Tickets for our Whisky An’ A’ That Festival 2016 are almost SOLD OUT! I would advise anyone  wishing to attend that they purchase their ticket to Nirvana now…. Ben Nevis Distillery Masterclass tickets are now on sale with a small amount also still available. Masterclass Tickets are only for sale in-store.

Regards

RWM Team

A match made in heaven for the nation’s favourite tipple

Whisky and water, scotch on the rocks – now there is a new perfect match for the nation’s favourite tipple as Scotland gears up to celebrate its Year of Innovation, Architecture and Design in 2016.

The Spirit of Speyside Whisky Festival, which takes place in Scotland’s most prolific whisky producing region, will show how the multi-million pound global industry has been built on the exact principles which will be nationally recognised over the next 12 months.

The Year of Innovation, Architecture and Design is a Scottish Government initiative – led by national tourism agency VisitScotland and a number of partners – which aims to celebrate Scotland’s outstanding contribution to everything from technology to textiles and architecture to craft.

Festival chairman James Campbell says that the union of innovative design and traditional whisky production was a fitting achievement to be celebrated during the themed year.

He adds, “From the bold, innovative moves of illicit distillers who pioneered production to the world famous architectural design of the pagoda which has become a hallmark of Speyside’s distilleries, whisky would not be the multi-billion pound industry it is today without these innovators.

“This amalgamation of heritage and innovation is what makes Speyside whisky so unique and we look forward to sharing our traditions and passion for Scotch malt whisky with visitors to the Festival.

“The five day event offers a rare opportunity for whisky aficionados, and beginners alike to learn more about the malts that have made our region world famous.”

The result of a successful marriage between traditional heritage and cutting edge production, Scotland’s national tipple is the reason why thousands of visitors will flock to the region for the 17^th year of whisky festivities.

Thousands of visitors will flock to the 17^th annual festival, which runs from April 28 – May 2. The five day celebration raises a toast to Speyside’s internationally acclaimed malt whisky through exclusive tastings, tours and appreciations.

The programme is made up of over 400 unique events, including a selection of new attractions, ensuring there’s something for everyone.  For those who appreciate the region in equal measure to the whisky, the Festival has organised a range of entertainment from comedy and crafting to cookery and indulgent dinners, as well as heritage walks and scenic excursions.

Scotland’s first themed year ran in 2009 as the year of Homecoming. The success of the project brought about a range of benefits to the country and boosted tourism overall. Following on from this, the Scottish Government announced a series of themed years to showcase the country as a dynamic and creative nation through a yearlong plethora of programmed events.

“The Spirit of Speyside Whisky Festival is a terrific success story and has attracted many thousands of overseas visitors to Scotland,” explains Paul Bush OBE, VisitScotland’s Director of Events.

“Although an industry that has a long-established heritage, whisky production in Scotland embraces creativity and innovation to supply global demand.

“This fits perfectly with the theme of Innovation Architecture and Design and visitors can look forward to finding out about this interesting side of our national drink during the festival in 2016.”

Speyside contains more than half of all Scotland’s malt whisky distilleries – over 50 in total – and the vast majority of them will be staging events during the Festival, including many that are not usually open to the public.

Contrasting heritage with contemporary, the programme will, for the first time, feature the oldest operating distillery in the Highlands of Scotland – Strathisla, established in 1789 – and the newest – Dalmunach which was officially opened in June 2015 by Scotland’s First Minister, Nicola Sturgeon.

Information about the 2016 Spirit of Speyside Whisky Festival can be found on the website http://www.spiritofspeyside.com/ where tickets will be on sale from early February. The Festival is also active on facebook.com/WhiskyFestival, Twitter and Instagram @spirit_speyside.

Picture caption: There’s whisky galore at the Spirit of Speyside Whisky Festival which takes place in Scotland’s most prolific whisky producing region from April 28 until May 2.

Captions:

1. Dalmunach – one of Scotland’s newest distilleries opened in June 2015 by First Minister Nicola Sturgeon
2. Strathisla – the oldest operating distillery in the Scottish Highlands, est. 1789
3. Spirit of Speyside Whisky Festival – Whisky Galore

Notes to editors

The Spirit of Speyside Whisky Festival is committed to promoting responsible drinking. Visitors travelling to and from festival events can take advantage of a range of transport options. Spirit of Speyside Whisky Festival has received funding from Highlands and Islands Enterprise and is also financially supported by many other private and public partners.

The Spirit of Speyside Whisky Festival is part financed by the European Regional Development Fund Programme 2014 to 2020. The Scottish Government is the managing authority for the European Regional Development Fund Programme.

Year of Innovation, Architecture and Design

2016 will shine a spotlight on Scotland’s achievements in innovation, architecture and design through a wide-ranging, variety of new and existing activity.

The Year of Innovation, Architecture and Design will run from 1 January 2016 to 31 December 2016 and will build on the momentum generated by the 2015 Year of Food and Drink as well as previous years including Homecoming Scotland 2014, the Year of Creative and the Year of Natural.

Through a series of exciting events and activity, the year will showcase Scotland’s position as an “innovation nation”, its outstanding built heritage, and its thriving, internationally acclaimed fashion, textiles and design sector.

The Year of Innovation, Architecture and Design is a Scottish Government initiative being led by VisitScotland, supported by partners including Scottish Government, Creative Scotland, Architecture + Design Scotland, Scottish Tourism Alliance, Scottish Enterprise, The National Trust for Scotland, Historic Scotland, Highlands and Islands Enterprise and The Royal Incorporation of Architects in Scotland (RIAS).

The Year of Innovation, Architecture and Design events fund is managed by EventScotland, part of VisitScotland’s Events Directorate

About EventScotland:

EventScotland is working to make Scotland the perfect stage for events. By developing an exciting portfolio of sporting and cultural events EventScotland is helping to raise Scotland’s international profile and boost the economy by attracting more visitors. For further information about EventScotland, its funding programmes and latest event news visit http://www.eventscotland.org/. Follow EventScotland on Twitter @EventScotNews.

EventScotland is a team within the VisitScotland Events Directorate, the national tourism organisation which markets Scotland as a tourism destination across the world, gives support to the tourism industry and brings sustainable tourism growth to Scotland. For more information about VisitScotland see http://www.visitscotland.org/ or for consumer information on Scotland as a visitor destination see http://www.visitscotland.com/.

The Whisky Exchange Vinopolis – My Memories

Ten years after opening in London Bridge, our Vinopolis store closed for the last time on Christmas Eve. We will be announcing its replacement very soon in the same part of town, and in the meantime, our new Covent Garden store is open for business. Alex Huskinson managed our Vinopolis shop for nearly six years, and he shares his memories of running the premier destination for whisky lovers in the capital.

The Whisky Exchange store at Vinopolis – a treasure trove of whiskies

As a cocktail bartender for many years before working in the shop, I had a big interest in spirits, but my only real experience of whisky was bourbon. I then started working part-time in the Vinopolis wine tour (back when it was good) just as they had the Diageo whisky room built and I was introduced to Talisker 10 Year Old. I fell in love.

I was then lucky enough to have The Nose – Whyte & Mackay’s Richard Paterson – come just a few weeks later and do a talk for us and I tasted the legendary 62 Year Old Dalmore (with accompanying bells, whistles and party poppers). It started an obsession.

I was first employed in the store part-time to teach the whisky geeks there about other spirits. The wealth of knowledge was more than extraordinary when it came to malts, and I was privileged to learn from them. Saying that, they knew nothing of Tequila, so it was a fair swap.

Alex Huskinson ran our Vinopolis shop for more than five years

The first tasting I went to was Mickey Heads and the launch of Ardbeg Almost There, which is still my favourite young Ardbeg. A real baptism of fire, with six-year-old Ardbeg all the way to one from my birth year.

One of the first events I organised was a gin tasting. It was a learning curve as I decided to think of the best tasting I could and just do that, irrespective of the amount of work involved. We did eight gins – all neat, and with a cocktail, and paired off against each other so you could see how they compared. Ninety people attended, which works out at 720 cocktails – in an hour-and-a-half. It was presented by Desmond Payne and Jared Brown and it took us four days to clear up, but it was fantastic.

In 2011, Chris and I got involved with The Whisky Show, running the first one in Vinopolis, with help from Emma Pineiro and the wonderful Martine Nouet – one of the most inspiring people in whisky. This was another tight learning curve, but most thought it was a success so we did the next three there, only moving out in 2015 when the Show became too big for the venue.

The aim with TWE Vinopolis has always been to create a store with character and personality while maintaining great customer service borne out by a love and passion for the drinks themselves. It was a lot of fun, and the people really made it special – both staff and customers alike.

Sale extended – Sunday 10th January! 

To receive your discount, enter code AW10-2015 at checkout.

Slàinte Mhaith

Shop Now!

Our mailing address is:
Abbey Whisky Ltd
Registered Office
Dollar, FK14 7AS
United Kingdom

Happy New Year from Whisky Enquiries. 

Some Industry Facts 

· The Industry earns £125 every second by exporting Whisky.

· 99 million cases were exported Worldwide in 2014. If we laid these bottles end to end they would stretch for about 30,000kms or the distance from Edinburgh to New York six times over.

· More than 10,000 people are directly employed in the Whisky Industry.

· Over 40,000 jobs in the UK are supported by the industry.

· Some 20 million casks are maturing in warehouses throughout Scotland.

· Scotch Whisky sells three times better than its nearest rival Whisky.

· More Scotch is sold in France in one month than Cognac in a year.

· Aberdeen University was the first in the UK to establish regular Medical Teaching in 1494, the same year as the earliest written reference to Whisky in Scotland.

· Andrew Usher was credited with producing the first Blended Whisky in 1853.

· The construction of the Usher Hall in Edinburgh was funded by Andrew Usher, he donated £100,000 to the city specifically to fund a new concert hall.

#WhiskyEnquiries

Contact Michel Hanratty of Whisky Inquires whiskyenquiries@hotmail.co.uk

AUCTION CLOSES TONIGHT FROM 7.30PM

This is just a reminder to let you know that whisky.auction’s December auction closes tonight from 7.30pm GMT, so you only have a few hours to make your final bids. There are still some great bottles to be had, including two bottlings of Johnnie Walker Directors Blend, as well as impressive whiskies from Karuizawa, Ardbeg, Port Ellen, Macallan, Highland Park, Caol Ila and Bruichladdich. If a bid is placed within the last three minutes of the scheduled finish time, the lot will be extended for a further three minutes, allowing you to place a further bid if you wish.

These are the closing times for each category – a great way of simplifying placing your final bids:

• 7.30pm – Books, jugs, memorabilia and miniatures

• 7.50pm – Japanese

• 8.00pm – Islands

• 8.10pm – Lowland

• 8.20pm – Highland

• 8.30pm – Speyside

• 8.40pm – Campbeltown

• 8.50pm – Islay

Our next auction will start on Sunday 31 January – if you have bottles to sell, don’t hesitate to get in touch.

Get bidding, and good luck!

The Whisky Auction team.

William Grant & Sons partnered with Rugby World Cup 2015

Earlier this year (2015) William Grant & Sons partnered with Rugby World Cup 2015 as Official Spirits & Champagne Tournament Provider. The tournament has been hailed the most successful Rugby World Cup to date, with 2.47m consumers attending 48 matches, across 13 national venues and a record 120million viewers tuning in to watch the final match.

Through William Grant & Sons global partnership with Rugby World Cup 2015 we reached over 140m adults via our integrated campaigns. In the UK, our #RaiseEmUp2015 campaign offered fans the chance to win tickets and exclusive merchandise to matches. Around the world we have seen a William Grant & Sons ‘airport takeover’ at Auckland International, a Tullamore D.E.W. Facebook campaign in the USA as well as Grant’s and Glenfiddich activations in Australia and South Africa – all giving fans the once in a lifetime chance to win tickets to the final.

Gary Keogh, Marketing Director, William Grant & Sons UK said: “We have been honoured to be at the heart of the action, celebrating the great sportsmanship that has been on show. We hope that all our activations, offered fans something special and added to their experience throughout a great Tournament.”

Well-aged whisky with Balblair, Old Pulteney and AnCnoc

For our final tasting of 2015, we welcomed Inver House Distillers to showcase some of their whiskies, focusing on an aspect of whisky that most companies are not talking about much these days: long ageing.

Lukasz, looking dapper for his final tasting of the year

With whisky’s popularity at an all-time high and the spirit taking years to mature, it’s understandable that we’re seeing younger whiskies appearing on the market. Nice as younger drams can be, there’s something special about whisky that’s spent years in a cask.

We were joined by Lukasz Dynowiak, Inver House brand ambassador, to walk us through well-aged drams from three different distilleries: Knockdhu, Old Pulteney and Balblair.

We started at Knockdhu, on the east edge of Speyside – a Highland distillery by mere yards. Its whisky goes by the name of AnCnoc, to avoid confusion with nearby Knockando – Knockdhu means ‘black hill’ in Gaelic, but the hill that gives the distillery its name is the biggest in the area, so the locals just call it ‘the hill’, an cnoc. The distillery’s range starts with 12- and 16-year-old whiskies, we jumped in straight in at the top, and tried the 18- and 22-year-old drams.

The 18 Year Old is very much a traditional AnCnoc, with honey, spice and citrus, as well as hints of tropical fruit, whereas, the 22 Year Old adds in a few extra years and some more sherry-cask-matured whisky to create something weightier:

AnCnoc 22 Year Old, 46% ABV

Nose: Sweet and waxy with fresh and dried orange peel, floral notes and Love Heart candy sweetness. After that there’s crunchy caramel, lemon sherbert and sweet orange juice.

Palate: Soft and floral, with sharp citrus – candied lemon, orange peel and honeysuckle. There’s some aniseed ball heat, a hint of mint and underlying dried-fruit sweetness – mixed peel, raisins and sultanas.

Finish: Butter and spice, fading to grassy meadows and herbal lozenges.

Comment: An excellent balance of sherry- and bourbon-cask maturation, with the distillery’s character enhanced rather than hidden by the casks.

We then headed up to Wick in the far north of Scotland, to try some Old Pulteney. The whisky is referred to as ‘The Maritime Malt’ in Inver House’s portfolio for two reasons:

1. Wick has a long history that is intertwined with the rise and fall of fishing and working by the sea.
2. it tastes really coastal.

While there’s no actual salt in the whisky, Old Pulteney definitely has a tang of the sea to it – breaking waves, seashores and a touch of brine.

The distillery’s core range consists of three whiskies, and while the 12-year-old is one that I usually have in my whisky cabinet, we focused on the other two. Ever since the 21 Year Old picked up Jim Murray’s top award in the Whisky Bible 2012, it’s become a worthy best seller, but while it is a great dram, it’s the 17 Year Old that I keep returning to:

Old Pulteney 17 Year Old, 46%

Nose: Leather and dried lemon peel, with butterscotch, fruity pears, white pepper spiciness, salty touches and a hint of damp rope.

Palate: Floral and sweet, with some cinnamon heat and lashings of fruit – apples, pears, fleshy mango and a bit of banana. Spice builds, backed up by white chocolate and salted almonds.

Finish: Salted caramel, white pepper and brine, finishing with shortbread and aniseed.

Comment: A careful combination of the 12 Year Old’s seaside brashness and the elegance of the 21.

To finish, we returned south, to Balblair. The distillery bottles its whiskies with vintages rather than age statements, and they regularly produce new versions as they sell out – each new vintage will be similar to the one it replaces, but they are all slightly different.

We tried Balblair 1990 and 1983, very contrasting drams – the 1990 is finished in sherry casks, while the 1983 was matured exclusively in ex-bourbon casks. Both are great whiskies, but the 1983 was the one for me – very good spirit, well aged in a cask that doesn’t overwhelm the distillery’s character:

Balblair 1983, 46% ABV

Nose: Toasted bananas, peach syrup and pine needles with a background of creaminess – vanilla cream and creamed coconut. Ground almonds and tropical touches – papaya and dried mango – are joined by waxy polish and a zing of lemon zest.

Palate: ‘Caramel sauce poured over peaches and pears’, my notes say. Behind that are notes of milk and dark chocolate, woody spice, orange and grapefruit zest, and a touch of pith. Sweet spice builds: nutmeg, cinnamon and fragrant cardamom.

Finish: Syrupy to start, turning leafy and minty before hitting a rich and earthy end.

Comment: Stacks of fruit, all balanced by nuts, spice and a bit of creaminess. My favourite style of dram and easily my pick of the night.

We then had one more whisky, chosen to mark three events that called for a special final dram: the last drink of the night, the end of Lukasz’s last tasting of the year, and the final tasting to be held at Vinopolis – both our shop and the neighbouring wine experience have now closed. Don’t worry, as we have opened a new shop near Covent Garden and it won’t be long before we’re back in the London Bridge area.

Our last dram was Balblair 1969, a suitable final whisky – old and elegant. While whisky isn’t all about long ageing, when it’s done right, it can produce something incredible.

If you want to know more about Inver House’s distilleries, I visited them a few years back – find more here: Balblair, Pulteney, Speyburn and Knockdhu.

If you’re looking for a lavish experience in the new year, Mahesh Patel has just the thing.

The whisky connoisseur — known for his whisky collection — wants to take you on a $2.5-million whisky experience in Scotland.

www.universalwhiskyexperience.com

This week Joe Ellis starts 2016 with a whisky review of The Glen Garioch Renaissance 15 Year Old.

https://youtu.be/kVvc7bARi80

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