Cooper King 24 month old Maturing Malt

There are many milestones in a distillery's journey towards releasing a single malt, the penultimate one must be release of a 24 month old Maturing Spirit.

Cooper King have just done that and I was lucky enough to be sent a sample box!

First a little history:

I first met Abbie and Chris from Cooper King at a Malted Meetup in 2018 when they told us about their plans to build a distillery.

In 2014, a desire to leave the rat race Abbie and Chris crossed the globe to Australia, in search of sun, sand and adventure.

While living and working in Tasmania, a nearby distillery won World’s Best Single Malt Whisky, a feat never accomplished outside of Scotland or Japan. They began researching for a whisky blog for friends back home and visited a number of operational whisky distilleries. They had an incredible three months leading a bizarre double life. One day apple picking, sleeping in the boot of an estate car, eating cup-a-soup for dinner and living the true back-packer lifestyle. The next, staying in nice hotels, learning about all things whisky and meeting up with distillery owners and head distillers.

Eventually they were inspired to come home and build their own distillery! They took advice from Bill Lark, the godfather of Tasmanian whisky, and others they met on their travels.

The distillery name Cooper King comes from Chris’ great-great-grandfather Charles Cooper King, a Lieutenant Colonel of the Royal Marine Artillery. They thought his adventurous spirit fitted the business perfectly. But there was a problem – they had to seek permission from the Cabinet Office to use the word ‘King’ in their company name!

Cooper King Distillery is located in Sutton-on-the-Forest near York in North Yorkshire.

The distillery was self-build on the site of an old stable block. The distillery houses a production area and cask maturation warehouse, together with a rustic tasting room and well-stocked shop.

Photo : CooperKing

Photo : CooperKing

The finished distillery

Cooper King Distillery was built on the basis of environmental, financial and social sustainability: they've run on 100% renewable energy from day 1, donate 1% of gin sales to their partner charity (the Yorkshire Dales Millennium Trust (YDMT), which is spent on planting native woodland), send zero waste to landfill and use plastic-free packing materials and lightweight glass bottles.

Production Process

Cooper King have sourced their the custom-made 900 litre copper pot still from Tasmania and use 100% Yorkshire barley combined with pure Yorkshire water in a 5+ day fermentation period to produce a "distinctive malt spirit unlike any other in the UK".

250kg of Maris Otter heritage barley and 1000 litres of hot water. mashed by hand (by Sophie!)

Maturing Casks

Their first casks were filled in August 2019, the 100th in April 2022. The whisky is matured, on site, in small 100 litre casks from "England's last Master Cooper" Alastair Simms of White Rose Cooperage locally in North Yorkshire.

Photo: YorkMix

They plan to release their first single malt in 2023.

This 24 month old spirit was distilled in 2020 using 2 row Maris Otter heritage barley, 100% floor malted at Warminster Maltings. It was mashed using local water and dried distiller's yeast before being fermented for 6-7 days. The wash was double distilled in their 900 litre Tasmanian Copper Pot Still and filled into Cask #16, a lightly toasted French oak ex-Merlot red-wine cask, at 60% ABV.

Distillery thoughts:

"A rich, fruit-driven, cask-aged malt spirit, the second and oldest to be released from the distillery. 

Rum-soaked raisins, ripe damson plums and rich prunes abound on the nose, supported by softer notes of toffee pennies and vanilla. 

Oak, spice and a little heat enters on the palate, beautifully balancing the fruit-led sweetness. Malted milk biscuits and golden syrup cake follow, with a hint of charred pineapple. 

An oily mouthfeel gives way to a long finish - with a little spice at first - before rounding off with a touch of soft chamomile."

 

My thoughts: 

Appearance: Mid gold in the glass (not a Cooper King one as I smashed it...) swirls cling as thin line, bead up slowly and fall as slow thin oily legs.

 

Nose: Youth shows itself immediately - a little fruity new make, perfume and toffee. The ABV hits you too 58.6% is not to be sniffed at (!) A few samples over a couple of nights and leaving the dram to breathe for a while opens it up a little: there's hints of dried fruit, tropical fruit and ginger spice. I added a few controlled drops of water to get it down to 46% ABV (the probably release ABV) this changed the dram. the new make notes faded to be replaced by pine needles, black cherries, caramel and oak.

Palate: Thick spicy sweet arrival, ginger, honey, tropical fruit, dried fruit and oak. A little toffee. Mouthcoating. The ABV makes itself known and the spice lingers on the tongue after the liquid disappears. Berries and cherries add to the tropical fruit notes - the wine cask influence is obvious. With water, at 46% ,the spice is tamed, the berries come to the fore, icing sugar offers a little dryness and brown sugar some sweetness. 

Finish: Lingering ginger spice and perfume with some tropical fruit. With water the finish is shortened - not much in the way of spice replaced by berry and tropical fruit notes with a little oak.

Overall: In two words "Huge Potential"! I think the enthusiasm shown by Chris & Abbie 4 years ago is still there, the rest of the team have been enthused too - see the picture below! I think this shows through to their spirit - its lively, spicy, delicious. Water tames the spice and lets the fruit show through. This was a wine cask rather than 'plain' ex-bourbon so I'm unsure of what the distillery character will be like - I'm assuming fruity and sweet - the wine has added berry notes. Another year in the cask will tame the spice and dilution to a more drinkable 46% will make this a great dram. Drinkable at 2 years old, I can't wait to try it next year!

The Cooper King Team