Whisky and beer begin in the same way, in the mash tun. In beer, this is where we'd develop the colour and flavour, but the accepted wisdom in whisky is that those flavours don't make it through the distilling process. This is why most whiskies are made with only pale malt. But as brewers, we believe that if it tastes different going into the barrel, it must taste different coming out. That's why we use complex and rich malts in our mash, and let those flavours develop even further during fermentation.
When it comes time to start distilling, we start with 10,000 litres of distiller's beer. That's a lot for our 400 litre still, so we took our brewer's mentality, and a little Yukon ingenuity, and had a custom copper "helmet" designed and manufactured for our brewhouse kettle to convert it into a large stripping still. This allows us to do a full stripping run in only four or five batches, as opposed to twenty-five.
The second distillation occurs in our full copper still, which removes the remaining sulfur notes from the low wines. Typically, distillers use the plates inside the still column to catch condensing vapour and re-evaporate it, essentially redistilling it and creating a purer, cleaner alcohol. For us, while we occasionally close some or all of our plates, we generally leave them open in order to capture more complicated, layered alcohols that might otherwise have been stilled out.
Our barreling philosophy is the same as our approach to mashing and distillation; we seek out variety. That's why we will often use a selection of barrels with varying char levels and from different producers. Just as each batch of spirit is unique, now each barrel in a batch can develop and age uniquely as well. Sherry, port, rum, and other barrels are sometimes used to create our Special Finishes, as well.
When we create an expression, we use the notes we keep for each barrel, but more importantly we use our senses. This allows us to develop a layered combination of tones and flavours, crafting a unique whisky which we then allow to mingle and evolve into its final form, ready for bottling and release.
The commitment is in your glass.
