English whisky. That’s a phrase you barely heard even a few years ago, but English whisky production is on the up and there’s a lot of exciting news dropping about new releases. What this space as the news emerges.
Whether you’re into whisky, walking or generally enjoying delicious things amid wonderful scenery, you are in for a right treat with this! We’ve teamed up with our pals at The Lakes Distillery to offer one lucky human (and their even luckier plus one!) the chance to visit the award-winning whisky, gin, vodka and liqueur-maker, which just so happens to be situated in one of the UK’s most scenic national parks: The Lake District.
Happy Friday, folks! Here’s The Nightcap to help you roll on into the weekend armed with a plethora of booze news. Always handy if you’re looking to impress down the pub/on a hot date/out in a bar*…
Welcome to the weekend, team! Step away from the workload and pick up a dram. You deserve it. Friday evening is here! (Apologies as always if you’re a non-nine-to-fiver and are indeed working at the weekend… join the vibe when you can.)
It’s been a short week here at MoM Towers thanks to the summer bank holiday Monday. But that hasn’t stopped us bringing you all manner of news over on the blog this week.
On Tuesday we unveiled our latest competition of much excitement – win a VIP trip to Speyside and discover The BenRiach Distillery! Then on Wednesday we got hold of Pernod Ricard’s annual report and crunched the numbers to see how the likes of Jameson, The Glenlivet and Chivas Regal performed over the last year.
Yesterday we had a blog double whammy: Annie talked us through all things aquavit in her beginner’s guide, before we shed a little bit more light onto Diageo’s Special Releases 2018 line-up. Not long until the full reveal: check back on 12 September for details of all 10 bottlings in full.
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What’s more exciting than a local whisky distillery? One that makes gin, vodka and an intriguing Port-like wine, too! We have a nose around Kent’s Copper Rivet distillery and get to sample some very intriguing spirits indeed…
The building that houses the Copper Rivet Distillery looks like it should be in a piazza in Siena rather than amongst the retail parks of what used to be the Royal Naval Dockyards in Chatham, Kent. A former pump house, it lay derelict for years until it was spotted by Matthew Russell who was having a picnic over the River Medway at Upnor Castle. His family had been looking all over the country for a place to start making gin, but when he saw those Italianate arches, he thought “bingo” (or perhaps “gingo”).
Last week, East London Liquor Company steamrollered its original crowdfunding target of £750,000 in a mere 24 hours. Here, founder Alex Wolpert reflects on four transformative years, details the distillery’s next steps, and anticipates the future of English whisky with his hyper-local London Rye.
“It’s been quite a week,” a humble Wolpert tells me over the phone, and I don’t doubt him for a second. The gin, vodka and whisky distillery – east London’s first for more than a century – exceeded the £1 million marker of its Crowdcube campaign within four days, with investments ranging from £10 to £175,000. At the time of writing, ELLC is making clear headway on its amended target of £1.5m.
Earlier this year we headed up to Cumbria to check out The Lakes Distillery, the National Park’s first legal spirits producer. It would have been rude not to catch up with Dhavall Gandhi, whisky-maker-in-chief, to find out more about his plans for the (shortly to come of age!) whisky, the distillery’s wood programme, and how the former-Macallan man got into whisky full stop…
Dhavall Gandhi is a busy chap. We were planning to chat in person when Team MoM travelled to The Lakes Distillery earlier this year. We were on a mission to check out the production area, the award-winning Bistro (it’s gooooood) and even meet the on-site alpacas (top tip: they’re fluffsome but not the friendliest. But head up on certain days and you’ll be able to encounter them up close). Gandhi was called away to the US just before the visit – there were casks to check out. His trip sums up the intense focus on wood – more on that later – and meant that when we caught up on the phone shortly afterwards, there was a lot of ground to cover.
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Join us as we head to Bimber Distillery to talk about its English single malt whisky: how to make it, what it will taste like and the exciting future ahead, all in a week when England celebrated St. George’s Day!
Since the 1905 closure of the Lea Valley Distillery and the subsequent end of barley-based whisky production in England, it has taken quite some time for the category to get back on its feet. While Scotch whisky has continued to thrive and has retained an enviable international regard, and Irish whisky has turned its luck around, English whisky production is still in its relative infancy. But times are changing, and changing fast.
We are undoubtedly in the most exciting period for the category yet; modern English whisky makers are refusing to rest on their laurels, or curse the success of their Celtic counterparts. Instead, distilleries such as St. George’s Distillery, East London Liquor Company, Adnams and Hicks & Healey are releasing various interpretations of English whisky, while Copper Rivet Distillery, The Cotswolds Distillery, The Lakes Distillery, Wharf Distillery, The London Distillery Company, Spirit of Yorkshire, Cooper King, and Bimber Distillery are all close to putting quintessentially English whisky on our shelves.
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Master of Malt may be best known as a multi-award-winning spirits retailer, but all that may be about to change as we reveal our plans to use cutting-edge additive processes to build a state-of-the-art whisky distillery and produce truly innovative new whiskies.
*UPDATE: It’s time for you all to know the truth about our big announcement.*
Happy Easter everyone! Or International Egg Day, if you’d prefer!
Now the egg, as the Beastie Boys have taught us, is a symbol of life. This Easter we couldn’t be more delighted to finally breathe life into a project that’s been a dream of ours for many years: our very own whisky distillery. And that’s not all. Allow us to introduce this incredibly exciting new venture through the medium of fancy video…
What drives a couple to quit two lucrative careers and build a Tasmanian-inspired whisky distillery in Yorkshire? We explore the story behind the Cooper King Distillery, England’s newest single malt whisky-maker.
“We got a bit bored and left our jobs and just started following our dreams, I guess,” Abbie Neilson takes a sip of her lemonade as we chat about one new distillery in particular set to join the swelling ranks of English whisky producers. Spirit might not yet flow at the Yorkshire-based Cooper King Distillery, but it already comes with a backstory that could fill the annals.
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In the lead up to St. George’s Day, you could win a limited edition English Whisky Co. Founders Private Cellar The Final Signature set worth £795!
St. George’s Day is next Sunday, and to mark the occasion we’re giving away a very special example of English single malt from the English Whisky Company in Norfolk. Everyone who buys any of the English Whisky Co.’s releases from now until the end of St. George’s Day will be automagically entered into our draw to win an English Whisky Co. Founders Private Cellar The Final Signature set worth £795! (No purchase necessary – see Terms & Conditions below.) More…
Exciting new English whisky distillery Spirit of Yorkshire opens to the public this Easter, but they’ve been quietly working under the radar and laying down casks for the last few months. We headed to the Yorkshire Wolds earlier this week to find out the full details.
Yorkshire. God’s own county. Also, now the location of a new independent single malt whisky distillery! Since we visited St George’s Distillery back in 2009 a number of projects have popped up all over England, which I’ll run through at the end of this post, but today we’re getting all excited about Spirit of Yorkshire!
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