Page 39 - (DK Eyewitness) Travel Guide - Scotland

A POR TR AIT OF SC O TLAND  37

How Whisky is Made Malting is the first
1stage. Barley grain is
Traditionally made from just soaked in water and
barley, yeast and stream spread on the malting
water, Scottish whisky (from floor. With regular
turning the grain
the Gaelic usquebaugh, or germinates, producing
the “water of life”) takes a a “green malt”.
little over three weeks to Germination
stimulates the
produce, though it must be production of
given at least three years to mature. enzymes which turn
Maturation usually takes place in oak the starches into
fermentable sugars.
casks, often in barrels previously used
for sherry. The art of blending was
pioneered in Edinburgh in the 1860s. Drying of the barley halts
2germination after 12 days of
Barley grass malting. This is done over a peat
fire in a pagoda-shaped malt-kiln.
The peat-smoke gives flavour to
the malt and even tually to the
mature whisky. The malt is
Mashing of the ground malt, or gleaned of germi nated roots
3“grist”, occurs in a large vat or and then milled.
“mash tun”, which holds a vast
Highland quantity of hot water. The malt is
Park
soaked and begins to dissolve,
producing a sugary solution
called “wort”, which is then
extracted for fermentation. Fermentation occurs when yeast
Pulteney 4is added to the cooled wort in
NORTHER N H IGHL ANDS Glenmorangie 5wash twice so that the alcohol alcohol, producing a clear liquid
wooden vats, or “wash backs”.
The mixture is stirred for hours
as the yeast turns the sugar into
Distillation involves boiling the
called “wash”.
See
vaporizes and con denses. In
inset
copper “pot stills”, the wash is
Glen Ord
distilled – first in the “wash still”,
HIGHLANDS
Talisker S P E Y S I D E EASTERN then in the “spirit still”. Now
purified, with an alcohol
content of 57 per cent, the
result is young whisky.
I
Fettercairn
S
Blair Athol
Edradour
Tobermory Dalwhinnie Lochnagar Glencadam
L
HIGHLANDS
WESTERN HIGHLANDS 6The whisky mellows in oak
A
N
Oban Aberfeldy CENTRAL Maturation is the final pro cess.
D
S
casks for a legal minimum of
Tullibardine
give the whisky a 10- to 15-year
Auchentoshan Edinburgh three years. Premium brands Traditional drinking vessels, or
ISLAY maturation, though some are quaichs, made of silver
Lagavulin Glasgow Glenkinchie given up to 50 years.
CAMPBEL-
TOWN
Glen Springbank LOWLANDS
Scotia
Bladnoch
Blended whiskies are Single malts are made
made from a mixture in one distillery, from
of up to 50 different pure barley malt that is
single malts. never blended.
036-037_EW_Scotland.indd 37 04/11/15 10:02 am