Scotland 2013: Springbank, Glengyle, and Crosshill Loch

I once again woke up bright and early, because I had a 10 AM tour of Springbank and Glengyle scheduled. Breakfast was another full Scottish affair, which was good since this tour promised to involve more walking than usual. David and Jean were also extremely accommodating when I asked if I could get breakfast at 6 AM the next morning, as I needed to catch the 9:45 AM ferry from Kennacraig to Port Ellen - the next one didn't run until the evening, so I didn't want to miss the morning run.

The weather that Saturday was, to put it mildly, gorgeous. Partially cloudy skies with a bit of a breeze kept things pleasantly cool. I poked around town for a bit until wandering over to Springbank, where George greeted me at the front gate. A handful of other guys joined us for the tour, which started in the malt barn.

Springbank the only distillery in Scotland that produces 100% of its malt on site - other distilleries with their own malting facilities use at least some commercial malt as well. Water for the malting process, as well as everything else in the distillery, is obtained from the Crosshill Loch, located behind the town. Malt is brought in, soaked with water from the loch, then piled 4-6 inches on the floor. One peculiar feature of Springbank's maltings is that temperature regulation is provided only by windows - this means that very careful attention must be paid to ensure that the malt doesn't get too warm while it germinates. All of the turning is done by hand - the first, but far from the last, element of their production process that is done by hand. However, the distillery was in its quiet season, so we didn't get to the see the malting in process. Instead, the space was being cleaned out so that it could be used as a gallery for local artists - one small example of how the distillery seeks to support its community.

From there we moved on to the area where they dry their malt to halt germination. Springbank is also unique in that they regularly use three different varieties of malt to produce three different kinds of whisky - Hazelburn is made from unpeated malt, which is dried over 20 hours with what George described as an enormous hair drier, Springbank, which is smoked for 6 hours with peat and an additional 24 hours with hot air to give ~10 PPM phenols in the malt, and Longrow, which is smoked for up to 48 hours (this is an extremely long time, I later found out from visiting other distilleries with maltings) to give ~50 PPM phenols in the malt.

The extremely complex peat storage facilities

The kiln used for peating malt

The 'giant hair drier'

A view from the flue underneath the kiln floor, with lots of peat residue

From there we passed through the large malt bins to the mill. We finally hit trend status - this was the third distillery I visited with a Porteus mill for grinding their malt. I later learned that there was a good reason for this - some of the mills were nearly a century old, so there was no reason to buy an inferior product. However, this wasn't so good for the company that built them - Porteus went bankrupt some years ago. The mill grinds their malt between two sets of rollers to give a mixture of husks, grist (think grits), and flour. The mixture has to be just right - if the percentage of husks is too low then too much material will flow through after mashing and if the percentage of flour is too high then the mash tends to become sticky and difficult to work with.

The next stop was the distillery's (in)famous open-top, cast iron mash tun, one of the last in the industry.  They use for waters in their mash, with increasing temperatures each time. The first two extract most of the sugars and are combined and pumped into a washback for fermentation. The third and forth waters pull out the last bits of sugar from the malt and are then recycled as the next mash's first and second waters, respectively.

Don't fall in

After a quick peek inside to see the wicked-looking rakes, we went next door to the washbacks. These are built from Scandinavian boatskin larch and last about fifty years before they start leaking too much to be useable. Even though we didn't get to see any fermentation in progress, it was still interesting to note the microbial scum floating on the water used to keep the wooden washbacks from leaking - there are plenty of bugs living on and in the wood.

There's an ongoing debate in the industry whether those microbes play any part in the flavor of the whisky, as some distilleries replace wooden washbacks with stainless steel. Presumably most of those microbes will be out-competed by the yeast added to the wash for fermentation, but at least some of them are likely to be multiplying and kicking out various compounds that add nuance to the wash and the subsequent whisky.

Springbank uses very slow-acting yeast for their fermentations, which take 72-100 hours to reach 4.5-5% ABV. This is very much the 'slow and low' approach to fermentation - it is ~50% longer than most distilleries and about half the ABV. While this reduces the yield per unit of malt, it also means that more secondary flavors are created alongside the alcohol. As an upside, the slow fermentation means that they don't need 'switchers' to prevent the wash from bubbling over the top of the washbacks.

After fermentation, the wash is pumped over to the stills. There are a number of features of Springbank's stills that are rare in the industry. First, their wash still is direct-fired (though it also has the now standard steam coils) with an oil burner underneath. This means that the still also needs a rummager - essentially large copper chains on arms that sweep the inside of the still to prevent any residual solids in the wash from burning and sticking to the inside of the still. Direct firing may contribute to the character of Springbank's whisky, because the higher heat of an oil burner produces compounds not produced by the more even heat of a steam coil. Steam gives more consistency, but direct firing produces more complexity.

I will defer to Springbank's own diagrams to explain the triple, partial triple, and double distillation procedures that are used to produce Hazelburn, Springbank, and Longrow whiskies. The production schedule - Hazelburn first, then Springbank, and finishing with Longrow - ensures that there is no cross-contamination of their spirits with one another. The phenolic compounds in peat tend to be tenacious, so very thorough cleaning of the equipment is necessary to make sure that none of it ends up in Hazelburn.

We exited the stillroom and went to the filling station, where barrels are weighed, filled with new make, then weighed again and marked, so that the rate of evaporation can be checked down the road.

We also got to take a look inside both traditional dunnage and newer rack warehouses. Dunnage has the advantage of consistency - casks are stacked at most three high and the earth floors keep temperatures cool in the summer and warmer in the winter. The downside is that because of the way the barrels are stacked, checking one somewhere in the middle is a huge physical task. Rack warehouses go up between five and seven levels, which means that there is a larger temperature gradient between the bottom and the top of the racks. On the plus side, checking individual casks is a comparatively easy task as each can be popped out of its slot.

Fun note, I noticed a few casks of 90s Ardbeg sitting in the warehouses (I'm sure they were positioned there for a reason, but hey). Bet those will fetch a pretty penny when Cadenhead's finally gets around to bottling them.

The last part of Springbank we visited was their bottling hall. Once again, the sheer amount of work necessary to put out their whisky became glaringly apparent. Casks have to be rolled in and dumped in a marrying vat, which also limits how much whisky they can bottle at a time. Cases are stapled by hand. The whisky has to be filtered (but not chill filtered). Bottles have to be checked for flaws, filled, labeled, corked, and topped with foil. While there are machines for a few of these processes, they're not automated - someone still has to stand in front and move things along.

This is a huge part of why Springbank employes so many more people than the average distillery - everything is done on site and all of it requires a lot of hands. It is another way in which the distillery tries to support the Campbeltown, by creating jobs that keep more of the money in the community, compared to having their whisky transported in bulk for bottling at an automated plant. This definitely adds to the premium that Springbank whiskies command, but it definitely makes me a lot more sympathetic to the distillery. In an industry dominated by large conglomerates that often extract a lot of value out of the area around distilleries while imposing significant costs (wear on roads being a major one) and not giving a lot back, Springbank is a noticeable exception.

That tape bucket is full of the foil caps added on every bottle

That wrapped up our tour of Springbank, but there was more to come. Everyone trooped back out into the sun to walk down Glebe Street, formerly the site of a number of Campbeltown distilleries, to the recently refurbished Glengyle distillery.

The original distillery was founded in 1872 by William Mitchell, brother of John Mitchell, the co-founder of Springbank. The two had a falling out, which resulted in William starting his own distillery. However, the business had collapsed by the mid-20th century and fell into disrepair, being used for everything from a rifle range to a carpark over the intervening years.

In the late 1990s, the Scotch Whisky Association began to rumble about delisting Campbeltown as a distinct whisky region, because there were only two remaining distilleries in the town - Springbank and Glen Scotia. Something needed to be done.

The Glengyle buildings were purchased by the owner of Springbank, Hedley Wright, a descendent of the original owners, in 2000. It took four years to fix everything up and install new equipment, including stills salvaged from the defunct Ben Wyvis distillery.

While the goal is to eventually have Glengyle be self-sufficient in the same way that Springbank is, with the whole production process being carried out on site, it is still dependent on Springbank for malt (six hours of peat, 30 hours of hot air to give ~15 PPM in the malt) and bottling.

Much like Arran, the milling (done with a mill obtained from the Craigellachie distillery), mashing, fermentation, and distillation are all sited on a single floor.

Wooden washbacks

The stainless steel mashtun

Fermentation and distillation is similar to that of Springbank, with long fermentation times, low ABV wort, and double distillation carried out in roughly the same way as Longrow. This results in a spirit that is similar to, but still distinct from, the three produced by Springbank. As an interesting note, the stills were modified from their original shape and riveted construction to the new shape and soldered construction they now possess.

I love the 1950s American diner style of the Glengyle spirit safe

We popped around the back to see the inspiration for the logo of Glengyle's whisky, Kilkerran. The Glengyle name is currently owned by Loch Lomond and used for one of their blended whiskies, so the distillery can't release its whisky under that name. The steeple of a local church is within sight of the distillery and the peak is framed by a small hole in their wall.

From the distillery we walked back down Longrow to the Cadenhead's shop. We trooped into the back to taste a number of different whiskies from Springbank and Glengyle. Standouts included the Kilkerran WIP5 Sherry Cask (the Bourbon Cask was somewhat unremarkable) and Longrow Red. We also tried some of the Cadenhead's living casks, which are casks that are regularly topped up with their respective whiskies whenever they drop below half full or so. This means that almost every time you go back they will taste different as new whisky is added to top them off.

There was also a locked cage containing Cadenhead's 'Duty Paid' samples, which are single bottles from casks that will never be bottled on their own again. This includes fairly standard casks as well as weird one offs like Demerara rum. The upside/downside of this is that there is no way to know what the bottle will be like - no one else has ever tasted it before. Still, it took a supreme act of will not to buy something out of there, but the knowledge that I was at the beginning of my trip and would have to carry anything I purchased around for the rest of my time in Scotland helped. I settled for 200 mL bottles from the Hazelburn living cask and the Campbeltown cask, which is a blend of Hazelburn, Springbank, and Longrow.

A case of wonders

After departing Cadenhead's, I walked around the bay to Glen Scotia, in hopes of getting a tour. Sadly by the time I got there, the one employee who had been present that day had just left after giving a small group of people a tour. So it goes - Glen Scotia is a working distillery, I was there on a Saturday, and they don't have an organized system for giving tours. I was really disappointed after trying their whiskies earlier this year, but it was a sunny day and I had a full afternoon, so I headed back into town to grab some lunch.

The closest I got to the distillery

After refueling, I decided to go for a walk around Crosshill Loch, roughly following this route. I took a slightly more circuitous course through town, but eventually managed to find the path towards the loch, which skirted a number of farms. I walked around the west end of the loch, then headed east and back down towards the bay along the Kilkerran Burn. I ended up at a large cemetery and eventually found the road, which took me north and back into town. It would have been nice to properly hike up Beinn Guilean, but I knew I had an early day coming up and would be working plenty hard to get myself to Islay.

Looking back into town - the church spire is just visible in the middle

Looking south towards Beinn Guilean

Crosshill Loch from the west end

Looking out across the bay towards Davaar Island

The east end of the Loch

After getting back, I more or less crashed, beyond getting dinner. I knew I needed to get up before 6 AM, so I could finish packing, eat breakfast, then get on the road towards Kennacraig. It was going to be a long haul.

Scotland 2013: Arran to Campbeltown

My last (half) day on Arran dawned damp once again, with heavier rain starting to come down. After wolfing down another Scottish breakfast, I decided to swing by the Isle of Arran Distillery again for a second round of drams, both because there were more I wanted to try (my liver can only take so much in one day) and because the wind was predicted to shift from the south to the west around mid-day. As I was planning on riding south down the Kintyre Peninsula, a crosswind sounded preferable to a headwind.

After packing up and settling my bill, I road the couple of miles down the road to the distillery and plopped myself down in their café once again. Getting through a full flight of cask strength whiskies took some doing, but I managed. By then it was around noon, so I had lunch there as well, to make sure I had enough food in me for the upcoming ride.

The wind had switched directions, but was still blowing fairly hard when I finally made it down to the ferry dock. Rain was coming down sporadically, but not too badly. I had to wait for a few minutes until the ferry came in, by which time a handful of other cyclists had joined me at the dock.

When it arrived, we piled on alongside a few cars for the short trip to Kintyre. I chatted with some of the other cyclists, who were headed to the other side of the peninsula to catch another ferry to the Isle of Gigha. The rain pick up a bit and the wind made for something of a rough ride, but we made it to the other side without incident.

Saying goodbye to Arran

When we finally got to Claonaig, I made a fateful decision. Ignoring James Saxon's advice, I decided to take the B road down Kintyre. My logic was thus: it was ~10 miles shorter by the B road compared to riding across to Kennacraig and back down the west side via the A road, the wind was coming out of the west, so being on the east side would shelter me from the worst of it. Adding to that, the B road is the designated cycling route on the peninsula, so the powers that be thought it was a decent way to go. Oh, how foolish I was...

To put it mildly, the B road is almost all up and down, with sections ranging up to 14% grades. I ended up getting off my bike to walk up them and going down was a sufficiently harrowing experience with cantilever brakes and 40 pounds of gear that it's not something I would care to repeat. While the road itself was in reasonably good shape, it was single track most of the way and cars passed me on average every 5-10 minutes, which made for a lot of tricky negotiation. Thankfully almost all of them were very polite, but one never knows how it's going to go down, so it was fairly stressful. Add into this sporadic rain, which was sometimes fairly heavy, and it was not a pleasant experience.

The usual standard of pavement on the B road

There are a lot of sheep on Kintyre

The only real argument for taking the east side is that there are some great views of Arran from across the water. However, for much of the ride, the road is actually out of sight of the water, passing through forested hills and valleys.

Adding to the fun, the southern end of the peninsula is studded with headlands and bays, which, if you don't have functioning GPS, makes it all too easy to get your hopes up that the next one is the last. I got faked out a few times, such as at Penniver, which had the added bonus of a long climb out of town.

Not my final destination

To cap my ride, a soaking rain started when I was just north of Campbeltown. I was getting pretty tired and hungry by this point. I had underestimated the difficulty of the ride, as 30 flat miles wouldn't have been a big deal, but the relentless climbs had really taken it out of me. I had been doing fairly well up to that point, but I was good and bedraggled with only a few miles left to go.

Sighting Davaar Island, which sits in Campbeltown's bay

One of the few bright spots during my final push was catching a waft of whisky in the air as I rode by Glen Scotia. I got a bit lost in downtown Campbeltown, but it didn't take me too long to reorient and find Earadale B&B, where I would be staying for the next couple of nights. Jean greeted me at the door and helped me to stash my bike out back. After that I climbed the stairs to find a very snug and well appointed room.

View out of my window at the public library

The cork floor is a really nice touch

I was pleasantly surprised by the accommodations, as it was also the cheapest room I stayed in during the trip.

After a much-needed shower and change of clothes, I stumbled back outside in search of dinner. The Taj-Mahal restaurant was just around the block and Indian food sounded rather good at the time. The meal was pleasant and reasonably priced, though it was a bit too sweet and underspiced for my liking. Still, there was a delicious piece of naan that was bigger than my face, which went a long way towards making up for all the calories I had burned earlier in the day, so I wasn't too bothered.

After dinner, I wandered around the harbor to let dinner settle before I went to bed.

I continued wandering through town as the sun set, almost but not quite getting lost. Finally, I made it back to Earadale and crashed into bed. It had been a long, hard day, but Springbank beckoned...

Whisky Review: Longrow 14 Year

I've covered some of the younger Longrow single malts before, namely the CV and 10 Year releases. This the first one that I have a full bottle of, so it's been nice to go through pretty much the whole thing before forming a final opinion. As with all Longrows, this whisky is made from heavily peated (~50 PPM) barley. It spends its whole life in ex-sherry casks (though I have seen other statements that it's a blend of bourbon and sherry casks or bourbon cask whisky finished in sherry casks - but this may just be different releases), putting another layer on top of the usual Springbank malt and salt.

Longrow 14 Year

Nose: very sweet, juicy berries, light sherry influence, fresh floral malt, caramel, vanilla, subdued vegetal/grassy peat, smoldering logs, bacon, seaweed, maritime air, mineral notes. After adding some water, the focus shifts towards the malt and peat, with the sherry moving back a bit.

Taste: sweet and rounded sherried malt with just a hint of sourness and bitterness up front, slowly wending its way into a pool of vegetal peat, black pepper and oak. After dilution the palate becomes much more malty sweet, with more creaminess and the sherry retreating.

Finish: very mild peat, black pepper, creamy malt, sherry, a hint of salt

I will give the same caveat that I give for most Longrows - don't expect a big Islay smoke bomb here. Especially on the nose, the peat isn't going to beat you over the head with phenols. It's spice rather than the main course. With that said, I really like the interplay of sherry and peat in this whisky. While initially sweet, especially on the nose, it has excellent balance. This is head and shoulders above the 10 Year I reviewed a while back. It's a much more cohesive expression of what Longrow can be. The sherry gives it more weight, but doesn't go so far as to smother the malt. And despite the extra years, it still seems very fresh and there's actually more pronounced peat than in the 10 Year (though that may have been a function of the sample I had). Overall Longrow 14 Year is a very, very enjoyable whisky. And while it's generally overpriced in the US ($100+), it can usually be purchased at much more reasonable rates from the UK, e.g. Master of Malt and The Whisky Exchange (I accidentally bought a bottle from each of them due to different naming conventions).

Because I happened to have some on hand, I was curious to see how the 14 Year compared to one of its younger brethren. Longrow CV is noticeably less mature - the malt and peat nearly jump out of the glass and have that bright agricultural character you get before the barrel really leaves its mark (e.g. Kilchoman). There are still a few feint-y notes from lighter compounds that haven't had enough time to evaporate or be transformed into something else, but it gives the whisky a pleasant edge. It's very green and vegetal rather than smoky, which makes me think of open fields rather than fire and ash. That wonderful Springbank saltiness is still there, which provides such a delicious accent to the other flavors. With time some oak tannins and meaty notes emerge to give the spirit a little more weight, but the focus is always on the inputs - malt and peat. The various finished whiskies that went into making this expresion will peek out, but are more bit players than stars of the show. What's nice is that the shared lineage between these two whiskies is clear but the emphasis is different. The 14 Year is more august, but the CV has youth and vitality behind it. Which I enjoy more really depends on my mood.

Whisky Review: Hazelburn 8 Year Old

I've been looking to try this whisky for a while. Between the decent but not fantastic CV expression and delicious cask-strength Hazelburn 8 YO Bourbon Cask I tried a few months ago along with the 8 year old Sauternes Cask and 12 year old versions that I have sitting unopened in my liquor cabinet, I was really interested to see what this whisky would be like. Once again, I trekked down to the Highland Stillhouse for a drink.

Hazelburn is Springbank's newest single malt - production began in 1997 with bottling of the 8 year old beginning in 2005. It is made from unpeated malt which is then triple distilled. This production process means that it shares much in common with other triple-distilled whiskies from the Scottish Lowlands and Irish pot still whiskeys. The 8 year old expression is made up of a 60/40 split of bourbon cask and sherry cask whiskies, which are vatted before dilution and bottling at 46% ABV.

Hazelburn 8 Year Old

Nose: vanilla candy, underlying sherry, nougat, salted caramels. After adding a few drops of water, the nose became creamier with more vanilla.

Taste: wood sugar and vanilla up front, bittersweet sherry emerges mid-palate and continues through to the back, then malt, light pepper, and bitter oak. After dilution, the pepper becomes more expansive.

Finish: bitter wood and sherry, with pepper and cinnamon/allspice after dilution.

I'll have to admit that I found this less compelling than the cask strength Bourbon Cask. While the sherry was rather well-integrated (this adds to my belief that marrying bourbon-cask and sherry-cask whiskies is superior to cask finishes), I think I prefer the purity of straight bourbon cask Hazelburn whisky. The classic Springbank salt - which is one of my favorite features of the distillery - was present, but I felt like I had to hunt for it. However, it was still tasty and a significant improvement on the CV version as the wood in the 8 year old was much less aggressive. This reinforces my guess that the CV had some over-oaked casks in the mix, as the preponderance of the CV is largely made up of younger malt which should be similar to the 8 year old. For a slightly different perspective on the 8 year old, you should check out Michael Kravitz's review.

The 8 year old expression of Hazelburn is shamefully overpriced in the States, but you can pick it up from Master of Malt or The Whisky Exchange for a little over $50 with shipping. At that point I would say that it's a much more reasonable choice if you want something that's lighter without being boring.

Whisky Review: Longrow 10 Year Old

Thanks again to my reader Florin for sending me a sample of this whisky.

I tried Longrow CV earlier this year. The robust peatiness took a little while to warm up to, but eventually I crowned it the winner among Springbank's CV range. With that under my belt, I was really interested to try one of the age-dated Longrows.

Longrow is the second style of Springbank's whiskies, with production beginning in 1973. It is a heavily peated (~55 PPM in the malted barley), doubled-distilled whisky. Those characteristics mean that it shares much in common with the whiskies made on the island of Islay, a bit northwest of the Kintyre peninsula where Springbank is located. This is entirely intentional, as the chairman of Springbank at the time wanted to see if it was possible to produce an Islay-style whisky outside of the island. It took several more decades until Longrow became a regular part of their production in the early 1990s, but it now has a fairly regular range of age-dated expressions. However, Longrow is still a niche even within Springbank, taking up ~10% of their production. Like Hazelburn, Springbank's other style, Longrow is named after a now-shuttered distillery in Campbeltown.

Longrow 10 Year Old

Nose: very delicate, vegetal peat - almost like incense, a hint of pine, slightly sour, citrus, vanilla, malty, toffee, bread-y salt, a few fruity/sherry notes, fairly dry, chocolate. After adding a few drops of water, the nose becomes even more mild, the peat becomes greener and almost grassy, and the toffee becomes more present.

Taste: sour citrus and berries (makes me think of Oregon-grape), malty sweetness, toffee, chocolate, a touch of pepper, and mild peat at the back. After adding a few drops of water, the sourness become more recognizably lemony.

Finish: toffee, chocolate, light peat and pepper.

The first time I took a sniff of this whisky, all I could think was "Where did the peat go?". Longrow 10 is made from ex-bourbon and ex-sherry cask whiskies that are aged only a few years more than most of what goes into Longrow CV (there is some teenaged whisky in that expression, but probably not too much). Sure, there is also probably some 11-13 year old whisky in the 10 year old as well, but it's still not a huge difference in age. Yet the peat reek had been almost entirely washed away. In a lot of ways I think this actually makes it a more pleasant sipper - the peat is an accent on the malty flavors of toffee and chocolate. However, I did find myself wishing for something a bit more assertive. Admittedly, this may be a side-effect of tasting a sample rather than a fresh bottle, but other reviews suggest that Longrows quickly head in that direction as they get older - the 14 year old is supposed to be even more diminished (I'll find out for myself soon enough) and the 18 year old is downright tame. This is really, really surprising, both because of the heavy peat character in the CV expression and because the phenol concentration in the Longrow malt is about 50% higher than that of the malt used to make very peaty whiskies like Caol Ila and Lagavulin. There's something about the way Springbank ages their whiskies that causes the peat reek to diminish exponentially with time. It's not precisely a bad thing, but you have to properly calibrate your expectations. If you're looking for something Islay-style, this is going to be more of a Bowmore than a Laphroaig or Port Charlotte.