English Whisky Co - Chapter 13

[opelfruit]

There isn't a place on the forum for European whisky, so as it's a single malt it's going in here

I have recently purchased a bottle of English Whisky Co Chapter 13 and it's so damn good I felt I needed to post about it and provide some aware of English whisky.

The English Whisky Co (St George's Distllery) is based in Norfolk, one of the worlds best barley producing areas. They first started producing whisky in 2006 and due to the nature of the distillery ethos there isn't much of the stuff about.

The whisky is batch made by hand, not chill-filtered, naturally coloured. Bottled on site, by hand one at a time. This is slow whisky, made with care and to the top possible quality which can be seen from cask buying, water choice and the barley they use. Let me tell you, these things you can taste in the finished product. Forget age statements, make a product to these standards and it doesn't matter how old it is (or isn't).


They are released in "chapters", not age stated or vintage released. Each chapter is a new bottling, they are generally limited releases due to volume but some are continually made for core range release. Chapters range from special finishes (rum, wine, sherry, liquer) to heavily peated, some are released in both standard form an cask strength form.


Chapter 13.

This is a lightly peated whisky and is matured in Sassicaia casks (a Bordeaux style red wine). The original release was a 49% abv, there was a 2nd and 3rd release at 45%.

I have the 2nd release, which was done for St George's Day. The 3rd release was done to commemorate 100 years since the start of WW1.


Nose: Sweet, heavy vanilla custard, honey, little whiff of smoke, dried fruit (raisins, sultanas). Humid forest, like a kinda piney smell, florally herbal if that makes sense (?). Something creamy I can't quite place, maybe coffee.

Palate: Oh yes. Firstly it's thick/oily, quite a viscous mouthfeel but it's lovely and soft coating and not sticky coating. Sweet, it's certainly on the sweet side of whisky, black cherries.
There is a touch of peatiness hiding in there, spices - cloves, nutmeg, black pepper. Just to keep it interesting there is some mustiness/earthniess, like old sacks, good mustiness though - it's only slight and I get it in Amrut whisky too. Red licorice laces.

Finish: Long, almost grapey, tingle of that spice and then finishes dry and clean.


This is my first bottle from EWC and it will not be my last. This is seriously good whisky and hands down one of my favourite bottles of the year. It's a whisky I would have in my cupboard permenatly and enjoy immensely each time I poured a glass.

I'm not sure what they are like for exports (for the none UK people on here), but if you get the chance to try a bottle of whisky from EWC please do.
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"Too much of anything is bad, but too much good whisky is barely enough."

[TheWM]

That's an excellent write up. Do you get the 'sherryiness' in there like I did? I can't think of many whiskies that are not held in a sherry cask that have IMO this similarity. The first time I had a taste I was literally blown away. We had 5 whiskies at the distillery and I was blown away. The price point makes a mockery of other whiskies 3 times the price (and more) and like Glenfarclas this makes me feel that this is a 'trusted' distillery that looks for the right product first rather than profit.

That said they did make it clear on our visit that the single malt whisky that you can get @ the supermarkets they sold (Morrison & Marks) was done purely for branding and bringing in some money.

Whilst this and all chapters (AFAIK) it is NAS, an important thing to remember is that the maturation in Norfolk is a lot higher than Scotland. They assume up to 30% more. I'm more relaxed about buying a NAS from here as I know that quality comes first. They will not reuse casks and any hint of sulphur will lead to the batch being discarded (although due to the volumes they produce this is not that much of a concern).

I highly recommend the 'World Whisky' tour and great discounts can be had buying in person from the distillery.

[opelfruit]

I got dried fruits that you find in sherried whisky but not as intense. There wasn't that Christmas cake note about it, it was much more lively and interesting. The bottle has only just been opened though so I may be more of that later.

I agree about the "trust" aspect. I really get the feeling that this whisky has been produced with care for the final product, that they want to produce the best whisky they can. Whilst it would be nice to see some age related info (even if it said it was 5 years old or whatever) I feel that I'm being treated considerately as a consumer and being told about the whisky with transparancy.....so I don't really mind.

As you mention, the price points for the whisky they produce vs the quality is fantastic and I do like to know that I'm not have the mickey taken out of me with high prices.

This just goes to show that you can produce high quality, limited release whisky in a transparant way and not rip of your customer. I wish EWC all the best and will look foward to become a loyal client of theirs in the upcoming years
_________________
"Too much of anything is bad, but too much good whisky is barely enough."