Borders Distillery WS:02 - The Long & Short Of It

Whilst they wait for their single malt to mature, Borders Distillery are teasing us with another single blend (not a term you'll find in the SWA handbook but one which a number of distilleries can now produce) from their Workshop Series.

Let's see what it's like...

Opened in March 2018 in the town of Hawick it's the first Scotch Whisky distillery in the Scottish Borders since 1837, the distillery is an award-winning conversion of Hawick’s former electrical works, a prominent landmark in the town since 1903.

The distillery’s founders have a keen sense of environmental and social responsibility, and wanted to support regeneration efforts in their corner of rural Scotland. Rather than erect a soulless new-build on the town’s outskirts, they chose to invest in refurbishing an existing building in the heart of the town, creating employment opportunities and a tourist attraction.

Borders Distillery has become the first official distillery listed on the WelcoMe platform, which confirms that its building is more accessible to disabled visitors.

A combination of swan neck pot and straight neck stills allow the distillation of

single malt whisky, single grain whisky and vodka.

“While we wait patiently for the first single malt from the Scottish Borders in nearly 200 years to be deemed ready for bottling by our tasting panel,” he said, “the Workshop Series gives our distilling team the chance to channel their imagination, energy and talents into making whiskies that really express our personality. It’s an exciting evolutionary journey that everyone can be part of.”

WS:02 is a single blend, malt and grain from the same distillery, but with a twist - it's actually two different malts: 1 which had a long fermentation and one which has a short one.

Distillery notes: 

"Some say there’s nothing new in Scotch Whisky. We say, think again. Welcome to the Workshop Series. 

Fermentation is an essential part of determining flavour in Scotch Whisky. For this second edition of the Workshop Series, our distillers experimented with very short fermentations of 55 hours and very long ones of 150 hours. Both batches were then distilled twice and matured in first fill ex-bourbon barrels, before being married with single grain."

Chill-filtered at 40% ABV. Entirely distilled by The Borders Distillery Company. 

Nose: fig pudding, butterscotch, and sultanas.

Taste: fresh bursts of gooseberry skin, citrus zest, and green apple.

 

My thoughts:

Appearance: Very pale gold in the glass, swirls cling as a thin line, bead up quickly and fall as slow thin legs 

 

Nose: light and fruity to start but this soon develops into gooseberry jam, fresh cut grass, lemon zest. There's a little sugary sweetshop note, some coconut and hints of dried fruit.

Palate: thin sweet arrival, honey, apples, pears with the gooseberries, citrus and lemon zest from the nose, with a little drying icing sugar. There's a little shortbread note with salted caramel chews and buttered popcorn. A lovely bite of ginger spice is left on the tongue as the liquid disappears.

 

Finish: Lingering dry spice, lemon zest and gooseberries.

Thoughts: Another interesting blend from Borders, a light thin on the palate - I'm not sure why they chill filtered this one, they didn't with WS:01 and that was lovely on the palate. Saying that the fruit notes are lovely, a little reminiscent of Inchmurrin, from the long fermentation, there's buttered popcorn from the grain but I'm not sure what the short fermentation is giving? Easy drinking and reasonably priced. Borders must be sitting on a huge number of casks now with some interesting spirit, a lot are older than 3 years. Their single malt marriage, when it comes, will have a great range of spirit styles to choose from - I'm looking forward to it!

Many thanks to Borders and @FairgroundComms for the sample!

WS:00 is their New Make Spirit also available in bottles.

WS:01 is a Malt & Rye experiment which I reviewed here.