Unity: A whisky for fans created by fans
Whisky Weekend sees Forty Creek release new limited edition
Forty Creek takes great pride in the fact that its DNA is very different as a company, North American brand ambassador Chris Thompson said Sunday.
“Our flavour profile for our whiskies is a little bit bolder but very complex and ultra smooth. Once people try it they know they are tasting something very unique,” said Thompson, as some 4,000 whisky enthusiasts came to Grimsby distillery over two days for the annual Whisky Weekend.
The event offers Forty Creek fans behind-the-scenes access with tours tastings, live music, a food truck, and seminars.
“First and foremost it’s about celebrating the latest and greatest limited release. This year, it’s Forty Creek Unity. It’s a whisky created by our fans for our fans,” said Thompson, adding the weekend is like a homecoming for the whisky brand’s fans.
During one of the weekend seminars — there were two each on Saturday and Sunday — he said the company picked five fans from across the country earlier this year and flew them in to help create the new limited release.
Thompson said at first Forty Creek master blender Bill Ashburn was dead set against the idea
“We basically locked them in a boardroom and gave them some really special liquid to play with. Ultimately, the final blend was created by the fans … it’s never been done before by any distillery that we’re aware of. It was a really fantastic and gratifying experience.”
He explained that the fans couldn’t come to a consensus and it was four against one in that boardroom with time ticking down on when they had to leave to fly back home.
Thompson said some suggestions were made about different characteristics of the two choices the fans had made at that point and Ashburn took what was said and quickly blended a new mix.
That new mix turned out to be Unity and all five agreed on its taste.
All but one of those five fans made it back for Whisky Weekend and were treated like rockstars, with people asking them to autograph their reserved bottles of Unity.
Asked if the distillery would have another fan-created whisky, Thompson said it might be hard to get Ashburn to relinquish the reigns again.
“But we never say never around here.” Thompson said Forty Creek’s success is due to its fans across Canada and the U.S. and that the weekend and number of people who come out is a testament to the quality of liquid coming from the distillery, on the South Service Road beside the QEW.
Davin de Kergommeaux, award-winning author of Canadian Whisky: The New Portable Expert — second edition, and contributor to Whisky Advocate and Whisky Magazine, said there were fans from Calgary, Houston,Texas and Cleveland, Ohio.
“People come from all over the place. Forty Creek I think is the only Canadian cult whisky. It’s like the Holy Grail of Canadian whisky for so many people.
“It’s like family here … it’s really exciting,” said de Kergommeaux of the weekend, adding he sees some of the same faces year after year.
He credits the distillery with being very welcoming and open, as well.
“You can come to Forty Creek any day of the week and meet knowledgeable people who will give you a tour of the distillery. I don’t think any other distillery welcomes people the way Forty Creek does,” said de Kergommeaux.
Thompson said Forty Creek is not a marketing brand and marketing and advertising really only began in the last couple of years, with a campaign around the 2017 NHL playoffs part of the change.
“This whisky became popular because friends recommended it to friends. People will say, ‘Listen, you need to try this because it’s great.’ Then people try it and realize that it’s actually really special, very distinct and different from other Canadian whisky.”
Thompson spoke of that distinctiveness during a seminar on The Influence of
Wood on Whisky.
“Wood is incredibly important to us. Different style barrels exhibit different flavour characteristics. We like to have a variety to work with and then we take all these really unique flavour characteristics from the barrels and kind of weave them into a tapestry.”
He said the distillery has just under 18,000 barrels on site with 80 per cent of them vintage bourbon barrels. There are also single-use bourbon barrels, rum, Cabernet Sauvignon, brandy and a small percentage of American and Canadian white oak barrels.
Thompson said as knowledgeable as he and de Kergommeaux are when it comes to whisky, he had to have cheat notes with him in the seminar to make sure he could stay on topic on the effects of wood on whisky.
“We’ve done master classes on whisky and blending seminars before but these two were completely unique,” he said.
The other seminar was Be A Whisky Competition Judge, with both men talking about how to evaluate whisky.
“It’s the same thing as if you were at an actual judging competition … it’s the process you would go through,” said Thompson.
Forty Creek Barrel Select was used as a benchmark whisky for those taking part in the seminar, with four more glasses of whisky, all unknown, in front of them. What was in those glasses was marked by each person and total scores averaged out. Each whisky was also revealed after the scores were presented.
“The most important thing is that a whisky be well-balanced. It doesn’t have to be too big or too robust. It has to have some complexity and the various elements have to be balanced nicely,” de Kergommeaux said.
He said there could be hints of spice, sweetness, fruitiness and other flavours people pick up with their nose and on their palette.
De Kergommeaux said a really good whisky is put together by people who really understand their craft.
“Sam Bronfman, who developed Crown Royal, said distilling is a science and blending is an art. Great blenders blend with their nose,” he said.
Thompson agreed that blending is an art.
“Our master blender (Ashburn) has been doing this for a very long time. The distillate part is technical and scientific, and that’s great, but we feel very much our whisky comes alive and develops its own unique characteristics when it’s extracted from the barrel,” said Thompson.
Those flavours and unique characteristics have helped Forty Creek win numerous awards for its various whiskies — like Confederation Oak Reserve, Barrel Select, Copper Pot and others — over the years.
“We’ve taken home some of the biggest awards in some of the biggest shows. We submit our whisky anywhere where there is significant whisky judging. We want to be judged against the best whisky in the world,” said Thompson.
People are giving Canadian whisky more respect and it’s being taken more seriously by both distillers at home and whisky connoisseurs around the world, said de Kergommeaux.
“I can present Canadian whisky to Scotch drinkers … there’s a different attitude now. People are doing great things …,” he said. “John Hall (Forty Creek’s founder) kicked off the renaissance of Canadian whisky with Forty Creek Special Edition and now others are doing that as well.”
De Kergommeaux admits he has a fondness for the distillery.
“I used to write about Scotch and when I started to write about Canadian whisky, Forty Creek was the first that really took me seriously. John Hall put a lot of time helping me learn about Canadian whisky and taking me through all the process here,” he said.
“At the same time it’s really great whisky.”
His book about Canadian whisky, which includes Forty Creek, came about as he started to research distilleries across the country, said de Kergommeaux.
“I had three binders full of Canadian whisky law,” he said, adding he sent a note off to a publisher and the first edition of Canadian Whisky: The Portable Expert came out in 2012.
The first edition, he said, did very well and with many changes in the industry since 2012 an updated version was needed.
“There are 170 micro-distilleries in Canada now, there were fewer than a dozen back then,” de Kergommeaux said, adding the second edition is already in its second printing.
While he enjoys Forty Creek’s Confederation Oak Reserve, de Kergommeaux said some of his top choices right now are a 21-year-old rye whisky by Collingwood, a 35-year-old J.P. Wiser’s and a 40-year-old Canadian Club.