This is a special partner episode of Scran with The Borders Distillery.
On on a very very wet day, Rosalind took a trip to Hawick to visit The Borders Distillery - an up and coming whisky brand that is making a big impact. When it opened its doors to the public in 2018, The Borders Distillery breathed new life into an industry that had ceased to exist in the Scottish Borders for nearly two centuries.
On on a very very wet day, Rosalind took a trip to Hawick to visit The Borders Distillery - an up and coming whisky brand that is making a big impact. When it opened its doors to the public in 2018, The Borders Distillery breathed new life into an industry that had ceased to exist in the Scottish Borders for nearly two centuries.
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LifestyleTranscript
00:00 [Music]
00:05 Hello and welcome to this special partner episode of Scran.
00:08 Earlier this week, on a very, very wet day, I took a trip to Hawick to visit the Borders Distillery,
00:13 an up-and-coming distillery/whisky brand that is making a big impact.
00:17 When it opened its doors to the public in 2018, the Borders Distillery breathed new life
00:22 into an industry that has ceased to exist in the Scottish Borders for nearly two centuries.
00:27 I met with founding member and director John Fordyce, who showed me around the distillery
00:31 and taught me through how it all came about, how they've been able to incorporate sustainable production
00:36 into everything they do, the importance of nurturing local talent and all about the liquid
00:40 they are producing at this modern, yet historical, distillery.
00:43 I also chatted to Andy Baird, one of the local farmers who has been working with the distillery.
00:48 John finished off our tour with a personal tasting, which was surprising for many different reasons.
00:53 [Music]
00:56 And this is a plate on fermentation. Again, it's got rye in it to make it a blend.
01:02 And this is made from two whiskies, one with a very short fermentation of 55 hours
01:09 and the other with a very long fermentation of 150 hours.
01:13 And this is the idea of the workshop series, that we can play around while we have the freedom to do so.
01:19 And while we're talking about distillation, the Borders Distillery, what the team can do before we launch the mould.
01:24 [Music]
01:27 This distillery certainly is doing things in new and refreshing ways. I hope you enjoy this insight.
01:33 [Music]
01:39 So I'm at the Borders Distillery with John Fordyce and we're going to do a little bit of a tour
01:43 and chat about the history of the building and what the distillery is up to.
01:47 So John, do you want to just tell us a little bit about where we are and what's going on?
01:51 So we're standing beside the mash tun in the mash house at the Borders Distillery, which was completed in 2017.
02:00 And distillation started in 2018 and we've been going for five years now.
02:05 It's a five tonne mash, eight washbacks and we have a capacity of about one and a half million litres of pure alcohol a year.
02:15 The machinery is all stainless steel but the building around it looks quite old. So could you tell us a little bit about that?
02:20 So these halls were built in 1888 and in 1901 five Irish guys came to Hawick to build an electricity plant.
02:31 And where the mash house is, is where they had a water engine using water from the River Teviot to generate electricity.
02:38 And then on the other side of the still house they had banks of lead acid batteries
02:43 where they stored excess electricity from the mills and converted it into domestic electricity for Hawick.
02:50 And Hawick was extremely wealthy at the beginning of the 20th century.
02:54 There were 64 mills producing cashmere, woolens and tweed.
02:59 Tweed was invented in Hawick in 1826 by William Watson.
03:04 And there were weaving mills and knitting mills and a population of about 23,000,
03:09 of whom were on the modern equivalent of tech wages. 100% export business.
03:15 And a bit like the iPhone in 2007, in those days if you had money you bought electricity.
03:21 And we don't know for sure but it's in between Bolton and Hawick to be the first towns fully electrified in the UK.
03:28 Did not know that, that's very interesting.
03:30 And then it carried on being an electricity plant until 1936
03:35 when all privatised electricity was nationalised so they could build the grid for the Second World War, the upcoming war.
03:42 And then it operated as a mechanical workshop up until 1973
03:49 when it was bought by Turmer and Scott who made a special type of radiator for the nuclear powered industry.
03:56 And then we shut the nuclear powered industry so they moved on to have a different sort of business.
04:01 And they left the building in 2011, on the 6th of September actually.
04:07 We knew that because when we bought the building in 2015 we still found the milk in the fridge.
04:12 So we were able to work out when they left to the day.
04:15 The building was in terrible condition, it was more or less ruined.
04:20 So we cleaned it, we left it to dry out for a year while we designed the distillery.
04:27 And then putting together a group of people, a really good group of people, in 2017 we built it and we started distilling in 2018.
04:35 And the advantage of using these old buildings, apart from the fact that they're relatively low cost compared to new buildings,
04:45 is that you can start from the premise of sustainable production.
04:49 So the stainless steel uses half the water for cleaning.
04:54 The old Victorian glass roofs, we've put louvers in which means that we get six air changes an hour in here for no electricity.
05:03 The perforated floor saves vast amounts of cement and concrete.
05:10 And then the way we put together the still house and the tanks underneath the still house means that we get the maximum heat recovery from our products.
05:18 The other thing to say is that we're in the prime barley growing area of Scotland.
05:23 So all of our barley comes to us from 12 farmers, with whom we have a long term arrangement, and Simpsons the maltsters.
05:31 And we call it borders, growers and distillers.
05:33 And that takes us into the new phase of thinking about sustainable production in whisky,
05:38 which is we're in charge of a thing called scope three emissions.
05:42 So we have to take care of all of our supply chain.
05:46 And then all of our co-products, which come from mashing and from distilling, they get combined into a waste stream,
05:54 which goes out to two farms who use it for biogas production.
05:59 One of those farms makes tomatoes, which we can buy in the town.
06:04 We call them malt tomatoes in here.
06:06 And then the other one uses it to dry cattle bedding, which massively reduces their straw requirement, which enables their biodiversity agenda.
06:14 So we try extremely hard to keep up with the industry's covenants with the Scottish government.
06:20 We're on to iteration three now.
06:22 And the advantage we have is that because we started reasonably late, we were able to incorporate all the latest thinking into the building.
06:30 Which is good because you don't often see old distillery buildings who can be that agile when it comes to sustainability.
06:36 But you guys are managing it really well.
06:38 And it gave us other advantages. So everything's on one plane.
06:41 So we were the first distillery to be on Welcome Me for the disabled community.
06:45 We have transparency throughout the whole building.
06:48 So you can see from the outside and all through the building.
06:51 We don't use electric light for about 10 months of the year.
06:54 So we're very heavily focused on that part of it.
06:58 So we're going to go and have a look at the stills now.
07:00 Yes, let's go through.
07:06 You heard John talk about the Borders Growers and Distillers Programme, a partnership between the 12 local barley farmers and Simpsons Malt.
07:13 We spoke with one of the farmers involved, Andy Baird, who told us about this important relationship.
07:18 We're now joined by Andy, who is a farmer and part of the Borders Growers and Distillers Programme.
07:27 Hi Andy, how are you?
07:28 Hi there, I'm good thanks. How are you?
07:29 Good, yeah. So could you tell us a bit about your involvement in the programme?
07:33 Yeah, so we're one of the 12 growers that supply Simpsons Malt and ultimately the Borders Distillery with spring malting barley.
07:40 So yeah, we're part of the supply chain collaboration.
07:43 And how important is that to your business?
07:45 I think it is really important. We can get a bit detached from where our grain ends up.
07:50 With a lot of the stuff that leaves the farm, we don't know ultimately where it goes.
07:54 So to be involved in a local collaboration like this, where we know exactly what it's going into,
07:58 we can go to the shop and buy the product and sample it, I think that's really great.
08:03 And it's a bit of a reward for the hard work that we put in throughout the year,
08:07 to know that it's ended up in some of the fantastic products that the Borders Distillery produces.
08:11 And so how did your involvement come about? Were you asked to join or what happened?
08:15 Yeah, we've always grown spring malting barley for Simpsons Malt.
08:19 And being one of the farms that is within a certain radius of the distillery, I think they were keen to involve us.
08:26 So we were asked to get involved in the programme and we were more than happy to do that.
08:31 So John, how important was it to incorporate local farmers in the business plan from day one?
08:36 So we basically had three motivations.
08:40 One is that farmers have choices. They don't have to grow spring barley.
08:46 And without spring barley, we don't have any whisky.
08:49 So we felt it important to be seen to be committing to people in our region.
08:57 The second reason is that we are now in the third cycle of the environmental covenant with the Scottish Government.
09:04 We are responsible for what's called scope three emissions.
09:07 So we are involved with the farming community.
09:11 And the third thing is that we're in a rural town with people who grew up in the rural
09:17 and our farmers are integral not only to the local economy but the local culture.
09:23 And it seemed to me that to be important.
09:27 And then there's a subsequent sort of reason that's developed, which is that there's a sort of popular trope
09:33 about how farmers are an environmental disaster area and methane is ruining the planet and all this kind of stuff.
09:41 And nothing could be further from the truth.
09:44 So for those reasons, really, we're very committed to this project and we're very proud of it.
09:50 So it's essentially a way of you knowing that you're getting the local barley rather than just buying it in from anywhere.
09:55 Yes. So our barley is stored for us in Dunnes because we will only use malted barley from Borders farmers growing in the Borders.
10:04 It's a commitment we make. And we have the arrangement with Simpsons and they're very keen to respect that.
10:11 And involving these 12 businesses.
10:14 So there are 14 businesses essentially collaborating on product, financial, environmental and community reasons.
10:23 And that's why it works.
10:25 Back to the tour now where we moved into the still house, which was one of the brightest and most naturally well lit I've ever seen.
10:36 Welcome to the still house. So we have four pot stills built by Forsythes.
10:42 These were actually put together in Buckie and they were installed at the end of 2017.
10:49 They started off from thinking about what kind of spirit we wanted to produce.
10:54 And what we were interested in was a very fruity estuary Scotch whiskey.
10:59 There's no such thing, despite what everybody says, called a lowland style.
11:06 We are distinct to Inch Darnay, to Black Knock, to Annandale, to the new one being built in Gebra.
11:14 We're very focused on just making a classic fruity estuary Scotch whiskey which we then mature and first fill bourbon.
11:22 And that's kind of our pitch for the future.
11:25 Now we had to think of that ten years before we launched and so far we've managed to stick to the original idea.
11:31 The other thing about this still house which is slightly different is that we have a carterhead still installed here.
11:39 And a carterhead came about, quite a good story, is a guy called Jock Steen.
11:45 He, not that one, the other one, who invented column distillation but couldn't make it work.
11:51 So an Irish guy called Anais Coffey, he did make it work and in 1830 he patented it.
11:57 And Coffey had two apprentices, the Carter brothers, and they, like all young apprentices, thought they knew better than the boss.
12:05 So they added a water jacket to the top of a column.
12:09 The other difference between a classic column distill is it has no windows, no outlet points.
12:15 Instead it's stuffed full of sacrificial copper which are tiny copper rings.
12:20 And what that does is exploit the third great quality of copper, apart from being malleable and a good heat conductor,
12:27 is that it strips out all of the alcohols that you don't want and it purifies your ethanol.
12:34 And that's a key thing because we are very sensitive to sulfurous compounds and lethal alcohols.
12:40 And that's what copper does and that was discovered a couple of thousand years ago.
12:44 What this effect does is to give maximum purity to the ethanol spirit.
12:50 And once it gets to the top of the still and it's been washed up and down through the copper,
12:54 we then capture it in a tank and in that tank we can suspend botanicals and we infuse flavor.
13:01 Or if we get our cut point up to over 94.5, we can suspend activated charcoal in the vapor and we get what we call steam vodka.
13:12 So we don't filter it, it's all dealt with in the vapor state and then we condense it down.
13:16 So we take our new make spirit, 99% of which goes off to be matured in casks,
13:22 and then we can make gin and vodka on the same steam circuit in the same distillery with the same team.
13:28 So it's a wee bit different and perhaps a bit self-indulgent but the products are excellent.
13:34 So how common is it to use this?
13:37 If you've Bombay Sapphire, it's made using Carterhead, it's part of the still combination that goes into making Hendrix.
13:44 There's one in Iceland to make Reykjavodka, but there aren't that many, but it's fun.
13:50 And it looks cool, which is a key thing.
13:53 And was it always part of the plan to do other spirits as well as whisky?
13:57 That's our original idea, if you're going to build something, try and get the maximum out of your investment.
14:02 And obviously the size and shape of the building would have determined the size and shape of your stills as well?
14:07 No, it doesn't look like it now, because like all distilleries it operates like a duck.
14:13 It's very smooth and beautiful and then underneath there's all the paddling going on.
14:18 But it's a big building, so we were able to determine our capacity and therefore the type of still
14:25 and therefore the size of the still without really being too worried about the building.
14:28 What was really important were the people.
14:31 So if you take the team at Forsythes and then the architect, the QS, the structural, the mechanical, electrical, engineers,
14:39 all operations as a single team from the outset and spending a year planning it,
14:44 it's amazing what you can fit into a confined space if you think about it for long enough.
14:48 Yeah, that's lovely. It's really bright and light and even though it's a horrible day outside it feels nice.
14:54 Yeah, and the day we started distilling was during the big storm, the beast from the east.
14:59 And it was actually snowing inside.
15:02 We have photographs of snow falling in the building onto the stills,
15:06 because the louvers which allow the air in to create the differential air pressure also let the snow in.
15:13 And the wind was coming, roaring up the commercial road and it just came straight into the distillery.
15:18 So when we opened we had to go to Argos and buy many, many hair dryers.
15:24 And we had everybody lying on the ground trying to unblock all the valves.
15:29 And it was snowing and it was minus nine. And that was the first day of distillation.
15:33 So it was quite eventful then.
15:35 Absolutely. Unusual start.
15:38 Can you tell us a little bit more about the other spirits?
15:41 So as we referred, most of it goes to cask and then we make a product called Kers Borders Gin,
15:47 made from Umake spirit infused with classic recipe of botanicals.
15:52 The key thing is that the spirit is entirely made in the distillery.
15:55 And likewise with the vodka, instead of infusing flavour, we're extracting flavour.
15:59 Because vodka by definition has a taste but no flavour.
16:01 As long as you can get your cut point up to 94.5, that's the kind of key point.
16:06 Are you using local botanicals in the gin?
16:08 No, we use Juniper from, well, local in the sense that we buy everything from Michael in Brighton, like most people.
16:15 We were using hogweed from here, but you're not allowed to sell anything with hogweed in it in the States.
16:23 So we're a very classic recipe. Heavy citrus, heavy juniper, a bit of licorice on the back for some sweetness.
16:30 So I can see here we're standing in front of one of the stills and it looks like it's called George.
16:34 So do they all have different names?
16:36 Yes, so the four pot stills are named after the four people that founded the distillery.
16:41 George sadly passed away. It's partly to commemorate the building of the distillery, but it's also, we have a big emphasis on people here.
16:50 So we chose not to automate. We have recruited distillers entirely from the town and the surrounding area.
16:57 We have seven girls and three boys. We've trained everybody up from scratch.
17:01 And we try and push everybody into getting their certificate of distilling.
17:06 Because there's such a young team and we've never had a history of distilling in this part of the world.
17:12 We try and make everybody have a varied experience. So every distiller also works a warehouse.
17:20 All the distillers are the guides. We have no guides here, so the distillers break shift to show people around.
17:25 And then of course we're very focused on their education.
17:28 So that's a big part of our ethos and a big part of why we founded the distillery.
17:35 And it's also a strategy that's very much heavily supported by the shareholders.
17:40 Must be nice bringing distilling to the area for the first time.
17:43 You think every part of Scotland probably had the history, but not here.
17:46 Well they did up until 1837. And then the boy that was distilling in Distillery Lane in Kelso, which is now the Co-op, was done, guess what for?
17:55 Illegal distilling?
17:57 No. A cask investment scam.
18:00 Oh, really?
18:01 It's terribly modern.
18:03 Very, very controversial lease they say. So it's been going on for a long time then.
18:07 And then he got shut down by the High Court and then nobody had distilled whisky since then.
18:12 Right, okay.
18:13 And one of the reasons for coming here was that nobody was here.
18:16 So we didn't want to be number, I don't know, 70 in Speyside or number, I can't remember what we're up to now in Islay, maybe 13 or 14.
18:24 So we've been able to stay first since 1837. And being able to stay first in the whisky industry is quite cool.
18:32 I believe there is an interesting water system here. Can you tell us more about that?
18:36 The Tweed Valley, there are two river systems. There's the one that everybody sees and fishes in and swims in and the rest of it.
18:43 And about 20 to 25 metres below that, there's another one, which is a very slow moving bit of water.
18:51 So when the rain from Ireland hits them off at hills, then it takes about 70 years to get to Hawick.
18:58 And by the time it's here, there is no traces of nitrates or iron or manganese in it.
19:04 And it's so pure that we put it straight into the mash tun, but we also use it unadulterated for dilution, which we do here in the distillery.
19:12 And that's an unusual thing. And the reason why Hawick is here is because of the water.
19:17 So it turns out that anybody can knit a cashmere jersey.
19:21 But only people in Hawick can wash it in Hawick water. And that's why Chanel are here and that's why Johnson's are here and that's why Hawick Co. are here and that's why Lovart are here.
19:31 These are all super high quality, high fashion export businesses, but they're here for the water.
19:36 The water in Hawick really has driven the development of the town.
19:40 So we have a confluence of three rivers at the top and then we have this thing happening underneath us very quietly.
19:45 So we use water from underneath us for process and then we, because it's the Tweed Basin, you're not allowed anything mechanical, electrical or oily on the river.
19:54 So we have a pumping station inside the distillery and we percolate water through the riverbed.
20:00 No larvae are hurt in this process. And then we soak it into the distillery and then we send it straight back out again.
20:06 Because the water is moving so fast, the dilution effect on putting the water back into the river means that you can stand on top of it and barely feel it.
20:15 So Hawick's a great place if you need water. And there were 64 mills of extracting water here up until the 70s.
20:24 The last mill that stopped extracting water finished in 2016 and we dug our borehole in 2016.
20:32 So we're carrying on a 250 year tradition of using water in this way.
20:36 We moved into the tasting room and bar.
20:42 John explained that the photographs that adorn the walls are a mix of those taken from before they took over the building and the process to restore it.
20:49 And you can see where the mash hole is. We've put in a floor, but we've retained the hoist, we've retained the roofs.
21:00 And the design brief for the architect was that if you'd be in Hawick all your life, used to walking along Commercial Road,
21:07 we should be able to come in, convert it into a distillery and you shouldn't notice.
21:12 We obviously repointed the whole thing, we cleaned it up, but the essential fabric has been part of the town for 120 years.
21:20 And I think the truth of the matter is that most people don't know we're here.
21:25 And the work on renovation and reusing, so all the steel in the building is reused from the previous building.
21:32 That meant that the architects and the team, they won the 2019 Civic Trust Award.
21:39 It's quite cool because we're on the front cover of that year's brochure with Hetherington and Fosters and all these other big guys.
21:46 And here's a wee Borders project with Borders architects, Borders contractors, Borders people, producing something to that standard.
21:54 I sat down with John to hear more about the bottlings they have done to date,
21:59 but I started off by asking him about his background and how he had come to be involved in the distillery.
22:05 A very long time ago, I started on the fifth flat of the Ankham Mill in Paisley in the sewing thread business.
22:15 And then I spent the next 29 years in between sewing thread, whiskey, wine and olive oil overseas.
22:26 And then I wanted to come back to Scotland after being away for a long time, but obviously after nearly 30 years,
22:34 that was a great deal fatter, a great deal older.
22:38 There was also no particular networks, and so it became obvious I would have to do something for myself.
22:44 And then a bit of luck is always neat.
22:48 The other three founders were also either leaving jobs or in between jobs or finishing projects.
22:56 And we all came together and decided to do this project. It's been great. Ten years now since we've been back.
23:02 We're sitting here with, we can see the bottles of the difference, but it's available on the wall.
23:07 And it's in a really nice bar area. And we've talked about the sofa you're sitting on is the hoik tweeds for the distillery.
23:14 And there's pictures on the wall showing the evolution of the distillery and the bar.
23:18 And it's again a really lovely space for anyone that wants to visit.
23:21 So can you tell us a bit about the spirits that are being produced?
23:24 Well, the thing to highlight, I think, is the black and white labels, Borders Malt Rye.
23:29 And then there's another one on the bar which we'll taste, which is called the Long and the Short of it.
23:34 And this is what we call our workshop series.
23:37 And these are a series of releases of blended Scotch whisky from a single malt whisky distillery.
23:45 Some nice people on Twitter have called it a single blend.
23:48 And the idea is that we're seeking to establish the reputation of the company as a distiller in advance of launching our single malt, which we think will be 2027.
24:00 But as you know, in Scotch whisky, one doesn't always have a lot of choice. It's ready when it's ready.
24:05 And that uncertainty means that we can't really wait till it's ready before we start getting going in the market, in particular export markets.
24:14 So we have Borders Malt Rye, we have Long and the Short of it.
24:18 The next one coming is Rye's Rain.
24:21 Then we've got to the Moon and Back, which is about Neil Armstrong.
24:26 Not really from here, Dumfries and Galloway, but close enough.
24:30 And then the last one is Bells and Whistles.
24:33 And then that should take us to the launch of the malt in roundabout 2027.
24:37 We can see you've got your Puffing Billy Steamed Vodka. I'm assuming the name is to do with the fact it's steamed.
24:44 Steamed. So we steam the charcoal rather than using it for filtering.
24:47 Yeah. Kare's Gin.
24:49 So William Kare was an interesting chap. He was a plant hunter.
24:53 He was one of the people employed by William Banks, who founded Kew Gardens.
24:58 And they were all Scots, these plant hunters, because you had to be able to read and write if you were going on these massive expeditions.
25:07 And Scotland had universal education because of removing the middleman in the church side from 1536.
25:16 So you had to be able to read the books, so the court, where everybody had to read and write.
25:20 South of us, they only got the Education Act in 1848, so we had a big competitive advantage.
25:26 And Kare went out to the Philippines, he went to southern China, to Canton, he went to what was then called Ceylon, Sri Lanka.
25:35 And he collected a record number of species for Kew Gardens.
25:41 He's still a top ten collector, two or three hundred years later.
25:45 And he's utterly unknown in Huyken, completely famous in Kew Gardens.
25:49 There's a botanical painter who lives in Huyken, she told us about William Kare, and then one of the other founders,
25:55 he went into the archive in Kew and found out all about this story.
25:59 And he died of an overdose of opium, owing to overwork, which if nothing else says a lot about the obituary writer.
26:07 He's quite a young man, and his statue is here in Huyken now, and we celebrate a big part of Scotland's history.
26:16 And Clownfraser Risky as well, I can see there.
26:19 The Frasers were a family that came to the borders fleeing religious persecution in the 12th century.
26:26 Funnily enough, we have French investors who fled the borders because of religious persecution at the same time.
26:33 And they came here, and in 1515, they were in Oliver Castle, which is at the bottom of a hill called Strawberry Hill.
26:42 It's a ruin now, or what's left of a ruin.
26:45 But Frasier is Frasier, Frasier derivative of Frasier, which comes from the Anjou, and it means strawberry pickers, hence Strawberry Hill.
26:54 And then the last person from the Frasier clan to be living here was a lady called Mistress Catherine, but she died, she was a widow, a spinster.
27:04 And the family sort of bifurcated after that, and a lot of it ended up in the northeast, Frasierborough, for example, and the other went to Ayrshire.
27:14 And there was a big argument about who was clan chief.
27:20 Started in the 16th century and finished in 1985 in the High Court.
27:26 And Lady Soltoun is the current head of the clan, but her daughter, who has the title Mistress Catherine, lives near Fraserborough.
27:33 We have that made for us to our own recipe, and it's what leads our way in the export business.
27:40 And so the whisky that you're thinking of releasing, or whenever it's ready, about 2027, can you give us an idea of what it's kind of tasting like now, or what you're expecting from it?
27:50 Well, so far, so good. It is maintaining its kind of fruity, estuary quality that we wanted to.
27:57 It's got, it's maybe slightly sweeter than I was expecting at this stage, but maturation of whisky in oak barrels isn't linear.
28:05 So I know where we are up to, and then we have an independent panel who assess the whisky every year.
28:12 If you left it up to me, the outcome would not be great.
28:16 So we have an independent panel, and we think we're on track, but it could change, it could stall, it could go up, it could go down, it could go any sorts of way.
28:24 But so far, so good, and we're very happy with the spirit as it is to date.
28:32 Having talked about the liquid, it was finally time to taste it.
28:35 John gave me a personal tasting experience that held a number of surprises.
28:39 So we're going to try some of the spirits now.
28:45 Okay, so we'll start with New Make Spirit, because I want to talk to you about water.
28:49 Okay.
28:50 So this is New Make Spirit at 63.5%, which is our filling strength, and we're going to do this in two stages.
29:00 So first of all, I want you to have a proper sniff.
29:04 Now this isn't, "Oh, darling, that peanut was lovely."
29:07 This is proper, get it out your nose, and then just wait, think about what you've just smelled.
29:16 I'll put a little bit of water in it.
29:19 Now notice the difference.
29:24 Okay.
29:30 So what you should be getting is a vastly more complex set of aromas.
29:35 There's much more volatility in the glass.
29:39 You can smell more.
29:40 The ethanol taste is going away.
29:42 Now the reason for that is that all the flavours are held in little balls of fat,
29:48 and you've got to hydrolyse the fat to release the flavour out of Scotch whisky.
29:55 So even though one drop does the job, and one drop above, fine by me, no drops at all, not ideal.
30:04 And how does that advice go down?
30:06 Not well.
30:07 No, the whole not well.
30:09 It smells good.
30:10 So at first I was getting sort of like really fruity, like raspberry, and now it's a bit more cereal-y and yeah, complex.
30:16 And also it's 60-odd percent, so you're going to want to...
30:19 Yeah, you need to cut it down, absolutely.
30:21 It's nice, really sweet. It's good.
30:24 Because as you were saying earlier, you can sort of do cocktails when you make spirits, becoming a thing, so yes.
30:28 So that's the first in our New Make series. That's called Zero Zero, because everything starts from here.
30:36 And everything we make starts with that base spirit, and that's why it's a reverse label.
30:41 It's still got the kind of industrial look, but it's a reverse label. That's where we start from.
30:47 So by reverse you mean it's...
30:49 It's white on black rather than black on white.
30:51 But it has the same fava corn at the top and the same bottle and all that sort of stuff.
30:57 Do people try and change your mind on the water addition?
31:00 So far, unsuccessfully.
31:02 We don't, when we're putting together a scotch whiskey, whether it's a single malt from multiple casks,
31:10 or making a blend, which is maybe the hardest thing to do in scotch whiskey, we don't taste it.
31:16 We smell it, or nose it, as we say.
31:19 And to know something accurately, you have to get a maximum point of volatility,
31:25 so you get as much out of it as possible.
31:27 And that tends, depending on who you are, it depends. I was told to do it at 19%.
31:33 So if the people that make the whiskey are using water, then...
31:37 It's just a suggestion, do what you like.
31:40 As long as you pay for the bottle, I don't really mind.
31:43 The top three mixers around the world are green tea, Coca-Cola and water.
31:48 So, everybody's doing their own thing anyway.
31:51 Green tea?
31:53 Yes, Asia.
31:55 I've tried them.
31:57 Yeah, Chivas and green tea, it's kind of famous.
31:59 You need to try it. I don't actually like green tea, so it might be a problem.
32:03 It won't be up your street, quite bitter.
32:06 So a few years ago, we decided that we'd try and make some rye whiskey.
32:09 It was not a success, because I broke the foot of the mash tun, so we've only ever made it once.
32:15 This is not a distillery that's set up to make rye.
32:18 We don't have the right equipment.
32:21 But we managed it anyway, and we put away a few dozen casks.
32:25 And we've been maturing it.
32:27 And this is a blended scotch made out of our rye, our malt, all entirely distilled at the Borders distillery.
32:35 And it's at 40% alcohol, and we call this workshop series number one.
32:40 So if the new make spirit is zero-zero, this is number one.
32:44 And we released it last year.
32:46 And it has a distinctive feel about it.
32:50 There's a pipette if you'd like water, just one drop.
32:53 How can I say no now? I'm joking.
32:56 No, no, no, yeah, exactly.
32:59 You're in a difficult position.
33:00 Yeah, because rye's coming back, isn't it?
33:03 Very trendy, yeah.
33:04 Yeah, it's pale.
33:05 Just as it comes.
33:06 It's nice, really light. It's lovely.
33:08 And again, really sweet.
33:10 Nice and fruity.
33:12 Yeah.
33:13 Bit of spice in the background from the rye.
33:15 It's 65% rye, 35% malt, and we're really pleased with it.
33:19 And the key thing about that whisky, apart from it's our first workshop series, it was put together by our team here.
33:26 So we did a whole century training thing, and nobody knows who's going to be good at it or not.
33:32 You can't tell.
33:33 You just have to put through the training, and people emerge.
33:36 Two of our staff emerged as being really good at it.
33:40 And the difference between good and not good is, someone like me, I can detect defects, but I couldn't tell you if it was figgy or gooseberry.
33:47 But the good people can.
33:49 They can associate what they're smelling with other things, and they can describe it.
33:53 And it's a real talent.
33:54 We're lucky we've got two or three people in here really good at it.
33:57 And then the next one is called the long and the short of it.
34:01 And this is a play on fermentation.
34:03 Again, it's got rye in it to make it a blend.
34:07 And this is made from two whiskies.
34:10 One with a very short fermentation of 55 hours, and the other with a very long fermentation of 150 hours.
34:17 And this is the idea of the workshop series, that we can play around while we have the freedom to do so.
34:23 And while we're talking about distillation, the board is discussing what the team can do before we launch the mould.
34:28 So this is just out on the 26th of October.
34:31 Same bottle, same styling.
34:35 And this is number two.
34:37 So will you continue on with the workshop series, even when you're producing your own?
34:43 We've got more releases coming up to the mould.
34:45 Now, I suspect we'll carry on after that.
34:47 We're getting really good feedback, and we're starting to export it, which is exciting.
34:52 It smells like toffees.
34:54 It's nice, it's a bit more body to that one.
34:56 Sweet, but not as sweet.
34:58 It's good.
34:59 They're all very, very drinkable, especially if you don't like whiskey.
35:02 From trying them, there will be an audience there that you can bring into whiskey.
35:06 Well, that would be very exciting if we could do that.
35:09 The industry as a whole, by the way, is doing this very well, I would say.
35:13 There's so many styles, and except the principle that everybody's making the same thing under the law,
35:20 but everybody's doing it differently.
35:22 What's happening now, I think, is everybody's using that opportunity to express themselves in different ways.
35:28 I think that's coming in front of the consumer.
35:30 The variety now is absolutely amazing.
35:33 I just think it makes the category a hell of a lot more interesting.
35:36 Obviously, a big part of the whiskey industry are tours.
35:40 People come in to see the distillery and try the whiskey.
35:43 You offer tours as well, so can you tell us a bit about them, please?
35:46 This is the last bit of a typical tour, the tasting.
35:50 We operate between the 1st of April and the 31st of October.
35:54 We run three tours a day, six days a week.
35:59 It's our distillers that do the tours.
36:01 We don't have any guides, so they break shift to take people around.
36:05 It gives them the opportunity to talk about their work,
36:08 and it gives the visitor a sense of who's talking to them, the people that make the stuff.
36:15 That's why, relative to other distilleries, we have quite a few tours,
36:19 and we just do a season, because we need to look after everybody.
36:23 The tour takes you around, starts you with a description of the building,
36:27 then we go through the mash house, into the steel house,
36:30 and we end up in here, in the nice wee room with the bar.
36:34 Which is what everyone will be looking forward to.
36:36 Absolutely, it's the best bit.
36:38 Christmas is round the corner, somehow, and there's a gift shop downstairs.
36:43 What would you recommend for the whiskey lover in your life?
36:46 We have, both in the shop and in the virtual shop,
36:51 we have this year a special hamper which contains one of the whiskeys
36:55 and food produce entirely made in the Borders,
36:59 which we're really pleased about, from chocolate to biscuits to jams to mustards.
37:04 And then we have combination packs of Workshop Series 1 and 2,
37:09 which is a great value for money, and highly original at this stage,
37:14 as a gift for the whiskey lover.
37:16 Nice, sounds good.
37:18 Now, we're going to look at, if you go back to Workshop Series 00,
37:23 I can make gin.
37:26 So we'll have a wee scoosh of gin.
37:29 I spent some more time with John and tasted Kers gin and Puffing Billy vodka,
37:36 both of which offer a neat take in their field.
37:38 There really must be something special about the water in Hoyke.
37:41 But of course it's the process that makes the difference,
37:44 and John and the team seem to be taking a very innovative,
37:47 creative and productive approach to their distilling.
37:50 I'll be watching with interest as they release more of their Workshop Series
37:53 in the coming years.
37:55 Thanks to John, Andy and the team for having me.
38:00 If you'd like to find out more you can visit www.thebordersdistillery.com
38:05 Scran is a logical podcast that's co-produced and hosted by me,
38:09 Rosin Derskin, and co-produced, edited and mixed by Kelly Creighton.
38:12 Please remember to rate, review and subscribe so you never miss an episode.
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