According to Exodus 20:8, Sunday is set aside for worship and to rest our tired souls. Church and worship can take many forms depending on one’s religion. With distilleries being at the heart of our beliefs and faith, a small band decided to head to the Glen Ord distillery Christmas fair for some rest and recovery. Glen Ord distillery, being situated just outside the similarly named Muir of Ord, was founded in the whisky boom years of the 1820s and has risen to a top 5 producer of malt whisky in Scotland. It has become famous for its owners focusing the brand exclusively in Asia. The Singleton of Glen Ord is sent to Asia, the Singleton of Glendullan heads to North America and the Singleton of Dufftown is situated primarily in the European market (although there is fluidity between markets)
Diageo has invested heavily in producing a slick arena and exhibition in side old warehousing. This provides the ideal setting for a fair offering the best of local produce and discount off its excellent in-house selection of whisky. Although we did not tour on the day it is arguably the best of the visit able distilleries in the company’s hands to see how production is done on a big scale. After purchasing a few bottles, Scott and David, accompanied by their partners, were then taken by Michael to Dingwall to see the opposite end of the scale from conglomerate ownership.-
Glen Wyvis is the worlds first ‘100% community owned’ distillery situated about the town share offerings have been highly successful and it represents the romance of what many
whisky drinkers think of when they have a glass of Scotch. Small batch, small scale,3 ingredients and straight from the cask to the bottle with only water ever added.The view from site is simply spectacular and the enthusiasm and pride Mike took in being a
part of the project really came through while he showed as around. The tiny mash tun and the new mill were particular highlights!
Following up later in the week was a tasting session with one of Grant’s representatives at the Woodwinters shop in Inverness. For £15 you got a tasting session with the UK rep for
Glenfiddich and five very large drams from their range. These were the 12, 15, 21, XX and IPA. Some interesting chat followed about the coloured and chill filtered 21 year old whisky, but credit to the rep he didn’t try and hide the fact and took on viewpoints with honesty and blunt realities that finance dictates that they would rather make more money by colouring their products..
However, all in all it was a very enjoyable experience and one which I would recommend highly to anyone wanting to either learn about whisky or enjoy products from a core range at a very reasonable price.
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