In which I meet a Scottish Dick Van Dyke, a legendary stillman, and a dram good dram. I also confirm that my career as a rally driver is a non-starter, and the nav system is deluded. (And also write far too much for one post).

Up at 8:00am after a thoroughly good night’s sleep. Those that kmow me well know that that is worth the trip right there. Mayfield’s version of the full Scottish breakfast was 2 sausage, 2 bacon, 2 eggs, beans, mushrooms and the tomato. Also a full press pot of coffee to myself that was easily demolished, like the food. Right, that’s me set for the day.

Nearly forgot, I met a lovely couple at breakfast, the husband (I hate my brain) and his wife Laurence. Among other things, they make yarn and other materials for crafts, all hand-dyed and local to the north coast. I didn’t write down the name of their business and have lousy interwebs at the moment. After I have access to better research options, I will update the post here ’cause they ship to the US.

Left the B&B for the long, arduous drive to Benromach, basically across the dual carriageway. Still managed to get lost… well, not really lost, just a wrong turn due to some road works. Almost a personal tour again, but was happily joined by Scott and Sarah from Ohio, just married (near Oban) and touring Speyside. Our guide was the inimitable Alec, who I realised, after many (many) jokes and stories, reminded me of a Scottish Dick Van Dyke. In only the best ways, not the really bad accent way.

The tour started with a lovely wee video talking about the history of the distillery and the family running it. It was full of romantic notions that Alec took playful delight in dispelling at every opportunity 🙂  My personal favourite was when we reached the washback: “Remember that part of the video, showing him sprinkling a handful of yeast over the liquid? There’s no sprinkling! There’s a 20kg block o’ yeast that he just chucks in there!”

When the original distillery closed in 1983, the owners gutted it for scrap for resale, everything that would fetch money. They left anything that wouldn’t , which wasn’t much, but did include the washbacks. But I’m getting ahead of myself. Most tours start by the mill, with an overview of converting the malted barley to grist. This is done by passing the barley through a mill. I’m used to seeing a Porteus mill in almost every distillery, so it was a pleasant change to meet Bobby (a mill manufactured by Robert Boby).

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Aside: The Porteus Mill.

Porteus seemed to make the best mills, damned near unbreakable, and should be the origin of the phrase “They don’t make ’em like this any more!” And perhaps for good reason. You see, the Porteus mills never broke down, or really needed much in the way of maintenance. To the point that, once all the distilleries had bought one, they never needed to buy another. Ever. One of the ones that I saw this trip was 94 years old. It needs the occasional tweak, but not much. If a part does need replacing, it’s custom made. Why? Because Porteus went out of business due to lack of return business. A lesson in how to make things too well.

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Right, where was I? Ah yes, we’d just meet Bobby. The next few steps were much like most distilleries. But, as is always the case, I did get to see something new. In this case I saw samples of the foreshot, which just looked nasty – visible impurities and all. We then got to wash our hands in some new make spirit (which we might also have supped out of our hands). The smell was wonderful… Ahhh, sweet peaty goodness… Wait a mo’. I forgot something!

Benromach seem to do something strange with their malting. I swear that Alec mentioned two, distinct drying runs: coal dried, malted, then peat dried at 10ppm. This is using highland peat, by the way, different from Islay peat. The composition is different because the source vegetation is different i.e. heather vs seaweed. Anyway, Benromach’s core expressions are lightly peated.

The wash still and spirit still are so completely different in shape that I’d have pegged them as being from two separate distilleries: one looks like stacked balls, the other about as traditional as you can get. Pictures will be added, again, when interwebs make for easier data movement.

Let’s see, what else? Oh, yes. The current Distillery Manager, the company CEO, and some other high heedjin were wandering about the distillery, and it was amusing as hell to watch Alec (quite openly) stall to avoid being in the same place as them. I think the tour would have been a lot more boring if he hadn’t… The dunnage warehouses smelled fabulous as always, and there was plenty of stock sitting, agimg, evaporating straight into my lungs. I probably robbed more than a few angels of their daily shares with the lungfuls I took in. How many people can say that? If I’m wrong about the whole god thing, I’m so going to hell, with an escort of sober Scottish angels. I did this while standing next to Prince Charles’ personal cask. No, really.

Fast forward to the tasting. We got to sample the Organic, 10 yr, 15 yr, and Peated expressions. I only took a sip of each. Because I was driving, which they asked in advance, they put my samples in miniature bottles to take with me, which I much appreciated. And because I did my usual and stuck around talking with the staff after, I also got a small sample of the 5yr (nee Traditional) expression. Oh, and kudos to Scott and Sarah who stuck around chatting for a while too. So much more personable. During my extended time, Alec showed me features of the visitors building which were remnants of its time as the old malting floor. While we were outside, Alec suddenly grabbed me (figuratively) and took me to meet a gent in his eighties who was gardening outside one of the two cottages on site. This was Tom, who bought the cottage during the closed years, because he used to be a stillman until 1983. In fact, he filled the final cask from that period.

Time to leave and head to my next stop. I’d decided to squeeze two tours in to my Speyside day. Originally I had planned to stop in on Glenfarclas, but the tour I really want to take there only runs in the summer, so some other year. Instead, I opted for the by-appointment-only Balvenie tour.

Really. Good. Call.

I drove past the place first time and ran into Glenfiddich, which meant I was in the right area because Balvenie, Glenfiddich and Kininvie distilleries are neighbours, sisters, and the ingredients in Monkey Shoulder blended malt. A quick  double-back and I found the tiny car park, in the woods, just enough space for ten cars. A few minutes walk to the wee building that is the visitor centre, and I found our host waiting with kettle boiled and a selection of teas and coffees. All very civilized.

Our full group of nine gradually filled, the last couple being another pair of newlyweds from Nashville. They joined the Scot-American hybrid (yours truly), an engaged couple from Boston, and a group of four happy Germans who are their own private whisky club. Charlie was our host, in-house brand ambassador, and all round good egg. I completely failed to take notes on this tour, so I’m winging it here. Which is a little sad because it was a packed but well-paced three hour tour. Let’s see what I can do.

First, the malting floor. Balvenie do some of their own malting in-house, using barley that they grow on a farm they own just across the road (between the distillery and their water source). Sadly, there had been some problem last week, so the floor was bare. But, they had just started soaking the next batch, so we were able to compare barley that was freshly harvested (hard), barley just added to water (hard and wet), and barley just about ready to get its germination on (bloated, wet, and raring to sprout). Then we headed up into the kiln, which I’m delighted to say wasn’t running. Peat. I smelled peat. Didn’t expect that. Turns out that for drying, they mostly use smokeless coal, but they also use two shovelfulls of highland peat, burned in a separate oven. Two shovelfuls is, of course, tiny compared to the big peat boys. So funny to see such a wee pile in the corner, like someone had just swept up mud from someone’s shoes.

Next, the mill. Porteus. ’nuff said. Next, we get interesting. Both Balvenie and Kininvie whiskies are made on site, and some equipment is co-located. We saw two mash tuns, one Balvenie, then other Kininvie. Come to think of it, I believe Kininvie is entirely unpeated, hence the separation. Same thing with the washbacks, this time in separate but neighboring rooms. What was fascinating was that the two rooms smelled completely different; a coup!e of us commented on it. Really, there was no way you’d mistake them for the same thing. I didn’t expect that so early in the process. And would never have realised it if I hadn’t been able to walk from one to the other.

Unsurprisingky, the whiskies go their separately ways to their own respective stillhouses, and we were following the Balvenie trail. We only saw the spirit stills, but Charlie made a point of stating that, unusually, the wash and spirit stills were identical. I might question that, just because two of the six spirit stills had subtlety different proportions. They were also the only two with spots for the portholes sometimes seen on wash stills. Hmm, curious. Inquiries of Charlie didn’t provide answers this once. Interesting fact, though: Balvenie still employ their own coppersmith, a rare if not exclusive thing.

Something else rare and exclusive: they have their own cooperage! On-site, even! And, dear gods, do they have barrels. And I mean just the empty ones. Between the three distilleries, there are dammed near a million full and aging on the premises. But I swear I saw the next generation sitting outside awaiting the call (they sit outside because they need to be kept wet to keep the wood good and, well, Scotland). The backlog of barrels looking for the attentions of the six coopers (for repair) took up more space than some towns I’ve driven through. Job security is one thing, but that’s gotta be soul destroying. “OK, that wuz a good mornin’s wurk, a good dozen barrels a’ fixed an’ ready tae go. Noo, whit’s left? Thoosands. Aye, right, tae hell wi’ that. Ah’m aff tae the fillin’ room!”

We got to stand and just watch the coopers work for a while. It’s a dying trade, but a tough one. Minimum four years apprenticeship is required if you want to take it up.

Then we went back to the main area to visit Warehouse 24. A traditional dunnage warehouse, this building was the old, abandoned manor house that Mr Grant decided to make the start of his new distillery, after he decided that Glenfiddich wasn’t enough. Walking past the near 50 year old casks (that will fetch a fortune if they make it), we saw something unusual: a large tun over in the corner. This is the revered Tun 1509, in which Malt Master David Stewart MBE (I kid you not) has mixed a selection of barrels known only to him, let them mingle for a while, then poured the results into approx 8,000 bottles. After that, done. No more of that batch.

We toodled on upstairs to view, and not sample, three casks to see the difference that age and cask type makes. It was here that I saw the darkest 14yr sherry cask matured whisky I’ve ever seen. It looked b!ood-red in the dim light, and I’d have put it at at least 25yrs. We were allowed to fill a 200ml bottle to purchase if we wanted, and I wanted. Got to draw from the cask and fill ourselves! Why no drinking? I believe its because we’re in a tax-free warehouse, so by consuming, we’d be violating tax laws. Or something.

Finally, back to the visitor building for our samples. To start, a quick sip of the new make spirit, which is apparently just like a German schnapps (Obstler, perhaps?). Then: 12yr Double wood, 12yr single cask, 14yr Caribbean, 17yr Double wood, 30yr. Then there was a special treat. On the way out of the warehouse, Charlie pointed out a 1974 bourbon refill cask that they had set aside. Yup, we got a freshly drawn 43 year old Balvenie that I wanted to be inappropriate with. It was magnificent, and really deserved a lot more time than we were able to give it.

And so the tour ended, a very short three hours later. We paid our dues, bade adieus, and cleared off.

Now, my day wasn’t technically over. I had about 140 miles to drive to get to my next B&B. I had been told that the tour was only 2hrs, but I’d factored in some fudge time, so would only be a little late, right on the 8:00pm deadline for check-in.

What I had not factored in was road works. Nor had I factored in being stuck behind a lumber lorry travelling at half speed for over an hour. And I certainly hadn’t factored in the nav’s idea of the fastest route being a largely 1.5 lane winding road for 40+ miles. 60mph my posterior, my dear nav. First, I don’t think that that was the real speed limit. Second, I’m good on narrow roads, but not that good, and not that brave/stupid on largely blind roads. Thirdly, I’d have destroyed my little rental Kia. So I’m screaming along these roads – I don’t mean driving fast, I mean I was actually screaming, mostly at the nav – while also trying to call ahead to my host to inform them of my late arrival. And failing. When I was actually in service areas, their line reported busy. For two hours. Which I didn’t believe. Eventually about an hour out, in a proper town with signal, I fired off an apologetic email in the hope that Trish, my host, would check when I didn’t show on time. I made it by 9:00pm, 1.5 hours later than planned, the Kia ready to be done for the day and likely in need of new brake pads and a clutch job (can I say that?).

Trish was just fine with it all, and seemed mosly concerned that I made it intact. We chatted for a bit and she was surprised to learn that I knew the village already. You see, my last few nights would be spent in Ellenabeich. More on that meaningless statement of great significance tomorrow.

I settled in, enjoyed my four Benromach drams, and slept.