The Scotch Blog

Whiskipedia is on the Air.

Happy Hogmanay!

In keeping with Scottish First Foot tradition, make sure a dark-haired man (and NOT a light-haired man, or a woman), is the first person to cross your threshold after midnight. He should be bearing a gift. This will ensure good luck in the new year!

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Ian Buxton just let me know that Whiskipedia is live.

It uses a separate registration than The Whisky Channel, but it uses the same engine as Wikipedia, so if you are familiar with posting/reading Wikipedia, they'll be no learning curve.

From the site:

First of all, our thanks are due to Gavin Smith, well-known whisky author, who has kindly provided the overwhelming bulk of the site at launch (1st January 2008) in full recognition that you will probably all mangle it unrecognisably. The launch text is drawn from Gavin's excellent and authoritative book Whisky: A Book of Words (Carcanet Press, 1993),and subsequent paperback edition The A-Z of Whisky (NWP).  A new and fully revised edition will be published sometime in 2008.  BUY THIS BOOK!

However comprehensive this initial coverage it can never be totally complete and some entries require revision. THIS IS WHERE YOU COME IN! The site is arranged in classic 'wiki' format, which means you can add new articles and edit existing entries. Please feel free to do so, bearing in mind some commonsense rules for behaviour:

1. Please log in and identify yourself. Attributed entries carry greater authority. If you want to post it you should be prepared to put your real name to it!

2. Please respect the opinions and views of other users and do onto others as you would be done by. It's a community - be nice.

3.  Distillers/Brand Owners: By all means post an entry on your brand/distillery/key personnel, but confine yourself to matters of fact and historical record. 'Flogs' and blatant puffs will be removed and, if you keep doing it, you'll be blocked! Kindly don't pretend to be a consumer - we've seen that trick before.

4. The site administrator's decisions are final. They may also be arbitary, inconsistent, capricious and downright wilful. Get over it.

Enjoy the site.  In the words of Austin Powers "Oh, behave."  Have fun.

Check it out: www.whiskipedia.ORG.

I've looked at the whisky-related pages on the original Wikipedia and was appalled by the stupidity and inaccuracies I've seen on that site. I'm hoping that this one is better, more accurate and will be the final word in on-line whisky information.

Ulf Writes a Book

Keeper of the Quaich and Malt Maniac Ulf Buxrud emailed to let me know about the fall release of his book:

My whisky book, with a foreword by Charles MacLean, is due and globally released at October 31st.

Unofficial release will occur at Malmoe (Sweden) Whisky Festival mid October.

Pre orders may be placed via my UK publisher.

The book will be available a few weeks later via usual web book shops like Amazon, B&N etc. or over the counter at major book sellers - including visiting centers at Diageo's Malt Whisky distilleries.    

Ulf

The book, entitled Rare Malts as described by the publisher:

Rare Malts is an endeavour to document the facts and figures of a formative and exciting segment of whisky history. It is also an attempt to mirror the arduous work and joy surrounding the rise of a cottage trade that became an industry.

Its format is portraits of all the distilleries involved in the compilation of the Rare Malts Selection series; a collection of outstanding examples of the makes of thirty six legendary distilleries. Each portrait contains histories and technical data, flavour profiles and tasting notes.

A must have for every whisky devotee.

FOTSB - The Whisky Exchange

Welcome to a new feature: Friends of The Scotch Blog: shops, sites and people associated with Scotch whisky that I've met along the way...

The Whisky Exchange & Sukhinder Singh

On my last trip to London, I had a chance to have dinner with John Glaser (Compass Box), John Milroy of Milroy's fame, Sukhinder Singh of The Whisky Exchange, Nadi Fiori (Italian importer - High Spirits) and Jakob Bruhns, André Doerlit, & David Larsson (of Danish importer QualityWorld).

I got to sit next to Sukhinder and chat with him a bit.

The Whisky Exchange was established in 1999 primarily as a mail order business - offering a variety of spirits - with Single Malt Whiskies at the forefront.

Suhkinder is a collector and a purveyor, but above all, he is a lover of whisky. Says Sukhinder:

The Whisky Exchange came about due to my passion for Whisky and in particular for Single Malts.

I originally started collecting Miniatures at the age of 12. When I purchased a very large collection of minis I was faced with the dilemma of "where do i keep 8000 miniatures?"

I decided to specialise in Single Malt Whisky minis - I sold everything else and ended up with 300 or so minis. 20 years of collecting later and I have 4500 Single Malts in miniature and now the task is to find a place to display them all.

About 12 years ago, I started getting interested in the larger bottles and started with collecting only 1 bottle from each distillery.

I now have about 1000 different bottles, dating from the 1880's.

The profile of the collection is a mix between drinking whiskies and collecting whiskies...

Whisky is of course for drinking; therefore I have set aside a large number of bottles, which I feel are very good drinking whiskies - to be drunk in the future.

On the collecting side, as with every other collector I would like to get an example from every distillery that has ever existed in Scotland. Many bottlings from distilleries which were easy to find a few years ago, are now getting difficult and of course pricey!!!!! (eg: Kinclaith ).

This will only continue to happen as stocks from closed distilleries are used up.

Original distillery bottlings are always better, but not possible in many cases such as Banff, Convalmore, Kinclaith, etc.

Limited Edition bottlings are usually interesting, with the best example being Black Bowmore.

My main areas of great interest are Ardbeg, Bowmore, Macallan, Port Ellen, Springbank and of course Lost Distilleries.

Some bottles from my collection may be seen in our Rare/Old Malts section.

Located in London, between Heathrow and Central London, close to the Boston Manor tube station. Sukhinder says that customers are welcome to visit their facility by prior appointment, and they'll even pick you up from the station.

We have a large showroom with over 1200 new & old expressions of Single Malts to choose from with a price range to suit everyone from £10 - £20,000.

We can recommend drinking whiskies to suit your taste, help with collecting and advise for investment purposes.

If you are looking for something in particular, please check as we have many items arriving everyday and these may not have been added to our list as yet.
Sometimes special whiskies are kept back for customers making enquiries only.

The Whisky Exchange also recently opened a satellite location - inside the incredible Vinopolis. Located close to the Borough Market under London Bridge, Vinopolis is a massive educational center - originally designed to highlight wines, the center was expanded to include  spirits.

With the addition of the Whiskey Exchange shop and The Still Room (set up by Diageo with an emphasis on Talisker and Johnnie Walker Black Label) Vinopolis now helps visitors appreciate whisky.

The guys from QualityWorld and I took a field trip to the Vinopolis shop.

At the Vinopolis location, The Whisky Exchange has a range of about 500 Single Malts, 200 other Whiskies, and about 150 other premium spirits including cognac and rum.

"We also have 5 casks on display, you can fill and label your own bottle. The spirits have not been filtered in any way so this is as close as you will get to drinking "Straight from the Cask."

The current choices are 3 Single Malts, a Bourbon and a Rum.
 Longmorn 1990 from a Bourbon Barrel
Clynelish 1994 from a Sherry Butt
Caol Ila 1991 from a hogshead
A 6 years old Bourbon Whiskey and
Pampero 1992 Rum from Venezuela.

The also have a nice selection of books and whisky related gift items.

Next time you are in London, visit one of the two locations, I'm sure you'll walk out with something interesting.