Ian Buxton dons his wellies and digs out his shepherd’s crook
Spencerfield Spirits is not your usual whisky company. For one thing, it’s based in the tack room attic of the owner’s thoroughbred livery stable and, for another, you have to meet Doug (the company dog, pronounced ‘dug’ – it’s a pun, you see) and four friendly horses before you get down to business...
By Ian Buxton
from Issue 64 published on 01/06/2007
There are numerous financial risks involved in establishing a new malt whisky distillery. But how do you make sure the whisky you produce is any good? Richard Jones reports
It’s not the most expensive mistake you could make in life, but it certainly doesn’t come cheap.
The economics of setting up a new malt whisky distillery alone are pretty terrifying.
About £800,000 for a small distillery of reasonable quality according to Dr Harry Riffkin, managing director of con...
By Richard Jones
from Issue 58 published on 30/08/2006
The Star in the East is beginning to rise.And if the markets of China,India and Russia perform anywhere near to their potential,they could change the world of whisky forever.Richard Jones reports
It’s hardly front page news that the economy in China is doing pretty well at the moment.
Well actually it is. On the 19th April 2006 The Independent reported the visit of Chinese President Hu Jintao to Washington with the headline ‘America meets the new superpower’. Inside the same newspaper comme...
By Richard Jones
from Issue 56 published on 01/06/2006
Social poker nights both at home or at style bars and clubs have been the fad trend of 2005 – and whisky has been the drink of choice. Rob Allanson reports
Think of poker and it stirs up images of either suave casinos or dirty smokefilled back rooms: the tuxedoed Monte Carlo high life of James Bond, or seedy, salacious danger-tinged impromptu card schools.
Both images of the game are as valid as each other as they have played integral parts in the dev...
By Rob Allanson
from Issue 53 published on 12/01/2006
The new Whisky Exchange shop at London’s Vinopolis is part of a new project that shows how grape and the grain can make a harmonious blend. Kate Ennis reports
For fans of renowned mail order website The Whisky Exchange the news that proprietor Sukhinder Singh has opened a retail shop in central London will be music to the ears.
Before now, experiencing Sukhinder’s vast selection of whiskies was only possible by appointment at his showroom tucked away on ...
By Kate Ennis
from Issue 53 published on 12/01/2006
The times they are a-changing in Kentucky as the bourbon producers enjoy a renewed interest in their products. Dominic Roskrow reports
The road is a nightmare. Little more than an uneven dirt track, its entrance sufficiently concealed that we drive by it twice.
We’re just outside Bardstown in Kentucky, and we’re meant to be getting a glimpse of bourbon’s future. Right now, in the dust and glare of the late summer sun, it seems we’...
By Dominic Roskrow
from Issue 52 published on 30/11/2005
Talisker is an icon malt and it's celebrating its 175th anniversary. Dave Broom takes a walk on its wildside.
The Wild Spirit.
Saturday night on Scotland’s utter northwest coast. I was staying with a friend who was working on a fish farm and we were heading to a ceilidh in Ullapool.
Fortification for the journey came in the form of my first-ever malt. The first swig blasted strange new flavours of smoke a...
By Dave Broom
from Issue 51 published on 07/10/2005
A threat to the future of Scotch?
In my youth – a couple of centuries ago it seems – I remember snow lying around my home in Perth for weeks on end. I remember sledging every year and often daily in the 1950s and early 1960s. I don’t remember getting days off school because of the bad weather, but I suppose we must have done.
The S...
By Dominic Roskrow
from Issue 50 published on 09/09/2005
The Scottish Liqueur Centre is set for a new lease of life. Ian Buxton reports
Located at Bankfoot just off the main A9 north of Perth, the Scottish Liqueur Centre was for years a low-key part of the Scottish drinks business.
The family-owned company ran a small visitor centre; blended and bottled a pleasant but unassuming range of fruit liqueurs and produced Columba Cream li...
By Ian Buxton
from Issue 49 published on 15/07/2005
Modern whisky cocktails are impacting across the world. Australian drinks writer Naren Young takes a global view
It’s quite ironic that even though many of the world’s most famous mixed drinks and cocktails are whisky-based (think Mint Julep, Manhattan, Old Fashioned, Rob Roy, among several others), they’re served with alarming irregularity in many corners of the globe. As more consumers jump on the white spir...
By Naren Young
from Issue 49 published on 15/07/2005
Allied is rolling out its quarter cask range after the success of Laphroaig Quarter Cask. Dave Broom was given a sneak preview
THE LAST TIME Whisky Magazine encountered Allied Domecq’s master blender Robert Hicks he was still laughing at the ridiculousness of the experiment – and the fact that his hunch had paid off.
The Laphroaig Quarter Cask is now a cult. But even on that day there were hints that there were other thing...
By Dave Broom
from Issue 48 published on 10/06/2005
Each year Jack Daniel’s holds a World Championship Barbecue and all sorts of enthusiasts attend. Peter Krass went along
When you take a sip of Jack Daniel’s you may think you’re simply drinking Tennessee whiskey, but you’re not. You’re taking a drink of a whole subculture, a subculture comprised of avid JD drinkers, collectors, and fans from every part of the world.
In an annual pilgrimage, thousands of these folks ...
By Peter Krass
from Issue 48 published on 10/06/2005
Inverallan Scotch Malt Whisky is using the Internet to promote whisky and Scottish water across the world. Eluned Price reports
If you don’t happen to live in God’s own country – and few of us do – the chances of being able to taste the best Scottish malt whisky as it should taste will be slim. If you take your whisky neat that’s different, but the water that you add – even just a splash – can adulterate the purity and balan...
By Eluned Price
from Issue 47 published on 05/04/2005
Not all liqueurs are over sweet and unpalatable. And some should even justify a place in your drinking repertoire. Ian Buxton reports
Liqueurs – love them or hate them, no genuine whisky lover would let them pass their lips. Right? Well, wrong actually. In the course of researching this article I’ve had to think again and, if not exactly converted, I’ve been partly won over by their honeyed charms.
Historically, whisky liqueurs h...
By Ian Buxton
from Issue 47 published on 05/04/2005
A couple of years ago there was a spate of takeovers of Scottish distilleries and independent buyouts. What happened to them? Ian Buxton investigates
Once upon a time, almost all Scotch whisky was made by independent companies. Then, over time, the twin pressures of economics and competition forced rationalisation and, one by one, the independent companies merged, amalgamated or were taken over.
They, in their turn, were swallowed by other corpo...
By Ian Buxton
from Issue 46 published on 10/3/2005
Some of the best whisky makers and blenders are women. Charles Cowdrey met some of them at a special roadshow.
A couple of issues back Whisky Magazine reported that more women than ever are drinking whisky, a revolutionary albeit welcome development, but women making whisky? If there still is a male-dominated bastion left, surely that is it.
But as a matter of fact, yes, women do make whisky and other fine ...
By Charles K. Cowdery
from Issue 46 published on 10/3/2005
Tullibardine shut its doors in the 1990s. Now, as part of a retail complex, it is back. Charles MacLean went to the triumphant reopening
Although it only opened in 1949, Tullibardine was the first distillery to be commissioned in the 20th century. Its creator was William Delme-Evans, a Welshman with a dream. Within four years he sold his distillery; it changed hands a couple of times and was then mothballed in the 1990s. Sad and dila...
By Charles MacLean
from Issue 45 published on 21/1/2005
New technology is being adopted by whisky companies. Richard Jones goes surfing
Here are a few facts I bet you didn’t know from the world of whisky: there are five washbacks at Springbank distillery, each made from boatskin larch and with a capacity of 21,000 litres; the grist mill at Laphroaig is nicknamed ‘Red Bob’ and is one of the oldest Porteus Mills in the business; Denis...
By Richard Jones
from Issue 45 published on 21/1/2005
Pip Hills has compiled a directory comparing the taste profile of some leading malts and blends – and has reached some startling conclusions. Here he explains
If your only source of information was the pages of this magazine, you might think that most folk who drink whisky drink malts, not blended whiskies. If your source was overheard conversations, you would get the same message.
It’s not uncommon to hear people in upmarket bars comparing malts, but it...
By Pip Hills
from Issue 45 published on 21/1/2005
The Welsh Whisky Company is in business and impressing whisky experts with its product. Charles MacLean visited it
Like all good whisky tales, the story of the revival of distilling in Wales begins in a pub.
It was 1997. Brian Morgan, an economist who was at the time working for the Welsh Development Agency (he is now director of Cardiff University’s Business School), was talking to a friend about the economic ...
By Charles MacLean
from Issue 44 published on 25/11/2004
The Celtic fringe of Britain has a long tradition for some of the world’s finest whiskies. Ireland and Scotland have refined their creations over centuries, so why has it taken so long for Cornwall to catch on and produce its first single malt whisky? Jamie Smith finds the answer lies, of all places, at a cider farm
Somewhere in a dark, cobbled cellar not far from Cornwall’s craggy north coast something very exciting and, for many, long overdue is taking place.
In a dark, damp cellar, Cornwall’s first malt whisky is slowly maturing inside recharred Speyside bourbon casks. Hidden in the bowels of the Cornish Cy...
By Jamie Smith
from Issue 44 published on 25/11/2004
Martine Nouet looks at the whisky industry in Northern France – and plots its Celtic roots
Aland with a profound sense of identity, Brittany became part of French kingdom only in the 16th century. With its own Celtic language – the
exact replica of the Cornish one – its culture deeply rooted in myths and legends, its climate so similar to Ireland’s or Scotland’s west coast, Brittany has ...
By Martine Nouet
from Issue 44 published on 25/11/2004
As ways of making drinking a cerebral pastime, whisky chess takes some beating. Alex Kraaijeveld explains how it works
Have you ever heard of shot glass chess? It’s a game of chess played in which glasses of different shapes and sizes serve as pieces.
The glasses are filled with either a clear (for ‘white’) or a coloured spirit (for ‘black’) and whenever a piece is captured, its contents have to be drunk by the sid...
By Alex Kraaijeveld
from Issue 44 published on 25/11/2004
Chicago has its fair share of whiskey bars. Scott Longmantakes a tour
Let the Italians and the Norwegians fight about who found the place to begin with: it was a bunch of malcontents from Plymouth, England who
first settled the United States. And somehow, that early Anglo influence impacted everything downstream, including Chicago’s taste in whisky bars 400 years late...
By Scott Longman
from Issue 44 published on 25/11/2004
Bruichladdich is the latest of a series of distilleries to launch its own whisky academy. Mark Furse joined one of the first groups to see what you get for your money
Promoted under the engaging tagline: ‘got a thirst for knowledge?’ The Bruichladdich Whisky Academy is an attempt to provide participants with a structured approach to whisky making in a hands-on environment, which will appeal to all aficionados of malt whisky.
In many ways Bruichladdich is ideally...
By Mark Furse
from Issue 43 published on 23/10/2004
Young consumers are seeking innovative ways to drink alcohol. Andy Knott reports on how Diageo is promoting its super premium blends
For you, is it complete when neat? Alternatively, does a cube or two of ice suffice? Or does a dash of H20 steal the show?
With the exception of the cocktail and long, mixed drink, the parameters for revealing a whisky in its truest light haven’t stretched much beyond straight up, on the rocks, or ...
By Andy Knott
from Issue 42 published on 3/9/2004
There is a new wave of whisky drinkers who are confident, intelligent, young and individualistic. Many of them are women. Dominic Roskrow reports
It started off as a simple enough idea: to feature women who enjoy whisky, some employed in the trade, some not, and to get a feminine view of the world of whisky.
Hold a tasting and see what happens. Shake up the masculine image of whisky a little.
That was the intention, but it didn’t sit easy. ...
By Dominic Roskrow
from Issue 42 published on 3/9/2004
If a group of women conducted a whisky tasting, would it be very different to a men’s one? Well yes, actually. Dominic Roskrow meets the girls
The panel
Gillian Bell Proprietor,Caledonian Connoissseur
Abigail Bosanko Author
Susan Brannan Scotch Malt Whisky Society
Anna Conway Business development manager, Fior brands
Isabel Coughlin Press and public relations, Bruichladdich
Annabel Meikle Scotch Malt Whisky Society
Kate Patrick Freelance j...
By Dominic Roskrow
from Issue 42 published on 3/9/2004
Abigail Bosanko’s new book is a romance aimed at the professional female. But it includes whisky tasting notes and its central character is a whisky expert. What’s going on?
On the face of it A Nice Girl Like Me would seem to be a typical girlie novel. It’s got a pink cover. It’s about a woman married to an older man but is romantically drawn to a young, dashing, handsome buck. Will she or won’t she?
And to be honest, do we really care? Not if we’re male we don’t.
Han...
By Abigail Bosanko
from Issue 42 published on 3/9/2004
Iseabail Mactaggart could have pretty much chosen to work anywhere. She chose the Islay whisky industry. Here’s why…
Although she would hate anyone to say it, Iseabail Mactaggart was the sort of person they were thinking of when they coined the phrase ‘high flyer.’
By the time she had reached her 20s she had a degree in two languages under her belt, was a native speaker of two more, had worked in Shanghai and Lon...
By Iseabail Mactaggart
from Issue 42 published on 3/9/2004
How many of us have thought about giving it all up and starting afresh as a worker in the world of whisky? Richard Jones speaks to some people who have done just that
Go on, admit it, the thought has crossed your mind. There you were after a distillery tour, one dram safely inside you and another in your hand, quietly soaking up the atmosphere, the history, the general wonderfulness of the place.
Or perhaps you were enjoying a formal tasting, even a Masterclass ...
By Richard Jones
from Issue 42 published on 3/9/2004
Fake whisky bottles appear in most markets of the world. But as Erkin Touzmohamedov reports, there are some bizarre ones in Egypt
When Moses went to Egypt (to let his people go), he’d hardly have imagined that this land’s inventors would give the world ‘water of life’. It is generally considered that Alexandria’s alchemists passed the knowledge of distillation – i.e. the production of alcohol – to Europe. Alas, Islam’s holy bo...
By Erkin Touzmahamedov
from Issue 42 published on 3/9/2004
Can whisky-making be taught properly at university, and is our understanding of science leading to better whisky? Gavin Smith looks at the issue
If you walk into any pub on Speyside where retired distillery workers congregate and ask them whether things were better in their day, you’ll receive the resounding answer ‘yes!’ Partly, of course, this is human nature. Nobody wants to admit that someone who has succeeded them has found a better way...
By Gavin D. Smith
from Issue 41 published on 16/7/2004
The Scapa distillery on Orkney is to be reopened full time after years of neglect Dominic Roskrow visited it
If the owners of Scapa distillery needed a sign that its time was finally up they got it during a tempestuous evening on Orkney last August. During a storm lightning took the electricity out. Permanently.
“The electricians who were quite young took one look at the wiring and said they didn’t know w...
By Dominic Roskrow
from Issue 41 published on 16/7/2004
Blues – from its roots in black rural poverty through 60s psychedelia and on to the college rock scene of today has always been about attitude. Here Jefferson Chase takes a walk on the wild side, while on page 24, Dave Broommeets the masters of psychedelic blues, Love.
Everyone knows the legend of Delta bluesman Robert Johnson going down to the crossroads and selling his soul in return for being taught how to play the guitar, but the story of Johnson’s death is equally devilish and probably closer to the truth.
On August 13th, 1938, the 27 year old Johnson was pl...
By Jefferson Chase
from Issue 40 published on 4/6/2004
Dave Broom talks music with seminal 60s band and whisky drinkers, Love.
Brighton 2003. We don’t quite know what to expect. I mean, Arthur Lee and Love are about to play Forever Changes, in total, with horns and strings, something which is scarcely believable for those of us who take the view that Love’s third album is one of the great records, a touchstone of west-coast...
By Dave Broom
from Issue 40 published on 4/6/2004
We might moan about nanny state governments these days, but over the years legislators across the world have tried all sorts of bizarre things. Here Christine Green looks at some of the stranger alcohol laws
Do you consider yourself a whisky connoisseur or someone who merely enjoys partaking in a glass or two when entertaining? Alternatively, you may find your fascination of the world of alcohol draws you into exploring its history.
And if you take up the challenge and delve deep into the archives you ...
By Christine Green
from Issue 40 published on 4/6/2004
As promised in Issue 36, we asked some experts to cross the usual genre boundaries to see if any combinations worked, what might work and what was best left in its
component bottles. Gavin Smith reports
The panel
David Robertson Co-founder of the Easy Drinking Whisky Company
Billy Walker Distillery owner
Gavin Smith Whisky writer and author
Richard Paterson Master blender, Whyte and Mackay
David Stewart Master blender, William Grant & Sons
It’s one of those ideas that just happens and which g...
By Gavin D. Smith
from Issue 39 published on 1/5/2004
Scottish whisky and Spanish sherry have long had a special relationship. But as the pursuit of better quality intensifies, the link is becoming stronger. Dominic Roskrow reports
We’re standing in a large outbuilding that is part farmyard barn and part concrete warehouse. It’s gloomy inside. High up in the walls small square windows allow streams of sunlight to pierce the semi-darkness like spotlights. But they serve only to highlight the wood dust and
smoke that pollutes th...
By Dominic Roskrow
from Issue 38 published on 7/4/2004
New Hollywood blockbuster Lost In Translation gives whisky a status that it has rarely enjoyed in film before. Dominic Roskrow reports
It’s being hailed as fledgling director Sofia Coppola’s coming of age. Critics have favourably described it as Tokyo’s answer to Brief Encounter. There are whisperings that actor Bill Murray’s role will get him an Oscar nomination.
Even the soundtrack – the first significant work by independent ico...
By Dominic Roskrow
from Issue 37 published on 23/2/2004
Is whisky produced today as good as it used to be? Richard Jones hosts this months’ philosophical debate
Ultimately, it all boils down to a question mark. One of the liveliest and most contentious debates in the world of Scotch whisky divided by the
Riddler’s favourite grammatical symbol.
On the surface everything might appear tranquil, but delve beneath and it’s right up there with caramel, chill fil...
By Richard Jones
from Issue 37 published on 23/2/2004
As whisky becomes fashionable, the battle is on for our money. Alex Meadreports on the sponsorship market
Sponsorship. It’s one of those words that can mean a lot of different things to different people.
To some it brings up images of an offspring pleading for sponsor money because they’re doing a car wash for charity and to others it reminds them of when they had to beg Bob the butcher to give them £2...
By Alex Mead
from Issue 37 published on 23/2/2004
Why don't whiskies from different nations ever get belnded togeterh? Or do they? Gavin Smith found out
It was one of those questions that hardly seemed worth answering. “If they blend different Scotch whiskies together, why don’t they ever put Irish or bourbon in as well?”
“Well, it wouldn’t work, of course”, I replied. “I mean it just wouldn’t be possible, it’s probably not legal, and then there’...
By Gavin D. Smith
from Issue 36 published on 28/12/2003
The Easy Drinking Whisky Company is taking the selling of whisky to a new level – by selling directly on taste. Dominic Roskrow reports
Quite often the best ideas are the simplest ones. The ones when you say ‘why didn’t someone think of that before?’
So it is with the concept behind Easy Drinking Whisky Company, which has taken the selling of whisky to a new level – by selling directly on taste.
The company is set to launch three ...
By Dominic Roskrow
from Issue 35 published on 17/11/2003
’Own label’ whisky brands are thriving across the world. But how does the market work and how has it developed the way it has? Peter Mulryan reports
The world of whisky has not been unaffected by the growth of the multinationals, in fact, the whisky industry has led the way. As early as the 1920s Johnnie Walker was sold in more than 120 countries; now four bottles of the brand are consumed every second, of every minute, of every day.
Between th...
By Peter Mulryan
from Issue 35 published on 17/11/2003
Irish Coffee is known and loved across the world, but how did this happen? Peter Mulryan shows how it first took off
For a brief period during the 1940s there flowered the most glamorous form of transport that we are ever likely to see.
In the days before budget airlines, or even decent runways, flying boats, the huge dinosaurs of the aviation world, criss-crossed the Atlantic, pushing man and machine to the limi...
By Peter Mulryan
from Issue 34 published on 5/10/2003
Irish Coffee is known and loved across the world, but how did this happen? Peter Mulryan shows how it first took off
For a brief period during the 1940s there flowered the most glamorous form of transport that we are ever likely to see.
In the days before budget airlines, or even decent runways, flying boats, the huge dinosaurs of the aviation world, criss-crossed the Atlantic, pushing man and machine to the limi...
By Peter Mulryan
from Issue 34 published on 5/10/2003
Burn Stewart has a global presence after its recent purchase by a Caribbean based
company. Peter Mulryan finds out what its plans are
Idon’t know about you, but I just hate traffic jams, which is why I am sitting on the M9 distracting myself by compiling a list of the World’s best bars.
There’s Abaco in Palma, Neary’s in Dublin and Smokey & Bunty’s in St James, Trinidad – where the seats aren’t that soft, the air conditioning is ...
By Peter Mulryan
from Issue 33 published on 25/9/2003
Some of the great whisky brands have remained popular, others have all but disappeared. Why? Tom Bruce-Gardyne investigates
When The Stranglers first growled the words “Whatever happened to … ” in their hit No More Heroes, they could have been singing about
Scotch. For just as punk destroyed many older bands in the late ‘70s, some of the great names in whisky were beginning to get pushed aside.
Twenty-five years on, it ...
By Tom Bruce-Gardyne
from Issue 30 published on 7/4/2003
You don’t always equate quality beer with Indian restaurants. But Sukhi’s was so good it ended up in Britain’s Parliament buildings. Michele Hart reports
Lancashire curry house Sukhi’s knew it was doing something right with its beer when it heard it was to be listed in the Common’s Bar in Britain’s parliament buildings.
Sukhi’s Quality Premium Lager is actually brewed specially for Sukhi’s by Hepworth & Co, a micro-brewery located at the other end o...
By Michele Hart
from Issue 5 published on 24/03/2006
