SPRINGBANK SOCIETY NEWSLETTER JANUARY 2010
Greetings to all Society members from a cold Campbeltown. Hopefully you are beginning to thaw out after all the snow. We were very lucky not to have much snow here which is just as well as we donʼt cope to well with the conditions. Winter always seems to take us by surprise.
Latest Releases
The Springbank 18 y/o has been released, and is just in our shop yesterday. The tasting was carried out last week, so here are the tasting notes:
Colour: Rusty Copper
Nose: Full of authority. Rich and creamy at first, the nose develops to reveal vanilla, ripe fruits and marzipan before hints of sherbert, almonds and strawberries tempt you onwards to the first mouthful.
Palate: A classic full-bodied dram. Thick and oily in texture with an extremely fruity and mellow taste which gives way to a sweet liquorice and aniseed flavour as it opens up. Hints of liquorice and aniseed.
Finish: Sweet and chocolatey with some coconut, the finish is long and consistent with a pleasant smokey tingle.
The cost for this yearʼs 18y/o is £62.50 plus postage and packing, one only per customer as it is limited. If you would like to order please e mail me as usual.
Springbank CV is also ready to “hit the shops” at a cost of £28.50 plus postage and packing. Tasting notes as follows:
Springbank CV is the product of a variety of different cask types and sizes, all specially selected by Director of Production Frank McHardy and Distillery Manager Stuart Robertson. Frank and Stuartʼs years of experience allowed them to choose a range of casks, every one complementing the other to ensure a great whisky with lots of flavour and the classic Springbank Style. What does CV mean? Chairmanʼs Vat? Curriculum
vitae? Cuvee of Vintages? It means whatever you want it to mean, enjoying the whisky is the most important thing.
Colour: Muted gold with a reddish glow.
Nose: The initial nose is a mix of subdued sherry sweetness, subtle peat notes, menthol and eucalyptus. Further nosing revealed a meaty character with complex hints of sesame oil and soy sauce.
Palate: Subtle sherry notes come through along with a depth of oak and spice. These then evolve into notes reminiscent of our traditional Dunnage warehouses.
Finish: The flavours remaining are mainly coming from the sherry casks, although right at the end a hint of port tannins can be detected, perhaps suggesting the pedigree of casks used for the Springbank CV.
Springbank CV will also be available from the online shop, or e mail me.
Society Bottle
We are thinking of the next Society Bottle and have asked our members in the USA to set up a tasting panel for this one. We felt it only fair to involve them a bit as normally they do not get to buy the Society Bottles.
We are now working with an importer in America who will distribute to our members in the USA. The next tasting panel after this one will again be announced on the website, later this year.
Staff Changes
We have two new members of our Sales team from the beginning of this month. They are Jenny Karlsson and Iain Scott. Jenny will be responsible for some of our European customers while Iain will be working with our UK customers. Photographs of both to follow when we can catch them!!!! Both have had a stint working in the distillery “with the boys” so that they have a feel for the Springbank process from start to finish.
Society Glasses
We now stock Glencairn whisky glasses with the Society logo. We thought it was a good idea to give members a free glass with the Hazelburn Society bottles as it was near Christmas. This turned out to be not really one of our better ideas (it was my idea, so blame me) as a number of the glasses were broken in transit. However, we have the glasses for sale at £5 each or £25 for six, plus postage and packing. They should be easier to pack in boxes of six so that they do not get damaged. If anyone would like to order please let me know. They will not be in the online shop as they are exclusive to members.
Springbank Open Day
Preparations for the open day on Thursday 20th May are ongoing. The music will be provided Campbeltown Brass band for part of the day. They are a very accomplished band with numerous awards to their name. The band have just completed the recording of a CD which will shortly be on sale. As you can imagine the town is very proud of these young musicians.
Also there on the day will be John Brown with some of his wonderful wood carvings, “Food from Argyll” and also Maureen from Eaglesome Sandwich shop with some of her delicacies.
There will of course be distillery tours, masterclasses and Cadenhead tastings (in the tasting room). All of these things are beginning to take shape – if no where else, certainly in my head. The Society will also have a wee corner somewhere, trying to drum up new members, and with Society Bottles for sale (whatever we have left from previous bottlings).
There will be another newsletter before May, perhaps even two, to keep everyone informed of the progress of both the next Society bottle and the open day.
Springbank/Cadenhead babies
We now have tow new babies in the “family”. Peter Currie and Grant Macpherson are both “new dads” to beautiful baby girls.
Judging by both, but especially Grant just now, they arenʼt getting their full 8 hours sleep a night. Grant was reported as being “very grumpy” the other morning!!!
The Sales Team
The team have started their travels already, Ranald has been to Sweden and Peter is currently in Canada. Ranald is off again next week to the Linkoping Whisky Expo in Sweden on 5th & 6th February, from there he goes straight to Norway for VenFeber in Oslo on Tuesday 9th February, tastings in Stavanger on the 10th and 11th, and finally the Whisky Meet in
Bergen on 12th and 13th. Very busy person.
Holidays
I am going on holiday on 5th February for three weeks so your e mails may not be answered until I come back. I will be here all next week, so feel free to bombard me with e mails before I go off. Hopefully I will come back refreshed and raring to go with the winter blues banished!!
and finally……………….the technical bit from Stuart.
Fermentation
Once the sugar wort has been pumped from the mashtun to the washback
fermentation can be initiated. Washbacks can be made from a number of materials but in the main stainless steel and various species of wood are predominantly used in the whisky industry.
Stainless steel vessels usually have domed tops completely sealed with the
exception of a man door, a vent for CO2 extraction and possibly a switcher
(rotating blade for knocking back froth during fermentation). They usually have domed bottoms to aide emptying and can be fitted with side entry mixers for keeping the yeast in suspension. Wooden vessels are usually fitted with lids also made of wood which provide an adequate seal for fermentation. They can also be fitted with switchers and most now have CO2 extraction fitted. The wooden washbacks are usually set at an angle to aide emptying. Antifoam which alters the surface tension of the liquid in the wash back preventing foam forming can also be used when required.
Yeast, Saccharomyces Cerevisiae, used for fermentation in the distilling industry can be purchased in a number of ways, pressed, slurry and dry. Here at Springbank we use pressed yeast, which is manufactured in the UK specifically for the distilling industry. Yeast is a living organism and must be stored in a clean refrigerated environment until used.
The essential properties of a good distilling yeast are as follows.
Good flavour production and complete and rapid fermentation of wort sugars . Lack of flocculence and minimal frothing coupled with the ability to grow well even above 30ºC and able to withstand a wash alcohol level of up to 10%abv. The concentration of yeast added to the washback will depend on the character we want to produce in the washback. As long as an adequate amount of yeast is added per tonne of malt mashed complete fermentation will occur.
At the beginning of fermentation the yeast culture uses the sugars in the wort to multiply, this is known as aerobic fermentation. Here at Springabnk the original gravity will vary between 1038 and 1048 degrees depending on which mash it is during the week. Once the reservoir of oxygen in the washback has been depleted the yeast begins to convert the sugars into various alcohol’s, carbon dioxide and energy in the form of heat, alcohol’s are a byproduct of what is called anaerobic fermentation. During fermentation the gravity of the wash will decrease due to the conversion of sugars to alcohol’s.
Complete fermentation will take a minimum period of forty eight hours but
fermentation time can be as short as forty hours or as long as one hundred and thirty hours. Many flavour compounds are produced during fermentation and distillers “ tailor “ their fermentation’s to their specific requirements. During fermentation the temperature of the worts, now known as wash, will rise from 16 – 20ºC up to 34ºC. Temperatures above 35ºC will destroy the living yeast cell, so should be avoided.
Once fermentation is complete the final gravity of the wash as measured against water should be around 0. 998 but can be as low as 0.995. The alcohol content of the wash will depend on the original gravity of the wort. Some distilleries like Springbank will produce wash with an alcohol content of up to 5% by volume where other distilleries may produce wash with an alcohol content of between 8 and 10% by volume.
As always feel free to drop us an e-mail should you have a question.
Stuart Robertson,
Distillery Manager.
Well I hope this newsletter has not been too long winded for you. I am currently trying to think up a competition for you with a suitable prize. Hopefully the next one will have more than two entries!!!
As usual any comments, suggestions, etc are always welcome.
Slainte
Janet
for Springbank Society.
