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Other Scotch Classics:
Bunnahabhain |
Century of Change? |
Accommodating Distilleries
Wining about whisky
by John Hansell
When I started getting passionate about wine several years ago, I thought it would be a nice diversion from writing professionally about whisky. Boy, was I wrong. These days, to understand whisky, you should also know wine.
Just have a look in this issue's Buyer's Guide. You'll see that I reviewed six new Bruichladdich whiskies, four Classic Malts, three Edradour whiskies, a Caol Ila, and a new Longrow. All these whiskies have one thing in common: they were aged in mostly atypical wine casks. Ten years ago, nearly all Scotch whisky was matured in either used bourbon barrels or oloroso sherry casks. Now distillers are taking whisky from these casks and "finishing" them off in wine casks that might be completely foreign to you, with names like Tokaji, Barolo, Sauternes, Amontillado, Rioja, and Granache.
What's going on here? There are several factors feeding this proliferation of unusual wine-finished whisky. Single malt scotch is more popular than ever, and the whisky producers are looking for ways to capitalize on this demand and introduce new expressions. Finishing is a "back-end" process, meaning that they don't have to wait 12 years to introduce a new 12 year old whisky. They only need to take an 11 year old whisky and put it in a different cask for a year and voila-or perhaps Rioja!-you have a new whisky.
Another influencing factor is that there are now more smaller-sized whisky companies than there were a decade ago. The consolidation of the whisky industry is prompting the larger whisky companies to sell a distillery for anti-trust reasons. Or they see the distillery as being redundant or unprofitable with regards to their overall distillery portfolio. Smaller companies snap up these distilleries and, unlike the larger conglomerates, often have a greater entrepreneurial spirit and are willing to take more risks trying new things. The large companies see what the smaller guys are doing and then they start coming out with new whiskies to compete with the smaller companies. Bottom line: we end up with a lot of new whiskies.
Some of these new whisky expressions are being targeted towards a younger audience, designing the whiskies as a cocktail ingredient. After all, the younger the consumer is when they start drinking whisky, the more years they can buy whisky before they die, right? Depending on the type of wine cask used, whisky can be made sweeter and can be sold at a younger age (and lower price).
So, is all this good or bad for the whisky enthusiast? It's a little bit of both, actually. The good news is there's a lot of new whisky expressions for us to try. Imagine if there was only one Bruichladdich whisky? That would be like having just one Beatles album. Perish the thought. New expressions are fun, because you get to see a different side of a whisky's personality. It keeps whisky drinking fun and exciting.
The downside is that you may not like the new whisky. Or you liked the previous expression a lot better. And you aren't too happy about spending $100 finding this out. Indeed, all these new expressions can be a bit daunting. Just have a stroll down a whisky specialist's shelves. It's my job to keep track of new whiskies (and the whiskies that are being taken off the market), and I find it challenging. How can you possibly keep current on all the changes?
Plus, while I really enjoy some of the new wood-finish releases (some of them are quite stunning), others have gone a little overboard with the wine influence. It sort of reminds me when my daughter discovered all the fonts available in our new family computer. Let's just say the next couple of school reports weren't very pretty.
My advice? Enjoy the ride, but be careful. No one wants to go back to the way things were 20 years ago when the choices of single malts were sparse. This is an exciting time to be a whisky enthusiast. All of us should take advantage of this.
However, the variety and range of flavors with all these wood finishes is greater then ever. More now than ever, it's very important for you to "try before you buy." One person's beach vacation can be another person's Normandy invasion. And if you're a whisky traditionalist (a nice way to say "stubborn"), you might just be a bit grumpy until you get used to the new flavors. Just give it some time. And while you're waiting, you might just want to brush up on your wine knowledge.
Other Scotch Classics:
Bunnahabhain |
Century of Change? |
Accommodating Distilleries
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