Moray’s Maltman
Your whisky expert meets a master distiller who is by turns both artist and scientist in his work…
ONCE upon a time there was a farmer by the name of Mr Hamish Macadram. Hamish lived on bountiful farm in luscious Speyside and was the proud owner of a large barn – abundant with grains and cereals.
The only problem with the barn was that it had a leaky roof – and Hamish was scared of heights, so he could never really fix it properly.
When the downpours came, it could make a real mess of the harvest. But one day Hamish discovered the water had dripped into his prized barley and yeast supplies. A beam of sunlight, magnified as it shone through the thick barn window, had warmed the goo into a pungent sweet, beery mix.
Intrigued by this reaction, Hamish continued to heat and nurture the potent broth in various copper vats on his old stove – until it had turned into a clear spirit.
He stored the spirit in a cask which his Spanish galleon-sailing, sherry-drinking cousin had lent him. After a few years, it had turned into a glowing golden elixir that people from far around came to enjoy. Hamish became very rich and lived happily ever after…
Almost as happily, in fact, as Graham Coull, distillery manager and master distiller at Glen Moray.
“I grew up in Elgin and my mother was an English teacher and my dad taught chemistry,” explains Graham. “My dad loved Scotch and devised a wee module for the school focusing on the science of whisky, creating Hamish Macadram and the fateful turn of events that saw the birth of uisage beatha.
“I suppose if there was anyone who inspired me in my formative years, it was the kilted stickman Hamish – and my dad!”
Graham studied chemistry at Edinburgh University, then secured a job at Webster’s brewery in Halifax in the early 1990s. “There were a couple of options on the table when I graduated, including a job at the Sellafield nuclear plant.
“Being a student who enjoyed beer, the brewery option was a bit of a no-brainer!”
The decision came just as demand in the whisky industry was about to go nuclear.
Graham got a job with William Grant in 1994 initially working on the bottling side, progressing to become process leader in Dufftown, which meant, in effect, that he was distillation manager for Glenfiddich, Balvenie and Kininvie. He moved to Glen Moray in 2005 and now assumes the dual role.
“The role of distillery manager involves the day-to-day running of the operation, making sure you produce the