Classics: Scotch

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Bunnahabhain: the Gentle Giant Awakens
by John Hansell

"If you hit a sheep with your car and there’s a fence, then it’s the farmer’s fault. If you hit a sheep and there’s no fence, then it’s the driver’s fault. Ultimately though, it’s the sheep’s fault.
           - John MacLellan, Bunnahabhain Distillery Manager

John was discussing rush hour on Islay, the small remote island off of Scotland’s western coast, known for its peaty, smoky whiskies. I understood him completely. During a recent visit to the island, I sat in my car for 20 minutes waiting for several cows to surrender the coastal road that connects the tiny village of Port Charlotte with the Bruichladdich distillery. It was the closest thing to an Islay traffic jam.

This is Islay life, John was pointing out to me as we made our way to the Bunnahabhain distillery. If Islay isn’t secluded enough, the Bunnahabhain distillery is tucked away from everything else along Islay’s remote north shore. Of Islay’s eight distilleries, Bunnahabhain lacks the peat-smoked punch found in the other whiskies on the Island. It’s almost as if the Bunnahabhain distillery was banished to this remote location for being the black sheep of the Islay distilling family.

Even Bunnahabhain’s previous owner, Edrington, seems to have treated it with a certain degree of apathy, never expanding its range of whiskies beyond the standard 12 year old and choosing to focus on other higher-profile distilleries in its portfolio, like Macallan and Highland Park. Bunnahabhain was always kept out of the limelight.

This all changed when Burn Stewart Distillers purchased Bunnahabhain in 2003. As John put it, “In one day, we went from being a small fish in a big pond to being a really big fish in a small pond. Since then, we’ve been doing a lot of exciting things at Bunnahabhain. People are beginning to take notice.”

The distillery is accessed via a winding, single-track road that descends down to the distillery’s coastal location. The island of Jura sits just across the sound, and on a clear day you can see the Islands of Mull and Colonsay off into the distance as you make your descent.

Unless you are driving a lorry with a load of malted barley destined for the distillery, that is. Between the treacherous slopes and winding turns, there’s not time to take in the sights. John points to the skid marks on the road: “That’s where a lorry driver’s heart skipped a beat.”

As we approach the distillery, John points to a cottage and tells me that he’s actually been living in the cottage since 1989. As we walk into his office, I ask John if he’s lived on Islay all his life. “Not yet,” he says with a deadpan face. The Islay humor is unmistakable.

The process
The location of the distillery may be somewhat romantic, but the distillery’s exterior itself isn’t particularly so. It’s nice, and it’s functional. As John was quick to point out, “When Burn Stewart acquired the distillery in 2003, their first priority was to improve the quality of the whisky, not the appearance of the distillery.”

After some coffee and shortbread cookies, John took me on a tour of the distillery. He told me that Bunnahabhain (pronounced Bu-na-ha-venn) is Gaelic for ‘mouth of the river.’ But the water source to make the whisky is actually from the Margadale Spring, located about a mile north-west of the distillery. The water is piped from the spring to the distillery and isn’t exposed to the peaty bogs that surround the spring.

The malted barley is sourced from two locations: Berwick-upon-Tweed on the Scottish mainland and also from the Port Ellen maltings right on Islay. The barley is lightly peated, to the point of being unrecognizable in the whisky by most drinkers. These two factors account for why Bunnahabhain doesn’t brandish the peat smoke found in Laphroaig, Lagavulin, and the other distilleries that make Islay so well-known among whisky drinkers.

Two different yeast strains are used to convert the sugar to alcohol during fermentation. One is a quick-acting strain to jump-start the fermentation; the other is a slower-reacting strain to sustain the fermentation.

The working aspects of the distillery are fairly traditional, lacking the computerization found in many newer distilleries. “This is our version of a computer,” John says with a smile, as he points to make-shift gauges on the wall in the stillhouse. “One of the guys put this together during an idle moment while working the late shift.”

One of the pleasures of touring a distillery is that each room is a sensory delight—from the steamy, malty sweet mash room to the sharp, pungent aromas wafting from the washbacks (fermentors); the warming glow emanating from those huge copper pot stills inside the stillhouse; and finally the damp, chilly, dark, whisky-tinged aromas of the barrels aging in the warehouses.

A single, stainless steel, copper-topped mash tun produces enough sugary wort to keep six “Oregon Pine” (also called Douglas Fir) washbacks busy, and those washbacks produce enough wash (beer) to employ the four stills at the distillery, which converts the wash into whisky. Like most Scotch distilleries, Bunnahabhain is distilled twice, and all of the whisky bottled as Bunnahabhain is aged in the warehouses at the distillery.

The Whiskies
The driving force behind my visit to Bunnahabhain is that Burn Stewart has done something unique in Bunnahabhain’s 125 year history. They have just introduced the distillery’s first line extension—18 year old and 25 year old expressions to complement the flagship 12 year old.

“We are fortunate with Bunnahabhain,” explains Ian MacMillan, Distilleries Manager and Master Blender for Burn Stewart. “Unlike many of the other Islay distilleries that closed down for most of the 1980s, Bunnahabhain was only silent during 1982 and 1983. We have the luxury of maintaining a consistent line extension indefinitely now and into the future, with stocks going back to 1966.”

Tasting the new whiskies with John and Ian, it became clear that Bunnahabhain ages well, and each expression shows a different personality of the whisky. The 12 year old shows gentility and versatility. The 18 year old flaunts depth and complexity. It is the most sherried and balanced of the three. The 25 year old expresses incredible maturity, with dry spice notes and a salty tang on the finish. (For a more formal review of all three whiskies, consult this issue’s Buyer’s Guide.)

Prior to the introduction of the new line extension, there had been glimpses of Bunnahabhain’s potential with the issuances of various limited releases over the past 25 years, dating back to their Centenary bottling which was released back in the mid 1980s. One particular bottling, sold in 2002, was exceptionally good. It was a 1968 vintage aged in sherry casks, called Auld Acquaintance. The whisky sold out so quickly, a second expression was released shortly afterwards which tasted quite similar. It too was a 34 year old, from 1968, and aged in sherry casks. The good news is that there were still bottles of this whisky available at the distillery’s gift shop, selling for about $275, and it is worth every penny.

John told me that Burn Stewart has committed to doing two limited releases each year, one of which will be for Islay’s annual whisky festival at the end of May. Last year, for the festival, the company released a single cask, cask-strength, 12 year old Port wood finish expression, and bottles of this are also available at the distillery. This year for the festival they will introduce a 14 year old Pedro Ximenez finish. I tasted both with Ian and preferred the Port wood finish, which was the more balanced of the two. The Pedro Ximenez was a bit dominant and fairly sweet, masking some of the gentler notes of Bunnahabhain. (Incidentally, we also tasted a wonderfully fresh, experimental manzanilla sherry wood finish 14 year old cask sample. This was by far my favorite of the various wood-finished whiskies we tasted, and I am optimistic we will see this bottled in the near future. (Perhaps for the 2007 Islay Whisky Festival, Ian?)

Interestingly, for the 2004 Islay Whisky Festival, Burn Stewart released an unusual peated, six year old version of Bunnahabhain called Moine. Why make a peated expression when the lack of peat smoke is what separates Bunnahabhain from the rest of the Islay distilleries?

“We need smoky Islay whiskies for our Black Bottle blended whisky. We didn’t have one of our own, so we created one,” notes Ian. “Each year we make a little more of it. In 2006, we made the peated version for about six weeks. Other companies are ordering more of it from us to put in their blended whiskies. Smoky Islay whiskies are in demand right now.” Just don’t expect to see peat smoke-infused Bunnahabhain single malt for sale anytime in the near future.

One whisky you can look forward to later this year, however, is a limited edition 125th Anniversary bottling of Bunnahabhain. This whisky will consist of three 35 year old sherry casks distilled in 1971. It will be bottled unchill-filtered and at cask strength. Ian anticipates the there will only be about 400 bottles available worldwide. I tasted a cask sample of this at the distillery and it was absolutely stunning! We’ll have to see how the final product turns out, but it has the potential of being the best Bunnahabhain ever.

The Future
“Bunnahabhain has been a jewel for many years, but only for those who knew it,” Steve Campbell, Managing Director of Burn Stewart, told me over a dram while I was over in Scotland. “We’re hoping that more people will discover Bunnahabhain with the introduction of the 18 and 25 year old.”

Fraser Thornton, Marketing Manager for Burn Stewart, echoes Steve’s optimism. “To us, the Bunnahabhain brands are a lot like people. The ones that are the most successful are the ones that are cared for and nurtured the most. This is Burn Stewart’s vision for Bunnahabhain.”

Some skeptical whisky enthusiasts might loathe embracing what, superficially, smacks of marketing-speak. But I can honestly say that I felt this devotion, commitment, and optimism from the entire team involved in making and selling Bunnahabhain during my visit. It was quite refreshing.

Why the paradigm shift now? Perhaps it is because the distillery is now owned by a company that is truly passionate about the brand. Then again, it might be that the portfolio of Burn Stewart distilleries is so small (only Deanston, Tobermory, and Bunnahabhain) that Bunnahabhain now is, as John put it, “a big fish in a small pond.” Or maybe it just has something to do with the distillery’s Islay roots, the people living there, and they way they approach life.

John said to me as I was leaving the Island, “Islay people look after each other. If someone dies, you might have a few hundred people at the funeral. And we only have a few thousand people living on the island. He could have just been the guy you bought your morning newspaper from, but that doesn’t matter.”

He paused for a moment, and then continued. “We just seem to have our priorities right. Things move more slowly here. As we say on Islay, ‘death is nature’s way of telling you to slow down.’ If you’re taking the ferry to the mainland, it doesn’t leave until three, so what’s the rush?”

Indeed. It may have taken 125 years to bring out these two new Bunnahabhain whiskies, but it was worth the wait.

Other Scotch Classics:
Wining about whisky | Century of Change? | Accommodating Distilleries