WHISKY
THE WORLD OF WHISKY
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WHISKY THE WORLD OF
FELIPE SCHRIEBERG
CONTENTS
INTRODUCTION / 6
IS IT “WHISKY” OR “WHISKEY”? / 12
A SHORT HISTORY OF WHISKY / 16
HOW ALL WHISKY IS MADE / 26
DRINKING AND ENJOYING WHISKY / 46
CANADA / 52
IRELAND / 66
JAPAN / 96
SCOTLAND / 124
THE UNITED STATES / 186
THE REST OF THE WORLD / 236
CONCLUSION / 348
INTRODUCTION
Whisky is a surprisingly simple product for something that’s built up into a multi-billion dollar global industry, and it hasn’t changed significantly over centuries.
Whisky is simply distilled beer left in a cask for a certain length of time. That’s it. The joy of whisky is that in the nitty-gritty details involved in producing this cask-aged distilled beer, there exist almost infinite combinations of aromas and flavors available to enjoy (or not), and the numerous sensations they evoke.
This book is not a profound examination of those flavors and aromas, nor is it an exhaustive compilation of distilleries and their whiskies. There are many other books that fulfil those needs.
While you will learn the basics of whisky in this book—how it is produced and consumed—my main purpose here is to recount the stories of a few dozen distilleries and brands that have taken root around the world. It is a selection of well-known, iconic and long-established producers, as well as smaller, bold, and ingenious newcomers. Each has been selected carefully as a representative of the global whisky industry in its entirety.
Taken together, their stories create an accurate picture of the current state of the whisky industry. You will learn not only about their products but also about why each of these brands and distilleries
makes whisky as they do. You will come to understand the incredibly wide and ever-expanding variety of whiskies now available—and how whisky producers are responding to changing markets, especially in the context of the radical transformation of the industry over the last 30 years.
You’ll start to see the trends driving the global whisky industry today, and what they might mean for the aromas and flavors you encounter in your glass.
Whisky production has come a long way since the fifteenth century, when British and Irish monks first started to distill grain-based moonshine, primarily for medicinal purposes. For the first few centuries, casks were rarely used to mature this “aqua vitae (water of life),” as it was known. It was far more common to mix in or infuse a wide variety of herbs, spices, sweeteners, and other ingredients to make the rough unaged spirits more palatable.
You could say these early spirits had more in common with infused vodka or gin. While the use of casks for storage and maturation of alcohol is a practice that dates back millennia, it was not widely used for whisky until the nineteenth century, when larger quantities of sherry, brandy, and rum began to be imported into the UK. The casks used to transport these spirits were then used for whisky.
However, today’s world of whisky also reflects that of the United Kingdom in the second half of the
sixteenth century, when King Henry VIII, his vice regent Thomas Cromwell, and his Lord Chancellor Baron Thomas Audley dissolved all English, Welsh, and Irish Catholic orders. Formerly cloistered in their abbeys and monasteries, distiller monks and nuns set up shop amid the general population and taught lay people how to make the spirit that evolved into what we now know as whisky. Eventually, it was common for taverns and inns to make hooch with their own stills to ply to travellers.
Similarly, within the past 30 years the knowledge of high-quality whisky making has spread around the world, a reflection of the wider global craft spirits boom. While whisky has been a drink enjoyed globally for two centuries, its production internationally is a recent development.
Yet, as you will read in the coming pages, in modern times whisky has run in boom-and-bust cycles. The last serious downturn was in the 1980s, suffering from an image as both unfashionable and a liquor for the elderly. Now, though, whisky is enjoying a golden age (which could explain why you’re reading this book).
Previously, Scotland, the United States, Canada, Japan, and Ireland tended to enjoy a monopoly on whiskymaking knowledge, and production was largely controlled by a relatively small number of companies. Though large conglomerates are still the industry’s main players, today there are more whisky producers, brands, bonders, and bottlers than ever before.
Numerous factors have contributed to this boom. Experienced whisky consultants such as Dr. Jim Swan have passed on their knowledge to many eager new producers around the globe. The internet has enabled information on distillation and whisky making to be shared easily. New, smaller producers in the US and Scotland are exciting many whisky fans. The high-quality equipment for creating the best whisky is easier to procure. Furthermore, the generally transparent culture of the industry, especially in Scotch whisky, means that distillers and entrepreneurs are usually more than happy to share their deepest secrets, tricks, and methods. Many new producers have benefited from their transparency.
This combination of democratized knowledge and innovation means that consumers now live in a “postmodern age of whisky.” Skilled producers can highlight any flavors and aromas they desire from any part of the production process. Traditionally, these arise from distillation, maturation, and the dark art of effective blending. While whisky makers are certainly investigating these areas extensively, some have also successfully demonstrated that other aspects of production including fermentation, the strain of yeast used, and the way feedstock grains are farmed also can have a massive impact on a whisky’s character. In many cases, the larger whisky companies are paying close attention to these developments, either experimenting themselves, or acquiring those distilleries that impress them.
As a result, new frontiers of aroma and taste are being discovered (or re-discovered) by the global whisky industry. A few decades ago, certain traditions were not questioned. Now, however, the industry is exploring a number of fronts—for example, how the concept of terroir intersects with whisky, or how the values driving regional, national, or historical identity can influence locally produced whisky. To an extent, this evolution is driven by consumers’ endless thirst for more information about the actual production of whisky. And, of course, new whisky makers are searching for novel ways to stand out in a market that offers far more choice than ever before.
The result is an exciting new world of whisky to discover.
IS IT “WHISKY” OR “WHISKEY”?
Though it may be hard to believe that one little letter can make a big difference, many whisky fans take it very seriously. Here’s the spelling rule that will keep you straight: American and Irish whiskeys are spelled with an “e,” while whiskies from any other country are not.
There are a few exceptions. For example, in the US, notable brands Maker’s Mark, George Dickel, Old Forester, and Rittenhouse don’t use that “e.” Oddly, the latter of this group is made at Heaven Hill Distillery–where all other whiskey brands keep the ‘e’ in their branding.
The Irish and Scots take the spelling particularly seriously, and you will suffer a sharp lecture from the Irish if you write about their whiskey without the “e.”
A Scot, meanwhile, will quickly and emphatically correct you if you insert a rogue “e” when writing about their whisky.
Even the mighty New York Times got in trouble over this spelling when its drinks columnist, Eric Asimov, wrote about “Speyside Scotch whiskey” in 2008. Of course, he knew how it should be spelled–but the New York Times style guide made clear that the publication would always spell the word “whiskey”, no matter where it was made. So Asimov had no choice but to insert that “e.” Hordes of furious whisky fans rapidly made their feelings known, and Asimov pushed his editors to revise the style guide to reflect
the correct spellings. The Times agreed and changed their guide shortly after.
However, this raging spelling controversy is a relatively recent development. For decades, the spelling of “whisky” and “whiskey” was interchangeable across Scottish, Irish, American, and Canadian brands, as both are simply an Anglicized adaptation of the Gaelic phrase for whisky, uisge beatha (pronounced “oosh-geh beh-ha”).
The origins of the split begin with an Irish marketing campaign. The advent of Coffey and column stills in the early-to-mid nineteenth century meant that more whisky than ever before could be produced, especially as the cost of American corn declined. However, this whisky was generally of inferior quality, and blended together with more traditional pot-distilled malt whisky to give it more character and tamp down the harshness. (This is still the case today, although column-distilled whisky is much better now.) Scottish distillers were the first to employ these stills en masse and could flood the market, therefore outpacing Irish whiskeys. Understandably, the large Dublin distillers followed suit and began using these stills.
Yet in the late nineteenth century distillers in Cork, Ireland, stuck to their guns, producing inefficient but tastier pot-still distilled malt whiskey. So they launched a marketing campaign claiming that whisky spelled with an “e” was of a quality superior to the mass-produced fare from Dublin and Scotland. Not to be
outdone, the Dublin distillers adopted the “e,” which spread throughout Ireland. Despite these spelling wars, the marketing campaign failed to prevent the eventual collapse of Irish whiskey that began with World War I.
It is not entirely clear why this spelling took hold in the United States as well. Certainly, the large influx of Irish to the country in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries played a part. But there were plenty of Scottish immigrants in the US as well. (For those wondering, Canada has been consistent with the use of “whisky.”)
Legally, it took some time for bureaucracies to catch up. The British government, while working out the law related to Scotch whisky, named it “Enquiry into whiskey and other potable spirit,” in 1908. However, “whisky” is the official legal spelling used in subsequent laws including the current law, the Scotch Whisky Regulations Act of 2009. While Irish law does not specify spelling, the “e” is used in both the 1950 and 1980 versions of the Irish Whiskey Act. That said, European Union law, which Ireland also follows, allows either spelling.
As for the US, the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives issued a directive in 1968 stating that the official spelling in the US should be “whisky”—but in the years since has spelled it “whiskey.”
Go figure.
So what does it all this mean for this book? You may have noticed that “whiskey” and “whisky” have been used interchangeably depending on context—depending on whether whiskeys from the US and Ireland are being referred to, or whiskies from anywhere else. This will continue to be the case throughout, hopefully without generating too much confusion. Pluralized, you will read “whiskeys” when referring to groupings of American or Irish whiskeys, and “whiskies” or “whisky” in all other situations (such as referring to “the global whisky industry”).
What you won’t see here is what is considered to be the “politically correct” form encompassing all of it—“whisk(e)y”. To my eye, that is just too ugly and clunky, so you will have to indulge the bouncing back and forth between the spellings, depending on the context a whisky is produced in.
A SHORT HISTORY OF WHISKY
THE EARLY YEARS
From its creation, whisky has been a product deeply influenced by the wider social and economic forces rooted in the communities that make it. Two principal drivers have affected the development of whisky throughout the centuries: agriculture and taxes.
Whisky began as a neutral, grain-based spirit, the aqua vitae produced by monks and used primarily for medicinal purposes. While brandy—a spirit made from distilled wine—was made in climates that could grow the necessary grapes, in the United Kingdom and Northern Europe cereal grains were used instead to produce this spirit.
Eventually, primarily thanks to the social shock of the Reformation in the sixteenth century, which led to the dissolution of Catholic orders throughout Europe (see: Henry VIII in England as the most extreme example of this action), knowledge of distillation began to spread to the general population and the consumption of whisky came to be seen as a social, communal activity. Spirits distillation created a use for the spare grain harvest or the grain waste that would otherwise spoil. Spirits also kept for far longer than beer (which was also brewed in large quantities). Indeed, even then the Scots especially were eager producers and
consumers of spirits; in 1579, the Scottish parliament temporarily banned distillation in anticipation of a poor grain harvest, claiming “a great quantity of malt [is] consumed in the whole part of this realm by making of aqua vita, which is a great cause of the dearth.”
The concern about the possible societal problems from excessive alcohol consumption and the potential for the swelling of public coffers led to more significant taxes and regulation as governments sought to control and/or profit from distillation. Dutch officials imposed a tax on spirits in the early seventeenth century, while England and Scotland followed in 1643 and 1644, respectively—the former to finance the English Civil War. Thus began a long conflict between the taxman and illicit distillers looking to avoid paying their due.
Eventually, heavier taxation on malted barley (used not just for spirits but also bread and beer) would lead to significant violence, a period of tumult that has also shaped today’s whisky world. In 1715, new taxes on malt provided fuel for the Jacobite uprisings in England and Scotland. The 1725 Malt Tax, when those heavy taxes were then applied to Scotland, led to riots in the streets of Glasgow and other Scottish cities.
These taxes marked a major societal shift in Scotland, as whisky could no longer be easily produced legally at home, as it had in the past. Families had used their home-distilled spirit to sell at markets, barter for other goods, and even to pay rent. Little
wonder the taxes imposed by the English crown led to significant tensions, and a significant increase of illegal distillation, particularly after a rise in the duty in the 1790s was imposed to pay for the war with France. In Ireland, taxes on malted barley levied in 1785 would lead to the creation of what is now known as “single pot still,” when crafty distillers turned to unmalted barley to avoid paying the taxman.
During this time, and thanks to the technological advances of the Industrial Revolution, larger-scale distilleries were established in the lowlands and central belt of Scotland, but these for the most part made poor whisky—they used little malted barley, which produced higher quality hooch—while in 1823, 14,000 reports were logged of illegal distillation across Scotland. Made with malted barley and pot stills, illegal whisky was usually much tastier and higher quality than the commercially produced spirits. Even King George IV asked for “whisky from Glenlivet”— and he would’ve known it was illegally distilled—on his famous 1822 state visit to Scotland. That said, this underground trade also drove a significant amount of lawlessness and crime across the country.
The situation changed quickly as a result of the Excise Act of 1823, which reduced taxes on Scottish distillers and made it far easier to establish legal distilleries while also standardizing the construction and operation of these facilities. The act massively reduced illegal distilling and smuggling with immediate effect, and encouraged maturation and storage
of whisky, which illegal distillers rarely performed because they needed flexibility to disassemble and move their setups quickly. Many distilleries still active today were founded shortly after the establishment of the Excise Act, and the changes it drove make it arguably the most important piece of whisky legislation in history, establishing the backbone of today’s Scotch whisky industry.
English whisky benefited from a similar law in 1825 during a revival of that country’s whisky, some of which was sent to Scotland for blending. However, the English boom didn’t last long—when the Lea Valley Distillery in Stratford, Essex, closed down in 1903, it marked the end of English whisky for over 100 years.
The development of whisky in the United States and Canada followed an analogous, if accelerated, pattern as Europe. European emigrant settlers, including Scots, some of whom were displaced by the brutal Highland Clearances (which stretched from 1750 to 1860), established farms on the American continent. These rural families began making moonshine for their communities, generally using corn, rye, and wheat. The abundant oak found across North America, especially in the US, was used to transport this whisky to different markets—and also happened to improve its taste. Eventually, Kentuckians in Old Bourbon County got the idea to char the barrels transporting the whisky to create tastier liquor, which led to the creation of bourbon as we now know it.
Canada mainly avoided whisky-based violence, and taxes levied from whisky production were instrumental in helping set up the nascent Confederation’s economy after its founding in 1867. The story was not the same in the United States. In some parts of the country, slave labor was a significant factor in the development of distillation, and it is likely that some of the first American distillers were slaves. Whiskey taxes also presented President George Washington’s new government with its first major challenge since the foundation of the country.
In 1791, President George Washington—himself a distiller—imposed a tax on all domestic distilled spirits, the nation’s first on a domestic product, in order to pay back debts incurred during the Revolutionary War. Popular uprisings, especially in Pennsylvania, lasted years and came to a head in 1794 with an attack on a local tax inspector. Washington himself rode out with an overwhelming force of militiamen, and the rebels quietly went home.
Though Washington managed to prevent further instability, over a century later the imposition of Prohibition in the country also triggered a rise of crime syndicates smuggling and selling alcohol around the country. These are the famous dark days of Al Capone and his peers.
Significant whisky industries also existed in other corners of the world. In Australia, distillation was legalized in 1820, though small-scale distillers were
often hampered by law, especially an 1862 edict that favored large-scale production. The Federal distillery, built in 1888, was the third largest distillery in the world at the time, though it was not exclusively a whisky distillery.
In other parts of Asia, spirits distilled from rice, millet, and even barley were popular in China and Japan over the centuries. Rather than using the malting process to extract the sugars from starches that could be converted into alcohol, a fungus known as qu in China and koji in Japan did (and still does) the job. In some ways, the popular Chinese spirit baijiu, which is often made with rice, resembles the early forms of whisky distilled by monks, and, just like whisky, baijiu was also flavored with herbs and spices in the nineteenth century. A few Japanese distilleries then were making what could be called rice whisky as well. Yet, despite similarities, these Asian distillations are usually excluded from historical whisky narratives and have also not really influenced the contemporary whisky industry in Asia.
A MATURING WHISKY INDUSTRY
The whisky industry as we currently know it was established in the second half of the nineteenth century.
The Industrial Revolution made the mass production of whisky feasible, especially following the development of the column and Coffey stills—though, as
we’ve said, these also contributed to a decline in quality—that enabled continuous production, a massive leap forward compared to the limited batches available via pot stills. As transportation and trade networks expanded and modernized, whisky could be distributed and sold around the world, and this growing marketplace also made available a large supply of casks that formerly held imported sherry, wine, rum, and brandy for maturing whisky in warehouses.
The first large and international whisky businesses began to emerge during this time, and quickly found enormous success. In Scotland, grocers such as John Walker and his sons, the Chivas Brothers, and Andrew Usher, among many others, began blending together great amounts of whisky, creating iconic brands that found fans across the world. Inspired by these early successes, many more began acquiring and/or building their own distilleries.
In Ireland, a law passed in 1823 (which was similar to Scotland’s Excise Act) made legal distillation more viable and relaxed whiskey taxation, provoking the amount of legal distilleries operating in the country to triple over just 12 years. In 1825, the Midleton Distillery was operating the largest pot still in history, processing 31,600 gallons at a time, a figure that none of today’s distilleries come close to matching. From 1870, in the United States, the Illinois city of Peoria established itself as a true whiskey capital, producing 18 million gallons of alcohol (not all of it
whiskey) in 1880. By comparison, the entire state of Kentucky produced 15 million gallons that year.
These large industries were subsequently affected by a number of geopolitical shocks that were universally painful, more for some than others. World War I saw the collapse of a number of distilleries, while others were drafted into the war effort and forced to shift focus away from growth and innovation. In Ireland, the Irish War of Independence and subsequent Irish Civil War crippled the country’s industry. Prohibition was brutal for American producers, ended Peoria’s dominance, and allowed Canadian and Scottish producers to pull ahead, though both of those industries also suffered with the loss of the US, their main market. The Great Depression worsened the situation.
After World War II, a new whisky order emerged. The Scots, now ready to produce more whisky than ever, needed a supply of casks for which they turned to the Bourbon industry— which had loads to offer. Japan’s Yamazaki and Yoichi whisky distilleries, established in the interwar years, survived the devastation of World War II intact because they provided the Japanese military forces with their alcohol rations—which meant their businesses and supply chain did not diminish during the conflict, positioning them to prosper as the country recovered.
Compared to the prior instability, the postwar period was relatively stable. Large drinks conglomerates jockeyed among themselves for control of domestic
and international markets, buying up assets, building distilleries and brands, selling them to each other— and sometimes going bust.
For example, American companies bought many Scotch distilleries and companies during this time. Surprisingly, no new Scotch malt whisky distilleries had been built in the twentieth century until Tormore in 1960. It was commissioned by American company Schenley, and was the first of a new series of distilleries that were constructed across the country. In Japan, Nikka and Suntory steadily grew and built new production facilities, while Fuji Gotemba, an international project originally shared among Kirin Holdings, Seagram, and Chivas Brothers, was easily one of the most high-tech and modern distilleries in the world when it was built in 1973. Canadian whisky also quietly prospered as Crown Royal took off after its introduction to American consumers in 1960.
However, not everything was so sweet elsewhere. After prospering in the immediate postwar years, both bourbon and the wider American whiskey industry were limping by the late 1960s as demand plummeted, foreshadowing the coming collapse. The Australian whisky industry was virtually murdered as two international companies, Gibney’s and the Distiller’s Company of Edinburgh (now drinks giant Diageo) swept up local distilleries and diminished the quality of whisky in order to favor imports of their international brands. These local distilleries were eventually shuttered. Most Irish distilleries had shut up shop as well, and
the remaining companies took a gamble and merged into Irish Distillers, closing their remaining facilities and consolidating production at what is now the New Midleton Distillery. Eventually, the group acquired the Bushmills distillery in Northern Ireland, becoming the only company producing whiskey on the Irish isle.
THE 1980s CRASH TO PRESENT DAY
The ’80s were particularly brutal for whisky. Around the world, a new generation of drinkers became more interested in vodka, tequila, beer, and wine. Whisky was regarded as a stuffy drink for older people. Compounding the problem: whisky producers globally had ramped up, calculating that demand would rise, rather than rapidly fall. In short, they were ill-prepared for a radical reorientation in consumer behavior. Despite owning warehouses packed with whisky, many distilleries and businesses shut down, negatively impacting the communities that relied on them—which was especially painful during the global economic recession. While bourbon survived, to a large degree thanks to strong demand in Japan (Japan’s love for bourbon helps to explain why Japanese companies would later buy up distilleries such as Four Roses—Kirin, in 2001, and Jim Beam—Suntory in 2014), its luck ended with the Japanese financial crash of 1989.
However, amid the industry’s near-global bust were the seeds of a future renaissance. In Scotland, a number of enterprising distilleries such as Glenfiddich and
whisky vendors including George Urquhart and the Milroy brothers had begun popularizing and singing the praises of single malt Scotch whisky, creating the perception that it was a luxury product worthy of being considered and appreciated like the finest wines. The bourbon industry began to slowly pivot in a similar direction—Blanton’s introducing the concept of single-barrel bourbons serving as one example of this evolution.
Most importantly, because so much spirit was made in the ’80s, from the mid-1990s onward large amounts of well-aged and delicious stock were ready for release. The fresh interest in these aged spirits also triggered a novel degree of curiosity—drinkers wanted to know everything about how and where the whisky was produced. Whisky tourism became a rapidly growing sub-industry. Distilleries in Scotland, the United States, and eventually Ireland, Canada, and Japan inaugurated visitor centers and offered tours to accommodate eager whisky aficionados. The Kentucky Bourbon Trail, established in 1999 to educate enthusiastic fans, has so far welcomed 18 million visitors. Production, sales, and exports rapidly increased throughout the early 2000s, and the industry largely maintained its momentum through the Great Recession of the late aughts.
The craft distillery boom that started gaining pace in the 2000s has finally come into its own. In the United States alone, 455 craft distilleries across all spirits had been founded by 2011. By 2021, that number had
rocketed to more than 2,200. In the UK, the number of distilleries across all spirits increased by 135 percent between 2010 and 2016 for a total of 273 distilleries. By 2023, more than 100 had been added, totaling 387.
The story repeats around the world. Ireland now boasts a new list of distilleries and bonders making whiskey again, propped up by the pillars of Bushmills and New Midleton, while Australia’s industry has been revived with more than 120 distilleries producing whisky. England’s industry has also returned from the dead, with 40 new distillers making whisky since The English Distillery was founded in 2006.
Never have there been so many new distilleries making the water of life, though, aside from the countries typically associated with whisky, these tend to be smaller facilities. This mass influx of new producers, while accounting for a small amount of total whisky produced, have in turn influenced the wider whisky industry with innovations across the global supply chain and production process. The large number of distilleries and new brands is a reflection of the growing global market for whisky—one estimate from the Global Whisky Market Overview by Bonafide Research claims the global whisky market will be worth $127 billion by 2028.
Certainly, Irish monks, American distiller-farmers, and illegal Scottish distillers of yore could not possibly have imagined the scope and influence their humble spirit would one day wield.
HOW ALL WHISKY IS MADE
Ok, we’re going deep into deeper into the whisky weeds in this section. I hope that geeks will appreciate the refresher course and whisky newbies the education.
In his book The Philosophy of Whisky, author, writer, and drinks ambassador for the online retail giant The Whisky Exhange Billy Abbott offers a revealing recipe of how exactly whisky is made. A precis of his analysis follows:
First, make bad porridge by mixing smashed-up grains with water. Then, use that porridge to make a quantity of bad beer (“a low-tech beer that most of the world moved on from years ago,” comments Abbott). Distill this beer to make bad vodka because vodka is all about spirit purity, whereas in whisky the impurities left in the spirit contribute to flavor, once matured in a cask for a while. Maturation is crucial. Under modern standards, the processes involved differentiate whisky from similar but unaged spirits. Whisky can rest safely for decades in a cask—the record for the oldest whisky currently belongs to an 84-year-old Macallan from Scotland.
The main ingredients that are used across all whiskies are grains, yeast, water, and wood. Depending on the laws of the country where the whisky is produced, some additives are optional, such as peat or wood smoke.
But let’s get down to the basics of the production process.
GRAINS
For the most part, whisky incorporates one or more of a limited number of grain species. The main ones are barley—and malted barley will often be referred to as “malt”—rye, wheat, and maize (aka corn, but “maize” tends to refer to crops used for more “technical” products, such as ethanol).
Other grains, among them rice, millet, buckwheat, triticale (a wheat-rye hybrid), sorghum, and oats can be, and are, used. But because that use is limited, we will not cover many such whiskies in this book.
Distilled on their own, such as the case of single malt Scotch whisky, or combined together, like American rye or Bourbon whiskeys, each of these grains is responsible for different aromas and flavors.
Corn tends to create a sweet and creamy profile, heavy on vanilla, butter, custard, and crème brûlée, though sometimes it can bear musty undertones. Rye is darker and spicier, which can lead to notes of dark fruits, winter spices, and coffee. Wheat is probably the least-used of the big four, and wafts notes of honey and bread. Finally, barley is possibly the most flexible of these cereals for deriving flavors and aromas. Malted barley tends to provide caramel
and orchard fruits as well as bready and chocolaty notes. Unmalted barley, sometimes favored by the Irish, is a bit fresher, grassier, and citric (and will always be blended together with its malted counterpart). Because it is rawer than malted barley and can be harsher, triple distillation became the norm in Ireland as it extracts more alcohol from the grains, creating a cleaner spirit. Rye also appears in malted and unmalted forms—the former with a profile that is darker, toastier, earthier, and nuttier, the latter spicier, herbal, and peppery, yet retaining lighter notes after maturation.
Note that I am generalizing a bit for the sake of simplicity as to what these grains can do to whisky. So, too, their influence, which also will be determined by the processing. As in all things, exceptions to the rule abound.
Beyond this, varietal types and the manner in which the grains are cultivated can also impact flavor. Some whisky geeks swear by specific grain varietals. (Mention “Maris Otter” to a hardcore Scotch whisky fan and watch them swoon.) A number of enterprising distilleries have conducted successful experiments comparing different varietals used in their whiskies, between annual harvests of their grains or even among individual farms that provide the grains. Some distilleries and brands use specific heritage varietals that often will yield less alcohol, but pack loads of flavor.
For some producers, specific types of grain honor their cultural identity, or reduce their environmental impact. As you will read later in this book, Finland’s Kyrö uses a Finnish heritage varietal of rye that profoundly shapes its whisky, while Fielden in England uses a novel method of farming by which heritage grain varietals are grown together on the same field without any additional chemicals, fertilizers, or pesticides.
That said, most whisky producers rely on commercial grain varietals developed to deliver the largest possible alcohol yield. After all, whisky belongs to the wider agro-business ecosystem.
MALTING, MILLING, MASHING & STARCH EXTRACTION
The sugars whisky makers require from grains are contained in carbohydrates called starches, which must be first broken down—meaning the starch in the grain must be converted into sugar to enable fermenting. This is where malting enters the picture.
Usually, any malted grains for whisky are supplied to distilleries by commercial maltsters, though a few distilleries will create all or some of their own malt on-site.
Malting is all about “tricking” grains by soaking them in warm water to activate enzymes that will trigger the release of their sugars. Barley and sometimes rye
will be malted for whisky production, while malted corn and malted wheat are much less common in whisky. After the sugars are released, the grains are heated and dried before too much of the starch gets broken down.
The grains are subsequently ground down before mashing, which is another, hotter water bath in large wooden or steel vats to extract still more sugars, resulting in Abbott’s “poor porridge” mentioned above.
It’s worth noting that whisky makers also use the enzymes released by malted barley to extract sugars from other grains, a common practice with grain whisky in Scotland and Ireland, which is usually made of maize or wheat with some malted barley incorporated, and in many American whiskeys.
However, when malted grains are insufficient or not used, their unmalted counterparts require additional added enzymes to mimic the malting process in order to extract the sugars. While addition of these enzymes is legally barred from Scotch whisky production and only permitted as a support for whiskies made in the European Union, they are often used in both Canadian and American whiskies.
By the end of this process, what’s left is the “mash,” a mix of sludgy solids and a sweet, sugary liquid known as wort. American whiskeys then often ferment both the solids and the wort, while in Europe, only the wort is used. The remaining waste grains, once dried, are often converted into livestock feed.
PEAT
For any producer making peated whisky, peat smoke, with very few exceptions, comes into play during the malting phase—and usually, but not exclusively, in Scotland. Peat adds a virtual catalogue of smoky, medicinal, and meaty aromas and flavors to whisky.
Known as turf in Ireland, peat is a collection of mosses and plants that have been decomposing for thousands or even tens of thousands of years without oxygen. It looks like mud or dirt when dug out of the ground. Dried, it can be lit on fire and is the ancient fuel source of Celtic tribes.
Scotch whisky’s early years as clear moonshine was generally made using peat as a fuel source, turning most of that aqua vitae into a smoky elixir.
To use peat during the malting process, a small amount is burned, creating smoke that sticks to the barley as it dries. That adsorbed smoke contains compounds called phenols and guaiacols that are responsible for the smoky flavors and aromas in peated whisky. Peat is a spectrum–whiskies can feature heavy, medium, or light amounts. These compounds are then strategically shed over the course of production to arrive at the desired profile.
FERMENTATION
Now that the mash is ready, it’s time to make that bad, hopless beer. During fermentation, added yeast converts sugars into carbon dioxide, alcohol, and various flavor-producing compounds. All steps in the distillation process of whisky are crucial, but that is especially the case for fermentation, as much of a whisky’s character can depend on what occurs at this point.
Different yeasts, many of them variants of the breadand sugar-loving saccharomyces cerevisiae, will yield a range of aromas and flavors. Some distilleries have proprietary yeasts that they developed themselves, or brewed an ideal yeast mix they keep secret. In Scotland, most distilleries use the same kind of distiller’s yeast. Others experiment with various types.
This phase occurs in fermentation tanks known as washbacks or fermenters, usually made of stainless steel, although wooden ones made of larch or Douglas fir (also known as Oregon pine) are used as well. A debate rages over which is best: steel is easier to maintain and use, while wood offers unique microflora that its pores can grow, providing subtle contributions to the flavors at the end. Regardless, a typical fermentation length is three days—enough time for the yeast to eat all the enzymes and sugars and convert them into alcohol.
However, some distilleries opt for slower fermentations, a decision that enables more thorough processing of
available sugars. Going slow can also encourage build-up of lactic acid which can further process remaining sugars and add new aromas and flavors. Slow fermentation is considered de rigeur amongst today’s whisky cognoscenti.
Many American whiskeys use a process called sour mash, adding some of a previous batch’s fermented mash (or spent mash) to the current batch. This method helps maintain an ideal acidity level, control bacterial growth, and encourage consistency in terms of flavor.
Whatever the method, the result is a beer-like concoction, called the wash, clocking in at around 6 to 10% alcohol by volume (referred to as ABV from now on) that at best will be somewhat palatable and at worst quite unpleasant. Fortunately, though, its destiny is distillation.
DISTILLATION
The distillation process that occurs in either pot or column stills concentrates the alcohol found in the wash by heating it, separating the volatile alcohol vapors and condensing them into the spirit that becomes whisky.
Pot still distillation is produced in batches and across two or three distillations. Typically fielded in pairs (a wash still and a spirit still), pot stills are usually used
for distilling malt whisky. They can look either like large, squat, onion-shaped bulbs; longer, taller, and leaner conical structures; or anything in between. The first will tend to lead to a heavier spirit character, while the second will deliver a lighter one. A pipe called a lyne arm directs the alcohol vapor that is extracted—its shape and orientation also matters in creating the character of the spirit. While inefficient compared to the column, a pot still provides more flavor and character than a column still, which tends to produce a lighter, cleaner spirit.
Column or continuous stills are tall, tube-like structures. The wash flows through the column and is then blasted with hot steam to vaporize the alcohols in the liquid, as well as the flavor-providing compounds. A series of plates are placed throughout the still, which help filter out heavier compounds from the volatile alcohols that travel up through the plates to create the desired spirit strength. As with pot stills, characteristics such as length and number of plates can affect the resulting spirit.
Distilleries might also work with one type of still or have multiple types, and sometimes will mix them together during distillation. For example, to enhance flavors the major Canadian distillers often will redistill whisky through pot stills that already has been partly column distilled. American whiskey producers, especially for bourbon, like to pair their column stills with a piece of equipment called a doubler, which is a pot still that, unlike traditional pots, is able to keep
up with the continuous production of column stills while providing some copper contact during distillation to remove potential impurities.
Some producers use other, unusual stills. Alembic stills are similar to pot stills, while hybrid stills such as Penderyn’s Faraday stills incorporate elements of both pot still and column still distillation. And there’s nothing in the industry that matches one of West Cork’s stills, nicknamed The Rocket, which runs the fastest distillations in whisky.
Beyond the equipment they work with, distillers must make many decisions about how to approach their craft. They choose cut points (a separation process determined by the various boiling points of the components), decide how much unused distillate from past batches gets re-used, or select the appropriate speed at which to run distillations. These decisions ultimately define which compounds providing aromas and flavors attach to the alcohol that emerges from the still before it is put into a cask.
MATURATION
The clear spirit that emerges from distillation is placed in a cask made of oak (though rare exceptions where casks made from other types of wood also exist). Oak has been used to store alcoholic beverages for millennia, though who first came up with the idea to use it to store for whisky is open to debate.
While the origin is unclear, the practice became both popular and common as large-scale whisky industries established themselves in the nineteenth century.
Oak is perfect for storage: hardy, less prone to leaking relative to other woods, and provides delicious aromas and flavors. Usually, the spirits coming off the still—known as new make spirit or white dog, among other monikers—will be watered down before aging to between 63.5% ABV and the low 70s.
The amount of time the whisky must be aged also varies and is regulated by law—American Bottled in Bond whiskey must be a minimum of four years old, while all Scottish and European whisky must rest a minimum of three years. Straight bourbon requires no less than two. Many countries without clear whisky making laws tend to subscribe to the Scottish standard of three years to eliminate any doubts about their commitment to quality.
Length of aging aside, that spirit in the cask will undergo some important changes as it draws flavor-providing compounds from the oak, while alcohol and other volatile compounds evaporate through the oak pores—a disappearing act that is universally known as “the angel’s share.” The warmer and more humid the climate, the more alcohol is lost to evaporation. If the maturation environment is particularly arid, more water can evaporate, leaving more alcohol behind.
Different types of casks provide different influences. Outside the US, nearly all countries employ casks that once held different alcoholic beverages. Since World War II, the vast majority are ex-bourbon casks, and even casks that didn’t hold bourbon are almost all made of American oak because it’s easier and more reliable to work with—particularly due to a shortage of other types of oak, including different varietals of European oak or Japanese Mizunara.
Ex-bourbon casks (as well as ex-Tennessee whiskey casks, which in terms of barrels are viewed as the same in the industry) tend to provide rounded, sweet aromas and flavors. They help smooth out harsher notes while contributing nutty, caramel notes as well. Casks once filled with sherry—the fortified wine produced in the Sherry Triangle of Spain’s Jerez de la Frontera—are also employed widely and generally produce fruitier, darker, and tannic notes. An important and interesting note: Ex-sherry barrels are also usually made of American oak and almost always held throwaway sherry specifically made to season the casks for whisky maturation (these sherries usually get made into sherry vinegar). With rare exceptions, the previous “old school” sherry casks—those that were used to transport “real” sherry to various export markets—are no longer used for whisky.
American producers almost always use new oak, freshly charred to ensure that the whiskey does not become excessively woody during maturation. Charring adds sweet, smoky aromas and flavors. After
initial use, casks shipped abroad are often recoopered and toasted—a burning process that, as you may have guessed, is far less intense than charring—and perhaps recharred once more. Reused casks can be used multiple times and can last for many decades.
That said, approaches to maturation are changing radically in the industry, especially with single malts around the world. Younger whiskies with no age statement (also known as NAS whiskies) are no longer unusal to see. In hot climates, longer maturation is simply not possible, while other innovations in maturation, such as the use of STR casks (“shaved, toasted, recharred”), have produced whiskies that, despite their youth, are excellent. However, there are limits to what this hastening makes available. Some young whiskies, while not bad, are unremarkable and could have gained quality with more time in oak.
A further stage in the process is known as finishing, or secondary maturation. This is when the contents of one cask are transferred into another for an additional maturation period—often it’s ex-bourbon to ex-sherry casks. When first used in larger quantities in the ’90s, it was regarded as a groundbreaking technique, it’s now considered common practice.
A variety of new types of casks are now used for maturation and secondary maturation as well, though they account for a small minority of total casks holding whisky around the world. Ex-rum and ex-wine casks are back in vogue. Some whiskies
even have acquired the characteristic aromas and flavors of peated whisky simply by being matured in casks that previously held peated whisky. Other exotic whiskies include those matured in ex-tequila and mezcal, ex-beer casks, and even whiskies matured in other types of wood, including cherrywood, chestnut, cedar, or maple.
CASKS
Notice that I have been using the word “cask” rather than “barrel” throughout the book. “Cask” is the all-encompassing term for oak containers of varying sizes. The most commonly used types of casks are barrels, hogsheads, and butts.
Generally, the smaller the cask, the more the spirit is in contact with the wood, delivering more intense influence from the oak. Here’s a quick guide to the types of casks used in whisky:
Port pipes (172 gallons/650 liters): The standard type of cask for maturing port wine. More whisky is now matured in these casks as whisky makers seek the influence of port.
Butts (132 gallons/500 liters): These usually are the largest casks in a warehouse, and previously held Spanish sherry.
Puncheons (130 to 185 gallons/500 to 700 liters): Used for sherry but sometimes for rum, puncheons can vary greatly in size. The term can refer to casks made from leftover staves, the planks that comprise a cask.
Barriques (66 to 79 gallons/225 to 300 liters): Barriques held wine first before being used for whisky.
Hogsheads (63 to 72 gallons/230 to 250 liters): Favored by the Scots and most producers outside North America, hogsheads are often built from recoopered barrels.
Barrels (53 gallons/200 liters): Used for most American whiskeys, but sometimes they are employed abroad as well.
Quarter casks (33 gallons/125 liters): Quarter casks are so named for holding a quarter of the capacity of a butt.
Octave/Firkin (13 gallons/50 liters): Octaves can also be referred to as “quarter casks,” particularly in the US, because they hold a quarter of the amount as a barrel. If you see “quarter casks,” feel free to seek clarification.
Bloodtub (30 to 40 liters/8 to 10 gallons): These barely see commercial use as the time whisky matures in blood tubs is limited due to intense contact with the wood.
BLENDING
This is arguably the most important step of all in whisky making. Whisky is produced on a large scale and the world’s most popular releases can only be created by a master blender or a blending team with a very sensitive collective nose and palate, blending a small number of casks together—or perhaps thousands.
Canadian whisky magnate Samuel Bronfman once declared that “distilling is a science; blending is an art.” No whisky company can overlook the importance of blending, and they are wholly dependent on the human senses of master blenders and their blending teams to deliver.
Blenders generally walk a tightrope, considering sometimes contradictory factors. In general, not only do they need to perform quality control ensuring that the whisky they are producing is actually good. They also are tasked with guaranteeing that the whisky continues to taste as it did in past years. Almost all whisky brands have a characteristic profile: Success with consumers depends on consistency of aromas and flavors as new casks are cycled into production. Sometimes, though, they need to conceive a new and innovative product that will be enjoyed by consumers, such as region-specific releases tailored to the tastes of a specific market.
Only in extremely rare cases do blenders not fret over consistency. Such enterprising brands, look-
ing to create a wine-like experience, unleash their blenders to change creations every year, allowing for more creativity while marketing different annual “vintages.” Thus, they are freed from the constraint of consistency.
But all blenders must gaze into their crystal balls and predict what consumers will want to drink years later. Because they require a mature stock, the success—or failure—of their crucial decisions will only be revealed decades later.
ADDITIVES
While there’s few ingredients needed to make top quality whisky, there’s sometimes surprising flexibility regarding the additional ingredients that can be included. Smoke, in particular peat smoke, is one of the best-known examples.
However, the most common additive is caramel coloring. Usually, the specific compound is E-150a. Often a very small amount is used and it is almost impossible to detect any aroma and flavor from it (on its own, it’s got a pretty bitter taste). It is surprisingly common for whisky to be artificially colored and there are two reasons behind it.
The first is simply that if a whisky looks darker, it looks “tastier” or “older” and therefore more appealing to someone who is not sure what they want to purchase and comparing the various bottles at the store.
The other is visual branding—well-known whiskies that use artificial coloring will have a specific shade of caramel that must be met—you don’t want consumers picking up two bottles of their favorite whisky and seeing differently colored spirits within—so using caramel coloring helps standardize the whisky as thousands of casks are cycled into its production.
Despite the tough rules enforcing its production, caramel coloring is allowed across all Scotch whisky. Notably, American whiskey is best known
for prohibiting the use of artificial coloring—it’s not allowed in bourbon, nor anything labeled as a straight whiskey (more on this on page 187).
However, outside of these categories American whiskey is extremely permissive. Anything that isn’t bourbon not labeled as straight or bottled in bond is allowed up to 2.5 percent of its content to be flavor additives picked from a long list approved of by the Food and Drug Administration. My favorite example is the Eau de Musc from Tamworth Distillery in New Hampshire, which uses castoreum, a compound sourced from the scent glands found just under a beaver’s anus. It was a popular sweetener in the nineteenth century and gives additional fruity raspberry notes.
Famously, and as you’ll read about later, Canada allows up to 9.09 percent of its whiskies to consist of added unaged wine, or spirits that are at least two years old.
In general, and much more often in recent years, the whisky cognoscenti frown upon additives, but there’s no denying they still play an incredibly important role in the industry.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
FELIPE SCHRIEBERG is a multiple award-winning whisky writer, author, and musician, published across a wide variety of mainstream and industry publications. He is also a member of the Keepers of the Quaich, an international society that recognizes those who have shown an outstanding commitment to the Scotch whisky industry.
For his work, he was awarded the 2022 Icons of Whisky Communicator of the Year and the 2021 Alan Lodge Young International Drinks Writer of the Year. He was named to the shortlist for the 2022 Fortnum and Mason Drinks Writer of the Year as well as the 2022 and 2025 IWSC Spirits Communicator of the Year awards.
As a musician, he is one-half of The Rhythm and Booze Project, a duo fusing live music and whisky through gigs, tasting events, and multimedia. He is also the co-founder of Rhythm and Booze Records, an award-winning, hybrid, indie spirits bottler and record label that pairs together music and exclusive, specially curated spirits.
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