Is your idea of heaven a relaxing evening with a wee dram of the good stuff? Are you a whisky connoisseur? Or a keen amateur who would like to learn more about single malts and how they are blended to produce the whiskies we know and love? If so you are in for a treat today as we host an exclusive whisky tasting session which will include five Laphroaig whiskies, culminating in the opening of a rare 27 year-old single malt.

Our guests will take you through all the finer points of getting the best out of a single malt whisky, from the colour, weight and nose to the all important taste and finish. How much water, if any, should you add to your glass? What do the aromas and 'legs' tell you about the whisky? Which flavours and textures should you be expecting as the whisky hits your palate?

Robert Hicks, Laphroaig’s Master Blender, John Campbell, Distillery Manager, and whisky writer Jim Murray join us live online on Wednesday 21st November at 8pm for a live whisky tasting.

For more information visit www.Laphroaig.com/live

H: Host
R: Robert Hicks, Laphroaig’s Master Blender,
J: John Campbell, Distillery Manager, and whisky writer
Jim: Jim Murray
G: Guest / guests

H: Hello and welcome to this very special interactive whisky tasting, you’re very welcome to this evening’s show, we’ve got a spectacular evening all lined up for you here. Some of you will be friends of Laphroaig already and you’ll know exactly who you are. Some of you are wondering what being a friend of Laphroaig is all about, and I’ll be able to tell you a little bit later in the show. We have some guests with us, esteemed whisky guests they are as well, experts in the world of whisky. What they don’t know about whisky isn’t worth knowing quite frankly. We have with us here the man who wrote the bible on whisky, quite literally and that is Jim Murray, Jim joins us here, thank you for joining us Jim. We’ve also got the distillery manager from Laphroaig and that is John Campbell, John thank you very much indeed for being here, and we also have the master blender from Laphroaig as well, and that is Robert Hicks, thank you very much indeed for joining us. We’ve also got live guests as you can see behind me here. You are live aren’t you?

G: We are

H: They are indeed, see they’re all live, they’re all here and they may well be asking one or two questions to our esteemed judges / experts in just a second. So, all of that, coming up in just a few minutes’ time for you. We’ve got lots of people joining us online; you could be one of those right now if you’re watching us anywhere around the world. We’ve had literally thousands of questions from both sides of the Atlantic. And you can send your question in, all you have to do is press click on the little caption box at the bottom there when you’ve written your question and it’ll come through to me on this very computer, right here in the studio. So send your questions away and you never now they could be going through to the experts in just a second. We will be talking about expressions this evening, the expressions reflects just the posh way of saying the types and ages of the whiskies, so if you hear me talking about different expressions of Laphroaig that’s what that is all about. Five expressions we will be testing tonight, they’re all in front here, now don’t worry, there are six bottles here, I know what I’m talking about, we have five of them though, there was an online vote for just two of them which I think is those two there. And with those two there, there has been an online vote, you can find out which one won in that online vote a little bit later on. And to finish off much anticipated, highly acclaimed, 27-year-old whisky just to finish off the evening. So that is all to finish, that is all to finish in just a few minutes, and we’ll be finishing with that 27 year old whisky. That’s all just around the corner, and in a couple of minutes time we shall just be finding out about the first of those, which is the 10 year old. Ok, let’s start off with the first of those whiskies, this is the 10 year old, and to guide us through all this, John, you know what you’re talking about with this, you’re the distillery manager, so what should we be looking for in this 10 year old?

J: Well for me the 10 year old’s the kind of classic Laphroaig, it’s the one that people will be most common with maybe, you can see it’s a nice, bright gold colour, some sweetness, medicinal and then wrapped with a peat smoke – there’s also a point here where I would probably cut it, so to cut – not to cut, I guess that’s the question then. Some people have different preferences,

H: Sorry when you say to cut it, what do you mean by that?

J: Just basically to add a slight drop of water, so just – I would just, small drop of water and that would release it. The background flavour’s more for me – and then what I’d be looking for in the ten year old is a Scottish sweetie which we call Oddfellows, and the brown ones, not the blue ones, and then you get more of the peat smoke as well. What you’ll find when you taste it, you get – there’s really good body in this one, and what’ll happen is it will move from the middle of the tongue outwards, so what’ll happen you’ll get the kind of the sour, acidy notes. Moving forward you get the peat smoke, and then it gets really soft, and really lingering finish with this one

H: Ok. We’ll find out what our other two whisky experts think of this in just a second, before we do all of that let’s take one of our questions which has come straight off the internet. The expression “why reduce the ten year old to 40%?” That’s what one of the friends of Laphroaig has asked, so let’s open that up as a question. John, let’s take that to you first of all

J: It’s basically since the 1920s Laphroaig’s always been 40%, and kind of Laphroaig is what it is, and you don’t want to – and it’s really popular as it is so we don’t want to –

H: It is very much an industry standard isn’t it?

J: Pretty much is yes

H: Sorry Robert, did you want to come in on that?

R: The government say, depending on where you are in the world, the local government decides whether it’s 44 or 43 or if you’re in South Africa, I don’t know if we’ve got any in South Africa, it will be 43.2 – but if it’s below 40% alcohol it’s not Scotch whisky, which is the main point, so that’s why we nearly all bottle at 40%

H: Ok. We’ve had a little bit of a chance now for our other experts to have a taste of all of this, now let’s move to you first of all Jim

Jim: Yes, this is actually always for me a fascinating one, because I think of all the whiskies that you find on Islay, this one on the nose encapsulates the island itself. It probably takes me back to when I first went – the fact that I first tasted it in the late ‘70s and this was the first one I ever did. It’s remarkably consistent, I find this particular one slightly lighter than more recent bottling, but you can’t be anything other than charmed by it frankly

H: So you’re charmed on that. What about you, I’m guessing that you’re going to be charmed as well, I’d be amazed if you’re not actually!

R: I’ll be charmed by – and I would agree with him about the island, it’s not often we agree but when I tried a ten year old Laphroaig it actually reminds me of walking along the beach on Islay, I mean that smell of the ozone and the seaweed and everything really comes through on the nose and on the taste

H: Alright, let’s find out what our table number one over here, you’ve all had a quick taste of that – how are we feeling about that at the moment. Are we happy?

Guests: We are

H: How did you feel about that madam?

G: Yes you could definitely taste the peaty flavour coming through

H: Are you a whisky drinker anyway?

G: I have a tipple occasionally

H: You have a tipple occasionally. Well now you’ve had a smoky, peaty one as well. Alright we’ll come back and find out more comments in just a few moments time from you there. And obviously we’re taking as many of your questions as we possibly can, so keep them coming in, little box at the bottom where you can check your question in there and we can bring it through to us as soon as possible. We’re going to be moving on with our second expression next, and the next one that we’re going to be trying is the Quarter Cask. So this is our second expression tonight and this is the Quarter Cask, and to guide us through this, the man who wrote the whisky bible which is sitting in front of me, Jim Murray. Jim, you’re sniffing away at that one and you’ve got your hand over the top of it which I’m interested in why you’re doing that?

Jim: Well you’re going to find that other people here will probably add water, I don’t do that, in fact every single whisky I ever taste for the bible there is no water added, because basically, well there’s two reasons, one it means that we’re all singing off the same hymn sheet, we can all add different amounts of water and if I’ve done the notes they don’t quite know what I’m talking about, the other is that I don’t believe it needs it. I mean Robert’s just said that 40% alcohol is Scotch whisky, well if you add water to it, you’re not drinking Scotch are you?

H: You know – we’re going to come to Rob on this in just a few minutes time but I have to say we have had hundreds of questions about whisky with or without water, it’s the most popular question

Jim: but I have to say that Laphroaig Quarter Cask is my favourite of all the Laphroaigs, and when I did the taste notes for the bible I actually called this burning embers of peat in a crafted fireplace, and even though this is a different bottling, it’s still true. This is basically Laphroaig in concentrate. It is very, very intense and it is – it’s quite spectacular frankly. This is my favourite of all the Laphroaigs

H: That’s your favourite of all the whiskies?

Jim: Yes – well all of –

H: We’re going to get a reply on the water / not water now. Let’s go up to you Robert

R: I think the bottom line is it’s – if you add water or not water you can add whatever you like as long as you like drinking it that way. I mean what we’re doing tonight, we’re learning a little bit about Laphroaig, I’ve been a blender for 44 years now, I was trained with water and I’ve always used it with water, I can pick up much more flavours with that – Jim does it without, John does it with water. So it’s very much a personal preference whichever way you do it, and that’s what it is about drinking it as well

Jim: Can I just say I agree with that, I totally agree with that

H: Will you two stop agreeing?

Jim: But – there’s a big but – the big but is that drink whisky the way that you’re most comfortable with it, that goes without saying. What I’m saying is though is that most people don’t ever try it without water. They’ve been told somewhere along the line add water to it so they never ever see the whisky the way it comes at you, and what I’m saying is if you’re dealing with a whisky that is very complex, look at it from all aspects and that means starting without water

H: I guess the best thing to do is to try a glass with whisky and a glass without and see which one you prefer, isn’t it?

Jim: With water, yes

H: With water. Oh with whisky obviously

Jim: Whisky helps

R: You go back to the old days when you used to say what do you have in your whisky and it’s mair whisky

H: Typical Scot, that’s what it’ll be. Ok so John what do you make of all of this, it’s had time to warm up a little bit for you and you know your thoughts on this one because we’ve got a question coming in maybe you can answer actually, it’s from Georgia, thank you Georgia for your question on that one. Now the question from you is “what time period is the whisky matured in the Quarter Cask?”

J: Well basically what we’re doing with Quarter Cask is providing a flavour package and what we’re doing is we get different ages of Laphroaig, we mix them together and then we’ll double mature them in the Quarter Casks. And what we’re basically doing here we’re balancing off the power to the distillery, the peaty powers and adding some more of the kind of gentle oak smokiness, some sweetness, just kind of making it more round character

R: Can I come in?

H: Sure

R: For better or worse I was the guy who designed this and I’m saying this – because it is a flavour package, and I feel that when people starting drinking malt whisky 10, 15, 20 years ago they needed the guarantee of age on the bottle. Now so many people are drinking malt they’re looking for specific flavours, and that’s what I tried to do with this is make a flavour that we then carried the maturation on in these special small casks, that we’re the only company that use them, to give a flavour package, and that’s a flavour, and quite honestly when you go by the sales and the comments it’s a massive hit.

H: This has caused more interest than anything else. This is from a Quarter Cask isn’t it?

R: Yes

H: Is that – that’s part of the barrel I take it?

R: John?

J: It’s part of the make-up of a cask, yes

H: Ok, what should I be looking for with this here?

J: Well basically –

H: I’ll pass it over to you

J: Basically what happens is the alcohol will be in this side, it permeates in to the wood and you see the tide line and this is kind of where it – the maturation, it goes in, takes out lignin’s, tannins, the oak flavours, the sweetness that you find in the Quarter Cask double maturation so that’s what you would expect to find in here and that’s what it gives the Quarter Cask flavour

H: Ok, thank you for explaining that. Let’s go and find out what our next table thought of all of that, let’s go to the Quarter Cask here. Sir, I think you were enjoying that back there

G: I was, yes

H: First let’s get a general view on that one – we enjoyed that more than we enjoyed the last one?

G: Yes

H: Half and half – you enjoyed the first one? Both good, you’re enjoying both of them! Let’s have a question, question for our experts

G: I was wondering how old the Quarter Cask actually is?

H: That’s a good question. How old is it?

R: I think I’d better answer that one, it’s up to 11 years old. It’s a mix – I’ve been a blender, as I say, for 43 years and I designed the flavour package, you can’t, when you have an age on the bottle that’s really the age – slightly older. What I tried with this was to design a flavour package because I think people want something different, and that’s what Quarter Cask – can I say when we did the first experiment we sold it to the friends of Laphroaig at £27 a bottle, and I’d love to meet the friends of Laphroaig that were selling it on Ebay for £65 a bottle! By the sound of it we’ve got some here tonight!

J: but one final – to me it’s not about age, it’s to do with balance. You cross the threshold between, well from good to great whisky if you can find the balance, and the balance is that thing between the sweetness and the dryness so that there’s not too much of anything. You mentioned about the sweetness, the sweetness is there in evidence, but the oak impact balances it out, and one of the things that makes this a truly great whisky, and why it’s my favourite from the distillery, is that the balance is absolutely spot on

H: Got another question about, I’ve got another question about water which I’ll come back to in – there’s going to be hundreds of them, trust me, and they’re coming in from all round the world. We will next be looking at the ten year old cask strength, and that is coming up very shortly. This is now our expression number 3 if you like, if you want to name it that way, it’s that one there which is the one we’ve got down there, and it is – it’s another one that’s causes a great deal of interest down here, so let’s go to you Robert on this, it’s the ten year old cask strength.

R: Yes ten-year-old cask strength, John talked about the ten year old as being the traditional one, this is the traditional one with muscles. All we do is we take the whisky straight from the cask, we take out the bits of wood and char and we put it into the bottle. Now just a word before we go into the flavours, this year is 55.7, next year it could be 57 or 54, every year we may be a different strength so don’t worry about that. One of the things with cask strength, it’s so high in alcohol that when you nose it you get the sweetness but you get alcohol, and as I say I like putting a drop of water with it, just to release the flavours, and once you put the drop of water with it, it warms up a little bit, it releases the flavours and you get powerful, powerful medicine. Someone likened it to being in a hospital because it’s iodine, the basic flavour of Laphroaig is an iodine-style flavour, and you get masses and masses of that, together with the sweetness, and when you taste it, the taste is absolutely gorgeous. It fills the mouth, it makes it massive. And it’s something that will last in your mouth for a long, long time

Jim: And it lasts even longer if you don’t add any water to it!

H: Do you know I actually made you put water in mine there just deliberately

Jim: It’s the first time I’ve ever done that to anybody I think

H: I know it upsets you and you will cry about it for a long time now, but I can tell you that I tried that first without the whisky – without the water – and I’ve tried it with the water –

Jim: but there is a trick

H: Go on

Jim: Well you were talking about the alcohol Bert – what you do basically is – people here should all become a fish, you basically stick your head back slightly, open your mouth, while you’re letting the whisky move around, and by opening the mouth you’re allowing alcohol to escape through the mouth rather than through the nose, so that way you don’t have to necessarily add water and believe me the ten year old, fine, at fall strength you’re taking it naked, you’re taking it the way God intended, you’re taking it straight from the cask – this is the way

H: I’d love to do that head tilting thing, but I’m not going to! Thanks very much indeed for the offer – John do you need to add anything on to that?

J: I think Robert’s right, I think this is kind of – for the kind of Laphroaig aficionado – this is kind of the fantasy Laphroaig for them if you like is this – what we’d like to do is basically take a cask straight out the warehouse, what most people would like to do is actually get inside one of our warehouses, pull the bung out a cask, get the lynch in and get their own sample but –

H: Is this good for a cold by the way?

J: Hopefully, yes

H: John’s got a cold

Jim: Does it prevent colds?

H: John’s got a cold at the moment! That’s my favourite so far, it really is my favourite so far – let’s go to the table over here guys, you’re right behind the experts here. Comments on that, are you enjoying that one? Out of the three so far, where do you rate them?

G: That was my favourite

H: That was your favourite?

G: Cured my cold

H: Cured your cold instantly!

G: Quarter Cask’s my favourite

H: Ok, Quarter Cask still winning on those but favourites on a couple of the others there. Alright thanks guys, we’ll get some more comments from you guys in just a few minutes. We have a question in, this is for Jim – “I can’t imagine a nicer dram than the cask strength. Do you think it gets better with each year’s release, and secondly I can’t seem to find it in South Africa. My bottle has had fair amount of use.” So –

Jim: Does it get better? Yes and no, I mean it can improve, it can go down. One of the beauties of whisky is the fact that it doesn’t stand still. You know from different years, slightly different casks will be used and you get a slightly different emphasis on sweetness or smoke or whatever, it moves around. Whether it gets better or not, not necessarily. I mean it can do but like most things, what goes up can sometimes come down

H: We’ll leave that question

Jim: Exactly

H: Thank you very much, oh the second part of that question was about South Africa, what are we going to do about South Africa?

R: I was going to say it’s not just South Africa, I mean Laphroaig is on reserve all round the world. One of the problems is that 10, 12 years ago when we were laying down the whisky’s new spirit, no one knew that malt whisky would go as far as it did, and no one would know Laphroaig would go as far as it – I mean it’s now in the top 100 Scotch whiskies, which for a small Islay distillery is tremendous, we just didn’t know it would sell as much

H: Alright. We’re in a very small studio here but we are in a very global market, I’m moving on Rob, thank you very much for that. We’ve had questions in from places such as Finland and Holland, we’ve just had some people – hi – they’re in New Zealand, they’re enjoying the show live at this moment in New Zealand, and I think they’re having a wee dram as they’re watching the show as well, so it’s great to have you with us, it’s morning time there so it’s a little bit early for you – put the glass down, move away from it! We’ve had an online vote between two whiskies which you’ll see on the front here, and they are those two there, there’s a 15 year old and a 25 year old, which one should be the one that we do next? You’ll be able to find out which one we do next when you join us back in a couple of seconds. So, that’s it, we’re going to try our vote – which one came out first, which one was the one that – and we’ve had hundreds and hundreds of votes this evening in the last hour people have been voting. You friends of Laphroaig you really are a busy old lot. How do you become a friend of Laphroaig, stay with us we’ll tell you how in just a few minutes. Those that already know really do know and are enjoying their whisky already. So, which one – did it – it was the 25 year old that won the vote. Is that a surprise to you, I mean do you think that’s the one that should have got voted through Robert?

R: Personally yes because it’s the newest expression of a Laphroaig that’s going to be there for kind of ever more. I mean one of the reasons that we brought it out as a 25 year old this year is that we had to wait until we made sure we had enough stocks to last so that every year from now on you’ll be able to buy 25 year old. It won’t be one that’s coming in this year and going out next year

H: Right

R: It’s a mixture of second and third fill sherry casks which means when you nose it at the strength - it’s at 40% because I kind of think that was the best strength you can nose and drink it at. I mean I’m a bit with Jim here where I wouldn’t add water to the 25 year old. When you smell that, one of the things that comes through is kind of grapes, it’s like raisins and sultanas, which is the sherry but very slight sherry influence. When you taste it, you don’t taste any sherry at all, you taste creaminess, you taste softness, that comes from the American wood we’ve used, and that then gives you, as the bit of sweetness and softness disappears you start getting the power of the Laphroaig coming through. It doesn’t hide it, it just moderates it a little bit and then it comes through

H: We’ll come to the rest of you boys on a question in just a second but we’ve had various questions coming through, keep them coming through – if you’ve got a question whatsoever then just write it in now, we’ve had hundreds, we’ve had over a thousand so – the chances are we’re going to be pushing time now to get them in but you’ve still got a chance of getting your relevant question in. Questions that have been the same, and we’ve had over a thousand, lots of questions were the same so we paraphrased them into questions that are very very similar. So, let’s come to your Jim

Jim: Yes. The 25?

H: Yes

Jim: Yes,

H: You’re going to be honest now aren’t you?

Jim: Yes I am being honest, well I’m always honest. I do like it, you can’t not like it, the thing is though you get the feeling it’s a car with only four gears rather than five. I think at 40% yes very charming, the citrus comes through superbly, it really does. Delicate, but, but it’s 25 years of age. I think the way that the world markets are going and what people expect when they’re paying reasonable money for a whisky now, they expect something with a bit more, they’re expecting a 46 minimum if not cask strength. I think this one’s slightly underpowered, very, very charming, but I would be very very surprised and very disappointed if in a year’s time it wasn’t being bottled at 46

R: Well just think, you talked about it only having four gears, but when you think it’s 25 year old, and 25 year old classic cars sometimes only had three gears, but they were superb cars

Jim: Yes, yes but if you’ve got the capacity to actually put that extra gear in there, put it in

R: Yes but again it’s down to personal preferences, I try when I put the whiskies together to make a whisky that I think is dead right for drinking. Ok, I fully admit cask strength is a bit high, but I mean Quarter Cask is 48% and 48% Quarter Cask is perfect, just for me with a cube of ice. The 25 year old, as it is, it’s alright Jim, you don’t have to shiver! With a 25 year old, 40%, I can drink that as it is, I don’t need anything in it, all the flavours come through

H: John, how are you feeling on this one?

J: Yes I agree with Jim that the real citrusy nose, the kind of grape thing, I get a really kind of black pepper taste coming through in my mouth as well, just before the aftertaste, a real peppery finish in that one. As you say, I wouldn’t add water to this one either

H: Ok. We’ve got Oby who says “good evening Islay, here are the votes from the Belgian jury! Laphroaig, 12 points” which I think is just great – so obviously that’s winning, and we’ve also got Juna whose in Finland who says “absolutely I would like to taste your 25 year old. I’m now tasting the Quarter Cask”. Try and keep up if you can! They’re in order here! Let’s move straight to our table over here and let’s see what the guys think over here. We’ve had 4 so far so what are you guys thinking about them so far? First, second, third or fourth, where would you place your favourite? Let’s start on the end over there

G: I think it’s subtle which is not a word I would usually associate with Laphroaig

H: Subtle, not something you’d associate with Laphroaig normally, subtle, good comment. Sir?

G: I like the Quarter Cask most

H: Quarter Cask is still with you –

G: I’m still –

H: Same with you –

G: Yes the Quarter Cask –

H: Quarter Cask

G: I think I’d go for the 10 year old. I think that’s probably dependent on my income though

H: Yes, yes. Well we’ve got one to surprise you in a moment that you’ll want to have. I know you’ve got a question down there, what’s your question?

G: Yes, how would you make Laphroaig distinctive from other Islay malts?

H: Ok, it’s a small place. John, you live there

J: Yes

H: You know what the local market is there – it’s a small place, but it’s producing plenty of whisky.

J: Yes and there’s kind of –

H: So how do you stand out?

J: There’s kind of lots of ways we stand out and it’s just by things – one of the things is in front of us here, it’s a malted barley

H: Oh, I’ve dropped my pen I was that stunned by it! Let’s talk about this malted barley first of all

J: Malted barley, well we produce about 20% of our volume on site, and that’s just actually as much as we can produce on the site, and it gives Laphroaig a unique character that we can’t get from the malt that we do buy in as well, so we always mix some of the special stuff in every single grind and it gives Laphroaig that kind of medicinal iodine, and just extra peat that we don’t get from the commercial malts

H: Jim, you’re still in the whisky there, can I ask you to –

Jim: Yes it’s really interesting because if you actually smell, if you pick that up yourself and just give that a little smell and this is the Laphroaig cask strength 10, right, now look at that.

H: It’s the same smell

Jim: It is – it’s amazing

H: That’s magic! How did you do that! That is terrific. Can you just describe what that smells like

Jim: well I think – people would recognise kippers, smoky bacon, that kind of thing is the kind of aroma that they would easily identify with that, I don’t know what you think

H: Just take us through what you do to that barley, that barley is smoked over this peat?

J: Yes well what we do we get – we harvest the peat from our own land, at the Glenmachrie, we take that back to the distillery and then we burn it slowly at a very low temperature. And what this does it allows us to provide a much wider smoke profile range, easy for me to say.

H: Very easy for you to say. I’m glad it was you that was –

J: In basic terms it means that the stuff we buy in from the commercial malteds has six different peat flavoured profiles. This has 14, so it’s a wider range

H: Alright, ok thank you very much for your comments on all of that, thank you for – Robert did you want to add something to all of that because I know it didn’t make it down to you – you eat that stuff don’t you?

R: Not really but I mean Jim talks about the smell, I always talk about the taste, because when you taste that the first thing you taste, it’s like eating that piece of peat, but underneath that you can actually taste Horlicks, which is the sweet flavour, that sugary flavour that we want to make the alcohol with, and from that we make Laphroaig

H: He says, munching away on the smoked barley!

R: Yes

H: Alright, whilst he munches away on the smoked barley, we have something that is extremely special for you. Let me just grab it because I’ll try not to drop it because it’s rather expensive. Rather expensive. There it is, she’s a little beauty, she’s 27 years of age and I’m going to introduce you to her in just a couple of seconds, so come back and join us for this 27 years of age. Well we’re back and we have the 27 year old to try. This really is something a bit special. It’s been – well – pretty highly anticipated, Jim’s already got his nose in there having a good old sniff of this one, and we’re going to ask – actually Jim whilst you’re sniffing at that, because I know you want to get a really good measure on that one, I’m going to give you some time to do that, whilst you do that let me just take one of the questions that we’ve got online here. One of the Friends of Laphroaig has said “why 27 years and not 28 or 29 or 26 or 30 – why 27?” You can answer that on the end Robert can you?

R: Well – yes well last year there wasn’t even going to be a 27 year old – I tested about 600 casks to make sure that we had the stocks available to keep the 25 year old running for in the future, and in doing that I found 18 casks that were absolutely superb. They were first fill Oloroso, I mean if you look at the bottle or the glass, that’s as it came from the casks, I’ve vatted five together this year, it’s the colour coming from the cask, it’s the strength from the cask, and as I say it’s something completely unique, and I think Jim can describe the flavour better than I can

Jim: Well before I do, something that actually is quite important to mention here is the fact that the distillery is capable of producing a 27 that works, or a 25 that works whether it’s underpowered or not, because a lot of distilleries can’t do that, all because the whisky gets older and older and older does not necessarily mean it gets better and better. You can pay a lot of money for a load of old tat, you might as well suck a few pencils for what you get basically out of some whiskies

H: Please don’t name them!

Jim: No no, but the point is that this distillery can do it, it can go up to that age, and also I’ve got to say it can go down. I mean the best vatted malt I tasted this year was an 8 year old that was done in Denmark and it was one cask of Laphroaig, it was cask of Ardbeg, it was 8 years of age and it was stunning. I must admit as well as doing 27s I’d love to see an 8, I’d love to see some younger stuff coming out, but that’s just to do with age

H: So, ok are we going to get a tasting out of you boys here, because we’ve been waiting for this for some time so John you know what this tastes like, time and time again

J: Yes

H: I mean I wouldn’t say you had it for breakfast every day but –

J: No, Quarter Cask for breakfast!

H: Sensible

J: This is the one to get you to sleep at night!

H: So what are you looking in taste there, what can we get out of this?

J: You can get a real sense of the kind of Oloroso sherry, the kind of Christmas pudding effect, real kind of sweet, caramel toffees, real sugary, and you can even see it through the colour, real heavy body in this one

H: It’s hanging onto the glass isn’t it?

J: Yes it’s really sticking to the side of the glass

H: And 57.4%?

R: That’s as it came from the cask. We just took the bits of wood out of it!

H: That’s as simple as that. I’ve still got a bit in this one here but – I’ll get you a new colander a little bit later. You must be very pleased with this one Rob?

R: Yes I am, I mean I say it was – there are only 18 casks we’ve bottled 5 this year, I don’t know, it’ll be a couple of years before we bottle any more, and it is absolutely superb. John talked about Christmas cake, and that is exactly what I think about it, it’s just like eating a big piece of Christmas cake or Christmas pudding

H: Ok, here’s a question from one of the friends who said “is the 27 year superior to all the other Laphroaigs? If so, why?”

Jim: Well for me it’s not because I think the Quarter Cask is better, but I’ve got to say that it’s extremely unusual to find an Oloroso cask, or a series of Oloroso casks with this intensity at this age – so clear, so bright, so rich and it works so well with the peat. It’s a real head to head, it’s massive. But where it really stars is on the finish, because that viscosity that you can see on the glass there is working on your palette, it’s clinging to every single crevice in your mouth, and it stays there for a long, long time. And you were talking about Christmas cake, I would say Melton Hunt cake, it is absolutely huge. But I still prefer the Quarter Cask, I’ve got to be – because it’s more typically Laphroaig if you like, but it – this is a treat

H: It is a treat indeed, let’s find out what our tables make all of this, because this one is the 27 year old, let’s – table behind us here – you’ve had a try on all of that, how do we feel about that one, happy?

G: It packs quite a punch

H: It does pack a punch indeed, doesn’t it? Sir you asked a question earlier on, I see there’s an empty glass in front of you there because obviously you’ve been spitting this out

G: I’ve been testing them out

H: You’ve been testing them out have you?

G: I have to say I think the Quarter Cask is better, I must admit, but this is certainly strong enough

H: So Quarter Cask getting a lot of –

G: I like that one

H: You’re liking – they’re liking. Sorry madam, I can’t reach across to –

G: No this is excellent but yes Quarter Cask probably gets my vote

H: If we were going to do a straw pole in here, this evening, would it be fair for me to say that Quarter Cask is the one that you really like the most? Show of hands for Quarter Cask. Oooh maybe not, maybe not, maybe not. Ok well we’re take a question that’s here from Neil in Birmingham – ah, travelled. From Finland to Birmingham, he wants to know “are there any casks in the distillery that are more than 27 years that you plan to release in the future?”

R: Quite honestly I don’t think so. John would know the casks in the warehouses better than I would, but I think that’s about our oldest cask that we have at the moment. I mean we did launch a 30 year old and we launched a 40 year old, that kind of took all the very old casks away from us

H: So you’re out of old casks

J: We’ve got some aside for a special event in 8 years time, we’ve got a bicentenary in 8 years time

H: So we’ll come back and talk to you in 8 years about that then won’t we. Thanks for making us hang on there for a little moment

Jim: Actually it’s worth hanging on, because for those of you who didn’t add water, you’re still chewing this aren’t you? You can still taste it, and one of the delights of this is the fact that, just like a great wine, as it oxidises, as it warms, it changes character in the glass all the time. What you’ve got is a moving whisky, you’ve got a moving target, it’s not the same any two times that you taste it, and that makes it quite fascinating. However, if I say to you guys that right towards to finish you’re getting a kind of a coffee finish, does that make sense?

G: Yes

Jim: There’s like a dark coffee, right on the finish, but it’s not bitter, and this is – you were saying about the sweetness on this, the sweetness works and this is where the balance comes in

R: Well someone just made a comment there which I agree with, it’s coffee but it’s more like chocolate coffee, it’s when you get a coffee and you put some chocolate into it and it gives you that thick richness, and that was a comment that came from the table behind

H: Fine tasters we have over there. Mocha, mocha, they’ve got a good nose on them. So let’s have a look at some of the other questions that we’ve got – actually there’s a question that came in a little bit earlier on from two or three people, so we sort of boiled that down into one – “is the whisky market a male-dominated market, are there many female whisky drinkers, are you finding more of them?” Whose going to take this one –

Jim: Well I did a tasting in Moscow a couple of weeks ago and there were more women in that tasting than there were men. I have done tastings in Sweden for 120 people, every single one of them was a woman. The days when it was just something that the wife bought their husbands, or their partners is over. They enjoy it

R: The misconception is that if you go back to Scotland in the 1950s and ‘60s, women weren’t really in pubs, it was a male dominated society, but that’s going away very very quickly, and as Jim says I’ve run tasting seminars all over the world, and I would guarantee at least 40-50% are women. I mean we’ve got a good percentage tonight

H: We certainly have

Jim: I mean, in the 50s the men were in the pubs and the women at home drinking the whisky weren’t they?

H: So nothing sexist going on. That’s fine. Carston said “haven’t tasted any whisky since last summer” – you poor soul, but he’s having a great time in Olberg in Denmark tonight with his two bottles, 10 year and 10 year cask strength. Excellent idea with online tasting, so at least we know that there are people right around the world at the moment doing exactly the same as we’re doing which is great

Jim: I’ve actually done a tasting, I’ve done two tastings in Olberg and both of them were jam packed with women, both of them

H: Carston was a fellow

Jim: Yes I know –

H: I just thought I’d tell you

Jim: Just underlining the point

H: We’ve got Craig who says “g’day from Australia” – this is quite unreal isn’t it?

Jim: G’day

H: G’day Australia, g’day Craig. He says “thanks for a fantastic experience, he has a 17 year old, 1989, FOL. How does that compare with the 15 and 25 year?” Good question

J: 17 year released was a very different Laphroaig in the fact that it was an older one but it still had quite a lot of punch in it, there was a different balance to that one as well

H: How would that compare to the 15 and the 25 because obviously he hasn’t got those there?

J: Much more fire in it, much more power

Jim: I’ve got about 12,000 samples of whisky

H: I’m coming to a party at your place

Jim: In my various warehouses and stuff, and I keep maybe in my living room 10 whiskies, at the moment one of them there is the Laphroaig 17, I think it knocks the living daylights out of the 15 year old, they’re not even to be mentioned in the same breath. As far as the 25 is concerned, let’s just say that the 17 year old has not only got 5 gears, but it’s got a 6.2 engine as well, that’s the kind of difference that we’ve got here

H: We’re getting the kind of message from all of that. We had a question earlier on, going back to water, sorry about this but I’ve got to bring it up again, we had a question about water which said “should I use tap water, should I use spring water – should I use – is it the purer the better water if I’m going to use water?”

R: Well I tell you if I’m in London I don’t use London water! I always use bottled water down here

H: Bit of bottled water for that

R: If your water’s good quality, if it’s soft, if it’s not hard, there’s nothing wrong with it, but I mean if you’re down here and you put water into the whisky from the taps, I mean you end up with a ring of chalk round the whisky. It’s not nice

H: This is going to sound like a basic question for those who are real aficionados but a question came in earlier about the temperature you serve whisky at, do people get that wrong? We’re going to get back to the ice in the glass I know we are, but should it be room temperature? Jim I noticed you tried to warm –

Jim: Body temperature

H: Body temperature?

Jim: But if you’re not going to put water into it, then the way to make it come alive in your glass is basically to make love to your whisky, you –

H: You’re getting personal now

Jim: No not really, if you love your whisky, it might just love you back, who knows if you actually get it up to body temperature, you are bringing the whisky alive because what you’re doing is that the molecules are expanding, you’re basically exciting the whisky, you’re making things happen in the glass. If you make it cool then it contracts, less is happening. If you put ice in it God only knows, I don’t want to find out –

R: You’re exciting me by cuddling the whisky

H: You keep cuddling your whisky Jim. Question in here, this is “what is, on your resume John”

J: Yes

H: Sorry, someone’s really been digging deep. “On your resume, apart from all the things we shan’t mention, what is” – oh I’m going to get this wrong “Lleach?”

J: Not bad, not bad at all

H: That’s L-L-E-A-C-H

J: Lleach is native of Islay so I’m the first distillery manager who is a native of Islay in 192 years I think it was

H: Wow, so this has been running, presumably this is something that’s been running through your family?

J: Yes and my dad was – worked at Laphroaig for a while as well

H: Most of us I’m guessing, and most of the friends who even know so much about your great whiskies won’t know much about the island, so just – 30 seconds on the island?

J: The island – it’s located off the west coast, it’s about 25 miles by 25 miles squared. 25 miles again north of Ireland, kind of if you look at our coast, there’s kind of 20 miles to the west, you’ve got Scotland, 25 miles to the south you’ve got Ireland, 3500 miles to the west, eastern seaboard of the US, so it’s quite a harsh climate, quite a – something that you need to be, get quite used to, and a lot of nice people on the island, very friendly people, very hospitable

H: And a fair few tourists as well I would guess?

J: Yes

Jim: It’s good for bird watching as well actually

H: Really?

Jim: Yes, very good

H: Bird watching with a glass of whisky in your hand, couldn’t get better than that could you? Got a question in here, “greetings from a proud square foot owner in Denmark” – what does a proud square foot owner in Denmark mean, because you guys are laughing and I’m thinking what the heck’s this question?

Jim: He’s got a square foot!

J: Friends of Laphroaig are given a – when you become a friend of Laphroaig, what you do on the – when you buy a bottle of Laphroaig there’s a -

H: Thank you, I was going to ask how –

J: There’s a ticket inside and what you do is you go online, as the people that are watching us tonight are and you type in this code and it entitles you to a free square foot of land in Islay, just right next door to the distillery, and when you come to the distillery, we give you ground rent for that square foot – lots of other benefits as well in the likes of we’re going to be doing a 27 year old, for friends of Laphroaig shortly, so they’d get specialised bottlings, stuff like that. Again Quarter Cask Laphroaig was all done on friends of Laphroaig first so it benefits the distillery as well, so lots of good points

R: Can I just say, excuse me, John and I are Scotsmen – you only get it for life, you can’t leave it to your children

H: there’s no passing on that square foot of? Ok, if you’re wondering about the friends of Laphroaig and you’re thinking well this is a nice little small club, that little small club is over 280,000 people already. Are you surprised how quickly that’s grown because that’s become a really good whisky tasting club hasn’t it?

Jim: I didn’t actually know that Islay had 250,000 square feet actually! That’s a bit of a shock there!

H: I hope they don’t all turn up to claim it all at the same time

J: And it’s growing really, really rapidly as well, especially with – I think the distinctiveness of a Laphroaig flavoured profile means that people, when they taste that, they have a real affinity to the brand

R: I mean you’ve got a lot of people from Sweden and Norway on tonight

H: Huge Scandinavian -

R: I mean – every year they come across to plant their flags on their piece of land on the field

H: You should give them little windmills and you can have your own electricity. It’s not a bad idea is it? Now this is Masden who lives in Denmark “can the panel tell us if they know why tumbler glasses don’t work as well as the tulip-shaped glasses for tasting whisky?”

R: Not for nosing, you really should have that because it’s actually what’s called the head space between the top of the whisky and the top of the glass is a volume of air, when you start warming, either Jim warms it or I put a little drop of water in, that brings the flavours off into that head space, and you smell that. If you’re drinking it, that’s not the perfect glass for drinking it. I prefer a tumbler type for drinking

H: Well that’s so you can get your ice in it!

R: For those of you who don’t know, I love my Quarter Cask with just a piece of ice in it

H: I think we all know that actually, I think we definitely all know that. Sorry, comments on glasses, anything to add – I mean I notice you’ve got the little discs on top of yours there Jim?

Jim: Yes well that’s just to keep the aroma at bay because it is quite warm in here so you know I don’t want to overwhelm, but no actually these are quite good, and for tasting – God if you can get it in your mouth what more do you want? I mean – I mean – this is perfect because for me this is perfect because as I say you’ve got the stem, you can get your hand underneath, so when it comes to the warming up, perfect. If you’ve got a big tumbler you can’t do it, it’s too thick, and also, another thing, it’s tactile isn’t it, the thing about nosing, tasting, it’s all terribly terribly – you know – and this helps that general feel

H: Got a question in here which I so wish we’d got the facilities to live this one out, can you – please – “can you guys know with eyes blinded what year you are currently tasting, or which whisky you are currently tasting?” Would that be easy for you to do?

R: In my sample room yes, but not here because the smells are different

H: Yes, yes

J: Definitely Laphroaigs

H: Oh yes these ones you could tell because they’re all fairly distinctive

Jim: If they’re bottled, then yes, but if you’ve got samples that have come from warehouses, it’s almost impossible because you could have something that’s been high up in a warehouse and matured for x number of years at a higher temperature, and then you take something that’s been lower, in a cask that’s given less oak and it’s been matured at a lower temperature, they could be completely two different ages and yet kind of similar, and so yes, when it’s bottled but in a lab just from samples it’s almost impossible

H: Question, and it’s a question from J Diddy in Providence, Rhode Island who wants to know “what can we look forward to from you guys at Laphroaig in 2008?”

J: Even more Laphroaig

H: I guessed that much. Because you seem to be coming up with a few surprises each year so –

J: Well we definitely are, it’s something we are looking at to try and provide, especially even with our festival bottling we’ve got to provide different variations of the Laphroaig theme and just a different look at the distillery and the flavour profiles it can produce, so – especially through our festival bottling, but you never know. Watch this space I guess

H: Alright, watch that space from Rhode Island if you wouldn’t mind. In the meantime let’s have a final comment on the five expressions that we’ve had this evening down from the panel. Let’s start with you Robert up the top and work our way down to Jim. Of these 5, what would you sum up by saying these five expressions?

R: Well, ok – as the blender, I – what I try and do is make every variation of Laphroaig there natural Laphroaig, one that anybody that tries it will know that it is Laphroaig even though it could be Quarter Cask which is quite sweet and quite soft, or whether it’s the 27 year old which is very very sherry, but inherently amongst all of them it’s intrinsically Laphroaig

H: Jim?

Jim: Or John?

H: I was going to come to you –

Jim: Well, what have I got from this, what I’ve got from this is an underlying that quarter Cask touches genius, it’s as simple as that. The Laphroaig Cask strength 10 year old is so wonderfully natural that as I say it’s almost like diving into the island, and the 27 year old – it’s just wonderful to come across something that is so rare as this. The last time I can remember anything quite like this from Laphroaig was from an independent bottling that came out in the late ‘80s, it’s that rare

H: We’ve been treated tonight – John, let’s have your sum up

J: Yes I think – for me to choose it’d be like I couldn’t choose my favourite child, so I’ve got to stay at the balance here, but I think as the guys said already and there should be taste profiles there that should suit most palettes as well, so – you should be able to find a Laphroaig that suits you

H: Ok well I think we’ve all learnt a great deal today, thank you very much indeed to our panel, I’m sure the guys here would like to show their appreciation as well, thank you guys, you’ve done a great job tonight. It’s – I’m guessing that it’s a tough job, but somebody has to do it, cheers to you watching wherever you are in the world, thank you very much indeed from us live in our studio here and we’ll see you soon. Bye bye

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