Bruichladdich, in keeping with 99.5% of distilleries, has not malted barley on site for around 65 years.
In the post war years distilling capacity could be increased by ‘farming out’ the malting to professionals and using the the labour and time gained to distil more.
The gin is distilled after an overnight maceration of the nine base botanicals - the seed, berry, bark, root and peel categories - in spirit and Islay spring water from Dirty Dottie's spring on Octomore Farm.
It was always our original intention to distil three different versions of Bruichladdich.
With Bruichladdich whisky being traditionally unpeated, we set out to distil two other whiskies at differing levels of peatiness. Port Charlotte was the first of these, heavily peated at 40 ppm, making it one of the most peaty single malts from Islay.
This begged the question, posed late one evening at the Port Charlotte pub: if at 40 ppm the elegance, finesse and purity of Bruichladdich spirit still shines through, what would happen if we upped the peat even further? In fact, just how far could we go?
Many comment on our vivid and vibrant blue/green colour (how could you miss it?), and there are many theories as to where it came from. It tends to be a “love it or hate it” colour – which is very Bruichladdich in itself!
The latest to pose the question is the peakperspective.com blog who comment on the origins and purpose of our beguiling “funky not-quite-blue-not-quite-green color”. Thanks peakperspective, and allow us to shed some light.
Our casks come from a number of locations including America, France, Spain, Italy and Austria. The quality and choice of oak is a primary factor in the resulting whisky flavour profile - vanilla flavours tend to predominate in American oak while fine French oak lends a "toasted butter" finish.
For an exploration of some of the issues around the use and effects of different casks and oak in whisky maturation see our Casks and Oak section of the Library.
Does whisky taste better the older it is? According to a team of Japanese scientists led by K. Koga it does, and it's better for your health too. And it's all down to the wood.
The Botanist owes its name thanks to thirty one botanicals and two botanists.
Dr Richard and Mary Gulliver, the botanists, have been scouring the island for the wild Islay botanicals which are hand-collected and dried.
The use of such aromatic plants for flavouring spirit is not new. The island’s clandestine distillers of old used whatever was to hand to improve their rustically produced usquebaugh, distilled on small, portable stills, hidden away in remote glens.
Most Hebridean place names are derived from either the Gaelic or Norse language, and denote a precise geographical location or landmark.
Bruichladdich is usually translated rather poetically as ‘brae by the shore’, but this is a rather vague concept in the context of Loch Indaal and its environs.
Bruichladdich is one of the fifty most unpronounceable names in Scotland says the Scottish Miscellany.
The full Gaelic name is Brudhach a Chladdaich, two descriptive geographical words. Brudhach is pronounced 'brew-ahhk' (with the 'hach' heavily aspirated), while in the softer Islay Gaelic accent, Chladdich, sounds like 'klah-dee' or 'klah-deehk'.
Put together we get 'brew-ahhk-ah-klah-dee-hk'. Over time, the end of the first word, and the beginning of the second were elided to become 'brew-ah-kladdie'. This was ultimately Anglicised in the nineteenth century to ‘broo-kladdie’.
West Coast Gaelic speakers still pronounce it as 'brew-ah-kladdie'.
The original whisky regions are Highland, Lowland, Cambeltown and Islay. To this has been added, for convenience, Islands and Speyside.
They are merely C19 bureaucratic administrative areas for distilling licenses. They represent no more, no less, the concentration of distilling licences at that time.
They were invented when there were 22 distilleries on Islay, 32 in Campbeltown, and 30 in the Lowlands. Now there are 8, 3 and 2 respectively.