Scotland inadvertently became the home of whisky. Nowhere does it like Scotland does. Everything, from the history and heritage to the eventual sip of a smooth Scotch whisky, is perfect.
The Scotch Whisky Association states there are 151 distilleries licensed to produce the spirit in Scotland. If you’re hiring a motorhome in Scotland, we’d recommend seeing more than one so you can watch how each distillery adds their touch. Be careful, obviously, about consumption: ensure that there is a designated driver or, even better, you take a bottle with you and find the perfect setting to enjoy it. Although the process might sound somewhat similar, each has its personal touches to create what they will tell you is the perfect whisky. Be careful, obviously, about consumption: ensure that there is a designated driver or, even better, you take a bottle with you and find the perfect setting to enjoy it.
Scotland is the home of whisky, and we’ll explore how that happened below.
The Beginnings
Whisky distillation in Scotland started as an art form. The nation had an abundance of rain-soaked barley that needed to be used up. And so, whisky was born. Even to this day, distilleries still use water from streams and burns.
Documents state that the first evidence of whisky production dates back to 1494. An entry in the Exchequer Rolls – historical financial records, primarily from the English and Scottish Exchequers, documenting the revenue and expenditures of the Crown. The entry stated: “eight bolls of malt to Friar John Cor wherewith to make aqua vitae.” ‘Aqua vitae’ translates to ‘water of life’, a term that quickly became the meaning of ‘whisky’.
Whisky historians claim distilling would have started long before 1494, and by 1780, 400 illegal distillers were operating in Scotland and only 8 legal ones. It wasn’t until 1823 that the Scottish Parliament dropped restrictions on licensed distilleries by introducing the Excise Act, and made it more difficult for illegal stills to operate. Combining the Excise Act with the 1831 new distilling processes, using a Coffey or patent still, modern Scottish whisky was born.
Whisky became smooth and enjoyable to drink, with processes and production going from strength to strength to this day. Most of us probably wouldn’t survive a sip of 1494-era whisky.
The Growing Knowledge and Perfection of Distillation Techniques
Some of the documented evidence suggests that early distillation techniques could have arrived in Scotland through Christian missionary monks. Others suggest that it came from Highland farmers who had a surplus of barley and discovered the technique.
The process actually started long before it was used for whisky. Irish and Scottish monks would use copper pot stills to distil fermented grain mash that they used for medicine.
Those same copper pot stills were used to mix primarily barley and water that producers would grind down into a grist and then mix with heated, freshly sourced water. The result is a sweet liquid called “wort”. They would then transfer the wort to fermentation vessels. The result was a fermented liquid ready to go into the copper pot stills to increase the alcohol content and refine the flavour.
The result was a raw, throat-burning whisky that would taste nothing like it does today. As technology and the fermenting processes were perfected, the throat-burning somewhat reduced. But the process used in modern whisky distillation isn’t too dissimilar to its origins.
The Scottish Whisky Distillation Process
The modern Scottish whisky distillation process produces some of the finest, smoothest whiskies you’ll ever taste. And, as we said above, the process is still somewhat similar to its origin centuries ago, but with better technology and ingredients. Here’s the step-by-step process:
- Malting: Distilleries soak high-quality barley grains in water to start the germination process. It’s then dried in hot air using a kiln that stops the germination process. That then forms a starch that converts into fermentable sugars.
- Mashing: Distilleries grind the malt into a flour called grist and again mix it with hot water before putting it into a mashtun. Enzymes from the malt turn starches into sugars, creating the wort we mentioned above.
- Fermentation: The wort goes into a fermentation vessel, and yeast is added. The yeast eats the sugars in the wort and produces alcohol and carbon dioxide. At this point, the alcohol content is only roughly 7-10%.
- Distillation: The mix goes into copper stills two or three times for distillation. The alcohol vapours rise and condense back into liquid form. It’s a process that essentially continuously concentrates the alcohol.
- Maturation: The spirit is then transferred into oak barrels to mature. Maturation takes several years, during which it takes on flavours and colours from the wood depending on what the distillery uses.
So, as you can see, it’s just a fancier version of the origins.
The history of Scottish whiskey is iconic. The smooth flavour hasn’t changed much over recent years. It’s truly a drink distilleries have perfected.