Until all the profiles are finished, you can use the
Distillery Data Overview
as some kind of a 'preliminary distillery guide'. I'll try to keep the overview as up-to-date as possible, but it's hard to keep track of the status of some distilleries. I use the world wide web for much of my 'research', but sometimes I'm confronted with conflicting information. While I was working on this page (early autumn of 2002) I learned that Allt-A-Bhainne, Benriach, Braes of Glenlivet and Caperdonich were mothballed. But when I went on-line to check the validity of the data I found lots of sites that still listed these distilleries as 'active'.
When French "We are committed to the long term growth of the Scotch Whisky business and the development of our brands. Following the completion of a review of our
distilling operations, Chivas Brothers will concentrate the production of its premium blended and malt whiskies at six distilleries: Aberlour, Glenallachie, The Glenlivet, Glen Grant, Strathisla and Longmorn. In order to balance customer
requirements, inventory levels and sales forecasts, this will involve the temporary closure of the distilling facilities at Allt a Bhainne, Braeval, Benricah and Caperdonich. Whilst there are no immediate plans for the reopening of these four
facilities, they are not being permanently closed and remain in our plans as we look to grow our business and to maintain the high quality of its Scotch Whiskies." Well, I guess we'll have to see about that... But that's neither here nor there.
(I finally decided to take the info on 'The Whiskyportal
' as a basis for the info in the overview.)
Anyway - I have to admit I have mixed feelings about the game of mothball that's been going on.
As sad as I feel about the disappearance of active distilleries from the Scottish landscape, it does make my 'job' a lot easier. I won't have to
sample any bottlings from these
This is all the general distillery info I have to offer so far.
I guess I should stop whining and get to work on the
So you wanted to delve a little deeper into
the whole 'distilleries' issue? Excellent choice...
More Data...
November 11, 2001 seemed like such an historic date at first.
It was the first day I
could proudly say I had 'seriously' sampled a bottle from each active distillery in Scotland (and quite a few silent distilleries as well). It wasn't long afterwards that I learned that there was little reason for pride and joy. Trying to say anything meaningful about a distillery based on just one bottle is pure madness.
Although 'madness' is what this website is all about, I'm quite serious when it comes to my research. I figured that I wouldn't to be able to say anything 'serious' about a distillery in Scotland before I had tasted at least three different bottlings. So, I decided that would be my goal during phase II of my mission; sampling three (or more) bottlings from all active distilleries in Scotland.
As I go along, I will publish 'distillery profiles'.
Each profile will contain some basic information about the distillery, its history and tasting notes on the bottlings I've tried so far. You can
check which distillery profiles are finished in the 'profiles' column at the left. I'll try to add a few profiles with every major update of the site. It has taken me five years to complete phase I of the mission, so this new undertaking
should keep me entertained for quite a while.
Distillery research will be the core of phase II
of my Malt Mission. At the moment, I don't
have any 'definitive' answers but read on
for more preliminary observations.
Well, not much more - not yet anyway.
Those of you that have been following my
alcoholic adventures through my Liquid Log
may remember something called log entry #93.
