Lochaline distillery bridges whisky and gin

It was during the 17th century that Scotland’s most famous product, whisky, was properly developed.

Aqua vitae was distilled by religious establishments as early as 1494, but the Highlander either drank the fresh burn water, or milk, buttermilk and whey. Ale was drunk in the Lowlands, and wine was brewed from native fruits and plants.

Heavy duties were imposed on imports of French wine, but to compensate for this a clause in the law allowed families to distill sufficient whisky in their own homes for the need of the household. The surplus barley would be malted and turned into uisge-beatha (Gaelic for ‘water of life’) in a pot still over a peat fire.

These rougher whiskies often employed bitter or astringent plants. John Lightfoot in Flora Scotica (1777) notes 18th-century Scots added blaeberry jelly into whisky ‘to give it relish to strangers’. Also used were juniper, wild raspberries, bird cherries, rowan berries and sloes – the last two Lightfoot and Thomas Pennant (on Jura) saw fermented and distilled into spirits of their own.

John de Vere Loder, in his book Colonsay and Oronsay, noted the tuberous roots of sweet, liquoricey bitter vetch tubers were dug up with a wooden trowel called a pleadhag and eaten raw, or tied in bundles and hung up in the kitchen roof to dry, and afterwards roasted. Hebridean tourer Martin Martin observed: ‘It has a blue flower in July … [and] gives a good relish to all liquors, milk only excepted. It is aromatic and the natives prefer it to spice for brewing aquavitae.’

This month, Ncn’ean, an experimental ‘organic’ whisky distillery on the Morvern Peninsula, released its first limited run of botanical spirit, described as a mix between whisky and gin, reminiscent of Scotland’s traditional usquebaugh made by infusing local herbs, honey, fruits extracts and fresh spirit.

Ncn’ean, which is pronounced Nc-knee-ann and opened in March last year on the Drimnin Estate by Lochaline, redistills with coriander, juniper, and fresh grapefruit and locally foraged herbs such as heather, sorrel, bog myrtle and thyme, and is described as having ‘creamy, nutty barley notes with grapefruit, herbs and sour berries’.

Its name is an abbreviation of Neachneohain, a witch-queen in Scots Gaelic folklore who was also referred to as ‘Queen of the Spirits’. Lindores Abbey distillery in Fife also released a botanical spirit earlier this year called Aqua Vitae, made by infusing its own malt spirit with local botanicals.

Also this month, a 21-year-old single cask Ledaig has been released by independent bottler Douglas Laing & Co, which describes the flavours as ‘sweet phenols up front, with barley, peat and burnt toast’.

A new whisky series Cladach – Gaelic for shoreline – combines malts from six of Scotland’s coastal distilleries: Caol Ila, Clynelish, Inchgower, Lagavulin, Oban and Talisker. Diageo said Cladach, bottled at 57.1 per cent abv., was designed to ‘capture the character of Scotland’s coastline’, with ‘maritime aromas of salt, warm sand and seaweed… salty, with rich honey and citrus notes’.