Grain Whisky

[soundmangt4]

I am curious as to why there isn't more grain whisky around, or is it used in blended whisky and not labelled as such?

I only as as I have had a couple of bottles recently from the Single Malt Whisky Society that were Auchentoshan grain whisky, and they were both fantastic, as well as being better value.
The latest is called Sweet Treats (18YO and from a virgin new toasted oak cask) and as the name suggests has a very sweet finish, but is very interesting, with a slight early hint of Vodka, but at 65.6% ABV, can take quite a bit of water without drowning it, making it even better value!
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Rob Hughes
Scotch Malt Whisky Society member
www.smws.co.uk

[William]

Grain whisky may contain unmalted barley or other malted or unmalted grains such as wheat and maize (corn) and it is generally distilled in a continuous still. Grain whiskies are light in body and flavour but they are not neutral as many believe but they do lack the character of malt whisky. Grain whisky like malt whisky is matured for a minimum of 3 years in oak.

Most grain whisky is used for blending as it is a comparitively cheap spirit to produce and is used to bulk out blends. Like malt whisky, every grain whisky varies in style and each grain whisky will add its own dimension to a blended whisky.

I would say up until recent years and this new upsurge in the popularity of whisky we would have rarely got the chance to taste a single grain whisky but thanks to the independent bottlers such as SMWS, Douglas Laing etc we are seeing some older bottlings of single grain whiskies.

The main grain whisky distilleries in Scotland are:

Cameronbridge
Girvan
invergordon
Loch Lomond
North British
Port Dundas (recently closed by Diageo)
Strathclyde

Silent grain distilleries:
Caledonian
Cambus
Carsebridge
Dumbarton

Not really sure about the Auchentoshan grain whisky, to my knowledge they have never produced grain whisky at the Auchentoshan distillery

The SMWS Code for Auchentoshan single malt whisky is "5"
The SMWS Code for Invergordon single grain whisky is "G5" perhaps it was Invergordon whisky you had.

The other SMWS Grain whisky codes are:

G1 North British
G2 Carsebridge
G3 Caledonian
G4 Cameron Bridge
G5 Invergordon
G6 Port Dundas

There are some excellent older single grain whiskies availble from the independent bottlers, one i had a few months ago which was excellent was from Douglas Laing, Clan Denny Strathclyde 33 year old, it was from a refill sherry butt. They still have some over at The Whisky Exchange for only £80 which is a fantastic price for a 33 year old whisky.

[Big Mac]

You do tend to find that the older single grain whisky releases tend to have been matured in sherry casks to add some character but this is usually a good thing as after a lot of years in a sherry cask sweet grain whisky is usually very drinkable as long as it has been good wood.

[Creed]

If you are interested Compass Box Hedonism is an excellent blended grain whisky which is very good, loads of rich sweet vanilla and coconut. I believe it is a blend of Cameron Bridge, Carsebridge and Cambus

[jcarrick]

I only realised the other day that the Snow Grouse is a blended grain whisky, i havent tried it though so cant comment on it but i had assumed it was just a lighter version of the standard Famous Grouse. The fact that they recommend you chill it before serving puts me off trying it, why do we need to dull the flavour by chilling it before tasting.

[Keith]