Tasting Note: White Horse (1922 Bottling)

Thanks to the auction skills of a whisky friend, I was offered a share in a bottle of White Horse 1922 at a bargain price.

I've previously tasted a 1940s bottling of this whisky, which I loved, and one from the 1980s, which was underwhelming. For this sample, I tasted it over two days, once on its own and once alongside three other whiskies.

The first impression of the whisky was not encouraging; it was very light on the nose, timid, in fact. The palate was rather better, but still nothing like the 1940s version.

The next day, in company, it seemed much more interesting. It definitely had the smell of byegone days, when direct fired stills were heating wash fermented with brewers yeast. There was a light maltiness, and perhaps a wisp of old scorched wood - nothing as definite as peatiness. The palate was much lighter than the nose had implied (perhaps a loss of alcohol?) and very creamy in texture. After some toasty, scorched brown sugar notes the finish was somewhat drying, astringent even.

Whilst it was a fairly complex dram, it was also a bit too light for real pleasure. A dram on the way out. Nevertheless, it was a pleasure and a privilege to experience the oldest whisky I've yet tasted.

Whisky and Nitpicking

At the last meeting of Glasgow's Whisky Club a small dispute arose over how many Scottish whisky distilleries have ever used Lomond stills. Drink having been taken (ahem) and a challenge thrown down, I faced the prospect of public humiliation if I couldn't prove that there had been more than five.

The five that we weren't arguing about are Loch Lomond, Glenburgie, Miltonduff, Scapa, and Inverleven. And the Wikipedia article which lists these five also seems to offer a convenient definition of a Lomond still, as being the invention of one person (Alistair Cunningham), for one company (Hiram Walker), at a well established date (1955).

I knew, however, that somewhere or other I had seen another name associated with Lomond stills, so I sat up very late reading a big pile of whisky books (not much change there then) and roaming the maltier corners of the internet.

Bingo! Littlemill, according to both Misako Udo⁽¹⁾ and Ingvar Ronde⁽²⁾, had pot stills with rectifying columns from 1930 onwards. Great! I was mentally crafting my magnanimous victory speech when that date caught up with my brain. 1930. That's a full twenty-five years before Mr Cunningham invented the damn thing.

It gets worse. In re-reading The Scottish Whisky Distilleries I had come across a reference to Nevis distillery (not Ben Nevis, but another Fort William distillery of a similar name), to which Barnard⁽³⁾ was said to have attributed a kind of Lomond still⁽⁴⁾. That's sixty-nine years too early. What the heck?

And as I mulled that one over, it struck me that Alastair Cunningham, in 1955, probably didn't name his invention after a distillery which would not exist for another decade. Surely Lomond stills must have been named for the malt distillate of that name which came from inside the Dumbarton complex? Holy moly, Wikipedia is wrong! The world's turned upside down!

By now, if you are still reading, then you are either the person with whom I originally had the argument (Hi Greg!), or one of the Malt Maniacs. In which case I feel perfectly relaxed about introducing a table to summarise where we're at:

Distillery	Dates of 'lomond' stills	Ownership at this date	Actual 'Lomond' stills
Nevis	~1886	Donald P MacDonald	No
Littlemill	1930	Duncan G Thomas	No
Lomond (Dumbarton)	1955	Hiram Walker	Yes
Glenburgie	1958	Hiram Walker	Yes
Miltonduff	1964	Hiram Walker	Yes
Scapa	1959	Hiram Walker	Yes
Loch Lomond	1965	Duncan G Thomas	???

Clear as a glass of Loch Dhu, yes?

So, here are my conclusions:

• Six or more Scotch malt whisky distilleries have had pot stills with rectifying columns instead of plain swan necks
• Five or more Scotch malt whisky distilleries have had pot stills with rectifying columns which are adjustable. The jury is out on Littlemill.
• There were four Lomond stills, at Dumbarton⁽⁵⁾, Glenburgie, Miltonduff, and Scapa
• In a weird way Wikipedia is sort of right, since Loch Lomond does have lomond stills⁽⁶⁾. Just not Lomond stills. If you see what I mean.
• OTOH, Wikipedia is definitely wrong about Inverleven.
• I don't think I've won my bet, but neither have I lost it.

Once you start digging into it, there are all kinds of tweaks to the basic pot still process which are used to cause rectification. Glen Grant's purifiers, the boil ball, Fettercairn's waterfall effect, those extra bits of piping you see running down from the lyne arm at Ardbeg or Talisker, et cetera, et cetera. It's enough to drive you to drink.

Notes
(1) Udo, Misako, The Scottish Whisky Distilleries, Black & White Publishing, 2006
(2) Ronde, Ingvar, The Malt Whisky Yearbook, Magdig Media, 2011
(3) Barnard, Alfred, The Whisky Distilleries, of the United Kingdom, 1887
(4) Although I can't find him using the word 'Lomond' in my copy of the book, just a picture of something which does look uncannily Lomond-like, on page 145, and at the top of this post.
(5) Dumbarton was a large distillery which mainly made grain whisky. It also produced two malts, Inverleven and Lomond. It seems that the two malts shared a wash still, and that while Inverleven had a normal spirit still, Lomond had a pot with a rectifying column on top. You can see some pictures of Dumbarton on the Canmore website, which is a great resource for anyone interested in Scottish industrial architecture, amongst other things.
(6) Although not according to the SWA, if Neil Wilson is to be believed.

Further Reading
E-pistle 2007/024 – Lomond Stills & The Oil Enigma
Whisky Science - Scottish Pot Still Variations

Closed For A Reason

Closed For A Reason

My tasting note for this dram - admittedly written after a long afternoon of tasting big Australian red wines - reads in full:

A good ordinary dram. Decent malt, light fruitiness. The initial nose was like a whisky smell from childhood.

I've tasted only a handful of whiskies from Convalmore, and none of my notes really get any more enthusiastic than the one above. Hence the title of this post.

In 1985, Convalmore was one of five distilleries to close. In 1983, eleven had shut down. The Scotch slump of the eighties meant that producers had to face some hard choices. I'd hazard a guess that it was probably easier to choose to close a distillery which didn't produce a particularly outstanding whisky.

About Convalmore
You can still see the distillery buildings, although these days they are just used for storage by William Grant & Sons (Glenfiddich and Balvenie are neighbours to Convalmore). There's plenty of detail over on Malt Madness.

Tasting Note: Arran 18 Year Old

Over the past few years Isle of Arran have been releasing an annual batch of a few thousand bottles of teenaged whisky, as steps along the way to adding an 18 Year Old to their core range.

After a good 16 and a very good 17, last year's limited release 18 Year Old was a bit mince. There was a bitterness to it which wasn't enjoyable. I understand that Arran had to sell almost everything they produced back in 1995 and 1996, so they were working with very limited choices, but still. They could have waited.

So I didn't really have particularly high hopes for this new permanent release. And thus, find myself somewhat pleasantly surprised, but not delighted.

With its sweet cooked apple notes, this dram is most definitely Arran. The nose is toffee - tarte tatin, in fact, with a subtle sweet spice note. Over time a lifted aroma emerges; some sort of pungent note which isn't menthol or lavender, but which reminds me of both of those things.

The palate is slightly hot, sweet, and has a toffee apple sweetness (but green apples). There isn't much obvious oak, and any malty notes take a while to build.

In conclusion, while this a more than decent dram, I think I'd rather have the 14 Year Old, or one of the finishes - probably the Amarone finish.

The Wood Makes The Whisky

If that's the best you can offer then I really do think you're doing it all wrong.

If you're claiming that 60% of the flavour in a malt comes from the wood, then stop what you're doing and go and learn how to make a flavoursome distillate!

A case in point is this tasty dram. If you were to offer it to a hundred people, whisky fans and non whisky drinkers alike, I doubt you'd even get one person calling it woody, or oaky, or spicy, or bourbon-like. In this case, "The Peat Makes the Whisky".

It's a classic Caol Ila, salty-sweet, coastal, iodic, peaty. Is there any discernable oak influence? Pfft.

A Modest Proposal

Although it rather seems to have been superseded in recent decades, the kitemark scheme was generally some sort of guarantee of reasonable quality. Doubtless it was, or is, as fallible as any other human run scheme, but to my youthful eyes it always seemed like a Good Thing.

Last night's meeting  of Glasgow's Whisky Club reminded me once again that there's a crying need for some mechanism whereby the whisky drinkers can be alerted to the presence of whisky for collectors, thus saving themselves the pain of overpriced, underperforming malt, and leaving more sealed bottles for the auction fiends.

The day had started with the unexpected appearance of two new drams from Compass Box, Flaming Heart 2015 and This is not a Luxury Whisky. A tasting of the latter quickly revealed that it wasn't worth the asking price, which arguably is almost the definition of a luxury good.

The Club night featured only one standard dram. It was a strong line up, with the dram of the night being an Auchentoshan 22 Year Old (bottled by the Creative Whisky Co. for my employer, the Good Spirits Co.)

But the shiny bottle, the one that provoked the most chat, was the new Arran Illicit Stills Volume 1. It was a fine drop, and didn't seem too youthful, albeit somewhat harsh in the finish. As with the Compass Box in the morning, the complexity of the dram didn't justify the price tag. However, the blooming thing is all sold out already. A quick rummage online suggests most retailers presold their stock. And that's despite there being 8700 bottles. What the heck?

So. We need some sort of classification or scheme whereby collectable whisky is separated out from the drinking drams. If bottles such as This is not a Luxury and Illicit Stills were marked with a 'guaranteed collectable' kitemark, then those of us who prefer their whisky to taste good, first, last, and foremost can safely pass them by and go find something tasty in an ugly container.

Anyone?

Distillery Visit: Dalwhinnie

On one of those rare glorious days when the sun is blazing down from a cerulean sky and Scotland seems more beautiful than any other place on Earth, I made the three hour train journey to Dalwhinnie.

The distillery sits just to the north of the village, clearly visible with its whitewashed walls and neat wooden worm tubs. It's a compact distillery, rebuilt in the late 1930s after a disastrous fire, and it feels like it could be the original Victorian buildings. The large impressive worm tubs at the front of the distillery have just been renewed in 2015 and add to the spick and span feel. It's a Diageo distillery, so no photography, which is a bit of a shame, as the mash tun is housed in what was a malt kiln, so there's a fantastic view of Charles Doig's roof from the inside.

Diageo also means a tightly scripted tour, but I was very lucky to have an enthusiastic guide who was happy to address my many supplementary questions. The guide gave a very thorough explanation of the whisky making process, and talked about Dalwhinnie's now abandoned experiment with shell & tube condensers, and how worm tubs are an essential component of the Dalwhinnie character. It was also interesting to learn that Dalwhinnie controls fermentation times by raising the temperature to kill the yeast.

The tun room has one 60,000 litre full lauter mash tun, with the rakes set high so as not to disturb the cereal bed, thus leading to a clear worts. There are six wooden washbacks, which ferment for about 60 hours, to produce a wash of about 9% alcohol.

The stills are large, lantern style, and they are worked hot, so that the spirit vapours don't get too much copper contact.

Dalwhinnie produces about 1 million litres a year. Most of this is stored elsewhere, with only a few thousand casks held onsite, in both racking and dunnage warehouses.

The recipe for Dalwhinnie, so to speak, is to make a fruity wash, distil it quite fast in big stills which don't give much reflux, and cool it rapidly with extremely cold water. The result is a new make spirit which is fruity, but also has a sulphur note. Consequently, the spirit needs long ageing, so as to reduce the sulphur to a trace, a suggestion of meatiness and a fuller body.

After the tour I did the Friends tasting, which includes five different expressions of Dalwhinnie, plus the new make spirit. I would sum up Dalwhinnie thusly:

* Key flavours: toffee citrus(lemon, with a little bitter orange), honey, grist

* Dalwhinnie really doesn't take water very well.

* The variations on the basic theme of the 15 Year Old don't really go anywhere very exciting. The Distillers Edition is allegedly sherried, but you would hardly know. The two outstanding drams were the 25 Year Old (which cost north of £300), and a 1991 cask sample which was delicious, but where the cask character was very dominant. (This is not necessarily a bad thing, but to approach perfection a whisky ought to meld a distinctive spirit with good wood in a way which lets both shine without either dominating)

I had quite a bit of time to kill before getting the train home, so I went for a wander to the south end of the village. It was an absolute belter of a day, and I ended up getting slightly sunburnt, but it was worth it. Just look at that beautiful, beautiful view:

Click on the picture to get the big version in all its sunny glory