There has never been a better time to be interested in whiskey but, at the same time, it has never been as expensive.
Whiskey's price boom has been overwhelming. The past decade has been a golden age for distillers, who are not just seeing increased interest in their product but also an increased willingness to shell out vast sums of money to access rare bottles.
There has never been a better time to be interested in whiskey but, at the same time, it has never been as expensive.
Whiskey's price boom has been overwhelming. The past decade has been a golden age for distillers, who are not just seeing increased interest in their product but also an increased willingness to shell out vast sums of money to access rare bottles.
"Rare" is an important word when it comes to whiskey. Rarity is what sets the top whiskeys apart from the others and what spurs people to spend what some might consider obscene amounts of money on a very different kind of investment. It's a near-perfect combination: small distilleries with plenty of old barrels on hand on one side, with a market thirsty for old, hard-to-find spirits on the other.
This is true across all sectors; Irish, Bourbon and Japanese spirits have all seen healthy increases in the prices being achieved. But it really sticks out when it comes to the world of single malts. For a single malt distiller, rarity is the essence of marketing and those distillers who managed to resist the urge to cash in on old barrels of spirit are being richly rewarded.
It's impossible to speak about expensive single malts without mentioning Macallan, so let's talk about the elephant in the room. The venerable Speyside distillery has some of the largest stocks of seriously old malt in Scotland and boy do they know how to sell it. They have almost cornered the market when it comes to sticking old whisky in a swish bottle and selling it to the highest bidder.
It is, once again, quite the victory parade for the Macallan distillery, with seven of the remaining nine whiskies bearing the name. Prices have been rising steadily – and, in some cases, spectacularly. A year ago, the Lalique 50 bottling had a global average retail price of slightly less than 209,000 dollars it has risen by 30 percent in 12 months. The Lalique 62 saw a rise of 27 percent in the same period.
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Overall the top 10 whiskies have seen a mean increase in average retail price of 54 percent in the past 12 months, although that is skewed by the huge average retail price of the Yamazaki, which did not appear in last year's list. However, even removing that price from the calculations, the remaining whiskies saw a mean jump in average price of almost 5 percent.
Going back further, the price rises are even more remarkable. A decade ago, there weren't many whiskies with price tags of more than 30,000 dollars today there are more than 25 whiskies north of the 40,000 dollars mark. The most graphic illustration is the simple fact that 10 years ago the Macallan Lalique 50-Year-Old had an average price tag of just 23,041 dollars today it is almost 12 times as much.
Single Malt whiskey is very expensive in South African rands. Macallan 12-year-old will cost you almost 900 rands.
Malt whisky /whiskey is usually made from barley, which has a particularly affinity with the malting process, and was also the most easily available grain during the development of the modern whisky industry in Scotland.
Malting itself takes place at the very start of the production process. The barley is soaked in water, turned on a malting floor (see picture) and then dried in a kiln, which catalyzes and then abruptly halts germination, releasing the starch in the grain. During kilning, peat fires are sometimes lit beneath the barley, which is an important factor in the flavor of the finished spirit: peat is a partially decomposed layer of vegetation extracted from boggy ground, which, when burned, gives the barley smoky, salty characters that translate into the finished whisky.
The malted barley is then heated in a mash tun with hot water, converting the starch into fermentable sugars and producing a sweet liquid known as wort. Yeast is added to the wort to start fermentation, resulting in the production of a beer-like liquid of around eight percent alcohol. This "beer" is then distilled twice in copper pot stills; the first distillation makes a rough spirit around 25 percent alcohol that is known as "low wines", and the second distillation – carefully monitored – produces the spirit that will be aged in barrels to become single malt whisky. The shape and size of the stills are crucial factors in the character of the whisky. Each distillery has a unique still that produces the desired expression; many are given names, in the same tradition as ships.
Grain whiskies are made from unmalted grain, usually in continuous or column stills. These can run 24 hours a day rather than on a batch basis, and so are more cost efficient.
Single Malt Whisky / Whiskey
This arguably the finest expression of whisky, made at a single distillery from malted barley, water and yeast. The style is produced in Japan, Ireland and most importantly (and famously) in Scotland. Indeed, single malt Scotch whisky is highly collectable and is easily one of the world's most sought-after and revered liquids, with many examples held in equal esteem with the world's top wines.
In addition, an increasing number of American craft producers have single malt whiskeys in their portfolio. The American Single malt Whiskey Commission was founded in 2016, and defined the category for distilleries in the USA; as of July 2018 the commission's membership had reached 100. However at this time the Alcohol and Tobacco Tax and Trade Bureau had yet to officially recognize the term.
Tradition may have as important a role as notions of terroir in differentiating single malts. A pure water source is usually unique to a distillery and is a source of pride, coming from local springs or rivers. The noted Japanese whisky Yamazaki is named for a suburb of Kyoto that is particularly famous for the quality of its water. But this may not have any role in differentiating the taste of finished product, and not all peated whiskey uses locally sourced peat. Moreover, many distilleries, including many single malts, do not run their own malting floors for reasons of cost and efficiency.
While there may be some terroir factors associated with the distillery location and the environment within the buildings, it is the shape and size of the stills and number of distillations which is usually regarded as having the most significant effect on a young whiskey. Thereafter many other characteristics can be laid over this core character through aging in oak barrels.
Single malt Scotch whiskies age in oak casks for an extended amount of time; mostly between eight and 20 years, but sometimes as long as 50-80 years. Oak maturation helps to soften the harsher edges of the spirit, while imparting its own flavors and allowing these to meld with flavors already present in the whisky. Various finishes are used to create character; casks that once held Bourbon are commonly employed, but Sherry casks are also popular, as are those that once held wine. The environment within the aging warehouses can play a big role in style, but barrels are not totally consistent products and two casks of the same origin filled with the same new-make spirit can produce very different results after a decade or more.
Time consuming, labor intensive production processes mean that single malt whiskeys usually occupy the top end of the whiskey market. Of course, time and care usually translates into a higher-quality product and, as such, single malts are usually savored on their own, with just a drop of water to bring out the spirit's flavors. Bartenders and mixologists are more likely to use more lightly flavored blended whiskies in cocktails.
Blended / Vatted / Pure Malt Whisky
Blended or vatted malt whisky is a combination of two or more single malt whiskeys. In contrast, standard blended whiskey will include grain whisky. Not suprisingly given the components, a skilful blender can make a product that equals most single malts in terms of quality.
Pure Malt is a tricky term; it has now been phased out of use by the Scotch Whisky Association as usage was inconsistent between single and blended malts. The phrase still appears on Japanese whisky labels, but seems to be applied to both types of malt whiskey.
