I was fortunate enough earlier this year to figure out a 'recipe' for a great Speyside Whisky* trail. Tried it forthwith and with a glass of Glenlivet 15 year old next to me, I am happy to share it!
*A quick side note is that Scottish whisky is spelt without the e - apparently they don't waste valuable drinking time on the extra e. Whiskey will therefore be from Irish descent.
Ingredients
- 50th birthday with a twist of hectic elections (this can be substituted with any event of your choice)
- Visit to
WildAboutWhisky** in Dullstroom or love of whisky (optional)
- Some monetary units
- A pinch of leave
- Valid passport with visa
**During a visit to WildAboutWhisky in Dullstroom a few years ago, I tried the Speyside ramble and decided I really liked the smooth, non-peaty whiskies.
Method
Contact Aida at Alivias (she is really great!), explain your quest, accept the quotation, do the payment and voilà! The only tricky bit is to get a visa - I always feel like an insect under a microscope. At one point I was frantically looking for our marriage certificate and needed a declaration from Husband that I will return. It stopped just short of asking for the thread count on our linen...
Pack, and get to the airport. Strap yourself into a seat and persevere for 11 hours in the tin can. Get through customs and then enjoy!
So at the end of August 2016, I set off to London where I spent a couple of days. The first day was mostly spent navigating the trains (not as easy as it sounds), finding my accommodation and adjusting to normal air pressure. Fortunately, I found Caffé Nero only half a block up the road so I got stuck there with the coffee and pain au chocolate. Day two was spent on one of the red sightseeing buses just soaking up sights and ... believe it or not some sun! On day three I set of by bus to the King Cross station to hop on the train to Edinburgh. The whisky trail started early the next morning from Rabbie's with our tour guide in proper Scottish garb and we had a blast for the next three days. We were 13 on the tour - five 20-something American girls, one 20-something German lad, two Australian couples, one American couple and me. I would say that our tour was therefore successful in changing the 'old gentlemen with cigars' image of whisky. ;-) After the tour, one last day of sightseeing in Edinburgh and then back home.
Very briefly, here are some of the things I learnt about single malt whisky:
- Always add 3 drops of water to the whisky to release the flavours from the oils. Ice contracts the flavours (at least initially) and coke is never a good idea with your single malt! :-)
- You need only 3 ingredients to make whisky - malted barley, water and yeast.
- The process followed is basically the same - only a few tweaks here and there changes the taste and character (feel free to skip this part - it is included for posterity)
- Malting - the barley is malted by soaking in water for 2 days and then left for another 5 days to germinate. The process is then stopped by drying the barley. For peaty whiskies, the flavour is introduced by burning peat when drying the barley.
- Milling - the malted barley is ground into grist.
- Mashing - the grist is put into huge mash tuns with hot water to convert the starches into sugars for approximately 6 hours. The liquid, called worts, is drained for the next process.
- Fermentation - the worts is pumped into washbacks where yeast is added and fermentation begins.Time varies, but could be as long as 75 hours. The liquid is now called wash and is similar to a strong beer - about 8-9% alc.
- Distillation - double distillation is used for Scottish whisky with the first happening in large copper kettles. After first distillation, the strength increases to 23-25% alc. Second distillation takes place in smaller spirit stills. When the liquid runs off there are three stages - the head which, at 80% alc, is too strong to use, the heart at approximately 70% alc which is sent off for maturation and finally the tail which is too weak to use at about 30% alc. The heads and tails are mixed and distilled again. The slope of the stills changes the flavour of the whisky and varies between the distilleries. Determining the different stages is mostly done by computer, but at the smaller distilleries, it is done manually.
- Maturation - a spirit can be called Scottish whisky if it has been matured in Scotland for at least 3 years. Different casks are used, mostly American bourbon casks followed by Spanish sherry casks. During maturation about 2-2.5% is lost every year due to evaporation and this is called the Angel's share.
- And finally, the following quote was shared with us: "Never drink whisky without water and never drink water without whisky" :-)
Enough with the words now, herewith the photographic evidence.
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| My carriage awaits... |
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| Really, really good coffee!! |
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| The classics! |
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| A few interesting buildings and features. Love the flower pots all over the city. |
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| New tucked in between the old |
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| A few very amusing signs and adverts... |
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| King Cross station and also the platform to Hogwarts ;-) |
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| Room 206, in the Cairn Hotel - I was allocated the same room on the first night and the last night of my stay. |
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| Taking the room assignment as a sign, I then had dinner both nights at Frankie & Benny's. Had a lovely chat with the same waitress at the same table too! :-) |
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| Al, our tour guide! He gave us loads of interesting information about the places and the history of Scotland general. The accent was also awesome of course:-) |
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| My fellow travellers! Gary, Peter, Toni and Kay. Bruce and Joanna. Kendra, Katie, Nicole, Bridget and Katie. Martin. |
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| On our way to the Highlands we stopped first for coffee and then in Braemar for lunch. |
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| The Scottish countryside and a loch without a ness... |
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| Late afternoon and close to our first whisky stop - this is the original Bridge of Livet. |
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| The second largest distillery in Scotland and quite an amazing operation. Bought a 15 year old Glen Livet, a jigger and a few glasses here :-) |
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| A very tall and amazing whisky 'sculpture' |
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| Our guesthouse (The Ardconnell) for two nights in Grantown on Spey. My room was lovely and even had a print of my favourite Klimt painting. I stayed there with Toni & Peter and Kay & Gary. We had supper at the Craig Bar where only pies are served. My 'Moo bloo' pie and beer were divine though. On our second night, Kay, Toni and myself ended up around the beautiful dining room table with a wee dram of whisky graciously provided by our host. Safe to say, we solved (nearly) all the world's problems that night. :-) |
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| Our first stop on Saturday morning was at the smallest distillery in Scotland. Benromach (of course with the strong Scottish R in the pronunciation). Got some lovely whisky fudge at the shop after the tour and tasting. |
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| Elgin Cathedral. |
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| We got a picnic lunch at Gordon & Macphail. There was a deli section as well, so no, it wasn't a liquid lunch ;-) |
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| We had the picnic lunch (mine consisted of lavish helpings of brie, ham and salad) after our tour and tasting at Glen Grant. The distillery is internationally owned and the picture above shows some of the other products. Later on we visited Cardhu which is one of the blends used in Johnny Walker. For some bizarre reason, I took no photos there. :-( |
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| Sunday morning and our last distillery. What an experience though - there was a chocolate pairing with each of the whiskies and we got a complimentary tasting glass to boot. |
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| On the way back to Edinburgh we were at the Centre of Scotland! |
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| Lunch at Pasha in Pitlochry. |
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| The Battle of Dunkeld was fought here. Very interesting gravestone on the right - note the skull and bones. |
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| Bridges over the Forth estuary - above and right is the old railway bridge which is still in use. Closest on the left is the 'bridge that's going to fall, but not today' and further along the new bridge which is almost complete. The three bridges represent three different centuries. |
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| The Walter Scott monument is the biggest of its kind in honour of a writer. |
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| Interesting sights in Edinburgh |
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| Left is the Edinburgh castle and to the right a view of the old city. |
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| A beautiful shop inside the Impressionist museum. |
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| Sculpture in the National Gallery which I loved. |
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| Outside the OMNI entertainment centre on the pavement. |
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| My last lunch at 'But first coffee' |
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| I was very glad to spot Bookworld (combination of stationery, gifts and books) in Edinburgh - all I saw in London were those few shelves in a small shop at the train station. And then at the airport, finally a proper bookshop! Real book smells - I felt right at home. |
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| A variety of coins - must be honest I struggled initially to remember the shapes. It's virtually impossible to read the values quickly enough in a shop. |
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| All these miraculously survived the trip back home. |
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| T-shirts I found for the girls in a goth-looking shop in Edinburgh. |
Glad to return home, but what an amazing trip!!
