Latest / Whisky Stories Podcast / Full Access at Tomatin: Scotch from the Cask & Distillery Road Trip Games
Transcript
- 0:00You haven't earned your kilt yet.
- 0:03I wasn't even a suit at that point.
- 0:04I don't know how you was Waistcoat it's.
- 0:06Too small. We couldn't.
- 0:07We couldn't get a mini skirt in size.
- 0:11You liked me, Charles, and I liked you, and now look how
- 0:13better we are. It's all in good, Jess.
- 0:16It's right in my diary. It's like, again, Ross was not
- 0:20sick there. Your diary.
- 0:23Scotland, tell me how he built Glen.
- 0:28I've never seen that. We shit with dirt on his hands.
- 0:31Welcome to the Whiskey Stories podcast.
- 0:43That's A1 on one and that's something that's really cool.
- 0:54And so if you haven't entered that and you've got to come in
- 1:04really, really cool. We are about 20 minutes out from
- 1:08our first stop to Matin Distillery.
- 1:11Ross is currently just recording himself I think.
- 1:13And this is vlog. Hello, we're vlogging.
- 1:16We're vlogging. We're vlogging the whiskey story
- 1:18as well. Side, back, get there.
- 1:20I will. I'll talk to see what's.
- 1:21Chuck in the in the car with Chuck, you're the cameraman, but
- 1:24you've got this is like the gold ticket the.
- 1:27I know. The whiskey stories Golden
- 1:29ticket competition was who do we want to bring with us or who
- 1:33wants to come with us to hold the camera and have to drink all
- 1:36the whiskey and and and have to share a rumour.
- 1:39Ross Bar. But it's been really nice.
- 1:40To be the charity case. Beatle here.
- 1:44Chuck, the last time you featured on the Whiskey Stories
- 1:47podcast was a it was Fraser. In fact, you stood in for where
- 1:52was this episode that Ross Anagnis couldn't make it?
- 1:55Yeah. Because I was.
- 1:56In Fraser and Curtis. Isn't it?
- 1:58That was it, right? But also, what I would say is
- 2:01that was the night before you flew off to your trip to Japan.
- 2:04Yeah. And we had a couple.
- 2:06I Once we finished recording, we had a couple rounds after.
- 2:08That couple rounds when? Was your flight the next
- 2:12morning? Like 10-11 in the morning.
- 2:14When did you when did you finally finish drinking that?
- 2:17Oh, I think, I think it must be my. 11:00 really.
- 2:21Well don't look at me, I've gone by 9.
- 2:23I said right, I'm leaving. OK, I don't even remember.
- 2:26Yeah. I shook your hand and said enjoy
- 2:28Japan, yeah. And I think I couldn't talk
- 2:30about that. At that point you were far gone.
- 2:33I. Think no, maybe I left about
- 2:3410:00 and then walked back to mine.
- 2:36And then? Ordered a five guys good.
- 2:39Sent to the wrong address so I had to fix that and I called the
- 2:44driver. Apologise I think I it arrived.
- 2:46Had one bite of a burger, fell asleep.
- 2:50Woke up in the morning and it had to panic pack to get my
- 2:53flight hacked. Had to get a taxi, go in the
- 2:59taxi 5 minutes after we left we had to turn back because I
- 3:01forgot my passport. I can only imagine you do your
- 3:07actual panic and how you're probably frowning at everybody
- 3:11about meaning it. Probably, yeah, but that is my
- 3:14resting page. So you made the flight though?
- 3:18Made the flight. I had a four hour 4 hour layover
- 3:21in Frankfurt so. Horrible big airport.
- 3:23Yeah, I was like, oh, thank God. Like I'll get everything's good
- 3:27now. I'll, you know, I'll sort myself
- 3:29out. I'll drink like 6 pints of
- 3:30water. Everything will be fine.
- 3:32Went to like the gate was like hours before, like charged up
- 3:36all my devices. So I was like, I'm a veteran of
- 3:38this. I've nailed it.
- 3:39Yeah, lined up to get. To get my ticket scanned to get
- 3:44on the plane and the room was just like this is not your
- 3:47flight. This is a this is a different
- 3:50airport in Japan that starts with Ed that you're not only at
- 3:54the wrong gate, but you're in the wrong terminal and your
- 3:56flight leaves in 20 minutes. Sprint get get on like the metro
- 4:04car to the next thing, which is the it's like torture because I
- 4:06can't. You can't control it you.
- 4:08Can't control it because I'm just standing there and.
- 4:10I just went straight all the way around and I was like, is this
- 4:14this flight? I was, am I gonna make it?
- 4:16And she's like, oh, yeah, it's fine.
- 4:17You've got like 20 minutes here. Like, well, obviously you're
- 4:20first class Chuck, so they would have held it for you anyway,
- 4:23Hey. I was like, it was midnight and
- 4:25then so that was like a 14. Hour, that was terrifying
- 4:27economy at the gate. This is not your light, Sir,
- 4:30This is another. Right, but I've got a point.
- 4:32This leads us on now I had planned for this, but I'm
- 4:34driving so I can't do it. So I guess what I want you to
- 4:37do, right? You're going to have to be
- 4:39clever here on how you do it because there is a skill to this
- 4:41hosting these OK player distilleries, right?
- 4:44Bring it to your phone, yes. Right, intro plays.
- 4:49Now what was it? What was the intro music?
- 4:51Did it? Did it do your phone right
- 4:54whilst you've got signals we are just about to jump on the a
- 4:57nine. Yeah, I want you to tap into
- 4:59Google 2025 Top Distillery Tours.
- 5:05Oh, as in rating. Right.
- 5:07And go and then go to the TripAdvisor because I, I, I
- 5:10haven't seen, I don't know them all, but I have seen that
- 5:14TripAdvisor does have the top 2025.
- 5:16Now what I will say, it might be a giveaway, but I think a gin
- 5:23distillery or maybe a gin distillery might be in there.
- 5:26OK. So we're not going to go to
- 5:27where we bypass Gin Distillery because this is not a Gin story
- 5:30podcast. No what?
- 5:31Are we classifying, you know, as a gin distillery or is?
- 5:34That I think it was Edinburgh, Edinburgh Gin, which we can
- 5:38count because it's owned by a McCloud distillers.
- 5:41Big, big friends in the podcast. And if they would like to have
- 5:44us take this whiskey bus to a distillery anywhere over there
- 5:48distilleries time do and then it would be fantastic, right?
- 5:52Have you got the list I guess? I do.
- 5:54They're not necessarily well. There should be a TripAdvisor.
- 5:57There is distilleries in Scotland and the 1st 2 are not
- 6:00distilleries but I can see why they're included.
- 6:04But the rest of the distilleries?
- 6:06Right. Well, do you want to play?
- 6:07Are we going to play? Play your distilleries right.
- 6:10What I would say 10 of them, right?
- 6:11I'll give the first two away because they're not
- 6:13distilleries. So #1 it's the Scottish whisky
- 6:15experience. OK, yeah, OK #2 is Johnny Walker
- 6:18Princess? Makes sense, right?
- 6:19Makes sense. But. #3 is a distillery.
- 6:23OK, but no, we're supposed to be playing higher or lower.
- 6:26Oh right, play higher up do you want?
- 6:28Me to name the distillery. And then that's was higher.
- 6:30Or lower. But we'll have to go.
- 6:32Me versus Rosser's, Chuck involved as well.
- 6:34We'll put Chuck involved as well.
- 6:35I just name them randomly. Then, well, you need to work.
- 6:37You need to game it so that you know where to finish.
- 6:39It's a tough, it's a tough old. Right.
- 6:43This is too. Hard right?
- 6:46Start with Charles. Start with Charles.
- 6:48Well, I'll name 1 distillery. OK.
- 6:52So the Blair Athol distillery, OK, OK, that's one particular
- 6:56tour you can do in Scotland. So what then?
- 6:58I would say is. Charles care, do you think X is
- 7:03higher or lower? Talisker, is it higher or lower
- 7:06than Blair Athol? I reckon I believe just with
- 7:09that minor people that will go to Blair Athol, it will be
- 7:12higher than telescope. Correct, right.
- 7:14Chuck stays on Chuck. Stays on so Chuck Glen going
- 7:21higher or lower. Oh, Talisker.
- 7:24Talisker. Well, then, Talisker, I think
- 7:26it'll be higher again, yeah. Correct.
- 7:29Oh God, quick game over. Higher or lower than Glen going?
- 7:36Actually I bet it'd be better too, but I think Glen going
- 7:39might be higher on the TripAdvisor.
- 7:42Oban is higher than Glen Goy. I'm surprised at that.
- 7:45I also would have done the same because I believe Glen Goy is
- 7:47the most visited distillery. But wait, you've got to think.
- 7:50Logic here is. More Reviews.
- 7:52People will be going to Oban and then travelling across the
- 7:56water. Oban, Oban going over there.
- 7:58So Ross over worry, we're on to you.
- 8:00OK, Oban. Glen Kinchy Higher or lower?
- 8:03OH. My goodness, I mean I would be
- 8:06devastated if Glen Kinchy is lower than Oban.
- 8:09So through out of staunch beliefs, I'm going to say that
- 8:13Glenn Kinchy is higher than Oban.
- 8:16Thank. You you're wrong.
- 8:17You're wrong. Glenn Kinchy is lower than Oban.
- 8:19Right. So wrong like.
- 8:21I think we're for example, so we're on Glenn Kinchy, so the
- 8:26Clyde side distillery. Right.
- 8:29Is that me? Oh, I thought you already knew
- 8:31it. No, I didn't know them all.
- 8:33Right. We'll go on the E Graham then
- 8:35the Clyde side distillery is a higher or lower than Glenn
- 8:37Kinchy. I'll say lower, correct, right?
- 8:41And I, I think we're pretty much at the end.
- 8:45I think this is for the no, no, no, no, no, no.
- 8:48No, there's one more. That's just for the
- 8:49championship, right? Tomato, distillery tomato.
- 8:52Higher or lower than Clyde site of course.
- 8:55Higher correct. Yes.
- 8:59Hi, Green Win. Well done.
- 9:00I guess you've butchered a. Really.
- 9:04A game show, they said. I think that's.
- 9:07I didn't have a sparkly, I didn't have a sparkly coat or
- 9:10sparkly. I guess that's been months
- 9:13preparing play our distilleries, right?
- 9:15That's a good one. And in 5 minutes you've put on
- 9:17that. That's it.
- 9:17I'll never be seen the good. Thing is, this year we're going
- 9:20to put this on the Facebook page.
- 9:21Are we? We're going to put this this car
- 9:22recording on the Facebook page. I'll be, I'll be open, I think,
- 9:24well, we'll see what kind of content is based on what we've
- 9:26just done probably won't make. I know, I know.
- 9:30We've got some hardcore whiskey people, a lot of whiskey
- 9:33professionals listening to the podcast as well.
- 9:35This is a game I used to play in Scotch at the Balmoral when we
- 9:40were slightly quieter. It was all about keeping,
- 9:43keeping on top of everything. I spy with my little.
- 9:45Eye, I'm going to give you a distillery and you get 5 yes or
- 9:51no questions. Right.
- 9:52Oh God. I'll give you a distillery and a
- 9:54founding date. You get five years or no
- 9:57questions then I guess. And it'll be interesting to see
- 9:59how the listeners, how early they get it, get past the tears
- 10:02and also how smart you are with your questions.
- 10:05OK, so I'll let these all three play and all three take turns
- 10:08and I'll start with a distillery that was founded in 1967.
- 10:15Oh so. That's quite modern.
- 10:16I mean, I get, I get. To yes, give me a yes.
- 10:18Or a space side distillery. It is a space side distillery.
- 10:22There you go. Chuck, what's your question?
- 10:24Yes or no question? Is it a distillery with is it a
- 10:29Is it a good looking distillery? Exactly.
- 10:33That's a subjective question. How many distilleries are on
- 10:36space side? How many of them look good?
- 10:38Chuck, to the lessoners, can I just say that is an example a
- 10:40terrible question. Is it a good looking distillery?
- 10:44I'm like, no, it's. Not a good looking distillery,
- 10:46right? I don't know.
- 10:47Right. We'll see if it does the
- 10:52distillery have exclusive distillery releases.
- 10:55Yes, it does. Again, not really narrowing
- 10:58anything down there. Well, so far, Angus has at least
- 11:01asked. We've got a space side
- 11:02distillery that looks pretty ugly that does have standard
- 11:05releases is. There any space side distillery?
- 11:07It does have some standard releases.
- 11:10It does have standard releases. Does it have a distillery?
- 11:13Can you stick an extra question in there?
- 11:14No, no, that's what I was. Just I was just clarify, clarify
- 11:18is that a distillery that is owned by Chivas?
- 11:21It is not. That's a good question.
- 11:24Right. OK, so it's not a Chivas
- 11:26distillery, it's in space guide. Has a question, maybe we'll give
- 11:31you guys eight years ago or nine years ago question. 66 is
- 11:35probably a good number because there's three.
- 11:36We've got 2. More, yeah.
- 11:38Well, OK, good luck. It's not a good looking
- 11:41distillery. Think it's a date, Charles, You
- 11:42know this. 60s right? Yeah, 60s as well.
- 11:47Which is why it wouldn't be a pigeoness distillery, it would
- 11:49be a pretty industrial one. I'm.
- 11:53Panicking. Panicking bad.
- 11:55Yes or no the. Best thing is to try and think
- 11:57of a distillery that you think it might be and then try and
- 11:59rule it out. Or.
- 12:00Confirm. That's why I had to ask the
- 12:02architecture much. Is that aye?
- 12:03Because I say, well, we know it can't be Torbour now.
- 12:05Yeah, that's right. So we.
- 12:08Don't have a courage. Is it open to the public?
- 12:12It is open to the public. OK, we got a last yes or no
- 12:15question. Well, it's open to the public.
- 12:17It's not cheapest. It's in space I. 1966.
- 12:27Aye, wait a minute. Keep in mind, people are
- 12:29listening to this podcast. Does it?
- 12:30Does it, does it? I mean, I've got 2 questions.
- 12:33I'll ask the proper one first. It's owned by Diageo.
- 12:38It's not owned by Diageo. Oh, that.
- 12:40Was a. Good question.
- 12:41That was a good question, right? So someone has to take a stab at
- 12:45this. Come to or come to go, I guess
- 12:48each. At this point, it's because
- 12:49you're not very close. Are you?
- 12:50Are you? Wait, I've got a question,
- 12:52another well, are you big on this?
- 12:54Do you like this distillery? I like this distillery.
- 12:56Are you a horse to this distillery?
- 12:59No, no, it's not manic. More No.
- 13:01That was founded in 1971, of course.
- 13:04But I do as well. I did and it's diazio I.
- 13:07Was. I wasn't.
- 13:08Let yourself down there in front of the.
- 13:09Beers right, I'll come. Up now, this distillery
- 13:13apparently has a capacity of about 4 million, but I know
- 13:15producers a lot less than that, and at least one of people in
- 13:19the car have visited this facility.
- 13:21That will be. That's a couple of clues.
- 13:25Oh give us a wee guess lads, I guess each.
- 13:28Space side not picturesque. 19-6 days someone's visited it.
- 13:34Isn't that the one that's was it called Petit Petev or?
- 13:37Petev. Petev.
- 13:39No, Petev, I'm afraid not. Is it Toronto?
- 13:43It's not Toronto, but it's a very good guess.
- 13:46I might found it around those years you.
- 13:49Have to make these games a lot easier, Ross.
- 13:51You're the one that's been to this distillery.
- 13:52Oh shit. Oh, I think I know what it is.
- 13:57I think I've got it. Well, your guess is a faggot.
- 14:00All of. US are going, I think.
- 14:03I've got it. Can't be Glenn.
- 14:06Glenn Allen, you know. It is Glenn Allen.
- 14:08He's done it. Well done it a.
- 14:12Good. Look at this other Glenn
- 14:16alcohol. I can tell you straight away.
- 14:18I can tell you straight away there's an image in the yearbook
- 14:21and I would not, I didn't. Think that interestingly because
- 14:24one of the features or one of the things that we'll be doing
- 14:26tomorrow evening is we are being hosted we are going to it's Glen
- 14:31Alley tasting tomorrow night in Bournet Castle I'm.
- 14:35Going to tell Billy Walker you talk Founded 1824, right?
- 14:43Right. So that could be a lot.
- 14:45So basically half a space side was found in 1824.
- 14:48Am I wasting a question by asking if it's in space side?
- 14:52I'm going to cut ahead. Well, you'll find out if it is
- 14:54or it isn't. I know, but we're losing a
- 14:57question. Either way, Either way, you're
- 14:58narrow. You're half in.
- 14:59Your choices, I guess, are you, are you Pero Ricard owned?
- 15:04Yes. Excellent.
- 15:05So there's at least 4. There's at least 4 Pero Ricard
- 15:09space side displays found in 1824.
- 15:13Right. Who's asking the next question?
- 15:15You. Can do Angus.
- 15:16I'm going to say, I'm going to say is it space size, space side
- 15:18distillery? It is indeed, yeah.
- 15:20Right, there we go. Well, I have one question I
- 15:22always ask because I have correlated this no.
- 15:29No, not. Really.
- 15:30No. Right.
- 15:30OK, there we go. That's a good.
- 15:32Very good question, Graham. Actually, I think I have another
- 15:35question if I could go Nick, miss you guys.
- 15:37Sure. Is it my dedicated Facebook
- 15:39appreciation page to this? Not that I'm.
- 15:42Aware of. OK, so.
- 15:43It's because I'm actually Glen Burgie is founded in 1824 I
- 15:47think, so that was a very good. Question.
- 15:49It's owned by Perno and Space Identity 100.
- 15:51Percent and and as is Milton Duff, but again, I don't think
- 15:54there's a Milton Duff page out there, so it could be Milton
- 15:56Duff as well. Glen Levitt has core releases.
- 16:00So it can't be. Glenn Levitt.
- 16:02Aberlowers. Aberlowers. 24 as well.
- 16:04I think there's a no but that's got strafy.
- 16:05Is it Strafyla? Strafiles earlier than that
- 16:08strafiles. Earlier than.
- 16:10But we're already narrowed down the portfolio of.
- 16:14Space side perils. Of space side perils.
- 16:16So I think we have like Glen Keith left, and Alta Vanya,
- 16:21which I think is far too modern. Brazen Grill and live it Which?
- 16:24Is are you a Glen of space Side? No.
- 16:27Oh. Glen, not a Glen I.
- 16:31Think you go. I think you go for that.
- 16:33This is difficult. They also have is it what's the
- 16:36one that tripped me up and what gish and sellers right?
- 16:38Is it balmenish? That's incredibly early.
- 16:42Oh, or is it Dalmenish? I can't.
- 16:45Remember I think when you guys did that.
- 16:47The one that does Karun. Jen, look, let's game this here.
- 16:50Chuck's Chuck's obviously seen that this is this could
- 16:52potentially be a lot of wasted content.
- 16:54So we need to get one right. So I reckon what he's done is
- 16:57he's picked one that he knows there's a good chance we're
- 16:59going to get it right, right. So is it Melton Duff?
- 17:02Yeah. He's done.
- 17:08He's. Done it, he's done it.
- 17:11We're. Turning off I've.
- 17:15Actually had to put my hand on the steering wheel for the
- 17:17first. Time and So what we're capturing
- 17:21here unless. He's on his ground, too.
- 17:25Is Welcome to Tomatin Hell of the Juniper, an unusual name for
- 17:29Scotch whisky distillery, but it's actually Tomatin village.
- 17:33So we always speak about these little get the same, get the
- 17:35same and get the same. There's the same.
- 17:37Now you're talking there. We.
- 17:39Are and we're talking historically about people
- 17:42putting distilleries, putting distilleries around small
- 17:46villages. So of course you had people who
- 17:47could work there. So Martin is an example of a
- 17:50village that was built around the distillery, and Buna haven't
- 17:54all the other example I can think of where really there
- 17:55wasn't anything in that part of the island until the.
- 17:59Distillery, you had that. Here we go to man.
- 18:03The workers cottages. Here we, here we go.
- 18:07We've made it. What a lovely day up here in the
- 18:09Highlands. Lovely. 20 miles in the South of
- 18:13Inverness. Let's get a wee picture.
- 18:14Get me the whiskey wagon. Whiskey wagon.
- 18:19The whiskey story is Whiskey Wagon.
- 18:21Here we are. Here we are.
- 18:22We've. Done it, We've made it.
- 18:24Legs one Done. Are we ready?
- 18:26Are you ready? Are we ready you?
- 18:28Have a dab a day. Right Angus, class us in.
- 18:34Welcome along to the Whiskey Stories podcast.
- 18:36Whiskey Stories road trip at the Tim and distillery.
- 18:42We've done it, lads, we've done it.
- 18:44We've made it out of Edinburgh to visit a distillery.
- 18:47Not for the first time, but the first time, we're actually
- 18:50outside of Edinburgh Distillery, outside of Edinburgh and getting
- 18:53away, look around hopefully. Yeah, my thoughts were if we're
- 18:55going to go up north, I want to visit one of my favourite
- 18:58distilleries. You know how much I've gone on
- 19:00about Tomatin. Tomatin 36 in particular, We've
- 19:03heard no end of stories about tomatoes and your love for it.
- 19:07Yeah. We tried it.
- 19:08I know we tried it at the whiskey Fringe at the half.
- 19:10Time and I can understand why 100.
- 19:12Percent. It was a spectacular.
- 19:13So when we were at Scottish Spectacular, I think we'd, we
- 19:15sold 13 bottles in 13 months and it ruined whiskey for me.
- 19:20Like I loved Tomatin things I didn't think it could taste for,
- 19:23for, for people that haven't tried it.
- 19:25It was just the most exotic, tropical, ridiculous whiskey I
- 19:27ever had. We're very lucky to be joined by
- 19:30an expert on Tomatin today. Well, we are.
- 19:31We have Liberty, Josephine, Libby, Jo, who's stupidly told
- 19:37us what our film. Would have avoided that.
- 19:41For the rest of this podcast episode, you will be Liberty
- 19:44Josephine. But we are trying.
- 19:47We it's now 10:50 in the morning, slightly too early for
- 19:51a drab maybe, but we left. We left Edinburgh at 7:00 this
- 19:56morning. We were in the whiskey wagon,
- 19:58Whiskey stories wagon, as we call the whiskey wagon, whiskey
- 20:01wagon. And we've head up.
- 20:02We are on our way up to Dorner for part of our Whiskey Stories
- 20:07Grand Tour. And the first stop off we
- 20:09decided ought to be rude not to pop in.
- 20:11So, Libby, Joel, thank you so much for having us here at the
- 20:14distillery. You very welcome.
- 20:16You've been tasked with taking us around and showing us, yes, I
- 20:19have the highs and lows or the highs and highs of the Tematin
- 20:23distillery, but you're also, you're from Tematin yourself.
- 20:26Yes, yeah, I am grew up in Tematin, just outside I wanna
- 20:31say. Outside the gates.
- 20:33Just outside the gates, yeah. So people that don't know
- 20:36outside. The village.
- 20:39Because that's the fascinating part.
- 20:40Like I've never visited here before.
- 20:41I'm driving in and you see the Tematen distillery, lovely wall
- 20:45area that you turn into and you're driving up and you think
- 20:48this is a really nice drive into distillery and then.
- 20:51Once you get past the warehouses.
- 20:52Yeah, suddenly we're in a there's a lot of housing estate
- 20:55in here. Yeah, yeah.
- 20:56And it's really interesting because I actually, because
- 20:59you've got the actual village of Tematen and then you've got this
- 21:01whole separate village in itself in the distillery.
- 21:05And I didn't even quite realise how many houses were here
- 21:08growing up because I didn't have any connection to the distillery
- 21:10itself growing up. Other my mum worked here for a
- 21:13bit when I was younger. Currently still works here, but
- 21:18yeah, I didn't have any connection.
- 21:19So you didn't know about the houses until I actually started
- 21:22working here. I came in and thought, this is
- 21:24insane. I didn't realise how many people
- 21:26actually live in here. Like it's a little like
- 21:29distillery commune it. Is it's.
- 21:31Like. It's like their own little
- 21:33distillery family. It's that's how I like to
- 21:35describe it. It is.
- 21:37You're working with your neighbors.
- 21:38You are in very close contact. Yeah, at all times.
- 21:41So. No one's falling out over their
- 21:43head. You have.
- 21:43To get on with everyone. And you so you're sorry, but you
- 21:47are a visitor centre team leader here.
- 21:49Yes, yes I am started that about a year ago.
- 21:53I started at the distillery about 3 years ago now, 1st of
- 21:56April will be my anniversary coming up and then moved on to
- 21:59team leader just March last year.
- 22:02Yeah. So it has been an incredible
- 22:04journey. I I fell in love with whiskey
- 22:07coming here. I, I didn't like whiskey very
- 22:09much before I started working there, but yeah, fell in love
- 22:13with it, fell in love with the brand already loved matinee as
- 22:16itself being from here, you know?
- 22:19You've got a real pride about it, you know?
- 22:20Yeah, exactly. Absolutely.
- 22:22Well, we are sitting here so this is the visitor centre where
- 22:24we're starting at the moment, but you're going to give us a
- 22:26little walk around and a little tour.
- 22:28But you know, from your own point of view, when you started
- 22:31working at the distillery, what was the what was the stand out
- 22:34bits where you were looking at it going?
- 22:36Well, first of all, you're approaching it from a person who
- 22:38really doesn't like whiskey. And so from you, what was the
- 22:41sort of eye opener was that it was the sort of moments where
- 22:43you thought that's really interesting.
- 22:45I think the first time I went out on tour was probably I, I'm
- 22:50not very good at sciences sort of stuff.
- 22:52I love it, but I'm not very good at it.
- 22:55So going out on tour and finding out that there was a whole lot
- 22:59more science behind the production and the making of the
- 23:02whiskey, that was kind of a turning point for me.
- 23:06I followed around our lead guide, actually Ken, who is
- 23:09phenomenal. He's really good with the
- 23:11numbers and that kind of chemistry side.
- 23:12So that was kind of the turning point.
- 23:15That's what made me fall in love with whiskey first.
- 23:17It took me a while to get into the the taste of it.
- 23:20Yeah, that was kind of many nights trying different ones at.
- 23:24Different times. It sounds terrible.
- 23:25I know it was a nightmare, but yeah, I love the stuff now.
- 23:28Yeah, again, just trying as many different types as I could.
- 23:33And it would be great because we're going to get into some of
- 23:35the liquid at the end of today's pod.
- 23:37Yeah. You have a portfolio flavour
- 23:40profile here at Tamatin? Yes, having produced peated
- 23:43whiskey, unpeated whiskey. And it is independent, just it's
- 23:47independently owned. It's owned by a Japanese
- 23:49company, am I right? Yes, yeah.
- 23:51So Dakara Holdings, they, they bought us over in 1986.
- 23:55So they never really interfered with the production side of
- 23:58things. You know, they've, they've left
- 24:00that in the capable hands of our our production team.
- 24:04But yeah, they're, like I said, came in in 1986 and just kind of
- 24:07left, left us to. It I love that.
- 24:09I love that you guys are we've bought the company I love.
- 24:12We love what you're doing. Just keep.
- 24:13Doing it don't fix when you're broke.
- 24:14If you I mean but. And and that's, and that's
- 24:16fascinating because I mean, we've heard, you know, obviously
- 24:19companies buying over and doing radical things with distilleries
- 24:22when they've bought them over completely, you know, thinking
- 24:25of, you know, even something like Glen Allocate when that was
- 24:27bought over by Billy Walker and his associates and they, they,
- 24:32they changed the kind of the production side.
- 24:35Of changed everything, yeah. Exactly how, how long they were
- 24:37fermenting et cetera. Whereas quite interest in a
- 24:39company coming in and just said no, this is what you're.
- 24:42Doing and and quite an interesting time because in the
- 24:4480s these were our, these were massive.
- 24:46Yeah. So, well, 70s we were, we were
- 24:49one of the largest whiskey producers of the world.
- 24:51You're producing 12 and a half million litres of spirit a year.
- 24:54Which is? Yeah, yeah.
- 24:56Crazy, crazy amounts. And where is that going?
- 24:59Majority into blends yeah you know but we had we had 23 stills
- 25:03on site 24 wash bags wow it's a huge huge amount and that's kind
- 25:08of why Takara came in in the 80s was because we that huge decline
- 25:12in the 80s as we all know we went into liquidation actually
- 25:15in 1986 and that's when Takara came in and and.
- 25:21It doesn't sound as bad. So it doesn't sound as bad when
- 25:23a distillery goes into liquidation.
- 25:26So I'm sure we say later, but how many, how many stills do we
- 25:28have on site now? We have 12 on site now.
- 25:31Yeah, that's cool. I.
- 25:32Mean when when when you guys talk us through the history then
- 25:34so that I mean what what what what is the big big historical
- 25:39moments of tomorrow what was the build up to becoming the big one
- 25:42of the biggest producers of whiskey and.
- 25:43Yeah. So started out in 1897.
- 25:47So that was a local guy, Mr. MacDougall, who started it up.
- 25:51Yeah. Great man, great man, Mr.
- 25:55MacDougall. So he started us up and he, we
- 25:59weren't actually open very long. It was, I wanna say 1903 or
- 26:02something where we we closed down.
- 26:03This sounds but it's opened in 1897.
- 26:06Did you? Say 1897.
- 26:07This sounds very much like a distillery that was affected by
- 26:09the Patterson crash. Great.
- 26:11Potentially, yeah. You know, one of our previous
- 26:13episodes opened the case with Justine Hazlehurst, The affairs
- 26:15of the Pattersons. Yeah.
- 26:17Yeah. The 1890s.
- 26:19Was everybody was opening in the 1890s?
- 26:21Yeah, but then I think a lot of people had to close in the sort
- 26:23of late 1890s, early 1900s because there was the knock on
- 26:27effect. And I think one one of the
- 26:28things that Justine pointed out in the episode is that the the
- 26:30Pattersons are often looked at as the guys that kind of started
- 26:34the started the the first real major whiskey decline.
- 26:40However, they were also seen by Justine and, and explains in the
- 26:44book that actually they were maybe more more seen as
- 26:47scapegoats because it turns out that quite a lot of people were
- 26:50doing exactly what they were doing.
- 26:52There was cast trading going on. There was liquid being sold but
- 26:55never used. All this kind of stuff was going
- 26:57on. But I think they were the
- 26:59freight, the face of it. So there are other distilleries
- 27:01around the whole of the country. Probably seriously affect Glenn
- 27:04Farkler's been one of them Cos the Paterson brothers ended up
- 27:06having a a large stake in the Glenn Farley.
- 27:08And and so stopping basically straight away, yeah.
- 27:12And then restarting before the wars.
- 27:15Yes, yeah. So we first single what was
- 27:18produced in 19, 2019, 20 something in there and that was
- 27:23kind of the the first moment that we started kind of building
- 27:27up the brand. Mm hmm.
- 27:29That is when kind of our logo came in the company that owned
- 27:33us at the time, which the name slips my mind, but they're the
- 27:35ones that brought the lions into it.
- 27:37So they're actually an English company.
- 27:39So it's a. Good point if they get the logo
- 27:40off charts so we got so explain that to me because.
- 27:44There's not any lions. Then there's there's no, there's
- 27:47no island cows. You can see behind Angus,
- 27:49there's a Big Island cow looking at it, but there's no lions in,
- 27:52in space. Well, in Space Islands is there?
- 27:54Yeah, thankfully no lions are going around.
- 27:56For the sheep. Yeah.
- 27:58So the the Hogs Head was obviously from the Hogs Head
- 28:01cast coming in. Yeah.
- 28:03So that was the starting in our logo and then the lines came in.
- 28:06Like I said, in that kind of 20s, they brought the lines in.
- 28:10They want to bring a little touch of their kind of culture,
- 28:13if you will. Yeah.
- 28:14I don't think I've ever noticed the hogs head in the logo.
- 28:17Now I feel like an absolute idiot.
- 28:20Well, that's amazing. Yeah, I have had a few people
- 28:22ask me why the Hog's Head has tentacles, which is something
- 28:26that I can never Unsee now. Yeah, mentioned it.
- 28:29It doesn't. Yeah, there you go.
- 28:32Why does the Hog's Head have tentacles?
- 28:34There's a terrible so, yeah. So, so from from that point
- 28:40then, I mean, when did the distillery really start to
- 28:43expand and grow to become that that?
- 28:46That yeah, well, it was, it was early 70s again.
- 28:48It was just the kind of the peak in the whiskey market.
- 28:52It just went crazy and we like I said was majority going into
- 28:56blended stuff and we had a lot of customers all over the world.
- 28:59The Cara were actually one of our customers at the time.
- 29:01So it was just a lot of stuff being sent out, a lot of demand.
- 29:05Our second mashed tongue came into us in 1963.
- 29:09So that probably would have been the the starting point in
- 29:12building. Increasing that production and
- 29:14the best named blend in the history of Scotch whisky as far
- 29:17as I'm concerned. Big T, big tea, That's pretty
- 29:21much what a lot of it would've went into for the UK market,
- 29:24right? Yes, yeah, was that was a blind
- 29:25called the Big Tea. Yeah.
- 29:26So, so when they were, so my understanding is when you had
- 29:29this massive production, it was the same kind of parcel of
- 29:31liquid that that was going to be blends in different markets, a
- 29:35little world with different names.
- 29:37But in the UK it was called Big Tea Big.
- 29:39Tea. Yeah, never have that big Tea.
- 29:41Never. Heard of it?
- 29:42Well, I'll show you a bottle of that.
- 29:43Later. Yeah, Yeah.
- 29:44Please do, right. But yeah, so that was like a
- 29:46Tamatinone. Yeah.
- 29:48Blend big tea. We still get people actually
- 29:51coming in now asking for big tea.
- 29:52We don't currently produce it, but it is still sought after.
- 29:57Yeah. Yeah, definitely.
- 29:58And the size of the distillery, then we're looking around,
- 30:00there's a lot of warehouses which are great.
- 30:02You see them when you're driving past, you see them when you're
- 30:04you're driving in and things like that.
- 30:05And then you can see all the different sort of areas of the
- 30:07distillery, but you're also seeing a few people walking
- 30:09around. How many people are employed by
- 30:11or how many people are working here just?
- 30:13Now 72. 72 My goodness. So that is not directly on site,
- 30:18no. Forget.
- 30:20Forget the village you. Can have a whole town, yeah.
- 30:23So 72 in total. So that includes our sales team,
- 30:27marketing and all of that, our office staff.
- 30:30And where are they based around then?
- 30:31Are they? So our main offices are on on
- 30:33site. So majority of the staff do come
- 30:36in, but obviously sales team down South, yeah.
- 30:38Yeah. You know, they're based out in
- 30:40England. So what about the distillery
- 30:42then? 72 people in total?
- 30:43How many people would you say, right, that you know, in a day
- 30:45like today or this week, how many people would be working
- 30:47here? Hard to say Twitty or maybe
- 30:51maybe no. I mean more probably because the
- 30:54got quite a lot of warehouse guys, you know, moving casts
- 30:56that that is a big part, you know.
- 31:00And that's a lot of warehouses. And also last time I said you
- 31:05had your own Cooper. Yes.
- 31:06You still got your own Cooper. Cooper, Same.
- 31:09Cooper, Alan. Alan Yeah.
- 31:10It's like the Scottish Hulk. Yes, 4 hours like you.
- 31:16Would like him if you go angry. 4 hours to die for.
- 31:19No, but but I remember last time I was here speaking to him and a
- 31:24larger portion of your casks, if not almost all of them are
- 31:27stored on site as well, right? Yes, yeah.
- 31:29So we've got 13 warehouses and about 180,000 casks on site A.
- 31:34100 and. 80,000 as bonkers, isn't it?
- 31:38Wow and. What do you think?
- 31:39The oldest cast you know. I know what the oldest casque
- 31:42is. Yeah.
- 31:43Can you tell? Filled in 1967.
- 31:45I'll show you that later on as well.
- 31:47Excellent. Yeah, because we are going to
- 31:48have a a wander around and we look around, what's the sort of
- 31:51quirky? Is there some, is there any
- 31:53quirkiness about Tomatin then is there other than a Hogs Head
- 31:56with tentacles? But if you're saying from from
- 31:59the history from the site or anything like that, what what
- 32:02could make Tomatin a little bit different or what's a bit quirky
- 32:05about it? Yeah, it's a great question.
- 32:09I think the but the people themselves make it yeah, that
- 32:16little bit quirky, you know, with the on the on site housing
- 32:18where it. Was really nice for me.
- 32:19Drove in, everyone came back to their garden.
- 32:21I just waved. Yeah.
- 32:24Exactly the blood, the bloody press release before we got.
- 32:28There, I've said to him I should not believe that I.
- 32:33Think it's such such a well known distillery, particularly
- 32:35in Scotland for your malt whiskey that you're independent
- 32:38and I think there's a little charm about that.
- 32:40Yeah, definitely. And like I said, the the house
- 32:42is on site. They, they make a huge part of
- 32:45our distillery that the people because they are living on site.
- 32:49Like I said, it's a community in itself.
- 32:50So the people do make Tamatin 100%.
- 32:54You know that even our our legacy whiskey that was, that
- 32:57was chosen by the people. That's legacy after the legacy
- 33:00of, of the people. So we are very people orientated
- 33:03and. What about then when you look at
- 33:05visitors, we've got a few, few people coming in then.
- 33:08So is it a case of booked? A lot of people booked in or is
- 33:12there people that maybe just on their way up?
- 33:14Are you? Open for tours every day 100.
- 33:16Percent, yeah. So we're open seven days a week,
- 33:20half well summer half 9 till half five we are.
- 33:24So we offer tours every single day.
- 33:27So we get a lot of people booking them up, especially
- 33:30coming into the summer. April 1st is our kind of summer
- 33:33start point, but we get quite a lot of people just stopping in.
- 33:37Yeah, we're just off the a nine, so you know, it's easy.
- 33:39People see the sign and go perfect, we can, we're heading
- 33:42down to Edinburgh, anywhere. We're heading up to Inverness.
- 33:44It's an easy stop. It doesn't take long to out of
- 33:47your route, you know, it's literally just off the main
- 33:49roads. And I sorry, I mean, from a
- 33:52handy point of view, whether it's a distillery tour or
- 33:54whether it's just popping in because you've got a lovely shop
- 33:56here where we are and you know, you've got handful selections
- 34:00you've got, we're going to be talking about them later on, I
- 34:02think when we're going to the warehouse.
- 34:03But you know, just the fact that if you did, if you were flying
- 34:06up to Inverness or driving up to Inverness or north up the A9 or
- 34:10you're coming back down, yeah, a quick pop in.
- 34:12It's not going to take you a long time to detour into the
- 34:14shop, Couple of nice bottles and then you could be back on your
- 34:17way again. And that would be that, you
- 34:18know, that's a perfectly stop off.
- 34:20Yeah, it really is. And you get even when people are
- 34:23stopping by as well, most of the time they know that they want to
- 34:26bottle. So it is they come in, we advise
- 34:28they get a ball, yeah, maybe if they're not driving and then
- 34:31head on their way. So it is it is an ideal location
- 34:35to have. Well, speaking about not
- 34:36driving, as we did start drawing straws.
- 34:39I drove up. I've got this far.
- 34:41But our cameraman, we have to give him a shout out.
- 34:44Charles Care? What about Charles Care?
- 34:45He's a man. Yeah, he's he's actually.
- 34:48I'm going to get a photo. He's he's volunteered.
- 34:50He's volunteered to drive, drive us up to Dorna from here.
- 34:52Yeah. Which was a terrible thing to do
- 34:54to himself. Well, yeah.
- 34:56And I think I think this is a perfect time for us to move on
- 34:59to a little bit of production. Well, I was going to say, but
- 35:01also in diplomatic terms, he's taking he's taking the hit now
- 35:04because later on some some mugs going to have to drive us home.
- 35:07So well, that's your job. Exactly it.
- 35:09Won't be me we've. Got 1 passenger who's just the.
- 35:13Passenger Princess. To be honest, you've been a
- 35:15passenger since we started the. Let's get.
- 35:20Let's cut to production. Yeah, nice, right.
- 35:26So let me Joe, where are we right now?
- 35:28So we are in our still house just now.
- 35:31Behind me you can see 12 stills all together.
- 35:34Well, and it's a vast room. You can tell from where we are
- 35:38there probably is room for another 12, which is exactly
- 35:41what. This side is the original, the
- 35:43original side. So if we'd come here in 1972,
- 35:46there would have been stills. Right.
- 35:47There would have been, yeah, you'd be able to walk right over
- 35:50that little hole in the wall up there is actually was a door out
- 35:53to the stills. So yeah, huge, huge amount of
- 35:57space. Ross, you were saying last time
- 36:00you were here the the roof was off.
- 36:02Yeah, it was one of them. Is that how they had to get you
- 36:04in? You're on your last one.
- 36:10And it was, it was really cool. It was me and my dad managed to
- 36:13sneak up. Scott Adamson, who's the master
- 36:17blender and global brand ambassador, sorted out a really
- 36:19cool tour. And yeah, the roof was off
- 36:21'cause of replacing the stills. Really.
- 36:22I've never seen that anywhere else.
- 36:24That's which was really, really cool.
- 36:26I mean, it still would last 30-40, fifty years.
- 36:29At least. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
- 36:30You know. 'Cause they patched them up and
- 36:31keep it. It depends.
- 36:32Again, obviously production, et cetera, but I've I've a wee
- 36:36coaster at home from Glen Kinchy that was part of the still I
- 36:39think from 72 till 2012. So.
- 36:43It's about exactly. So about 40 years that that that
- 36:45had lasted. And I've got the old spirit safe
- 36:48here as well. It's quite interesting.
- 36:50To see this is really interesting.
- 36:51Because this looks completely different to the spirit safe we
- 36:53saw at the Port of Leith Distillery, which I mean, what
- 36:57you're seeing here is Chuck and you come, Chuck, come on, then
- 37:00you come. You'll see like this is.
- 37:04So tradition 1979 on it there. Tell us about this lovely Joe.
- 37:10Yeah, so this is one of the old spirit sites.
- 37:11Now I like to use this as a demonstration on how people
- 37:15would nick the spirit because that was that was the the known
- 37:19thing people. Would what?
- 37:20Sorry. Neck the Yeah.
- 37:21Yeah, try and get the spirit from the safe.
- 37:24That's why rumour has it the two padlocks on the side, one was
- 37:28put up by the tax man, the other one was put up by the spirits,
- 37:31the stillman, so that they nobody could get into it without
- 37:342 keys. But this one here.
- 37:37So I don't know if this was very cleverly designed or by a
- 37:40stillman or very stupidly designed by a tax man, but if
- 37:44you kind of jiggle this enough. Oh, there he goes.
- 37:51The alarm. Was just comedic timing.
- 37:56Oh, really? Doesn't set up an alarm?
- 37:59Oh, right. I'm going to hazard a guess,
- 38:01right, and I might be completely wrong here.
- 38:03I'm going to say that one was probably set up by the stillman
- 38:07for basically ticking a box that says I've put, I've put, I've
- 38:11had. Lock on.
- 38:11Because, I mean, am I right in saying that back then when you
- 38:14used to have like the excise men, would they would live on
- 38:16site, wouldn't they? And yes.
- 38:18And at one point I think it was like the only two people who had
- 38:20keys to the distillery would have been the, the the, the tax,
- 38:24the salesman and the distillery manager.
- 38:26Yeah. And or the stillman, maybe.
- 38:28I don't know. But yeah, back then.
- 38:31Well, I mean I I'm sure the stories all exist.
- 38:34My, my, my great grandmother grew up in Coder, which is where
- 38:38Royal McClure is. And my granny used to talk about
- 38:42visiting and saying that the you could go and see the excise when
- 38:45I had lots of nice white clear spirit in his house.
- 38:47Yeah, he would offer you so. I think it depends on how good
- 38:49how serious your your excisement was.
- 38:52There were some that would probably have been exactly by
- 38:54the book, and every centilitre of spirit that was coming out
- 38:58was accounted for. And then I don't think, I don't
- 39:00think they were loved. No, I'm going to.
- 39:02I'm going to try and talk like I know.
- 39:04It's like I know what I'm talking about.
- 39:05Here, What would you think of the stilts now?
- 39:06What I'm going to say is that line arm there right is far
- 39:10there are is pointing up the way the angle of the line are now
- 39:13that's. Certainly.
- 39:13It's certainly not what you would describe as a dramatic
- 39:16line arm. It's pretty pretty standard.
- 39:18Aye. Because So what I'm saying is,
- 39:19does that mean what will happen is that the the vapors that go
- 39:23up and turn to liquid will then roll back down and well, I'm
- 39:25much more likely to roll back down?
- 39:26Yeah, but if it so some people will be a real incline and
- 39:30you'll see it really struggle up for more copper contact.
- 39:33I've seen another one where they're.
- 39:34Like and what and what what we have seen which is consistent
- 39:36with portly distillery boil ball.
- 39:39A boil ball. Which you pointed out there too,
- 39:41which is which again creates reflux more, more copper contact
- 39:44and that looks brand new brand spanking you.
- 39:48Yes, it does look brand new, doesn't it?
- 39:51This one came in to us that probably would have been one of
- 39:54the ones that was being replaced.
- 39:55Yeah, but two years ago, yeah. Two years ago.
- 39:59They have just recently been kind of lacquered up.
- 40:02Lacquered up because that was the other the the Porter Leith.
- 40:04Yeah, they they didn't. They didn't do it.
- 40:05Yeah. No, this is not something you
- 40:07see very often. Cannon.
- 40:10There you. Go.
- 40:12So just cannon, we're going to fire them up.
- 40:17So what we got here, let me show this is.
- 40:19So this is one of our condensers, yeah, obviously not
- 40:22working. Condenser.
- 40:24I've never seen just a condenser.
- 40:26Condenser on. Meals, yeah, it's amazing.
- 40:28It's really cool because you know, being able to explain how
- 40:30a condenser works to people, it's difficult anyway, so this.
- 40:35Well, I'm looking at. I'm looking at that one.
- 40:37Well, please do. Yeah, I like what Ross did as
- 40:40well. I just want to point this out.
- 40:41Right. Ross did what Ross Bart does.
- 40:43He goes, this is fascinating. Let me do.
- 40:44What is it? It's condenser.
- 40:48I did, yeah. I didn't see, you know what kind
- 40:51of condenser, right? So how does it work?
- 40:55So the condenser, yeah, each still has their own condenser.
- 40:58Our condensers are on the outside of the building, so you
- 41:00can't see them. There's 5 that is attaching onto
- 41:06the arm of the still there. So that is where your vapours
- 41:09are going through. Yeah, into there.
- 41:10And then if you look on either side of the condenser, you can
- 41:14see lots of little copper pipes going right through the middle.
- 41:16So they're all just pipes? They're just pipes all the way
- 41:18across. All the way across.
- 41:19It's a little bit better to see from that.
- 41:21Side so this presumably I I may have got it completely wrong,
- 41:24but this is where the vapour that comes in Yep turns in back
- 41:27into liquid. Yes.
- 41:28So cold water is going through those copper pipes all through
- 41:31the middle. Yeah.
- 41:32And then your vapours are coming in, going in between the cold
- 41:35pipes, and they condensed and. It's often the reason why you
- 41:38see these outside, because obviously it's so hot in here.
- 41:41I was, I used to wonder all the time, oh, you've got condensers,
- 41:44where the hell are they? And you'd walk out the still
- 41:46house and you'd see them. They're all outside.
- 41:48Yeah, all outside. I've never.
- 41:49I've never. Seen that like so I'm assuming
- 41:51there's no warm tubs here. Not as far as I'm aware.
- 41:57So not what so, but what's the difference between a worm tub?
- 42:00It does, it does, it does. I would say it does the same
- 42:02job. Charles Kerr's probably Charles
- 42:05Kerr would. You have a really good way to
- 42:06describe the difference there. No.
- 42:08No, no, it's all about copper contacts.
- 42:10Poxo. Yeah.
- 42:11So copper contact. It's a different, it's a
- 42:12different way to to play around with the spirit and and work.
- 42:15On a camera person that would be there would have been able to
- 42:18explain that to us as Vicky Wicky Elliott.
- 42:20Yeah. So, Chuck, I'm afraid that it's.
- 42:23Currently getting the thing the finger from Charles Ker.
- 42:25If you don't, if you don't up your game, we'll might have to
- 42:28just call Vicky up and see what she can do, OK?
- 42:30And it it's worth saying for the cameras, well, I've never seen
- 42:35so many spirit safes like that, do you know?
- 42:37That's, that's, that's that was the thing that I, I, when I
- 42:40opened the door, I thought was remarkable because usually, you
- 42:43know, not, not not that amount of spirit.
- 42:45Still, that is absolutely. No, it looks like it's set up
- 42:47for massive production. And still still padlocked.
- 42:49I can see from. Here, still padlocked yet?
- 42:51Are you able to jump in on that one as well or no?
- 42:55No, they fixed that issue. The stillman do have a key to
- 42:58that one though, of course. Yeah.
- 43:00Very. Good.
- 43:01That really interesting. And then you say, is there a
- 43:03vantage point or something we can see a bit better?
- 43:05He's still a. Little bit just upstairs, we'll
- 43:08head through and. We'll get something to surprise
- 43:10the boys with as well. I'll grab, I'll grab something.
- 43:12This is where we're getting. Our surprise just go through.
- 43:15The door. Yes, this is the surprise time.
- 43:22This is worth pointing out as well.
- 43:23This is Richard. So he is actually a member of
- 43:25staff. Yes.
- 43:26So you can see that last photo there.
- 43:28Yeah, it's Richard Noble, who celebrated 50 years with the
- 43:31company last year. Wow.
- 43:33Because I was actually thinking what's what?
- 43:34What's? His role, he is head
- 43:37warehouseman and he has been head warehouseman since 82.
- 43:42Wow, wow. Yeah.
- 43:43Because actually, I first thought when I came in, I
- 43:45thought, oh, to Martin, I've done something with Harrison
- 43:47Ford as well. If we go, he.
- 43:56Photographs very well. He does.
- 43:58Let me Joe, let me Joe said that we had 185,000 cash on a. 180 so
- 44:04yeah, roughly. And he's been here since the oh,
- 44:06he's unbelievable. He don't know all the I mean.
- 44:11Like you're saying when you. Look at him.
- 44:19It's so harsh. I guess, I guess there's a
- 44:21portion of you. Don't think so, yeah.
- 44:34Yeah, here we go. Oh wow.
- 44:41Oh, this is cool. Yeah, no, this is interesting.
- 44:45What do we have here? When we join.
- 44:48Well, can I answer this question?
- 44:50Oh, yeah. Go on.
- 44:51Is this the first ever German system that was ever installed?
- 45:00Yeah. So what was right now What?
- 45:05It was a German system. What was the lifter system?
- 45:08Yeah. And I'll tell you how I know
- 45:10that is mystery distilleries on the Facebook page, OK?
- 45:15The first mystery distillery I ever put up was Tomathan.
- 45:18Wow. And that was one of the clues
- 45:19that I actually put in so so. Maybe worth explaining?
- 45:22So this is this a mash talk? Yes, this is a mash talk.
- 45:25Yes you can and you can. No longer you can stretch your
- 45:28legs in there is. This one when you when you were
- 45:30talking earlier, we spoke about how you received in the 60s a
- 45:34second mash. Turn.
- 45:35Against this. The mash turn.
- 45:37Yes, yes. So this is a mashed stunt.
- 45:38So 1963, I think it was, I said, wasn't it?
- 45:41Yeah. And Graham said it was a a life
- 45:45a. Lifeter, Lauter, Mashed.
- 45:47In Scotland, that you can. Go Is that just where it was
- 45:49produced, or is there something special about this mashed stunt?
- 45:52Yeah, compared to other mashed stunts.
- 45:54Yeah, Zealander, I couldn't tell you.
- 45:56Oh, dear. OK.
- 45:57Yeah, we'll make that podcast. Let me Joe answer the question.
- 46:03So, well, just the fact that it was the first larger mash on to
- 46:07be put in in in a distillery in Scotland.
- 46:10And you know, it was also the first mash on to have the moving
- 46:13mechanism of the blades and that pivoting that you get this mash
- 46:18on as well. All of it is copper.
- 46:19So the plates that are sitting underneath the blades.
- 46:22There and they normally come round.
- 46:23Most would be. Stainless steel, yeah, but
- 46:25because of the time that this was built.
- 46:28Copper wasn't. Was.
- 46:29Expensive. Yeah, copper was not expensive.
- 46:32So that's. So the idea here then is is to
- 46:34keep it, keeps the IT, keeps it moving it.
- 46:36Keeps it moving, yeah. So the the blades themselves,
- 46:40they rotate so around the whole time so.
- 46:42Everything rotates, so you're getting everything rotates
- 46:44double rotation. Yes, yeah, exactly.
- 46:46And that is just the the more what would the more what's,
- 46:49what's the reason for the more movement?
- 46:51So the the more movement we get, the more sugar is going to, you
- 46:55know, the more the water can get in and activate those enzymes in
- 46:57there. So you want to get the sugar
- 46:59out. You don't want to be left with
- 47:00any sugar left in the grist. So constant moving movement is
- 47:04going to. There's a few There's a few
- 47:05tourists looking down at your. So this mash done no longer in
- 47:09production, you obviously do have a mash time that's in
- 47:11production. Very, very well.
- 47:14Notice that. No, no.
- 47:15No, but is is that allowed to mash done as well?
- 47:19OK. That's a good question.
- 47:20It is. That's a great.
- 47:21Question. That's a good question.
- 47:22Yes. We're we're saying
- 47:26provisionally, yes. Yes, we'll go upstairs and see
- 47:29what the signs. What we'll say, whoever designed
- 47:31the tour, this is quite a big thing to keep.
- 47:34I've never been inside a mashed on before.
- 47:37But also it's huge. It's the same with our wash
- 47:39backs. We still have a lot of our old
- 47:41wash backs on site because they're huge and they're very
- 47:43difficult and it's costly to remove stuff like that.
- 47:46So yeah, you can imagine trying to remove this.
- 47:48Exactly. If you're trying to remove,
- 47:49you'd either have to completely. Break it up and take it out
- 47:51piece. By piece or you'd have to do, or
- 47:53else you'd have to take the roof off.
- 47:54Yeah. So you don't want to have to
- 47:56take the roof. Off Really cool.
- 47:58I think was this the original? Sorry, is this the original
- 48:00position that I was in? Yes, yeah, yeah.
- 48:02So you can have a look up the top.
- 48:05The green feeders. The grist bins, yeah, Yep.
- 48:08So that's, that's lowering the grist in.
- 48:10Yeah. And the water as well.
- 48:12And you can see that. Yeah, and then your pipes.
- 48:16Oh, Chuck. Chuck knocked his head despite
- 48:20despite. The three.
- 48:21Caution, Chuck, despite the three caution, line your head so
- 48:24I can. Close into this, please?
- 48:25Yeah. Well done, Chuck.
- 48:31So what? He's a Greek.
- 48:32He's. What we'll see is that's a
- 48:35one-on-one and that's something that's really cool.
- 48:37And so if you haven't been to Tomatten, you've got to come and
- 48:41see and. If you do come to Tomatten now,
- 48:43you'll see a tiny little bit of truck and skull.
- 48:47Really, really cool. All right, we'll go up to this
- 48:49vantage point and tell you, Yeah.
- 48:51Mind your head, Chuck. Yeah.
- 48:54That's a lovely vantage point. Yeah, really, really impressive.
- 48:57Wow. He's got the Zoom working and
- 48:58everything. Yeah.
- 48:59There's this way around the camera.
- 49:01Yes, like I said this, this bit was actually a door through.
- 49:05To to the stills. To the stills.
- 49:06Originally when you had the stills coming right up to the
- 49:09store, yeah. You had a sliding.
- 49:10Door here actually. This is probably about.
- 49:13Last year, actually, we had the sliding door.
- 49:14Still. Wow.
- 49:14Still here? Yeah.
- 49:16That's probably a good point for us to ask some production
- 49:18questions because we know we've got a lot of listeners who love
- 49:20production now. We were speaking earlier about
- 49:23Matt 36, how fruity it is, etcetera.
- 49:27Must be a long fermentation. Yeah, 5 days, five days in
- 49:32total. Well.
- 49:32That is really at the upper end, isn't?
- 49:35It Yeah, yeah, you're like 170. Hours.
- 49:37That's that's I think the highest that I'm aware of.
- 49:40Yeah, yeah. That is, I've never heard up up
- 49:43to that point. So yeah, I would go for that.
- 49:46Yeah. And what the whole so
- 49:47fermentation wise then? Really, really long
- 49:49fermentation. What that does then?
- 49:51What does that do to? Why does that create?
- 49:53It gives you fruity esters, is what they say.
- 49:55It gives you more fruity character in the spirit once you
- 49:57go to distill. Yeah.
- 49:59And then in terms of distillation, how hard running
- 50:01the stills tell us a wee bit about?
- 50:03Yeah. So our distillation, first
- 50:06distillations were sitting about 8 to 8 hours.
- 50:09We're heating them to about 9090° to get that boiling up,
- 50:14but to start with in the first distillation anyway.
- 50:17But yeah, about 8-8 hours in the first one.
- 50:19Second one, depending on what boiler we're using can have an
- 50:23impact on the timings as well. So we've got a biomass boiler
- 50:26and AS a biomass steam boiler, sorry, and then a gas boiler.
- 50:30Try and use the biomass as much as we can.
- 50:32Better for us, but that one takes a little bit longer
- 50:35because you cannot blast the stills with steam.
- 50:38And and how big are your stills? So there are about 14,000 litres
- 50:44you get in there, yeah, because one mash fills three of our
- 50:46stills. So our mash is 42 1/2 thousand
- 50:48litres, sorry, our wash 42 1/2 thousand litres.
- 50:52So that is going in there into 3 stills at a time, so.
- 50:58What point of view? Right, OK.
- 51:00When you're waiting for, I take it you have to plan ahead?
- 51:04Well, you obviously will plan ahead, but when you're
- 51:06fermenting for fermenting for five days, is there anything
- 51:10else that can happen at the distillery for those five days
- 51:13or does it all wait till we're right?
- 51:15So we fill the fermentation tanks up, right, That's them.
- 51:19Done. We can clock off now, but you'd
- 51:21help come back on Friday. Fermentation tanks at different.
- 51:24Stages right So. Yeah, slightly different stages.
- 51:26So our mashing starts on a kind of Sunday night.
- 51:29They'll start that up again 'cause we don't produce over the
- 51:31weekend. Saturday and Sunday are for the
- 51:32boys, so yeah. Love.
- 51:37For the boys. So can you get more angels?
- 51:39Angels, the team for the team, yeah, but yeah.
- 51:44So they're starting set Sunday night and then going in.
- 51:48But because we're in constant production throughout the week,
- 51:50yeah, Monday morning there will be washes ready to be emptied
- 51:52from the previous week. Yeah.
- 51:54So it's just a constant. It's not the case that they
- 51:55start and they can't do anything for five days.
- 51:57I know it's. Just in the beginning of the
- 51:59year, yeah, when we when we close down, yeah.
- 52:01So you have a couple weeks for Christmas, then you do have a
- 52:03week of just mashing. You don't do any distillation
- 52:06because you don't have so many. But there are plenty of other
- 52:08things for the guys to be doing on site.
- 52:10Like like we said, it's a it's a huge site.
- 52:12So helping the guys in the warehouse.
- 52:13You do pitted malt as well, yes. Is that is that done in a
- 52:17particular time of year? Is it?
- 52:19Like a week or something that you do pitted malt or is it?
- 52:22Yeah, so around it, cause different distilleries are
- 52:24different ways of tackling it. Yeah, exactly.
- 52:26We, we produce it for the last two to four weeks of the year,
- 52:31which is just coming into December.
- 52:33We closed down. I want to say kind of.
- 52:36And then there's a case of deep clean and then production
- 52:39starting again in January. Then production starts.
- 52:41Where do you start? Clean SO.
- 52:43Sells that, I think it's a bloody nightmare.
- 52:46I mean, is it, are you talking like is someone in there?
- 52:49Is that the kind of outside contractors coming in or is that
- 52:52something? That you'd do something the guys
- 52:53do themselves. That's.
- 52:54Not a specialized. Yeah, just take them.
- 52:55Apart. And like, that would be the week
- 52:57that I take my holidays. Yeah.
- 52:59Like I'd be taking my holidays that day.
- 53:01Yeah, so they when they're doing a deep clean, yet people climb
- 53:04inside the machines and. Wow, with a Brillo pad and just.
- 53:08Yeah, something like liquids. OK.
- 53:11It's, it's such an interesting operation because it looks like
- 53:14you're, you're set up to be as big as you were back in the day.
- 53:18But clearly you're taking your time with the process and
- 53:21distillery manager, master blender, etcetera, have a real
- 53:24target for that spirit. And the spirit's so important.
- 53:27I guess we'll talk about maturation and stuff you've
- 53:29spent at the next stage as well. But thank you so much for
- 53:32showing us around the distillery.
- 53:33Oh, absolutely. Really cool.
- 53:36That's it's it's meant how warm it is.
- 53:40Yeah, Thanksgiving. Like warm draft.
- 53:42Yeah, a bit on a. Really cold Winter's day coming
- 53:45up here is just heaven. Right, Yeah, it's the best take
- 53:48your. Breaks up here, obviously.
- 53:49Yeah, nice one. Well, probably let's let's head
- 53:52off to the next place that's. Cool.
- 53:54This is the space that you very rarely see in distilleries,
- 53:56actually. This is where they're filling
- 53:58casks. Yeah.
- 53:59Do you know, it's really, really interesting because it's it's
- 54:02not a very glamorous part. No, no.
- 54:04Here we are. You.
- 54:04You can smell, you can smell the spirit.
- 54:06You can smell the list. Yeah, so is that, I mean, I take
- 54:08it there's a big tank there. So these vats here so.
- 54:11There's an even bigger tank there.
- 54:12Right. So these are our spirit
- 54:13receivers. And and So what have you got?
- 54:18A sets filling strength. Yes, we do.
- 54:21So normally it's 63 1/2%. At the moment it is going into
- 54:25the cast at 68.8. Percent, Yeah, the spirit
- 54:29receiver, this is before they're just about to put it into cask.
- 54:31Yeah, right. So comes into the tanks into
- 54:35here. We have water tanks above.
- 54:37So this tank is where they gauge the whiskey.
- 54:39So the spirit. Sorry.
- 54:40So they'll come in the boys in the filling store.
- 54:43Hey, Mark, who you just saw and Robbie is one of them, who is my
- 54:47brother actually, who works here.
- 54:49Yeah, Mother, brother, mother, brother, daughter.
- 54:52Yeah, family's taking over. So they'll gauge the whiskey to
- 54:56take it down to that 68 .8% and then filling it through this
- 55:01little thing here, which is literally just a little lever.
- 55:03Switch that on, Hold your cask up.
- 55:06Fantastic. And you can see behind us here,
- 55:08as Angus is really familiar with.
- 55:09Now we've got buns. Yeah, Angus was many of them.
- 55:13Yeah, Angus was good at take one out.
- 55:18I'm sharing a room with Angus this evening and I know that
- 55:21Angus snores very loudly. I might take one of these.
- 55:25It's one of these. And when he's sound asleep,
- 55:27lying on his back. I won't be.
- 55:31One at the other end. That is a whiskey.
- 55:35So these podcast exclusive that Graham will be banging Angus to
- 55:38say that what a fantastic access.
- 55:42Let's get out of here. And so this is, is this where
- 55:47you're saying this is Warehouse 6?
- 55:48Warehouse 6 So this is our oldest warehouse on site, really
- 55:51built in the early 1900s. This is where we keep our oldest
- 55:57whiskey. This is the casket you mentioned
- 55:58the cast. That I was mentioning earlier on
- 56:001967. So that is the 1967 cask.
- 56:04Oh, it's a 1989. There's a 1989.
- 56:07That's a best year for whiskey. That was the year that the
- 56:09whiskey stories yeah. Podcast was originally sorted
- 56:12out but no one knew for another 30 odd.
- 56:15Years and I've got my 1990. 9 Just a young prang, yeah.
- 56:20What are you Chucky 9119901990? Right there in the middle there.
- 56:25You are. Right there.
- 56:27Fantastic. Excellent.
- 56:28I mean, so all this, I mean, how many casks do you think would be
- 56:32in here? Let me go a few 100, I don't
- 56:35know exactly. We do have more upstairs like I
- 56:37said, but because it's not stacked.
- 56:39And this is where people come through their tours naturally.
- 56:41This is normally the end, so. This is where you come through
- 56:43the tour. That is why they are stacked.
- 56:44Up like this for people and showing you the different cask
- 56:47sizes, et cetera that. We get yeah sizes, which again,
- 56:51great visual. If you've never been to a
- 56:52distillery before, you don't know anything.
- 56:53About gas. It's great to be able to see
- 56:55that. Yeah, quote on the wall as well.
- 56:57Actually that was taken late 50s of the distillery.
- 57:00You've got the kind of train line.
- 57:01Going Yeah. So that was our sideline coming
- 57:04into the distillery. There's a big reason as to why
- 57:06the distillery was put where it was, was because this was the
- 57:08end of the railway line back then.
- 57:10Yeah. OK.
- 57:10So this was a built sideline off the main line.
- 57:13We had our own engine that would go to and from the main line to
- 57:15pick up and then load on and then load on.
- 57:19Yeah. And this is this is this
- 57:21warehouse that we're in, Warehouse 6.
- 57:25It's a great question. We don't want to debate.
- 57:28On. It I reckon it was for moving
- 57:30like malting. We used to do our own maltings
- 57:32on site. Yeah.
- 57:33So I I reckon it was for that, but I still don't really know.
- 57:37Could. We are we allowed to put Ross
- 57:39in? That get it up here and see from
- 57:42that photo and obviously we look around ourselves we're at the
- 57:44top of a hill here like Tomatin Tomatin means.
- 57:49Hill of the Juniper Hill. So we don't make gin here.
- 57:52We don't make gin. All the juniper bushes around.
- 57:55There is a few, not as many as there used to be.
- 57:58So there used to be huge amount in Juniper that's.
- 58:00Why it's? Why it's?
- 58:00Called. That's why it's Hell of the
- 58:02Juniper but no gin. No gin.
- 58:04No gin distillery. Trying to fuss, yeah.
- 58:09Fine, we think we like whiskey then.
- 58:10Yeah. I mean, these are great.
- 58:11I mean, and, and in terms of the casks that were set, whoops.
- 58:16Healthy safety nightmare. Yeah.
- 58:19Tripped over a bunch and there's the.
- 58:22Second biggest cask in here there.
- 58:26Are any kind of mystery casts that because I I've been to
- 58:31distillery and they had a cast and they were like, we just
- 58:33don't know what this is. We have no idea.
- 58:35I mean is that? Is there anything?
- 58:36Like that here we don't have any current mystery cast.
- 58:40We did have one cask that actually ended up being a
- 58:42Kibakan bottling, which was we, we first released, started
- 58:48producing Kibaki in 2005 and the first release of it was 2013.
- 58:53But there was 1 cask of Tematin whiskey from the 80s that they
- 58:57went to bottle and our master distiller at the time took out
- 58:59as a sample and was smelling it and thinking this is peated,
- 59:02Tematin is not peated. What is this?
- 59:04So they take it all around site asking different people to smell
- 59:07it and everyone's going, yeah, that's definitely peated,
- 59:09definitely peated. And then they take it to one of
- 59:11our production guys that was here in the 80s when they did
- 59:13it, and he just goes, oh, crap. But we got away with that.
- 59:16Oh really? Oh, really?
- 59:17So we had an accidental delivery of malt, feted malt coming in to
- 59:22us and they just went right. We'll produce it and put it into
- 59:27the cast and see. Probably.
- 59:28Nobody will notice, and they did notice it, but then it was
- 59:31released as a limited edition Kubaka.
- 59:33I worked at ME. I wrote it. 30 years later, 30.
- 59:37Years later, people were like, yeah, here we go.
- 59:39So let me, Joe, we're now upstairs in the warehouse.
- 59:42So I, I had no, I knew we were going upstairs, but I had no
- 59:44idea that we're going to be upstairs and there'll be casks
- 59:47up here as well. Quite, quite remarkable.
- 59:49And we have, we're going to give us some samples as well, I
- 59:51believe. So what have we got lined up
- 59:53here just now? So this is part of our new
- 59:57Warehouse 6 Distillery exclusives collection.
- 59:59Yeah, bit of a mouthful, but they are all.
- 1:00:04Up here and we we pull from the cast on tastings on the
- 1:00:07Warehouse 6 experience for for the guys.
- 1:00:10So what we did was we bottled about 2/3 of the cask and then
- 1:00:13kept 1/3 in there for tasting. So we've got a bourbon, a port,
- 1:00:18a cognac, and a Cabernet Sauvignon.
- 1:00:21And what are we going to try? We are going to be trying the
- 1:00:23Cabernet Sauvignon. No, probably no.
- 1:00:24I'm really excited for this because Angus is.
- 1:00:27He's been qualified now. He's been trained up to open up
- 1:00:30a cask. Now let's see if you remember
- 1:00:33Angus. Brilliant.
- 1:00:35Are you feeling confident? I guess not.
- 1:00:36Really. OK, I'll.
- 1:00:37Try. I'll try my best.
- 1:00:40Horribly. Wrong.
- 1:00:41Well, if you remember, absolutely he's done it.
- 1:00:47He's done it already. Well, you know that that was
- 1:00:53that was more successful than the last one.
- 1:00:55Absolutely. OK, let's get it poured out.
- 1:00:59And I was said in the podcast report, there is nothing like
- 1:01:02being in a warehouse. He does have a copper dog there
- 1:01:04he can use instead. Oh, now we've never used a
- 1:01:06copper dog before, so a cop to Ross, you'll be able to explain
- 1:01:10it what a copper dog is for anyone who doesn't know I'll.
- 1:01:13Be honest with you, I've never done it because you it's
- 1:01:15basically you've got to dip it in and hope the cask is full
- 1:01:19enough and fish it back. Out but copper dogs originally
- 1:01:21came from you know warehouse workers would keep this sort of
- 1:01:24basically what we've got is we've got a tiny I say tiny it's
- 1:01:27a copper sort of container there with a chain on it and what I
- 1:01:32believe they used to keep them up their sleeves and the chain
- 1:01:34would connect well that's on a padlock but.
- 1:01:36That's on a padlock so we don't lose the chain, yeah.
- 1:01:39I think the chain would connect this like a pocket inside pocket
- 1:01:42or something like that. And what these distillery
- 1:01:43workers would do, as we were talking about the the excisement
- 1:01:46on site and stuff like that, they would maybe open a cheeky
- 1:01:49cask up and just dip that in, pull it back out, stick up their
- 1:01:52sleeve. And that would be a wee DRAM for
- 1:01:54lunchtime, which works out perfectly because at the moment
- 1:01:56it's 12:00. Yeah.
- 1:01:58For the audio listeners, it really is so tips on how I
- 1:02:00should? Do this fish for whiskey.
- 1:02:02When you drop it in, it should fall naturally.
- 1:02:04If it doesn't, give the chain a little wiggle.
- 1:02:07You want to hear for the glug. OK, OK, let's.
- 1:02:10Let's give it, Yeah. So I just want give it a bit
- 1:02:13more, give it a bit more. That's a few lugs.
- 1:02:20That's a big lug. That's.
- 1:02:21A big lug. Hold on, yes, not like you pack
- 1:02:24a wee pour, eh? Oh wow.
- 1:02:26Amazing. Full to the brim.
- 1:02:29Right. Well.
- 1:02:30Assessed from Graham here. This is valuable liquid
- 1:02:34gentlemen don't get. Yeah, pour the whole thing in
- 1:02:37there if it fits back in. Yeah, because it can just get.
- 1:02:41Pretty well done so for audio listeners.
- 1:02:43Look at that. For audio listeners.
- 1:02:45Right. Where's yours?
- 1:02:45It's. Essentially like a bottle and
- 1:02:49chain with no top. It's.
- 1:02:50Just fished out the liquid. You can see the Cabernet Sauvio
- 1:02:53effect already. This is a Tomatin. 2008, 2008,
- 1:02:56So that's been fantastic. Well, we're going to pour this,
- 1:02:59get a few drams and sit down because I think it's time for
- 1:03:01the first drama of the day, isn't it?
- 1:03:02Right. Well, here we are now we've
- 1:03:04Angus has done a cracking job of splitting the bung.
- 1:03:08The Lady of the Glen. I didn't use enough force here.
- 1:03:10I've used too much. You knew last time, you knew
- 1:03:12what you were coming into, but you, you, you did a grand job
- 1:03:15with the copper dog, I have to say, up to your usual self with
- 1:03:20their measures. But it's not Angus whiskey.
- 1:03:23He's very, very good, boring, big jobs.
- 1:03:25And he certainly hasn't disappointed yet.
- 1:03:27And that's what I'm looking forward to.
- 1:03:28Let me talk us through this then.
- 1:03:30Yeah. So like I said, this is one of
- 1:03:32our Warehouse 6 distillery exclusives full maturation in
- 1:03:36the Cavs have which currently still in the Cavs have cast.
- 1:03:39You know what? So cabs have then?
- 1:03:40So you'd already mentioned what? Just remind me what's cabs have
- 1:03:44then? Cabernet Sauvignon.
- 1:03:45Cabernet Sauvignon. Right.
- 1:03:46Do we know where the Cabernet is from?
- 1:03:48I don't. That's all right.
- 1:03:49A lot of people won't disclose. Cheers anyway.
- 1:03:51Cheers guys. Cheers.
- 1:03:52You know the rough. Strength of it at the moment.
- 1:03:55About 57% just. Because he can be quite bold to
- 1:03:58his first set. So and while while you're having
- 1:04:02a taste, Charles, you've joined us, you're driving to to the
- 1:04:05next stop. How did you find the tour?
- 1:04:07Any any questions for Libby Jo not?
- 1:04:11Not really. I'm just, I was listening to
- 1:04:13everything so intended. Oh, no, sorry.
- 1:04:15Sorry. Yeah, I had a great time.
- 1:04:16I'm sorry. I had, you know, I'm still
- 1:04:18mildly concussed, no. Really great.
- 1:04:22It's lovely. Lovely lovely looking
- 1:04:24distillery, so amazing to see. Like the cast filling station?
- 1:04:27That, yeah. That's what I thought.
- 1:04:28Yeah, so, so good. Oh, that's lovely.
- 1:04:30For an hour, Facebook whiskey nerd people, they're going to
- 1:04:33love that little filling station.
- 1:04:35Yeah. With this whole warehouse in
- 1:04:36itself, I mean the downstairs one, obviously you get hit with
- 1:04:39that smell, but coming upstairs, like the floor, it's like you've
- 1:04:43walked into your attic, but there's just, you know, a couple
- 1:04:45£100,000, maybe millions worth of whiskey.
- 1:04:48Yeah, it's fantastic. I mean, and also with the Angel
- 1:04:50share coming up the way we're getting double the hip with the
- 1:04:53with the smell. Yeah, yeah.
- 1:04:55But like you said, this this that we're trying now the
- 1:04:58Cadbury 7 year distillery, excuse me, the only place you
- 1:05:00can get you can buy this whiskey.
- 1:05:02Is that the distillery? At the distillery, yeah.
- 1:05:04What? Do you think of the drum
- 1:05:05gentleman? I love that was absolutely.
- 1:05:06And do you know something for the first drum and 57, you said,
- 1:05:10you know, I have to go and drum for for the time of day, a
- 1:05:13lunchtime drum. But what I would say is, you
- 1:05:16know, the perfect sort of starting point.
- 1:05:18It didn't. There's a bit of spiciness
- 1:05:20there. You can feel it, but at the same
- 1:05:21time you. Get that kind of fruity
- 1:05:22character that you. Really, really nicely fruity.
- 1:05:24Yeah. And so obviously we're in a
- 1:05:26warehouse. I always say the best thing is
- 1:05:27drinking out of a cask. But also it's cold.
- 1:05:29Yeah. So as we but we're difficult
- 1:05:31when you're drinking whiskey and it's and it's slightly colder,
- 1:05:32but the the texture there, I think.
- 1:05:34Is excellent, yeah, really, really nice and.
- 1:05:36We've got a couple of the upcoming kind of fill Your own
- 1:05:41expressions Scott Adamson Master Blenders picked out as well as
- 1:05:45well as a Kubokan. I guess while you're enjoying
- 1:05:48that, we haven't really touched much on Kubokan at.
- 1:05:51All. No, no we haven't.
- 1:05:53What is what's how did that start?
- 1:05:55And and and tell us a wee bit about it.
- 1:05:58Yeah. So the Kubokan originally when
- 1:06:01they started producing in 2005, it was because the cost of
- 1:06:05blended spirit to put into blends was getting too high.
- 1:06:08So not at the time. Why not produce our own blended,
- 1:06:11our own pita spirit? Sorry.
- 1:06:14And so they started that for one, one week of the year first.
- 1:06:19Now it's up to between between two and four, kind of.
- 1:06:24But it became hugely popular. We released it first as a single
- 1:06:27malt in 2013. And that was with our old
- 1:06:31branding, which I'm sure a few of you I remember familiar with,
- 1:06:34with the ghost on the front because Kubachan does mean ghost
- 1:06:38dog in Gallic. So Ku is dog in Gallic, Bochan
- 1:06:41is ghost or spirit. Yes.
- 1:06:43Confusing Some Scottish cow. A cow.
- 1:06:45I can't remember what cow is now, but.
- 1:06:51And you do. Now you do this creation series.
- 1:06:55Yes, which? Looks into what the experimental
- 1:06:58and like the flavour LED wine series you've been doing with
- 1:07:00Tomatin, the creation series for Cuboc and.
- 1:07:03Hugely experimental. It is.
- 1:07:06Like I said, I have a soft spot for Queboken.
- 1:07:08It is one of my favorite whiskeys out there.
- 1:07:10And the creations themselves, they are just so unusual, so
- 1:07:13funky. But like I said, some of the
- 1:07:15best whiskey I've tried. Yeah.
- 1:07:17So currently on Creation 6, which is Jamaican rum casks and
- 1:07:22Pedro Jimenez Sherry casks. We'll be forward to trying.
- 1:07:24To leave that one to all that. Yes, absolutely.
- 1:07:27Probably try the second drum now, which is.
- 1:07:29What we what? What have we got?
- 1:07:30We're we want to go on to Virgin Oak.
- 1:07:32Yeah, that's it. So for context then, so just
- 1:07:34just so we're clear, these these have been, these are samples
- 1:07:37that have been pulled through that will because I believe when
- 1:07:40we arrived, we talked about, you know, one of the things that I
- 1:07:43always love when we speak to people who have we've been up to
- 1:07:46distilleries to say, oh, the distillery, the the hand filled
- 1:07:49distillery stuff. So a lot of the most
- 1:07:50distilleries will do this. There's a few casks, yeah,
- 1:07:53that'll be sitting in the shop. You get a chance to pour your
- 1:07:55own. You maybe put your, put your
- 1:07:56own, put the writing on the label and stuff like that as
- 1:07:58well. The thing?
- 1:07:59I've always liked about coming to Tomato is that I've always
- 1:08:01had more than one option. Yeah.
- 1:08:02Which actually is quite unusual. Yeah, like.
- 1:08:04Claims you get one and they might, you know, they might do.
- 1:08:07An extra. Maybe it's seasonal or.
- 1:08:09Well, I mean the big one that we the big one that we talked a lot
- 1:08:11about was the Aberlauer bourbon that Kev was bringing that got a
- 1:08:16few bottles down. That was a distillery pour, but.
- 1:08:20But that was that was, yeah. That was what was it?
- 1:08:22Exclusive. And handfuls would be stuff like
- 1:08:25do you remember at like Johnnie Walker French St. on like a
- 1:08:27winter edition, a summer edition that was you pulled the bottle
- 1:08:30from. That's the release you had.
- 1:08:31But tomato? The only example I could think
- 1:08:33of where we're going to pick up a bottle for Bobby Bar today.
- 1:08:37That is absolutely phenomenal. This one remind us what this is.
- 1:08:40Sorry. So this is a virgin oak cast.
- 1:08:44Some that is amazing. So I tried that for the first
- 1:08:47time yesterday and my God, I. Don't want to brush my teeth.
- 1:08:50So 20/20/19 So again, Young Spirit, we've spoken before
- 1:08:54about the effect of Virgin Oak and Young Spirit.
- 1:08:56It accelerates that maturation. Yeah.
- 1:08:58Yeah. And there's nothing left for me
- 1:09:00lads. I'm gonna, I'm gonna talk
- 1:09:01myself. I really sorry.
- 1:09:04These boys are like it's. Phenomenal, that is.
- 1:09:06It was his birthday just two days ago.
- 1:09:07Yeah. So it just turned 6.
- 1:09:09Right. So and, and so at the moment, so
- 1:09:11as I was saying, this is not available at the Today
- 1:09:14unfortunately, because I would have thought about a barrel load
- 1:09:17of it. But in terms of for people who
- 1:09:20are visiting, how long will that how long will these sort of
- 1:09:22last? I mean, obviously it depends on
- 1:09:24how many subject to how, how long the the whiskey last is,
- 1:09:27how, how popular it is. I wouldn't think that's going to
- 1:09:30last very long, no. No, the Virgin Oak, we the
- 1:09:33Virgin Oak is one of our best best sellers.
- 1:09:37Really. All your own range.
- 1:09:38Yeah, 100%. It's so it's so unusual to see.
- 1:09:41That God is still. Being able to and I'm actually
- 1:09:43gutted I can't can't buy any way of being able to buy a bottle
- 1:09:45that you'll. Have to come back.
- 1:09:47Don't have to talk. You've got to drive us well,
- 1:09:50gentlemen. Gentlemen, gentlemen, how great
- 1:09:52is it that we're getting to try it?
- 1:09:54Whiskey Stories Exclusive Getting to try this amazing
- 1:09:56lovely. Any wanky tasting notes for me?
- 1:09:59Well, no, actually, yeah, right. OK, I'm gonna try this right, so
- 1:10:04the do. Another taste give.
- 1:10:05Me, give me another taste that for.
- 1:10:07Me. There's that kind of custard on
- 1:10:08the nose, yeah. Like that?
- 1:10:10Oh yeah, great. Don't give me the wanky taste.
- 1:10:12You don't. Take a stab on it as well.
- 1:10:15What I'm saying I. Was gonna say I really got not,
- 1:10:18not initially, but I've got that kind of floor Polish kind of
- 1:10:21woody. Yeah, not really kind of nice.
- 1:10:23I expected a bit more spice on the palette, which is concerning
- 1:10:26the strength of the age, but actually it drinks really well.
- 1:10:29Yeah, I'm ready for this wanky tasting note from Graham
- 1:10:32Klegewer. Then no pressure.
- 1:10:36He loves it. Like sitting in a new, newly
- 1:10:40made and polished wooden gazebo on a summer's day.
- 1:10:46My granny had a wooden gazebo in her garden and that smell of
- 1:10:51like that Piney, that wooden kind of smell coming there's.
- 1:10:54Wanky tastes and then there's like pretentious way to.
- 1:10:58Say from. The OG Charles.
- 1:11:00Sorry sorry if this. Is Garthling you're being.
- 1:11:03Protected. I'll tell you this is, this is,
- 1:11:05this is. It's very, very, very good
- 1:11:09whiskey, right? That's, that's my tasting note.
- 1:11:12I I would say personally, that is absolutely fantastic.
- 1:11:15Distillation day on. It and so it's 2019 virgin oak.
- 1:11:19And what was ABV of that, Ross? 60.2.
- 1:11:23You're kidding. Right.
- 1:11:24Really. And then the next one.
- 1:11:26You've got almighty. Barbados Rum visitor centre
- 1:11:29exclusive Yeah 54.8% Have you tried this one as well?
- 1:11:33Yes, yeah, yeah, I tried them on.
- 1:11:34What's a year on that one? Not totally sure, around 14
- 1:11:39years. So it smells.
- 1:11:40It's still rum. Like we've had a lot of rum
- 1:11:43influenced whiskey. Yeah, but this is.
- 1:11:46You're getting kind of tropical fruits when you.
- 1:11:48Smells. Like pineapple?
- 1:11:49Yeah. Do you know how long it was it
- 1:11:50Was this a full? Maturation.
- 1:11:52They're all. Single full maturation Eminem.
- 1:11:55That's terrific. I mean, this is this is the
- 1:11:56beauty of these. Kind of like you said, I've been
- 1:12:00a few distilleries, I've got hand fills and it's like you've
- 1:12:02got your one option and that's a bad to have, right?
- 1:12:05Mango. Being able to offer.
- 1:12:06What was that? Sorry you missed that he's
- 1:12:08studying. Give us give us a taste of note
- 1:12:10and he's he's don't put don't put the W word in front of this
- 1:12:12because to Matt might want to use this all.
- 1:12:15Right. Well, I just said it.
- 1:12:16Well, you guys should smell. I don't want to.
- 1:12:18I don't want to tell you what it smells like, but.
- 1:12:20Yeah, when I said it smells like rum, Chucks went Oh yeah
- 1:12:23straight away. Yeah, just rubber bands and
- 1:12:25right Mango. Rubber bands 100% getting rubber
- 1:12:28bands on that. Isn't that interesting, The
- 1:12:30power? Right, Mango, don't know where
- 1:12:31you're getting. That but bright mango is a note.
- 1:12:34I get into that and spirit all the time.
- 1:12:36Like especially to Matt and and bourbon.
- 1:12:38It's got that exotic tropical note to it.
- 1:12:40Oh. That's easy going.
- 1:12:43And then our final jam, we're going to try the Kubok, and
- 1:12:45you're going to pretend to like it because you're going to
- 1:12:46pretend to like Peter. Westley.
- 1:12:48And then we're going to hear some, what, 3 drams, what three
- 1:12:51stories from Libby Joe. But I brought this bottle, the
- 1:12:54big tea. Having spoken about it, the big
- 1:12:56tea now I think just the they don't produce it anymore.
- 1:12:59But you do have the ability to produce it.
- 1:13:01Yeah, as far as I'm aware, if you make an order of about 6000
- 1:13:04bottles and they'll be able to do one for you.
- 1:13:07So, Graham, if you want that. I mean, what would one of these
- 1:13:10what, what, what, what is back? What's it selling for just now?
- 1:13:13Can can you buy it downstairs? No.
- 1:13:15No, no, not, not, not in production.
- 1:13:16Not in production, so you can't. You'd be able to get it online
- 1:13:19somewhere. But find an auction.
- 1:13:21Yeah, find out an auction somewhere, but.
- 1:13:22Because I mean, what I like about it as well is like it's,
- 1:13:24it's big T, nothing's fancy, tall round screw top right?
- 1:13:28The the the. That's that's traditional.
- 1:13:30Yeah. Martin, Martin.
- 1:13:31I was speaking to Martin, the the visitor centre manager, and
- 1:13:34he said that that was when you're in Inverness in your
- 1:13:37local pub Big. T was that.
- 1:13:38Would be your DRAM you'd have in the same way that we would have
- 1:13:41had Grouse, maybe White, Mackay. I think there was a guy that
- 1:13:43stayed in Inverness called like Tony and he was just massive and
- 1:13:46everyone called him Big T and big tea, drunk big tea.
- 1:13:51So this Quebakkan that we're about to try, What, what, what,
- 1:13:53what is this? This one is creation 6, Creation
- 1:13:56six. Let me just mention so it's ah,
- 1:13:59sorry. Do you mind holding?
- 1:14:03Yeah, so Creation 6, like I said, Jamaican rum casks as
- 1:14:08well. Thank you.
- 1:14:10Start on this side. Sorry.
- 1:14:14Yeah, Jamaican rum casks and Pedro Jimenez.
- 1:14:17So interestingly for this one we should get, should we be looking
- 1:14:21for similar notes of the most previous drama that we had with
- 1:14:24it being Jamaican rum, Barbados rum, Sorry, rubber bands, Smokey
- 1:14:28rubber bands. And in terms of rubber bands,
- 1:14:30because people and, and I think people get hung up on it.
- 1:14:32But in terms of PPM, in terms of what you're doing with Kibakan,
- 1:14:35how heavily pitted is this? Yeah.
- 1:14:37So at the moment our any Kibakan released is between 15 and 46
- 1:14:44units. This one, as far as I'm aware,
- 1:14:47is the highest. OK, yeah.
- 1:14:49And you'd. So to me the nose is quite
- 1:14:51welcoming, which would suggest maybe a really early cut on the
- 1:14:53spirit. Yeah, but also is is it?
- 1:14:56We don't have an age statement on these either.
- 1:14:58But no. So the oldest in this one is 11.
- 1:15:01OK. So really spirit for for British
- 1:15:03spirit as well. Yeah, 11 and 9 years are the 2
- 1:15:06casks. That's a very nice easy, easy
- 1:15:08word. Actually, it's lovely.
- 1:15:09Very nice. Is it nice and sweet?
- 1:15:11Yeah, very nice and easy. And you know, that's not only my
- 1:15:13style of whiskey, but actually that's probably that is probably
- 1:15:17at the four of them when I would go back to straight away.
- 1:15:18Yeah, yeah. Can I ask with, I mean, I don't
- 1:15:21know if you'd know the figures, but you said you're doing the
- 1:15:24Kibakan runs for like 2 to 4 weeks, Yeah.
- 1:15:27Do you know how much spirit you make in a week?
- 1:15:30Oh, I mean, I could, I could work it out, but it would take
- 1:15:34me a while because I'm bad at maths.
- 1:15:35OK, but I. Should I should have asked that
- 1:15:37question at the beginning? Yeah, but yeah.
- 1:15:39Yeah, yeah. It'd be just about working out
- 1:15:41now and you know, I don't know exactly how much it would be in
- 1:15:45a week, but we are doing similar that there is a slight
- 1:15:49difference in producing Kibakan as there is to to matin.
- 1:15:51You know, our fermentation times are slightly different,
- 1:15:54temperatures are slightly different.
- 1:15:55The distillation process is, is very different as well-being in
- 1:15:58the winter so that condenser condenses much quicker.
- 1:16:01So you get more of that kind of heavier oils coming through in
- 1:16:05the condenser in the winter than you do in the summer.
- 1:16:07I. Think it's something that people
- 1:16:08don't think about. I remember visiting Fettercare
- 1:16:10and you have this water system water cooler on their stills and
- 1:16:13they literally said that we make better spirit in the winter
- 1:16:16because the water that's coming in is colder cooler.
- 1:16:18And it's such a funny, simple thing to think about.
- 1:16:21But it is only three ingredients and then all the processes and
- 1:16:24increasing, making it unique. Well, that's probably when you
- 1:16:27start doing like when you start really looking into it.
- 1:16:29And we, we talked to, you know, Sterling at Port Leitha Steller
- 1:16:31about it. And as you're saying about now,
- 1:16:33it's like the fermentation process or the the strains of
- 1:16:37yeast, strains of barley, because what, what people can do
- 1:16:40now is, you know, historically, I think whiskey was just a happy
- 1:16:44accident, wasn't it? It was the people from the
- 1:16:46certain area were like, well, this is the kind of barley we
- 1:16:48have a local source to this is a local source of water.
- 1:16:51And you know, this is what we can get our hands on when it
- 1:16:53comes to Easton. And this is the size of still
- 1:16:55that we have and the mashed on all that kind of stuff.
- 1:16:58Now people are. Really like Tomatin, when, when
- 1:17:00Tomatin was first founded, you know, that would have been this
- 1:17:01the, the case. And then they've just carried
- 1:17:03that sort of on. They've made tweaks and what
- 1:17:05have you. But you can.
- 1:17:06But we're seeing with new distilleries like the
- 1:17:08manufacturer of flavour, because people can now manipulate that.
- 1:17:12Because you're hearing like when we had Paul Main from art
- 1:17:15talking about art and the whole, and he was saying, you know,
- 1:17:17even when they're designing A distillery, they could say we
- 1:17:19could put a, a, a bend and A, and a pipe at this area.
- 1:17:22And that will have an influence on copper contact and what have
- 1:17:25you. And.
- 1:17:25And even when we were speaking at Porter Leith and he was
- 1:17:28saying Ian Sterling, yeah, Port Leith was saying that there
- 1:17:32could be a difference in this in in the spirit fermented in a
- 1:17:35different area. Because the weather, because the
- 1:17:37way it was coming through, it was more so yeah, it can happen
- 1:17:39in the. Front it's amazing to see it as
- 1:17:40silly. It has been around for a long
- 1:17:42time. We've tried 4 whiskeys there,
- 1:17:43two different rum kind, two different rum types, virgin oak
- 1:17:47and a Cabernet Solvy all straight from the cask.
- 1:17:48Incredible. Not just plain bourbon, not just
- 1:17:50plain Sherry, although they do that very well.
- 1:17:52We discussed earlier. 18 probably is would be my go to
- 1:17:55all the Razzo, although to Ultimate and bourbon is like the
- 1:17:59Holy Grail brings us on to that point in the evening.
- 1:18:02Yeah, what? Well, evening, afternoon,
- 1:18:04evening. It's 12/5 past 12 in the
- 1:18:06afternoon. It's so rare to do a podcast
- 1:18:08during the day. Ross is going to have a snooze
- 1:18:09in the car and we have to Don it right.
- 1:18:11But so basically Liberty Josephine, you're what 3 drams,
- 1:18:15any 3 drams that have any meaning to you or story
- 1:18:19associated with them and we will allow you one on brand.
- 1:18:22OK, my first one will be on brand because it is the whiskey
- 1:18:25that got me into whiskey. Got to mention it.
- 1:18:28It is still my all time favorite whiskey.
- 1:18:31I cannot get enough of it. Which was one of the Kibokhin's
- 1:18:35creation #1 which was Imperial Stout cast by the Black Owl
- 1:18:39Brewery. Oh my God is.
- 1:18:43That still available to purchase or?
- 1:18:45Is it so we don't have it in in store here?
- 1:18:47You can get it in some some shops.
- 1:18:49I have people, I've got some of the staff on site that know
- 1:18:53about my love of this whiskey. They bring me half bottles that
- 1:18:55they've got from home. Really.
- 1:18:56That's perfect. I've got a friend in Germany who
- 1:19:00actually sent sent me a bottle of gration one from Germany.
- 1:19:03Really. Yeah.
- 1:19:04I have a huge love for it and it is just I always describe it as
- 1:19:07the perfect breakfast whiskey. Yeah, good.
- 1:19:09It's like marmalade on burnt. Toast.
- 1:19:12Oh, that is. Lovely.
- 1:19:13That is a brilliant lanky Yeah. I absolutely love that it's.
- 1:19:18A great stuff, yeah. So fantastic.
- 1:19:20Whiskey got me into whiskey. Brilliant.
- 1:19:22Savor every every drop of the bottles that I have at home.
- 1:19:25Look out in pubs in Edinburgh. Now, yeah, gotta keep an eye for
- 1:19:28that walk. In creation one, yeah.
- 1:19:30Keep walking creation one. Yeah, phenomenal.
- 1:19:33My next one is probably Lagoville and 12 year old
- 1:19:37limited release that they did a couple years ago which was in a
- 1:19:41tequila cast. Ohh again, phenomenal.
- 1:19:45Now I hate tequila. Yeah I cannot stand the stuff.
- 1:19:48I had a bad experience when I was maybe 19 and to Mountain
- 1:19:53Village. Actually it was 18.
- 1:19:55It was my 18th birthday. Your 18th.
- 1:19:57Too much tequila and. And the whole time you about it.
- 1:20:00Oh yeah, they all knew. Tequila gate, that was it.
- 1:20:04Yeah, different words when? You going?
- 1:20:08Yeah, everyone didn't want to speak to you.
- 1:20:12Yeah. Oh God, here she comes.
- 1:20:14Yes, but this lager? That was but this.
- 1:20:16Yeah, it did. So I, I remember I was in in the
- 1:20:19Johnnie Walker experience, actually, I like to go there
- 1:20:21once a year. Yeah.
- 1:20:22Just just, I love it. I love their bar in there as
- 1:20:25well. So do you.
- 1:20:26Like the Lagerville of ice cream cocktail.
- 1:20:29I haven't tried it. No, you need to try it.
- 1:20:31Do you say ice cream? It's like an ice cream, like
- 1:20:34it's trying to be like a Coca-Cola float sort of thing,
- 1:20:36right? Slag of villain.
- 1:20:38Ohh wow. The ice.
- 1:20:38Cream. Is lag of villain flavour ice
- 1:20:41cream? It's.
- 1:20:42I also highly recommend A Slag of Villain, which is a French
- 1:20:46martini with lagovillin instead of vodka.
- 1:20:48Oh, there you go, love. That I did have an espresso
- 1:20:51martini with lagovillin, yeah, you know, once that was
- 1:20:54versatile. Spirit, everybody, Yeah.
- 1:20:56And do you know something? Sorry, sorry from a what, 3?
- 1:20:58I'm just going back through our, what, 3 drums?
- 1:21:00Lagovillin does feature fairly the 16 yeah, 16 especially.
- 1:21:03And I'll be honest with you and apologies to anyone who's
- 1:21:07listening to this who who's a male.
- 1:21:09It's generally. I would say that Lagavulin has
- 1:21:11been only put down Megan Brown. Megan Brown, it was the first
- 1:21:14one. And then I think there's been a
- 1:21:16few other who are female whiskey drinkers who have put Lagavulin
- 1:21:20in in as their what, 3? Dramas.
- 1:21:22It's because they've got a better palate than.
- 1:21:24No, no, it was. Yeah, there's something.
- 1:21:28Lagavulin was probably trying to remember the first time I tried
- 1:21:32the 16 even, but it again just fell in love with the spirit.
- 1:21:35What was it about at the main? Because obviously you have this
- 1:21:37kind of bad experience with tequila.
- 1:21:39What was it like with the tequila cask, like a rolling
- 1:21:41that you just thought, wow? When did you try it?
- 1:21:44When? Yeah.
- 1:21:45What was it like? We must have.
- 1:21:46If it sticks out, you must have two.
- 1:21:48About two years ago, right, 2 1/2 No, it was Christmas time
- 1:21:52about two years ago. And yeah, I'd gone into the bar
- 1:21:56and the lovely woman at the bar that her name escapes me, but
- 1:22:00she brought me the nice big brown blue clip that they bring
- 1:22:03you in the Tony Walker bar. And then she said, oh, we've
- 1:22:06actually got a new release, which is the slag villain, 12
- 1:22:08year old. And she said it was Tequila
- 1:22:09Kass. And I said, no, I'm not.
- 1:22:11I cannot, I can't genuinely. I couldn't even smell Tequila
- 1:22:14Kass. I can't even smell it.
- 1:22:17I love that. Couldn't even.
- 1:22:21But she she forced me into drying the drama.
- 1:22:24And my God, I was so fortunate that she did great drama.
- 1:22:27It was just, you know, it wasn't that intense kind of taste of
- 1:22:33tequila, like, because if it was, I wouldn't be able to drink
- 1:22:35it. But it was just so subtle.
- 1:22:37And I think tequila is a great spirit in itself, but it's just
- 1:22:41too overpowering for me. Yeah.
- 1:22:43So that just gave a really nice balance between incredibly
- 1:22:46smooth. Yeah, just.
- 1:22:49It's true because if you do have a bad experience, it does put
- 1:22:51you off because I mean, I, I for a long time couldn't drink
- 1:22:54Schweppes lemonade because I had vodka lemonade at university and
- 1:22:58it just, it just. My mum had my mum had Schweppes
- 1:23:02lemonade in the house and I just.
- 1:23:04Couldn't drink it. I mean just it just brought
- 1:23:06like. I think from another side of it
- 1:23:20as well, I think I also highlights probably that like
- 1:23:25cask influence and the the influence of what's been in the
- 1:23:29cast, you can say, well, what is it that the the tequila
- 1:23:33influence on the spirit that goes into that cast is versus
- 1:23:37just a tequila. So there be things that we lost,
- 1:23:40there'll be maybe things that you don't like.
- 1:23:41The the thing that you really don't like about the tequila
- 1:23:43flavour is maybe lost in the in once it's been taken out in the
- 1:23:47whatever's left in the wood. Once you mix the lagovillin
- 1:23:50spirit, what it takes over and what have you more people.
- 1:23:52Are trying it now as well. I When that lagovillin was
- 1:23:55distilled and put into cask, it was probably illegal to use
- 1:23:58tequila. Cask at the time.
- 1:23:59So the fact that it then became legal and able to boss it more
- 1:24:02coming. Up and the other thing as well,
- 1:24:03you've got to remember that, you know, we're talking about, you
- 1:24:06know, wine casts, pork casts, all these kind of things, rum
- 1:24:10casts and tequila casts. The important factor to remember
- 1:24:13is that it it, it shouldn't have an overpowering influence on the
- 1:24:18whiskey. You should always be able to
- 1:24:19know like what should happen is you should know that's a
- 1:24:22Lagavulin, right? Because you can taste the
- 1:24:24Lagavulin flavour with a tiny different twist on it rather
- 1:24:28than being like, oh, I can taste tequila because it's like
- 1:24:31Sherry. If you can taste Sherry when
- 1:24:33you're drinking a cherry cast whiskey, that's probably
- 1:24:36overdone. If you can, you like it.
- 1:24:38No, you're the one that sits and drinks sweet.
- 1:24:41You ordered cherries? Bars as a 12 LB and so and so
- 1:24:45your third and final draft. My 3rd and final that.
- 1:24:54He also puts black card in his Guinness by the way.
- 1:24:59No, no, he's perfect. The third, Third, 3rd and final
- 1:25:02DRAM I want to not be like this is going to sound so on myself,
- 1:25:08but there's a blending experience at the Aberfeldie
- 1:25:11jurors. Okay, yeah, yeah.
- 1:25:13My 3rd and final DRAM is my own blend that I made.
- 1:25:17I love that. We said we're we didn't see.
- 1:25:24No, sorry, we're not having that because you're only one on
- 1:25:26brand. Yeah.
- 1:25:28No, no, no. You're.
- 1:25:28Allowed Aberfeld brand was. A a jurors experience.
- 1:25:32Yes. So what do you?
- 1:25:33Remember the components used. Yeah.
- 1:25:37So they used different regions as theirs.
- 1:25:39So they had their space size, their Highlands.
- 1:25:41Now, they didn't really name what what distilleries they were
- 1:25:43all from, yes. No, but I found myself using
- 1:25:53quite a lot of the Isla spirit. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
- 1:25:56So it was Ila, Isla and Highlands were were the two kind
- 1:26:00of main components of that blend.
- 1:26:02Fantastic. Yeah, phenomenal.
- 1:26:04One of one. 120 CL bottle in existence that is now almost
- 1:26:08gone. Wow.
- 1:26:09I mean, I think it, it goes back to we, we've talked so many
- 1:26:11times about blends and blending being so important because you
- 1:26:14know, as Greg Urquhart once said, is like, you're just
- 1:26:16literally making flavour. And if I think that's the great
- 1:26:18thing about it is you, you've made your own blend and you've
- 1:26:21gone. That is the whiskey I like the
- 1:26:23most. And if you could do that,
- 1:26:25imagine the, the, the ability where you could say, I know
- 1:26:28exactly how I like my whiskey and I can go, I'm going to take
- 1:26:31a bit of that bit of that bit of that bit of that, mix it all
- 1:26:33together and go. That is the perfect track for
- 1:26:35me. And that's where, you know,
- 1:26:36blending is so cool when you could be able to do that.
- 1:26:38Yeah, and it's becoming quite a big thing as well with
- 1:26:41distilleries being able to do that online as well.
- 1:26:43And and you create your own blend and you have that.
- 1:26:46It's really unique and I again, like you said, you can pinpoint
- 1:26:50those exact flavours that you like from either different
- 1:26:52regions or different casks and you are then creating the
- 1:26:56perfect whiskey for. Yourself.
- 1:26:57Great. Well, well, look at that guys.
- 1:26:59We've done it. Thank you.
- 1:27:01So much. Liberty Josephine, thank you for
- 1:27:04coming on to the podcast, but thank you for showing us around.
- 1:27:07Thank you. Thank you to the Tematen
- 1:27:09distillery. Yeah.
- 1:27:10Thank you. Thank you to Scott Adamson.
- 1:27:12Honestly, fantastic. We've had a great.
- 1:27:14Week I'll absolutely forced you to come on the podcast
- 1:27:16eventually, Scott. Yeah, once.
- 1:27:18Again, when you are coming on to the podcast, bring that virgin
- 1:27:21oak down here because honestly, I cannot stress if you it's what
- 1:27:26taking us two and a bit hours to get up here today.
- 1:27:29I genuinely I would do a Scott Moore and just say I'm going to
- 1:27:33cross state lines. I'm going to cross state lines.
- 1:27:36I would, I would drive up to Tematen Fort for for a couple.
- 1:27:40But what kind of what kind of number retail, what were they
- 1:27:42retail at roughly? Like what are you looking at for
- 1:27:45like hand fills from the distillery, what you're looking
- 1:27:47at there? Between 60 and 100. # again,
- 1:27:49well worth it. Plus 45 LB fuel when you're
- 1:27:52getting up. Well like we've got to get up
- 1:27:55the road. This is part of the road.
- 1:27:57In contact with you, Libby Joe and it's about distillery.
- 1:28:00Yes. So you can head online.
- 1:28:02If you're booking a tour, head online.
- 1:28:04All of that is done at tamatin.com.
- 1:28:07If you want to get in contact with any of us visitors at
- 1:28:10tamatin.com, give us an e-mail, phone us.
- 1:28:13All of our contact details are online as well.
- 1:28:16Let us know what we can do for you.
- 1:28:17Brilliant. Well, amazing.
- 1:28:18Thank you so much for that. It's been great, lads.
- 1:28:20We've got jump back into the whiskey Wagon and get ourselves
- 1:28:23up the road. Chuck's Chapman at the back.
- 1:28:25Thank you so much. All the very best.
- 1:28:28Bye. Listen.
- 1:28:29Cheers.