21 years, from the five regions of Scotland.
The Lost Blend 21 YO: At the heart of The Lost Blend are rare whiskies rescued from distilleries that have vanished into the mist. Many of these whiskies are lost forever and finding a Royal Salute Lost Blend may be beyond the pale.
In the Royal Salute vaults lie its own “crown jewels” – rare and precious whiskies, under lock and key. This whisky features the finest blends, aged for 25 years or more, and expertly combined to create an exceptional liquid with a glorious flavour. The Treasured Blend is available exclusively in travel retail.
The Polo Estancia Edition 21 YO: The first edition of a new collection which aims to celebrate iconic polo destinations, The 21-Year-Old Polo Estancia Edition pays homage to what is universally known as the ‘home of polo’ – Argentina. It is a bespoke 21-year-old blend fully finished in the finest Argentinian Malbec casks.
The Malbec: Argentinian Malbec wine is characterised by its deep colour and intense fruity flavours. The Polo Estancia blend was fully finished in top of the range Malbec wine casks from the high altitude ‘boutique terroir’ of Cafayate.
The Finish: A meticulous process that requires a talented Master Blender to reach the exact desired profile and ensure the strength of flavours of the Malbec do not overpower the more delicate aged notes within the Royal Salute whiskies.
The Inspired Blends comprise of the Union of the Crowns, Stone of Destiny and 62 Gun Salute.
Royal Salute Union of the Crowns: This 32 YO celebrates a remarkable coming together – the Union of the Crowns, which saw Ireland, Scotland and England united by the British monarchy. This blend is itself a powerful union of precious whiskies from all five regions of Scotland, aged for 32 years or more.
Stone of Destiny: The bedrock of the British monarchy, the Stone of Destiny has been the coronation seat of kings and queens for centuries. The Stone of Destiny comprises an extraordinary collection of rare and fine whiskies, all matured for at least 38 years.
62 Gun Salute: The spectacular 62-gun salute is the highest ceremonial honour, reserved for the most significant royal occasions. 62 Gun Salute is presented in a midnight blue, hand-crafted Dartington Crystal decanter, adorned with 24-carat gold and crowned with a cut crystal stopper, complete with a book describing the creation of the blend. The whiskies used to make the blend are aged for at least 40 years. It was launched in June 2010, for the Queen’s birthday celebrations. The few bottles available have 50 YO malt and grain whiskies.
Royal Salute 29 Year Old PX Sherry Cask Finish: A limited-edition 29-year-old blended whisky from Royal Salute, matured exclusively in Pedro Ximénez sherry casks. 70 cl at 40% ABV.
The first blended grain whisky in the Royal Salute portfolio, the Snow Polo Edition evokes the spirit of the spectacular sport from which it takes its name. It is carefully crafted to a higher than usual ABV of 46.5% to match the exact latitude of St Moritz, the Swiss resort where snow polo was first played against the backdrop of pristine, white mountain peaks.
The Royal Wedding Edition: This expression commemorates the wedding of HRH Prince Henry to Ms Meghan Markle. Every whisky in this exquisite blend has been matured entirely in American oak casks as a tribute to Ms Meghan Markle’s American origins. Only 70 bottles were made, in individually numbered, hand-blown crystal decanters and presented in a handcrafted American oak box.
The Peats Beast family has grown. Along with the Standard 46% single malt whisky un-chillfltered, no additives, no colouring, the range now includes: a batch strength version finished for 9 months in Pedro Ximinez casks.
Timorous Beastie represents “ultimate distillation of the Highlands” in a small batch marriage of Single Malts distilled at Glengoyne, Glen Garioch, Blair Athol and Strathearn Distilleries, amongst others.
Douglas Laing & Co, the family firm behind the “Remarkable Regional Malts” Scotch Whisky range, unleashed Timorous Beastie “Meet the Beast”, a limited edition of the sleekit dram to amplify the flavour experience of their Highland Malt brand end May 2021.
Established in 2014 by Douglas Laing & Co, Timorous Beastie represents “ultimate distillation of the Highlands” in a small batch marriage of Single Malts distilled at Glengoyne, Glen Garioch, Blair Athol and Strathearn Distilleries, amongst others.
The
Macallan claims that it has achieved success and fame through its ‘Six
Pillars’, viz., Spiritual Home, Curiously Small Stills, Finest Cut, Exceptional
Oak Casks, Natural Color and The Macallan itself. It has released five expressions in honor of
its pillars so far, starting in 2005; the 50, 55, 57, 60 and 62-year-old single
malts in bespoke Lalique crystal. The 62nd was released on December 17, 2013 at
a price of US$ 26,000.
Origins of Some Distillery
Names
Ardnahoe:
Ardnahoe means “Height of the Hollow” in Scottish Gaelic and gives Ardnahoe Distillery its name. Loch Ardnahoe, from where water is sourced lies a duck’s flap from the distillery.
Ardross:
Ardross Distillery draws its name from Ardross Castle, in the estate of which it lies.
CAIRNS :
Cairns Distillery has been named after the Cairngorms. The Cairngorms are a mountain range in the eastern Highlands of Scotland closely associated with the mountain Cairn Gorm. The Cairngorms became part of Scotland's second national park on 1 September 2003.
Lagavulin:
The name Lagavulin comes from the Gaelic Lag a’ Mhuilinn, meaning “hollow of
the mill.” Prior to the early 19th century, the area was home to countless
illicit whisky moonshiners and other nefarious characters.
Laphroaig:
It’s assumed that the name Laphroaig originally came from the Gaelic Lag
Bhròdhaig, or the “hollow of broad bay.”
Macallan: Macallan is likely derived from the Gaelic magh, which translates to fertile ground and ellan, which is a reference to an Irish-born monk 8th century Christian monk named St. Fillan.
Glenlivet:
Glenlivet comes from the Gaelic liobh ait, which which means “smooth flowing
one” in reference to the river that flows through the glen.
Glenmorangie: Glenmorangie’s name comes from Gaelic Mòr na Sìth,
which the company translates to “glen of tranquility or or Gleann Mór-innse “vale of big meadows.”
Bruichladdich: Bruichladdich is usually translated rather poetically
as ‘brae by the shore’, but this is a rather vague concept in the context of
Loch Indaal and its environs. Bruichladdich – Brudhach a Chladdaich – is made
from two Gaelic words. Brudhach has a meaning that ranges in steepness from ‘an
ascent’, hill-side, brae, to a steep acclivity, and precipice. The bank of
glacial drift deposits that separates the distillery from the warehouses is classified
as a steep bank. This strange geological feature runs for eight miles along the
north side of Loch Indaal, a hundred feet tall in places, at a steep angle of
eighty degrees along most of its length.
Chladach
or cladach means generally a shore, beach, or coast; but more specifically, a
stony, rocky beach. Brudhach refers to the unusual bank, while ‘A Chladdaich’
intersects the bank at the place of the dangerous, rocky, lee shore.
Famous Grouse: Perthshire grocer Matthew Gloag created and named his
blend Famous Grouse after the red grouse, Scotland’s most popular game bird.
Craigellachie: In Gaelic, it means “rocky hill,” a
reference to a famous cliff that overlooks the Spey.
 |
| The Famous Grouse outside Glenturret Distillery |
Aberlour:
Aberlour –The name comes from the Lour stream that feeds River Spey. The word originates from the Scottish Gaelic words Obar Lobhair.
AnCnoc:
AnCnoc – [ah-knock] The original name of the distillery was Knockdu [knock-doo] and was derived from the Gaelic word Cnoc Dubh meaning “Black Hill”. Back in 1994, due to confusion with Knockando distillery, they were forced to rename into AnCnoc meaning “The Hill.”
Auchentoshan:
The name is derived from the Gaelic word Achadh an Oisein translating into “corner of the field.”
Benriach:
The words origins are often speculated, Bennmeans “mountain” in Gaelic. Riach can be couple of things. The most used translation is “speckled mountain” but there are other suggestions that Riach may refer to an old farm in the region named “red deer.”
Bunnahabhain:
“mouth of the river coming from the words Bun na h-Abhainn.”
Cragganmore:
The name comes from the Gaelic AnCreagan mor meaning “the big rock.”
Craigellachie:
Comes from Creag Eileachaidh meaning “Rocky Hill”. It refers to the small hill overlooking river Spey.”
Dalwhinnie:
Derived from Gaelic word Dail-coinneeamh, which means meeting place, referring to the meeting of ancient cattle drovers’ routes through the mountains.
Highland Park:
The distillery’s name comes from High Park, the elevated area on which it sits.
Tomintoul:
Tomintoul derives from Scottish Gaelic Tom an t-Sabhail, meaning 'The Hill of the Barn'.
Aberfeldy:
“The confluence of Palladius or Paldoc” Aber (Brythonic-Pictish – confluence or river mouth) Phellaidh (Old Gaelic – St. Paldoc, Christian missionary).
Allt A Bhainne: “Burn of Milk” This area was used to milk cattle.
Ardmore: “Big Height” Ard (Scottish Gaelic – high) mór (Scottish Gaelic – big).
Arran: “Place of Peaked Hills.”
Balmenach: Am Baile Meadhanach, “The Middle Farm.”
Mortlach:
Mortlach was established in 1823 and named with the original name of the town.
In the 19th century, James Duff, the Earl Fife, changed the town name from
Mortlach to Dufftown for his family name. The distillery remains the same.
Ardbeg:
Ardbeg, the heavily peated whisky, gets its name from the Gaelic Àirde Beaga,
which translates to “little height.”
Talisker:
The only distillery on the Isle of Skye, Talisker is situated in the middle of
territory historically home to Clan Macleod. It was founded in 1831 and gets
its name from the nearby Talisker House that was the home of the son of the
Macleod Clan Chief.
Oban: Oban distillery, was constructed in 1994 along the rock-filled harbour of the same name. Because of its location, it has characteristics of both the Highland and Island whiskies.
Women in Scotch Whisky HISTORy
Jill Boyd, Whisky Maker at Compass Box, was the first woman to join the Compass Box team and has recently over seen the release of Hedonism: The Muse, their Blended Grain 50.3% ABV limited edition expression celebrating International Women’s Day.
Royal Brackla : The Brackla distillery was built in 1812 by Captain
William Fraser of Brackla
House on the estate of Cawdor Castle. Brackla whisky was selected by
King William IV to be his whisky at the Royal Court.
Oban: Oban distillery, was constructed in 1994 along the rock-filled harbour of the same name. Because of its location, it has characteristics of both the Highland and Island whiskies.
Ballechin: Ballechin Distillery took
its name from the town of Ballinluig. The Distillery was its own shop from 1880
through 1927.
Women in Scotch Whisky HISTORy
Stephanie Macleod is
Master Blender at Dewar’s.
Dr. Rachel Barrie has now been in the whisky industry for over 28 years. Starting as a researcher under the eye of legendary whisky figure Dr. Jim Swan, she then worked at Glenmorangie, Ardbeg, and Bowmore before moving to Brown Forman in 2017 to work as a master blender, charged with handling whisky creation across their then recently-acquired distilleries of GlenDronach, Benriach, and Glenglassaugh.
2021 June’s relaunch of Benriach’s entire core range, accompanied by many new releases, is Barrie’s most significant stamp of authority. Dr. Barrie believes that Benriach 10 is the personalisation of Sammy Davis Jr’s song, Rhythm of Life.
2021 June’s relaunch of Benriach’s entire core range, accompanied by many new releases, is Barrie’s most significant stamp of authority. Dr. Barrie believes that Benriach 10 is the personalisation of Sammy Davis Jr’s song, Rhythm of Life.
Cara, daughter of Fred
Laing, is now the Director of Whisky at Douglas Laing & Co. She didn’t
start off there; she worked as Brand Manager for Jura at Whyte & Mackay
before moving on to Bowmore.
Aimee Gibson is a talented
blender who began her career with Diageo whilst on placement and is now with
Johnnie Walker.
Jill Boyd, Whisky Maker at Compass Box, was the first woman to join the Compass Box team and has recently over seen the release of Hedonism: The Muse, their Blended Grain 50.3% ABV limited edition expression celebrating International Women’s Day.
Allison Parc is the
founder of Brenne whisky and something of an entrepreneur in this field.
Working closely with her French distillers, she’s created a single malt made
with barley grown in Cognac, France.
Emma Walker-not from the
Johnnie Walker family- is an expert whisky blender at Diageo with a background
in chemistry.
Heather Nelson was the
woman to found and run a scotch whisky distillery, the Toulvaddie Distillery, in
over 200 years.
Margaret Gloag may be credited with getting her family into the liquor business.
Margaret Gloag may be credited with getting her family into the liquor business.
Elizabeth Leitch ‘Bessie’
Williamson joined Laphroaig in 1934 and became the manager after the owner, Ian
Hunter, suffered a stroke. Upon Hunter's death in 1954, Williamson inherited the controlling interest in the Laphroaig distillery on Islay, Hunter's house Ardenistiel, and the island of Texa. Williamson is credited with positioning Laphroaig, and by extension other Islay malts, to the American market.
In 1698, the company now known as Berry Bros. & Rudd was started by a woman. Only her last name is known: Bourne. The Widow Bourne established a grocer’s in the prestigious neighbourhood opposite St. James’s Palace.
Helen and Elizabeth
Cumming set up Cardow, later Cardhu when acquired by Johnnie Walker.
Gemma Paterson is The
Balvenie’s Global Ambassador.
The three granddaughters of The Highland Distilleries Company plc’s first chairman William Robertson, Agnes, Ethel and Elspeth, combined their business interests under a holding company, Edrington, and created a charitable trust to be its principal owner and distribute its dividends to charities in Scotland.
The three granddaughters of The Highland Distilleries Company plc’s first chairman William Robertson, Agnes, Ethel and Elspeth, combined their business interests under a holding company, Edrington, and created a charitable trust to be its principal owner and distribute its dividends to charities in Scotland.
Becky Paskin – Whisky writer, presenter, and educator who doesn’t accept that it’s a man’s world in Whiskyland.
Kristiane Sherry – Editor, Master of Malt.
Dawn Davies – Head Buyer, The Whisky Exchange.
Annabel Thomas – CEO and Founder, Nc’nean Distillery.
The first licensee after the passage of the 1823 Excise Act was Jane Macgregor of Littlemill Distillery.
Georgie Bell – Global Malts Ambassador, Bacardi.
