We learn how to taste whisky at Glasgow’s Clydeside Distillery

National World - LocalTV

We took a trip to Clydeside Distillery to learn how to taste scotch whisky.

Transcript

00:00Hi Cara, we're here at Clydeside Distillery this morning and we're going to do some whisky tasting.

00:06Could you tell us a wee bit about what we're going to be trying this morning?

00:09Yes, I've got three whiskies for you to try, so good morning, you'll be stumbling out of here,

00:15hopefully you'll love them all. So we've got three for you to try as I said,

00:19there is a journey that we take with those three, so a nice mental journey as you're sat down

00:24with the river Clyde in front of you, it can't get any better than that.

00:27So we'll start off with whisky number one, as it is your first whisky we always cheers to that, don't we?

00:33So we'll raise a glass together and say Sláinte Mhath, which is Gaelic for good health.

00:37Sláinte Mhath.

00:38You want to start by nosing the whisky, so you can give it a smell of both nostrils,

00:43you will find that you do have a more dominant nostril, I know, the body's wild,

00:47it does change throughout the day so you can test that out, see what one's your stronger nostril,

00:52you might get some more smells coming through, you can open your mouth as you smell that as well,

00:57give it a little swirl as well, it's been sat there a few minutes,

01:00you'll be able to see the oils that come through as well,

01:02and once you're ready you can give it just a little sip.

01:05Now whisky is meant to be savoured and enjoyed, you don't want to neck this right back,

01:09take your time with it.

01:11These are pretty young whiskies so you want to hold it in your mouth for about three, four seconds,

01:15let your cheeks get used to it, let your taste buds get used to it,

01:18I know it's a shock when you have that first sip, but you should be getting some senses through.

01:24So all of your senses are linked with your memories,

01:27so that means that there's nothing wrong with what you're tasting,

01:32it's all linked with your memories, who am I to say that your memories are wrong?

01:35So if you want to maybe shout out if there's any smells or flavours or memories that come cropping back,

01:42again, no wrong answer, it's all personal to you.

01:45I think probably going into pubs with my grandad when I was younger and he drank quite a lot of whisky.

01:50Did you get a wee dram as well then?

01:53Probably not, no, because I don't know what my reaction would have been at that age.

01:57Well, I'm born and raised in Glasgow, my granny would always rub it on my gums when I was crying,

02:02and I turned out just fine.

02:05But I get those kind of memories coming through as well, like sat in an old man's pub with the fire roaring.

02:11I'm usually still sat in old man's pubs.

02:14Especially on a day like today, oh my goodness, you want to wrap up cosy,

02:17so a dram will do that to you as well.

02:20So usually I feel that this one's quite sweet.

02:23So this one here is from an ex-bourbon barrel,

02:26so you will get the sweetness coming through from our new make spirit that we make just next door.

02:31About 30% of the flavour of your whisky at the end will come from that new make spirit that we make just here.

02:36And all the rest is going to come from the cask itself.

02:40So we use an ex-bourbon barrel, as I said.

02:43Let me just find a stave from that.

02:46So this is a stave from the bourbon barrels that we use.

02:48This is the outside and this is the inside.

02:50You can see that it is gorgeously charred, more black from the charring.

02:54That's all done from the bourbon industry themselves.

02:56So they'll char the inside just to keep that liquid water tight,

02:59but as they do so it's releasing a liquid, sorry, not a liquid, a compound called vanillins,

03:05which is very similar to, funnily enough, vanilla.

03:09So if you're tasting anything or smelling anything coming through that's kind of caramelised,

03:13like vanilla, toffee, butterscotch, fudge, anything like that,

03:18yeah, that's all going to come from the bourbon barrels itself.

03:21So here in Scotland, we absolutely love the bourbon industry.

03:25We love America for all its bourbon.

03:27So much so, there's now more bourbon barrels in Scotland than people,

03:31by nearly a 4 to 1 ratio.

03:33So it's almost catching up to sheep.

03:35So we're really living up to that stereotype here.

03:37So you will find that it is your most popular cask for whiskeys,

03:42but you can understand why.

03:44It's really sweet and really rich, isn't it?

03:46Yeah. How have you enjoyed that one so far?

03:48Yeah, very nice. Just kind of the colour of it, it's quite light and clear.

03:52Really light, isn't it?

03:53So this one here is roughly about three and a half years old.

03:57As we are such a young distillery, we're not tied down to any traditions at all.

04:00So this whiskey and all the whiskeys we're going to try are just going to age and get older and older

04:05until we've really perfected that.

04:07So the colour will all come from that cask itself.

04:10So think of a cask like a set of lungs.

04:12It's constantly breathing in and breathing out whatever was in there before.

04:16And you can see that even more with our second ram.

04:18Look at the colour difference in that one.

04:20Yeah. So this one's a lot darker, as you can see.

04:23Give that a smell as well.

04:25So this one, still 46%, like the other ones.

04:28All three of the ones we'll be trying are 46% ABV.

04:32They're all made from that new make spirit that we've made just next door.

04:35The only difference here is the cask.

04:37Now you can see how different that colour is.

04:39This one here has been aging in an Oloroso sherry cask.

04:43So a fortified wine from the south of Spain.

04:46And you're a professional now at tasting.

04:48You can give it a little sip.

04:50You can hold it in your mouth.

04:51Your taste buds should be used to that whiskey flavour by now.

04:57And see how different that is.

04:59It's a bit more kind of rich.

05:01That one, I know, maybe sweet.

05:03See, in terms of the sherry cask, is that kind of part of the process,

05:06that you maybe go and try that first and just kind of get to know the sherry a wee bit as well

05:10before the kind of, the casks?

05:12So sherry used to be really popular here in the UK.

05:15So much so that the bodegas in Spain would simply send it in huge travel casks.

05:20And that's how we started experimenting with aging whiskey in sherry casks.

05:25But obviously it's not very popular anymore.

05:28And there was a great law in Spain that you can only barrel and bottle sherry in Spain.

05:33So they're keeping all of the profits now, which is quite rightfully so.

05:36But it means we're not getting half as many casks as we were used to.

05:39So we need to be in talks with the sherry companies now.

05:42So what they'll do is they'll purposefully age their sherry and season the casks.

05:48And then they'll pour the sherry down the drain in some cases and just sell us the casks.

05:52So we're using Oloroso sherry specifically, because that's the sherry that we like.

05:57That will get seasoned for around two years and then we'll get the casks.

06:01So because of that, it's more purposeful that we're doing that.

06:04We're not getting them sent in from the bourbon companies.

06:08It will cost a little bit more, but this is my favourite type of whiskey.

06:12What do you think?

06:13Yeah, it's very nice.

06:14It's quite smoky as well. It's quite nice. I like that.

06:17So we don't use any peat here at all.

06:19So you won't get any smokiness coming through.

06:22It might be from the oak cask itself.

06:25It is around the same age, but sherry casks are a lot smaller.

06:30So you might get more of a punch, as I said, that kind of like lungs.

06:35You might get more of those flavours coming through as it's a smaller cask.

06:39This one reminds me a lot of Christmastime as well.

06:41You said that it's sweeter.

06:43That might be coming from the wine itself, like the plums and cherries.

06:47It's kind of Christmassy with those spices like nutmeg, cinnamon.

06:51There's some like white pepper on the tongue.

06:53So that sweetness is kind of cancelled out with that spiciness.

06:57So it's a really nice balance, really is my favourite one.

07:00That's nice.

07:01Now there is a reason why we've tried the both of these this morning.

07:04Obviously we've tried an ex-bourbon barrel.

07:06We've tried an ex-sherry cask.

07:08What we're going to do now is take about 90% of the first one we had, the bourbon,

07:14and about just 10% of the second one we had.

07:17We're going to marry the two together until we have our little baby.

07:21This is our flagship whisky, Stob Cross.

07:24Now you can tell by the colour that it is a marriage of the two.

07:28It's that lovely light golden-y colour.

07:31And obviously I managed to take where we are, Stob Cross Road as well.

07:35Yes, yes. So as much as we are very young,

07:38this cask you're drinking from just now is around five years old.

07:42Because we're so young, we still wanted to tie it back to those traditions

07:45that we celebrate all throughout the tour and all throughout the building.

07:49So our lovely view, we're at Stob Cross Road.

07:51This is Stob Cross Quay as well.

07:54Next door there was a Victorian manor house built called Stob Cross Manor, of course.

07:59And even before that, before Glasgow was the booming city that it is today,

08:03this was a pilgrimage stop-off point.

08:05So a Stob was a wooden post.

08:07The one that was here had to cross through it.

08:09So that was to signify to travellers going on a pilgrimage from the city centre,

08:14letting them know where that post was,

08:16that they were on their way down to Dumbarton Castle.

08:19The castle is still there, just a few miles west.

08:21So with this whisky being so young, around five years,

08:24it's still packed full of all that history.

08:26So hopefully now that you have tasted the bourbon and the sherry casks separately,

08:31you're able to distinguish some of those flavours that we've met along the way.

08:35So you'll get the lovely sweet notes coming from the bourbon and that lovely caramelised cask.

08:40But depending on your palate, you'll get those kind of wintery spices

08:44from the second one, the sherry, either to start or to end.

08:47I absolutely love this whisky.

08:49It's very smooth, it's very nice, I like that.

08:50Really smooth, doesn't it? Yeah.

08:51So for me, I get those spices at the end.

08:53It's lovely and sweet, and then it's just cancelled out by those sweet Christmassy notes.

09:02Where are you getting those spices through?

09:03Are you tasting that sherry at all?

09:05A wee bit, yeah.

09:06Getting towards the end, it's nice.

09:08It's very nice, yeah.

09:09What one was your favourite?

09:10I like the Stob Cross, I think that was very nice.

09:12Oh, you're not just saying that.

09:14No, I'm not just saying that, no.

09:16First one was nice, it was quite, kind of, was it too strong?

09:19But I think that's a really nice whisky.

09:22Can I see the crossover to it?

09:24Yeah, yeah.

09:25So the whole reason why we've tasted all three of these,

09:27hopefully you're going away learning something,

09:29that you know, if you like a bourbon cask or a sherry cask,

09:32or you like ours.

09:34All three of these are still single malt whiskies,

09:36so you heard me say a marriage, I'm not just being romantic.

09:39We do actually call it a marriage because it's not a blend.

09:42So everything here is made in-house, just next door,

09:45with that new make spirit.

09:46It's just aged differently in different casks,

09:49and married together.

09:50So it's still a single malt whisky.

09:52So at least you know, you love your single malt whiskies,

09:55and you love ours.

09:56Well, thank you so much.

09:57Thank you very much.

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