Classifying Scotch whisky by region - the Jim Murray view

[Exciseman]

My personal view is that the 'whisky regions' are dinosaurs.

I find shops (whether bricks-and-mortar or online) that groups malts in this way really annoying, especially where they additionally categorise by sub-regions.

What's wrong with a straight A-Z?

[Nick Brown]

Hi there,

whisky regions made sense - in times gone by. It was eons ago that whisky was considered a local product and the region where it was made was important...
Who cares for regions anyway? And why?

Greetings
kallaskander

so you would presumably have no objection if, say, peated Benriachs were sold as Islay malts or Glenkinchies as Highland malts

[scotchio]

The smarter shops have both plus a search function so how is it a problem? If you classify by flavour some distilleries will crop up all over the place, like benriach. And where do you draw the line in caregorizing by flavour when each cask is in itself a variant.

[Lawrence]

We can fix that Mr. T.

If regions don't matter then Scotland doesn't matter as a region. Put Lagavulin on a barge and set up shop in Guangzhou where there's cheaper labour.

[mongo]

remarking the (demonstrable) fact that there is rarely a consistency of style within regions surely is not tantamount to saying that regional information should be dispensed with completely or played fast and loose with.

[olikli]

I'm not really sure if the climate in Guangzhou is comparable to Scotland. And cheap labour is hardly a factor for making whisky. How many people work in an average distillery? 5? 10?

Hmmm. You might consider replacing the expensive marketing and PR people with cheap Chinese working bees. Could actually be refreshing given what we are currently being served

[Exciseman]

You can't, of course, classify distilleries by 'flavour category'. What you can do though is classify individual expressions by category. There are shops that do just that with wine.

[William]

I use two categories to classify Scotch whisky: those that are made in Scotland and those that are not.

Am I the only person baffled by your comment?

[William]

We can fix that Mr. T.

If regions don't matter then Scotland doesn't matter as a region. Put Lagavulin on a barge and set up shop in Guangzhou where there's cheaper labour.

ok, but then it couldn't be called Scotch.

Scotland is not a region - unless you want to classify Canada, Australia, Ireland, North America etc as "regions" of the old British Empire (I do hope you don't!)

Ipso dipsomaniac ( I made that up) you can't move Lagavulin Distllery on a (hufge?) barge and take it to China and call its whisky Scotch.

But you could make a Lagavulin-style Scotch at Benriach and call it Benriach.

Am I taking this too seriously?

[Peat Sampras]

I am, like Mr Tattie Heid, a map nerd and geography amateur and therefore, I like the regions concept. I even have whisky maps representing the 4 regions (Lowland, Highland (including Campbeltown), Speyside and Islay). I do not recognise the Islands as a region though And I do like threads like "is Dalwhinnie a Speyside distillery"

[Lawrence]

We can fix that Mr. T.

If regions don't matter then Scotland doesn't matter as a region. Put Lagavulin on a barge and set up shop in Guangzhou where there's cheaper labour.

ok, but then it couldn't be called Scotch.

Scotland is not a region - unless you want to classify Canada, Australia, Ireland, North America etc as "regions" of the old British Empire (I do hope you don't!)

Ipso dipsomaniac ( I made that up) you can't move Lagavulin Distllery on a (hufge?) barge and take it to China and call its whisky Scotch.

But you could make a Lagavulin-style Scotch at Benriach and call it Benriach.

Am I taking this too seriously?

Yes, you are missing the point and everybdody here is aware of the SW regulations.

[Pete Smoke]

I do not recognise the Islands as a region though

Have you enforced a trade embargo, and withdrawn diplomatic relations?

[Mr Tattie Heid]

Hi there,

whisky regions made sense - in times gone by. It was eons ago that whisky was considered a local product and the region where it was made was important...
Who cares for regions anyway? And why?

Greetings
kallaskander

so you would presumably have no objection if, say, peated Benriachs were sold as Islay malts or Glenkinchies as Highland malts

Why would he see validity in bogus regions when he doesn't see validity in actual ones?

[kallaskander]

Hi there,

Hi there,

whisky regions made sense - in times gone by. It was eons ago that whisky was considered a local product and the region where it was made was important...
Who cares for regions anyway? And why?

Greetings
kallaskander

so you would presumably have no objection if, say, peated Benriachs were sold as Islay malts or Glenkinchies as Highland malts

Why would he see validity in bogus regions when he doesn't see validity in actual ones?

I see the finer points of irony were lost in translation.

And the question if I would object to a peated Benriach being sold as an Islay malt is a case in point.

I do think that regions are pretty useless in a world where the compouds of a malt have very little to do with the region where the malt is cobbled together.

But I am all for regions and do not want to see them vanish.

Indeed it would be a loss of information if you would classify an Ardbeg and a peated Benriach only as "peaty malts".
The naming of the regions Islay and Speyside is the important information and distinction between the two because Islay peat and peat used for Benriach might differ.
And if you used Islay peat to make Benriach - how would you be able to tell them apart in a system based on flavours alone?
The same the other way round. The information that unpeated Bunnahabhain Bruichladdich and Caol Ila Highland style are not Speysiders is important.

It might be convenient for interested parties to have a wishi washi conglomerate of peated whisky - a category which would include the usual Islay suspects the Benriach peated line Ledaig and Highland Park the peated Loch Lomonds Ardmore Benromach 10 Ballantruan by the Tomintoul distillery peated Isle of Jura Caoran Reserve Fiddich the odd Islay cask finish peated Balvenie Brora but not Clynelish and all other odd peated experiments by distilleries I just do not remember at the moment.

Where is the gain in that?

Greetings
kallaskander

[DavidUK]

[/quote]
so you would presumably have no objection if, say, peated Benriachs were sold as Islay malts or Glenkinchies as Highland malts[/quote]
Why would he see validity in bogus regions when he doesn't see validity in actual ones?[/quote]



It might be convenient for interested parties to have a wishi washi conglomerate of peated whisky - a category which would include the usual Islay suspects the Benriach peated line Ledaig and Highland Park the peated Loch Lomonds Ardmore Benromach 10 Ballantruan by the Tomintoul distillery peated Isle of Jura Caoran Reserve Fiddich the odd Islay cask finish peated Balvenie Brora but not Clynelish and all other odd peated experiments by distilleries I just do not remember at the moment.

Where is the gain in that?

Greetings
kallaskander[/quote]


None whatsoever!!

[William]

Yes, you are missing the point

Mr T's point was that "geography is geography, and whisky is whisky. It's too easy for novices to confuse the two." Which I take to mean that if a whisky tastes like Lagavulin, then it tastes like Lagavulin, no matter where it is located.

I was merely questioning (ineffectively, obviously) the relevance of that slow boat to China you mentioned.

[Willie JJ]

But I am all for regions and do not want to see them vanish.

Indeed it would be a loss of information if you would classify an Ardbeg and a peated Benriach only as "peaty malts".
The naming of the regions Islay and Speyside is the important information and distinction between the two because Islay peat and peat used for Benriach might differ.
And if you used Islay peat to make Benriach - how would you be able to tell them apart in a system based on flavours alone?
The same the other way round. The information that unpeated Bunnahabhain Bruichladdich and Caol Ila Highland style are not Speysiders is important.

But doesn't the real information come from the distillery name? Knowing the distillery provides the geographical info and more. People need to know a fair bit to understand your peating point and those same folk will not be fooled by regional classifications. The classifications are only for the marketers I think.

[Mr Tattie Heid]

I don't have any problem with sorting distilleries by region. As I said, it's a matter of geography. What I object to is putting too much credence in regional style. It's something we see relative novices do: "I'm conducting a tasting, and want to include typical samples from each region. What do you suggest?" We invariably advise them to forget about regions and concentrate on a variety of flavor profiles. It's true you'll almost always end up with one of the Kildalton malts, and it's hard to argue that south shore Islay isn't an interesting subregion in itself. But if you walked into Gordon & MacPhail knowing nothing but regions, you might pick Bruichladdich for your Islay, Bladnoch for your Lowland, Aberfeldy as a Highlander, An Cnoc as a Speyside. If you did this after attending a tasting with carefully chosen representative samples form each region, I think you'd end up being very confused.

[two-bit cowboy]

Here's a great post that supports neither one side of the argument nor the other, but rather offers a well-regarded opinion as a guideline. Plus, it's a good read.

http://blog.thewhiskyexchange.com/2012/ ... conundrum/

[mongo]

being able to appreciate the (often great) diversity of styles and profiles within regions is no less worthy a reason to maintain regional identification than the fiction that knowing the region necessarily tells you something about all the whisky produced in it.

[Peat Sampras]

I do not recognise the Islands as a region though

Have you enforced a trade embargo, and withdrawn diplomatic relations?

Indeed it seems that this year I will visit no Scottish Island, other than the three previous years. However, this is due to me trying to save some money. I would love to go to the Islands this year and I will surely be back sometimes. So no embargo here

[scotchio]

I don't have any problem with sorting distilleries by region. As I said, it's a matter of geography. What I object to is putting too much credence in regional style. It's something we see relative novices do: "I'm conducting a tasting, and want to include typical samples from each region. What do you suggest?" We invariably advise them to forget about regions and concentrate on a variety of flavor profiles. It's true you'll almost always end up with one of the Kildalton malts, and it's hard to argue that south shore Islay isn't an interesting subregion in itself. But if you walked into Gordon & MacPhail knowing nothing but regions, you might pick Bruichladdich for your Islay, Bladnoch for your Lowland, Aberfeldy as a Highlander, An Cnoc as a Speyside. If you did this after attending a tasting with carefully chosen representative samples form each region, I think you'd end up being very confused.

But there are general common styles in certain areas.
Lowland: malty light grassy lemony,unpeated
Islay Peaty
Midlands/east some creamy small still malts others often notably fruity
North East Highlands Light and spicy
Traditional Highlands big bodied and smoky
Cambeltown Briny
Speyside Bigger full bodied malts with a tradition of sherry maturation are concentrated in central Speyside,Southern speyside on the Livet has a number of delicate light malts,some ofthe distilleries in Keith and Rothes have similar qualities.
Course these are generalizations and there are exceptions but it doesnt make the idea irrelevant

Good old Michael Jackson liked his regions and prattled on about breathing casks,peaty water,peat structure,rock forms.lepricorns etc.Wonderfully fanciful and maybe complete nonsense but there is some sense in the idea that factories in a common area may choose to create a similar style of product.Geography and tradition are a big part of the image of whiskies.Take the location out of the equation and you're discussing nondescript factories producing a range of flavoured spirit drinks.