#GBMM2017 Introduction

On Saturday 12th August Maltman Mike organised and ran a little whisky tasting shindig at the House Of Malt in Carlisle #GBMM2017!

As you can see from the logo there was going to be a good turn out from some of the newer distilleries as well as the more established and of course a great bottler.

Twenty free tickets were made available and all were snapped up quite quickly - as well as the usual band of dodgy bloggers and vloggers there were some locals visiting the House of Malt shop in Carlisle for some free drams.

This blog gives an overview of the evening and I'll do more in-depth blogs of each of the dram providers!

The Great Big Malted Meetup 2017 took place at The House Of Malt in Carlisle

The shop is owned by Ben, Mike works there! They sell a large range of whiskies, gins and vodkas and an ever growing range of craft beers. They also sell online from www.houseofmalt.co.uk

Photo @JWBassman_

It's a great venue to hold a whisky tasting..

Inside The House of Malt

...but we actually started off with some Temu Gin, House of Malt have a UK exclusive on this Monk distilled gin all the way from Finland!

Crafted from rare wild forest ingredients
deep in the Finnish Taïga—the last
primitive, untamed forest
wilderness of the North

The meet up was due to start at 7pm but all those thirst bloggers turned up early to swap samples, meet face-to-face for the first time and share stories. It was really great to meet people for the first time when your only previous contact had been over twitter!

All the bloggers sat at the back of the room leaving the front for the locals!

Blogger's Corner! Photo @JWBassman_

It was great to meet Grimm @GentlemanGrimm, Vin @NNWhisky, John @JWBassman_, Daniel  @Whisky_Viking and Sarah @iheartwhisky for the first time 'in the flesh'.

A few samples were exchanged, some from secret suitcases!

Sample Suitcase!

As each of the distillery / bottler reps arrived introductions were made, more samples were tried and stories swapped (we hadn't even started for real!).

The drams to be tasted were lined up, unfortunately the Lakes Distillery were a little late so I didn't get them included in the line-up:

Part of the line up!

The plan for the night was:

• Abbie and Chris from Cooper King, but drinking a dram from Tomatin (Read more here!)

• Jan from Douglas Laing (Read more here!)

• Chris from The Lakes Distillery (Read more here!)

• Maltman Mike and me presenting Wolfburn (Read more here!)

I'll add links to the individual blog entries above over the next few days!

Lots of whisky was drunk, some cake was eaten (some people ate a lot more than some others!) and real as opposed to on-line friendships made!

Me, John, Vin & Grimm

It was a fantastic evening, many thanks to Maltman Mike for organising, House Of Malt for use of their beautiful premises, the dram suppliers Tomatin, Douglas Laing, Lakes Distillery & Wolfburn, Cooper King for driving all the way over from Yorkshire to tell us about their plans and all my fellow tasters for making it great!

Newer Distilleries 2 - Ardnamurchan

This is the second in an occasional series about newer distilleries, this entry is about the Ardnamurchan Distillery.

Location

Ardnamurchan Distillery is located in Glenbeg, Ardnamurchan, Argyll in the far West of Scotland. It is Scotland's most westerly mainland distillery.

Beautiful location overlooking Loch Sunart Photo : CNN

History

The Ardnamurchan Distillery was conceived in 2007, the build started in 2013 and they opened in July 2014. They have created the first distillery in the country with self-sustaining energy requirements through wood-burning boilers and hydro systems.

Photo : Adelphi Distillery Ltd

Production Process

The distillery has its own malting floor, using barley grown on the local estate. Water comes from local springs and the Glenmore river.

They have 4 Oak wash backs (the only Scottish distillery to use them) and 3 stainless steels ones.

Photo : Adelphi Distillery Ltd

Photo : Bluestone 98 Mark Ingram Photography

Photo : Adelphi Distillery Ltd

They produces two styles of spirit, one peated and one unpeated. The spirit was first casked into American and European oak, ex-sherry casks and American oak ex-bourbon casks in 2014 and they are planning on leaving it until it is at least 7 years old before offering it for sale.

Cask #1 being filled 1st August 2014, Photo : Adelphi Distillery Ltd

All whisky will be matured on site, they have a twin floor traditional dunnage warehouse, the lower level having a soil floor.

Photo : Adelphi Distillery Ltd

Photo : Adelphi Distillery Ltd

From left to right: New Make Spirit (July 2014); Spirit, 1st fill Bourbon barrel
7 ½ months old; Spirit, 1st fill Sherry hogshead (PX) 5 months old
Photo : Adelphi Distillery Ltd

Whisky
The focus will be on single malt whisky, with no plans to sell produce to blenders. The volume of the distillery will be kept low, to ensure quality over quantity. All whiskies will probably be bottled at cask strength starting in 2021.

Website
Link to the distillery website

Video
Link to the promo video

Visit
Opening Hours and Tour Times (Easter to October)
Monday to Friday: Open 10am to 6pm; Saturday: Closed; Sunday: Open 11am to 5pm (Tours on Sunday by prior appointment)
Tours on the hour every hour – first tour 1 hour after opening, last tour 1 hour before closing - always a good idea to book in advance!

Contact
email : ardnamurchan@adelphidistillery.com
phone : +44 1972 500285 

Strange smoke from St. George's English Whisky

There are a number of English distilleries in operation at the moment, not all of them have started selling whisky yet.

Map : www.cooperkingdistillery.co.uk/blog/the-english-whisky-map

I'll cover off some of them in my new series "Newer Distilleries" but for now here's a review of two drams from The English Whisky Company and it's St George’s Distillery near Norwich.

Photo : English Whisky Company

Their whisky is batch made by hand with no computers, matured in fine casks, bottled on site using their own water and is non chill-filtered. In this review I'm looking at two of their basics drams The English Original and Smokey.

Original and Smokey

Whisky : The English Original (NAS)

Characteristics : 43% ABV, NCF, Non-coloured
Price : £36 widely available
Colour : Light Gold
Nose : Green apple and vanilla ice cream; a little alcohol burn, a sweet honey develops over time.
Palate : Nutty honey on the tongue, quite sweet and slightly drying.
Finish : Buttered popcorn and a little spiced orange.
Overall : A pleasant little dram, very sweet and youthful.
Link : Original

Whisky : The English Smokey (NAS)
Characteristics : 43% ABV, NCF, Non-coloured
Price : £36 widely available
Colour : Light Gold - the same as the Original so I'm assuming they share the same maturation methods.
Nose : Smoky baby puke - yes really - not pleasant at all. A little like Frazzles smokey bacon crisps?
Palate : Sweet honey on the palate with a little smoke - very drying.
Finish : Medium length smoky finish
Overall : Peated to 45ppm but it's not a touch on a decent Islay - just has the wrong find of "smokey" aroma.
Link : Smokey

Overall : I liked the original - a nice simple dram - typical bourbon cask vanilla and a little honey, the Smokey on the other hand just didn't do it for me - the nose was very strange and the indifferent finish just didn't cut it - give me an Islay dram instead. maybe it's the youthful NAS that's giving the strangeness and a few more years in the cask might help?

Newer Distilleries 1 : Wolfburn

This is the first in an occasional series about newer distilleries - mainly because I wanted to find out a little more about them and I thought if I wrote a blog entry - you could too!

The first entry is about the Wolfburn Distillery

Location

Wolfburn Distillery is located in Thurso in the far North east of Scotland, it's the most Northerly mainland distillery.

History

Although there was a Wolfburn Distillery on the site in the 19th century, there is little trace of it or its whiskies still around. The present distillery was started in August 2012 with the first new make flowing in January 2013.

The name Wolfburn comes from the nearby Wolf Burn (stream) which supplies the distillery with it's water. Wolves were once a common site in Scotland and the logo comes from a woodcut by Konrad Gesner, a 16th Century zoologist.

Photo : albaimport.de

Photo : HeraldScotland.com

Production process
Wolfburn have a great process diagram on their website explaining how their whisky is created.

Diagram : Wolfburn.com

Wolfburn have two traditional pot stills of 5,500 litres (Wash) and 3,800 litres (Spirit) with a weekly output of c 3,500 litres. There is no automation in the process.

Shane Fraser, the Master Distiller, decribes the new make as "Sweet and malty, like Weetabix with warm milk added" there is also some "Dried apricot but with a slight spice behind it, with a splash of water added it softens the aroma and I get more of a banana smell with a slightly perfumed background.”

The spirit is casked at 63.5% abv and matured in a mixture of 2nd fill American Oak Quarter casks (120 litres), 1st fill American Oak ex Bourbon casks (200 litres) and 1st and 2nd fill Spanish Oak ex Oloroso Sherry casks (500+ litres) and matured in dunnage warehouses on site.

Photo : John O'Groat Journal

Bottling also takes place on site, all of the whisky produced is non-coloured and non-chill filtered.

Photos : @Wolfburn_Whisky

Whiskies
Wolfburn currently bottles the:

Northland - matured in the Quarter Casks this is a fruity malty dram with a hint of peat. Bottled at 46%, priced at round £45-£50 for 700ml

Aurora - matured in the ex Bourbon and Sherry casks with is a sweet sherried nutty dram with a hint of spice. Bottled at 46%, priced at around £45-£50 for 700ml

Small Batch No. 128 (from Warehouse No.1, Stow No. 28) - matured in small 100 litre first-fill ex-bourbon casks, a lightly peated smoky dram with sweet honey. In case you don't know, I didn't, a stow is a row of casks in a dunnage warehouse!

Morven - a lightly peated whisky coming in September 2017. Bottled at 46%, priced at around £45-£50 for 700ml

Specially selected or experimental casks are also bottles as the Kylver Series.

Website
Link to the distillery website

Video
Link to the promo video

Visit
The distillery is open 10am - 4,30pm Mon-Fri with tours at 2pm. Weekend and holidays may be different - always a good idea to book in advance!

Contact
email : info@wolfburn.com
phone : +44 1847 891 051 (note: the office is not always manned – email is the best way to reach them)

#BlindTasting - Review

If you're reading this post you must have read my previous posts on our recent Series of #BlindTasting sessions Part 1, Part 2 and Part 3 where @jwbassman_, @SpiritAndWood, @GentlemanGrimm and @WhiskyWings swapped some samples and blind tasted them!

The blind leading the blind #BlindTasting Pt3

Following on from our two successful #BlindTasting sessions over the last month we followed up with Part 3!

Spirit Of Speyside winners @TweetTastings

Last week I was lucky to be selected to take part in Steve @TheWhiskyWire latest @TweetTasting, this time is was 6 of the winners and runners up from the recent @Spirit_Speyside

Not the most exciting of un-boxing videos but more than made up by the contents and the lovely hand written letter!

@_littlebrowndog managed to sprint around Speyside on the day taking photos of each of the drams outside their native distilleries! Many thanks for allowing me to use them here!

@_littlebrowndog with the drams and the Spey

First up was:

@_littlebrowndog outside Aberlour

Nose: Loads of sherry on the nose - as you would expect! Lots of honey and dried fruit, if I didn't know better I'd think the Mrs was making Christmas Cake! After a little time in the glass  the nose develops with  chocolate hints and spice.

Palate: Smooth, tongue coating, you can taste the spice attacking your mouth followed by soothing sherry - yummy! A little water enhances this dram - honey and spice fill the mouth. A little dry biscuit develops but the sherry is always there!

Conclusion: A strong dram to start with and a really lovely one - liquid Christmas Cake - this is a typical sipping Speysider!

Next was:

@_littlebrowndog outside Tamdhu

Nose: On the nose - dried apple, a little honey and wood. A strong dram which just jumps out of the glass to say hello! There are some nuts and a little cinnamon over the top of the dried apples.

Palate: Quite drying on the palate - lots of toffee and a little orange, finishes with some spice - delicious!

Finish: This is a great dram - love the long dry finish, sprinkled nuts and spice over apples

Conclusion: Had this one a few weeks ago on a previous @TweetTastings Liquid gold - delicious dram!

Third up was:

@_littlebrowndog outside Cragganmore

Nose: Nose has a lot of perfume, strange but not unpleasant! Pears with a little sweetness may be pineapple? Not getting any smoke thought.

Palate: Disappointing, maybe because of the previous two? watery honey with a little smoke now!

Finish: Enjoying the smoke on the finish - this one would have been better to start with rather than the high ABVs

Conclusion: A new one for me, would maybe have been better as the first of the night?

Fourth was:

@_littlebrowndog outside Aberlour again?

Nose: Aniseed bullets straight out of the sweet shop! A little grass and some sherry! Getting the chocolate - maybe a cherry chocolate cake - now there's a plan! Getting some spice on the nose as it lingers in the glass - maybe some fresh black pepper?

Palate: Oily, mouth filling, an expected surprise. Melon and cinnamon with a touch on honey!

Finish:

Conclusion: !

Fifth dram was:

@_littlebrowndog outside? Glenlivet

Nose: Grass and herbs, with a little spice - very nice! Develops after a while - still grassy but chocolate and ginger spice come through.

Palate: Smooth and buttery on the palate, some sweetness with a long honey finish. Very nice!

Conclusion: This is a class dram, develops over time - loved the loooong dry biscuity finish. 

Final dram of the evening was:

@_littlebrowndog outside the beautiful Glenfiddich distillery

Nose: The vanilla jumps out at you to start with, a little ginger - I think this one needs time to develop.

Palate: Creamy on the palate, slightly drying, some fudge and biscuit - with a chewy finish

Conclusion: A slightly underwhelming dram, expected a lot fmore but maybe as it was the 6th of the night following the stronger drams it was a little nose and palate fatigue! Will need to try again on it's own.

For me I think the first two won the @spirit_speyside competition - @TamdhuWhisky Batch Strength 2 only just 'nosed' the @AberlourVC A'Bunadh

Many thanks to Steve and Pery at Spirit Of Speyside for organising and all the other folks who joined in!