Dramnation: World Whisky Tour

As you may know, we're a big supporter of local whisk(e)y figures that continue to inspire and educate people on the industry and its whiskies. Earlier this month, our friend Matt Wooler, founder of Dramnation hosted their first inner city tasting at Pocket Bar in downtown Sydney. Continuing from the first World Whisky Tour tasting series in May which was held at Crooked Tailor, Castle Hill , the second series of the tour expanded the tasting collection to also include whiskies from Brittany, France and Arkansas, USA.

As we'd written last year, Dramnation was founded with the aim of imparting knowledge and introducing whisky appreciation for individuals, and it's great to see them continuing that mission.



We were invited by Matt to join the tour and to celebrate their inaugural inner city tasting. As with all Dramnation tasting events, guests were welcomed with a cocktail. This event saw the classic Whiskey Smash cocktail back in action (based on the Old Forrester Bourbon), which proved to be quite a refreshing opener to the night. The second series of the tour revisited a number of highlights from the first tasting, and there were whiskies from different regions of the world too, including:

• The Hakushu Distiller's Reserve (Japan)
• Armorik Classic Single Malt (France)
• Kavalan Port Cask Finish (Taiwan)
• Starward Solera (Australia)
• SMWS B3.2 Ooey-Gooey Cinnamon Bun (US)
• Paul John Edited Single Malt (India)

The line-up included one very special bottle from The Scotch Malt Whisky Society (SMWS) - B3.2 or so cheekily titled 'Ooey-gooey cinnamon bun' - a bourbon whiskey from the Rocktown Distillery in Arkansas, USA. The 2 in the B3.2 denoting that this was a second Society release from the Rocktown Distillery. The inclusion of a Society bottle added to the eccentricity of the line-up and helped ensure guests were treated to an extensive range of profiles of the different world regions.



What has always stood out for me at each Dramnation event is the immaculate setup and the superb attention to detail on the setup. As much as you can touch and feel (and taste) the whiskies -- you can equally explore different sensory experiences that are scattered across the tasting tables. Bottles filled with barley, rye and corn -- showcasing the mix for bourbon whiskies, cinnamon sticks, licorice and chocolate are just few of the items that are presented for guests to appreciate. Mozzarella and cheddar cheeses were also made available on each table with the notion being that the different cheeses can invoke or cleanse one's palate. The mozzarella cheese was what Matt described as a palate cleanser, a type of cheese that help to neutralise your palate. The cheddar cheese complements the tasting, by being a palate exciter, a good cheese to have before each dram.



The night itself was co-presented between Matt, Matt Bailey of The Scotch Malt Whisky Society and Jeremy Daunay, founder of Le Baron des Spirits who was there to represent Armorik (a distillery we'll soon be featuring in detail in an upcoming post).

Jeremy opened the night with the Armorik Classic Single Malt; a clean and light malt from Brittany, France. Armorik, being a recent addition to the local market certainly pleased the crowd and will be one whisky to watch over the next year. It wasn't that long ago that Jeremy presented the Armorik series at The Wild Rover and I recalled truly enjoying the different expressions.



Each host spoke to the different whiskies, outlining the differing factors that make up the individuality of each, and how the extent of maturation in the different regions varies. Perhaps the adage that age is just a number rings true in certain circumstances. This was certainly true for Kavalan, Starward and the Society B3.2 (Rocktown Bourbon) where they have all been matured for 3 years or less and yet their punchy profile certainly did not disappoint.

Full tasting notes on all the whiskies presented on the night were provided to all the guests and have also been published on the Dramnation site here.

The inaugural Dramnation tasting at Pocket Bar was a success and it was fun, insightful and introduced people to the whiskies from the different regions. The night even saw a beer into the mix with the Gage Road ESB being introduced to complement a couple of the whiskies.

Keen to check out the next Dramnation event? Dramnation have published the dates for their next events through to October. Taking a similar themed approach to whisky appreciation, the upcoming events will focus on different aspects of whisky distilling and whisky appreciation. For more details or to book on the following events, visit the Dramnation site. Specific upcoming dates are:

• 30/07 - Wine Cask Whiskies Session 1, 2016 at Crooked Tailor, Castle Hill
• 20/08 - Smoke Stacks Session 1, 2016 at Crooked Tailor, Castle Hill
• 22/10 - Southern BBQ Boilermarkers at Crooked Tailor, Castle Hill

TimeforWhisky.com attended the Dramnation World Whisky Tour Tasting Class as a guest of Dramnation, with thanks to Matt Wooler.

Cheers

Hendy

Whisky Live London 2015 review

You know how occasionally things just work out incredibly fortuitously? Whisky Live London was one of those occasions for me. 

I had to be in London for 4 days for work. Having not been for a few years, I decided I'd take the Friday as leave rather than head home a day early - figuring it shouldn't be too hard to find something to do in London for a day. I got in early the weekend before too, had a great time bar-hopping with this bloke, and at one point dropped by the SMWS bar in Greville St, London, where I got talking to Martyn, The Whisky Cyclist. Upon hearing I was only in town for the week, Martyn asked was I going to Whisky Live on Friday?

"Umm...well I bloody well am now!" was about all I could manage.

I genuinely had no idea it was on (which was surprising, considering how many UK bloggers I follow on Twitter), but it looked like I'd sorted out my Friday! Even better - just before plonking down £50 on a ticket, I noticed Whisky Live were offering media passes for an early media/blogger session. So with one of those sorted, all I had to do was wait for Friday to roll around.

I was excited to visit Whisky Live London because I'd heard good things (and generally, from what I could tell, major whisky shows held in the UK have been pretty high quality). I was also keen to see how it compared with Whisky Live Sydney, which I don't consider a bad show at all, but in my opinion is more of a beginner show, as opposed to say The Whisky Show or Oak Barrel's Whisky Fair, who cater more towards the enthusiast.

Fast forward to Friday, and I turn up to the impressive grounds of The Honourable Artillery Company for my first taste of a UK whisky show...

Arriving into the relatively empty hall, I quickly spotted a few familiar faces from the whisky blogging world - the likes of Dave and Kat from Whisky Discovery, Greg from GreatDrams and later the famous Joel Harrison (formerly Cask Strength, now Worlds Best Spirits). One thing that struck me first was that whilst a number of the big whisky companies were present, they weren't necessarily presenting the whiskies you might think. William Grant & Sons for example, had no Balvenie, Glenfiddich or Kininvie in sight. They did however have an impressive lineup of seven different Girvans. Diageo too were present, but with Mortlach (and yes, the new NAS Talisker Skye).

Then there was Wemyss Malts, Maverick Drinks (who are as entertaining in person as they are online), and Whisky Magazine presenting the full set of World Whiskies Awards winners (the competition having been held in London the night before).

The Rare Old Bar allowed attendees to sample some pretty rare drams (such as a Glenfarclas 1961 Family Cask, Glengoyne 35yo or even the Appleton Estate 50yo rum) for a fee, but there were plenty of impressive drams on offer at the exhibitor booths too, including a few gems I managed to sample on the night:

• Girvan 25 and 30
• Teeling 21
• Wemyss "Velvet Fig" (winner of the previous night's "Best Scotch Blended Malt")
• Balcones Brimstone
• Kavalan Vinho Barrique (winner of the previous night's "World's Best Single Malt Whisky")
• The Lost Distilleries Blend
• Master of Malt 40yo Liquer
• ...amongst many others (notes up soon)

As mentioned, the World Whiskies Awards were held the night before (also in London), and I imagine there would have been a few sore heads during the show. Nevertheless, a few legends made an appearance - including these two fresh from their recent wins:

Unlike previous shows where we'd run into Bill Lark, Bill was there as a punter (from what we could tell), enjoying the show and as always, happy to chat to fellow whisky lovers. A legend (or should we say the legend?) of the modern-day Australian whisky scene.

Maverick Drinks (known and loved for their fantastic range of Drinks by the Dram) had an interesting stand, with a number of expressions from That Boutique-y Whisky Company and Balcones (not a bad drop amongst them) and a live Tweet board, where you could tweet them, see your tweet in real-time, and score a dram for your troubles (a Batch 4 Arran from That Boutique-y Whisky Company, thank you very much).

After about 2 hours the public started to shuffle in and the hall started to fill up, so I headed off to one of the masterclasses - an introduction to Dewar's (Bacardi's) "The Last Great Malts", with an enticing lineups of whiskies that, until recently, were not often seen for sale:

• Aberfeldy 21
• Craigellachie 13
• Craigellachie 23
• Aultmore 25
• Royal Brackla Single Cask 21yo (my pick of the line-up)

It might have been an "introductory" masterclass, but these certainly weren't "introductory" whiskies, with at least two of them retailing for £300+. A great experience though, with a very entertaining host in Stephen Marshall (ex-SWMS and current brand ambassador the Last Great Malts).

After a few more drams shared with a few more bloggers, it was time to call it a night. Was it a good show? Without a doubt! With a line-up of some very interesting / not often seen whiskies, some great characters, an enjoyable masterclass schedule and the ability to taste the complete lineup of the World Whiskies Awards winners just a day after the awards, it was about the best possible way to spend a Friday evening.

Cheers,
Martin.

TimeforWhisky attended Whisky Live London as a media guest of Whisky Live (as we did in Sydney in 2013).

Distillery Tour #3: Kavalan Distillery (Taiwan) - Makers of the 2015 World's Best Single Malt Whisky

Third in our Distillery Tour series (don't worry we haven't forgotten about Yamazaki - it's due soon) is the Kavalan Distillery in Taiwan. Or should we say, the distillery responsible for the World's Best Single Malt Whisky 2015, as crowned by the World Whiskies Awards in London last week.

Just a few weeks before the Kavalan Solist Vinho Barrique Single Cask Strength picked up the coveted title, Steph and I were lucky enough to be treated to a private tour of the distillery (which was very lucky, considering the regular tours are in Mandarin, which neither of us speak).

Located in Yuanshan, a rural township in Yilan County (about 1hr 20m away from Taipei city), the Kavalan Distillery really is a sight to behold. Much like its parent, the King Car group, the distillery is absolutely massive, with everything done on a grand scale - the grounds, the warehouses, even the tasting room.

..but what really fascinated us, before all that, was Yilan County itself. Kilometer upon kilometer upon kilometer of flat, water-filled plots, some with shacks and run-down houses, some with modern mansions. Truly unlike anything we'd ever seen before (the photos below don't do it justice - but believe us when we say the landscape was like this for a good 30-40 minutes before we got to the distillery). Simply amazing.

Unfortunately Ian Chang (Master Distiller, who we met at The Whisky Show 2014 in Sydney) wasn't on site, but nevertheless we were given a very enjoyable tour by an enthusiastic tour guide who showed us the ins and outs of the distillery.

Kavalan obtain their barley already malted from the UK, Sweden and Finland, and don't do any in-house malting (though if they wanted to, they'd certainly have enough room!) Producing 3 million bottles a year, with the average cask aged for 3-4 years, means you need some serious storage facilities. In addition to the incredible 5 story warehouse they currently have, at the time of our visit, the distillery were constructing another. Unsurprising really, given the popularity in recent years. Due to frequent earthquakes in the region, the casks are bound 4 at a time, to reduce the risk of them toppling over - particularly those racked towards the top.

As with many distilleries, casks are a mix of port pipes, sherry butts and bourbon barrels, with the type of cask identifiable by a unique code on the front (and of course, the shape / size). The 3 casks below, first filled in 2006, were the first Kavalan casks to be filled (when you think about it, to win the World's Best Single Malt is a pretty incredible achievement for a distillery that's only been producing for 9 years!

Interestingly, in addition to the regular spirit/wash stills producing the single malt that has made Kavalan famous, the distillery has recently installed a number of other, very different German stills, which are intended to produce gin and brandy. Watch this space.

The tour itself (which I should point out, is completely free) is, in a similar fashion to the Suntory Hakushu Distillery we tourd back in December, somewhat of a "standard" tour. You see the mashing, you see the fermentation, you see the distillation, you see the barrel houses, and then you go into the tasting room. It's enjoyable, and you do get to see a few close-ups (such as some sample grains, open casks, new make spirit / whisky at various stages of aging in different casks), but you're not going to try a single cask whisky straight from the barrel, or taste a new make with your hands. From the looks of it, the distillery simply gets too many visitors each year to offer any specialist tours. It's certainly a popular tourist destination.

Unlike the aforementioned Hakushu Distillery tour, the tasting at the end of the tour is of one whisky only - the Kavalan Classic Single Malt 40% (4yo). There are nosing bottles on each table to allow tasters to nose each Kavalan expression (including the award winning Kavalan Solist Vinho Barrique Single Cask Strength), but they aren't for tasting.

What the distillery shop offers, however, is 50mL sample bottles of every expression, along with a limited distillery-only peated 7yo expression (housed in a stunning presentation box, and available for a very reasonable ~$350HKD / $57AUD). If there are two things I really like to see in a distillery shop, it's a distillery-only expression that doesn't cost the earth, and a large range of samples. Tick, tick. Well done, Kavalan.

Was the tour worth doing? Yes, absolutely. While it might not be the most interactive of distillery tours you'll go on, you'll get to see whisky distillation / aging on a simply massive scale, in a country that just a few short years ago no-one would have thought could produce a decent whisky, let alone a world-beater.

A few tips if you do plan to visit:

• As mentioned, the distillery is a decent drive from Taipei (it took us about 1h 20m in a taxi), and if you're not driving yourself, your options are pretty limited. Our hotel (the excellent W Taipei) arranged a taxi for us, who waited at the distillery and drove us back. If you're not driving, I'd suggest doing something similar.
• If you are driving though, there's plenty of parking (of course it goes without saying - don't drink and drive, but this isn't like some Scottish distilleries where you'll be tasting 4-5 whiskies at the end).
• Book ahead, and if you don't speak Mandarin, see if you can arrange an English tour.

With Ian Chang (Kavalan Master Distiller) the day after his 
"Best Single Malt 2015" win, in London.

Cheers,

Steph & Martin.