MALT AND MASH
Talisker may be made using a similar process to most single malt
whiskies, with its five separate stages, but in every sense Talisker is
unique. It is the only distillery on Skye, in fact, the only distillery
for 100 miles and its remarkable birthplace is fully reflected in the
character of the malt.
This is a whisky with a taste and flavour all of its own, a rare
combination of barley, peat, water, oak casks, the shape of the still,
the skill of the stillman and that all-important ingredient, the
atmosphere of the distillery's warehouse.
The first stage, the malting, involves the finest barley being steeped
in water and then smoke dried over peat fires to precise specifications
laid down by the Talisker distiller. This malted barley is then
delivered to the distillery for milling and mashing in the local
iodine-tinged water. The mashing takes place in the distillery's
lare iron mash tun, and the young whiskey is then drained off as a
frothy liquid, the 'wort,' to be pumped in the fermentation vats, the
'washbacks.' At Talisker the modern practice of using stainless steel
vats has been shunned in favour of retaining traditional wood.
The Skye water used during the process is a important component
of the whiskey's final character. It is drawn from Hawk Hill beside
the distillery (the hill incidentally, is a favorite haunt of some of
Scotland's few remaining Golden Eagles).
Recently when supplies of water ran low the manager consulted old
maps and called up a water-diviner who unearthed six more
springs, lost since the days when the distillery carried out its own
malting and so needed even more water..
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