Ali’s Old Lorry

Hi everyone,

Visitors to Dufftown may have spotted the lorry, pictured below, while on a tour of our distilleries. It belongs to one of our longest-serving employees, Ali Buchan who started his career in our cooperage 39 years ago. After spells in the bottling plant and the engineers’ team, Ali started working shifts in our malt…(please click on the link below to read the remainder of the article)…

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Kind regards,
Ludo

Loch Fyne Whiskies Stocks ‘Brora 1981 30yo Chieftain’s

‘Brora Chief 1981 30yo 50%alc.

(These notes by the Joynson himself)…Output from Brora in its final years was very variable; typically peaty; there are also many offerings with no peat. I suspect it was unloved because it was due to be condemned and the workers treated it with some disdain. Nowadays no distillery is loved more than Brora and, like Sid Vicious’ terminal career move, it’s closure may have been the best thing that happened to it. Discuss.

Anyway how about this Chieftain’s bottling from a sherry butt? Well it’s amber in colour, we can see that.

I have copious tasting notes to transcribe for you: Peat, then sulphur notes (as fishy exhaust fumes) and then peaty again. Once the peat is assimilated, estery notes rise as raisins and banana particularly comes to dominate. With time the peat returns as definite yet light; my notes say ‘roasting fires’, perhaps someone can explain that to us all? The aroma with water added changes it dramatically, starched, fresh linen, peat and cocoa, a low level but nice peat.

Tasted it is surprisingly sweet!! It’s soft and well balanced with a caramel syrup. Adding water releases the peat into the embouchure.

To surmise: a sweet and softly peaty dram that engages the drinker to have some more. Please enjoy, responsibly.

G8 on the Flavour Map, Complex, Rich and Smoky.

Distilled: December 1981
Bottled: April 2012
Limited to 553 bottles from Butt # 1525

Best regards,
Loch Fyne Whiskies
david@lfw.co.uk

TRY THE GLENDRONACH TASTE AVALANCHE THIS SUMMER!

AN AVALANCHE of raisins and spices awaits visitors to GlenDronach this summer!

For the award-winning Aberdeenshire distillery has just bottled its latest Distillery Exclusive which once again promises to leave an indelible impression on the taste buds.

Distilled on the 24th of September 1993, and matured in an Oloroso sherry butt, cask number 1607 was bottled this June as an 18 year-old, at cask strength (56.1% vol). The whisky is rich ruby mahogany in appearance. On the nose, there’s the aforementioned avalanche of raisins and spices supplemented with cedar wood notes, while on the palate it offers the taste of fruit cake and sweet spices laced with figs, raisins and lashings of currants.

This exclusive GlenDronach expression is now available, but only to visitors to the distillery shop. It retails at £74.99, and with the cask generating just over 600 bottles, it is very much a limited release.

Also new at GlenDronach this summer is the latest outstanding Distillery Manager’s cask. Personally selected by Alan McConnochie, GlenDronach 1993 cask # 1616 is a classic, richly-sherried 18 year-old single malt redolent of all the wonderful things you associate with GlenDronach – raisins, chocolate, spices and dates. Visitors can hand-fill their own bottle at the distillery with a personalised label and take home a little bit of heaven.

The GlenDronach Visitor Centre is open seven days a week in the summer from 10.00am to 4.30pm. It offers regular guided tours (The ‘Discovery Tour’) throughout the day – at 10am, 11am, 1pm, 2pm and 3pm.

The distillery also offers the ‘Connoisseur’s Tour’ – a more comprehensive, in-depth experience – which can be arranged by appointment only.

More information from the Visitor Centre visit www.glendronachdistillery.co.uk  or email info@glendronachdistillery.co.uk  

www.ralfy.com celebrates the water of life with water ! . . . Whisky Review 287 – Water with your whisky.

This Vlog is a watered down version!

Loch Fyne Whiskies Stocks ‘Ballechin #7 Bordeaux Casks’

Ballechin #7 (peated Edradour) OB 46%alc…(Notes below from the Joynson)…

A fascinating interplay between sweet red wine and low-down dirty peat.

Presented in oh-my-goodness pink, which has plenty of shelf stand-out (or just try-and-avoid yuk). This is the seventh variant of Edradour’s very peaty distillation matured, this time, in Bordeaux casks, entirely matured that is not a finish.

Pale gold in colour with a touch of strawberry sauce (that’s appearance not taste).

The opening aroma is of hot, sweet engine oil. Then peaches and pears – with the anticipation of a peaty threat, as if someone’s started playing a growly cello. The peat rises as exhaust, vegetative and herby. Tasted (still neat) there is honey, sweetness and a thick berry sauce (maybe it’s the strawberry sauce after all). Shuggling air over the soaked tongue ignites the peat magnificently and the swallow is all Bordeaux before a sweet wine-and-peat ping-pong.

The addition of water raises the peat-exhaust whiff and reverses the neat tasting event to peat then wine, which is neat, so-to-speak.

Some of the Ballechin’s work very well, others less so; this one works well but is risky, and exciting because of this knife edge flavour experience. Now, would someone stop the cello player please?

On the Flavour map square G9 on the Smoky side of Rich and Smoky.

Best regards,
Loch Fyne Whiskies
david@lfw.co.uk

The Gateway to Distilleries

Illustrated Web-Guide published

Ardbeg, Bowmore, Chichibu, Cooley, Dalmore, Glenmorangie, Glenlivet, Glenfarclas, Midleton, Slyrs and their neighbours can be easily visited. More than 120 distilleries are illustrated and described in full detail by thousand photographies.

“Join in a picturesque journey to the distilleries of Scotland, Ireland, Mainland Europe and Asia. Meet the people behind the labels and learn more about the making of uisque beatha, the water of life.” says the editor Ernie J. Scheiner.

Historic aspects, details of production processes are explained for the whisky enthusiast. A comprehensive list of independent bottlers, whisky festivals and literature is also added.

It is an excellent teaching website about the whisky industry.

See www.whisky-distilleries.net

A new blog post, taking a look at the history of Banff and Mill of Banff lost distilleries…(please click on the link below to read the remainder of the article)…

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Lifetime achievement award for Gordon & MacPhail’s David Urquhart

Joint Managing Director of Gordon & MacPhail, David Urquhart, has been honoured by his industry peers with a lifetime achievement award for his services to the Scottish Licensed Trade.

David was presented with the accolade at the DRAM magazine Scottish Licensed Trade Awards 2012. Established over fifteen years ago, the awards were the first in Scotland to recognise the very best of the Scottish on-trade industry.

Due to retire this autumn, David has dedicated 40 years to the work of Gordon & MacPhail, the whisky and licensed trade industry and various local community causes close to his heart, including the Elgin Bid and the Forres bid to host the European Pipe Band Championships.

He has been committed to continuing the work of his ancestors, who have been involved in Gordon & MacPhail since its first year of trading. Established in 1895 as a family run grocers, tea, wine and spirit merchants in Elgin, the company has since grown into one of the UK’s top independent wine and spirits merchants, alongside its others business interests as a bottler and exporter of whiskies from throughout Scotland and a distiller, owning Benromach Distillery in Forres.

Commenting on his award David said: “I’m honoured to receive this award, which was a huge surprise for me. It’s come at a very timely point in my career as I prepare to retire and hand over the work that I have achieved, along with my fathers and grandfathers before me, to the next generation coming through in the business.

“As a family we have grown Gordon & MacPhail to be one of the top independent wholesalers in the UK along with our growing worldwide recognition as experts in the Scotch Whisky industry. I’m proud to have been able to be part of this.

“I’m confident I’ll be leaving my role in more than capable hands, and locally I hope to keep busy with the many community initiatives Elgin and Forres are involved in.”

Susan Young, Editor of the DRAM comments: “David Urquhart has spent the last 40 years serving the Scottish licensed trade, and helping to grow his family company, Gordon & MacPhail. His passion, commitment, determination, and above all, his integrity made David a very worthy recipient of the DRAM Lifetime Achievement Award.”

Benromach, the distillery owned by Gordon & MacPhail, was also sponsors of a special DRAM award – the Benromach Award for Success.

The judges in this category were looking for a business that had successfully grown and developed particularly over the last year – whether by growing their turnover or by further developing their business in other ways. Nominees were asked to share the secret of their success.

The gold medal and the title of Benromach Award for Success went to SimpsInns, followed by Omni Taverns (silver medal) and Fort Hotel (bronze medal).

It has been reported that Bruichladdich Distillery will soon be sold to Remy Cointreau; please read the article in the Telegraph for further details via the link below;

THE LINK

Tomatin Distillery is coming to town!

Thursday 26th July

Alistair will be showing a full range of Tomatin products to include new releases

12yr
NEW release 15 yr old
18yr
21yr
30yr
Decades

This will be a welcome return for the big man with the keys!

Cost : £25/person
Time : 7:30pm

Slainte

David
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Midlands Whisky Festival
Sat 29th September 2012
12 til 4:30pm
Tickets £35 on sale NOW

www.whiskyfest.co.uk