A Number of Anniversaries

Nearly Three.

It doesn’t seem like three years since Alex Salmond pushed the button to start grinding the very first mash for the refurbished Glenglassaugh, but it is. That momentous occasion took place on the 24th of November 2008 and already it is the 28th November 2011, the anniversary of the first mash and we are rushing towards the 4th of December, when the first spirit ran and then the 16th December when we filled the first cask.

To mark the occasion of the first cask filling we will be emptying and bottling the contents of the first cask on the16th December 2011. This will be the first whisky from the first cask filled at the re-furbished Glenglassaugh, truly a piece of history not only for Glenglassaugh but also for The Scotch Whisky Industry. It is not often that a distillery comes back to life after such a long silent period, 22 years of non-production, and shortly afterwards wins praise for its new spirit and innovation but more importantly top awards from the most rigorous and independent spirit competitions in the world, the IWSC and the SFWSC, for its aged whiskies.

If you want to find out more information on how to buy a bottle or about the contents then look at my last blog or go directly to our on-line shop www.glenglassaugh.co.uk . This exclusive bottling is only available from the on-line shop or at the distillery.

More Awards

November saw yet another award for our aged whiskies.

We have been reluctant to enter competitions recently as entry itself is expensive and requires submission of a number of samples, in addition the number of competitions grows annually and the integrity and standards employed by each is not universally consistent. However the Scottish Field Magazine awards are known for their high standards with a number of independent judges and true blind tasting used and the whiskies themselves evaluated over several rounds.

I was therefore very pleased and proud to accept, on behalf of all the team, the Gold Award for the best Scotch Whisky in the Over £80.00 category 2011 for “The Managers’ Legacy – Walter Grant” at the recent award ceremony in Edinburgh. The award now sits beside the other awards which we have won in last few years in our display cabinet at the distillery for all visitors to see.

Special Bottling

As mentioned previously we have had a series of country exclusive bottling releases; in Austria a 1983 ex-sherry butt, in Canada and USA we have a 1974 ex-sherry butt, in Germany a 1983 ex-Sauternes hogshead finish, in Norway a 1983 ex-sherry cask, in South Africa a 1986 ex-sherry butt and in Singapore both a 1973 and a 1975 hogshead. These last 2 both very different and a fantastic contrast, the black ox and the white rabbit.

Bourbon Octaves

Our Octave filling has never been more popular and we have now sold out our second deliver of Oloroso Sherry Octaves as well as our first delivery of PX Octaves. We will not have any more of these Octaves until late January or early February.

To allow more choice we now have available first fill bourbon Octaves and the first of these will be filled this week on the 30th November. All the information on how to order these or any other Octaves is available on the website www.glenglassaugh.com .

More Work and Travel in December

I am writing this on the return flight from Frankfurt, and another very enjoyable few days at Inter-Whisky Frankfurt renewing existing friendships and making new ones.

A very exclusive master-class was undertaken on Saturday with 1 Spirit Drink (2 years and 10 months old) and 6 whiskies, the youngest of which was 28 years and the German exclusive bottling for 2011 and the other ones a 35 year old (The Chosen Few – Ronnie Routledge), a 36 year old (Our latest over 30 year old single cask bottling, and my personal favourite), a 42 year old (The Managers’ Legacy – Bert Forsyth) and a 43 year old (The Managers’ Legacy – Walter Grant)

While it was a great occasion to sample all of these whiskies with a very audience it was disappointing that due to constraints of the organisation we only had 30 minutes available. To do any justice to this number and quality of samples would have needed four times as long and so I will again apologise to those that were there for the speed with which I went through the presentation and tasting. At least many people made sure that they took their samples with them to appreciate later.

On the 2nd December I will be travelling to Zurich where I will be attending the Whisky Ship Whisky festival with House of Single Malts, who are our Swiss Importer and then after travelling to Austria on Monday, I have a tasting in Vienna at Potstill , the home of our Austrian importer on Tuesday evening and another one at the Whisky Club in Graz on Wednesday the 7th December.

In the meantime we will be winding down production at the distillery and finishing the year producing some more peated spirit, which is becoming ever more popular. It is now 2 years since we started producing batches of peated spirit at various times in the year and so next year at this time we will have some three year old peated spirit that will have become whisky, something to look forward to.

All for now.

Slange

Stuart