BIMBER DISTILLERY DEBUTS ITS FOUNDERS’ CLUB AND EXCLUSIVE SMALL CASK RELEASE TO CELEBRATE REACHING WHISKY MILESTONE

London’s award-winning Bimber Distillery has opened entries to its Founders’ Club, and will release a limited number of private casks for members to purchase (just in time for Father’s Day), to celebrate its first casks reaching three years of maturity.

A significant milestone for Bimber ahead of it’s official whisky release in September 2019. The Founders’ Club, which publicly launches today, aims to build a community of people who according to Sales Director Farid Shawish; “share our passion and want to be part of a distillery whose mission is to produce a true handcrafted whisky, made with care and traditional methods. Our members will always be welcome for a chat, and their input will play an important part in shaping the future of Bimber Distillery.”  

Members will receive their first, exclusive cask strength bottle of London Single Malt Whisky in December this year. This is different from most other distilleries where members often must wait many years before receiving a mature bottle of whisky. Members will also enjoy a further three special and rare releases; a unique members tour of the distillery for up to four people (including tasting Bimber’s Master Distillers private casks), a sample box with 6 x 50ml bottles of cask drawn samples, a welcome pack, 10% discount on online whisky purchases, and notice of all future releases, before they launch.

According to Farid “prospective members have the advantage of being able to try our whisky at one of our tours, or by purchasing samples from our website, before deciding to join the club. We want to be fair and accessible, and have priced our Founders’ Club at £395, which is substantially cheaper than other comparable offerings.” 

Members will also be able to purchase their very own 30 Litre cask, hand filled by them with either Peated or Non-peated New Make Spirit. These casks will mature at the distillery for three years, at which point they will be bottled onsite with personalised labels.  Casks are expected to yield approximately 49 bottles of London Single Malt. The offer is strictly limited to 50 casks and is priced at £895.      

NOTES:

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BIMBER DISTILLERY – HANDCRAFTED ENGLISH WHISKY 

SINGLE FARM LOCALLY GROWN ENGLISH BARLEY:

We travelled to many British farms to find the highest quality barley possible, before choosing a farm in nearby beautiful Hampshire. The county’s maritime climate is perfect for producing barley and Fordham & Allen, our farmer, sows and harvests the barley at the optimum times of the year. We carefully select two-row barley varieties, Concerto and Laureate, to produce our premium single malt whisky. These barley varieties deliver a high-level of extract and fermentability, which together provides the optimum level of predicted spirit yield and complex aromas. 

TRADITIONAL FLOOR MALTING:

It is our belief that traditional floor malted barley is an essential process in producing premium, handcrafted whisky. We have therefore chosen to partner with Warminster Maltings, Britain oldest maltster, who dedicate an entire malting floor to Bimber. The resulting malted barley is a unique product of outstanding quality. Malt has been made forever, by hand, on floors, a perfectly natural, albeit labour intensive method. The whole process is conducted within the ambient temperatures of the malt floors, regulated by the opening and closing of the non-glazed windows. It is a very natural process which allows the individual batches of barley to express themselves to the optimum. This emphasises the special character of the malt and creates maximum extracts. 

FERMENTATION:

At Bimber, we take pride in our long fermentation process. We ferment slowly, for seven whole days to create a light and fruity whisky. This limits the amount of whisky we can produce, but helps us produce a premium, handcrafted whisky, just as the best distilleries did in times gone past. The first stage in the process is where hot water is added to the grist in a mash tun to convert the starch in the grist to sugar. The resulting sweet liquid is called ‘wort’s’.We prefer to use clear wort’s as it produces a new make spirit with a less intense, cereal character. The wort’s are then cooled and pumped into charred wooden tanks called washback’s. These are made at Bimber’s own cooperage with American oak. The lengthy contact with the oak,  produces a lighter, more complex, fruity flavour.We then add our yeast, which is a strain carefully created for Bimber. This ferments the sugar, converting it into alcohol. The resulting wash is like a strong beer with an abv of 8-10%.

SMALL DIRECT FIRE COPPER POT STILLS:

At Bimber, we believe that the spirit needs a lot of contact with copper during distillation, to retain the heavier elements of the distillate and produce a lighter whisky. Our two small copper pot stills, Doris and Astraeus were designed to our specific instructions to maximise copper contact. We choose to heat with direct fire, rather than steam, in the traditional way. This enables a slow but powerful cook for a more full-bodied spirit with a depth of flavour. The first distillation takes place in Doris, our 1000-litre wash still, which produces a low-strength, 33% abv spirit called ‘low wines’. These are then redistilled a second time in Astraeus, our small, 600-litre spirit still. The distillate is collected in three stages or ‘cuts’ called foreshots, heart and feints. Only the heart, which has an alcoholic strength of 72% abv is retained for maturation and the foreshots and feints are recycled within the next batch of low wines. This new make spirit is then reduced to 63.5% before being filled into casks.

ON SITE COOPERAGE

At Bimber we have carefully sourced the finest American Oak and Sherry casks from the USA and Europe. We use a range of cask types as this allows flexibility to create a unique flavour to be produced. At times smaller casks are used as the whisky has more contact with the wood and creates a different flavour profile. We are proud to say that we have our own onsite cooperage who check all casks and repair and re-char the casks when required. This long-established yet rare skill is something we believe is key to the personalised whisky process here at the heart of Bimber. 

ART OF BLENDING:

The art of blending is one of our Master Distiller’s greatest passions. We believe that blending is an underappreciated stage in the whisky making process. Our team personally monitor the progress of each cask, nosing and tasting regularly to find the optimum moment to bottle our precious whisky. We record the taste profile of every sample so we can ensure our London Single Malt Whisky retains its signature light, fruity style.At the same time, we are keen to innovate and push the boundaries of what is possible within the art of whisky making. We are constantly creating new and exciting finishes for possible future special editions and one-off releases. Only the very best of these innovations will go on sale to our discerning customers.