Far eastern whisky

Tom Morton gets up close and cheesy with a few drams at Glengarioch

by Tom Morton

Part of a mission to educate myself about malt whisky which eventually gave birth to the book Spirit of Adventure

A QUARTER of a century ago I sputtered and backfired my way into Oldmeldrum (all one word) aboard an ancient MZ (Moteraddwerk Zschopau) two-stroke motorbike and sidecar, as part of a mission to educate myself about malt whisky which eventually gave birth to the book Spirit of Adventure. And a sputtering, backfiring, very much parttime career talking, writing about and drinking whisky.

Which continues to this day. Now, though, instead of a dodgy East German, Soviet-era motorcycle combination, I am comfortably whisked from Aberdeen to the Glengarioch (pronounced GlenGEERY; and also all one word, or least since rebranding in 2009) Distillery in a brand new Mini, made by BMW, from Bavaria in united, sleekly capitalist Germany. That’s in Europe, by the way. You may remember Europe.

I am delivered by Visit Aberdeenshire to one of the jewels in that organisation’s touristic crown, which it must be said Glengarioch, the most easterly distillery in Scotland, was not in 1992. At the time of my oil-pre-mix MZ trip, it was more famous for its pioneering use of waste heat in a complex of greenhouses - to grow tomatoes - than for its single malt, though the horticulture was to stop the following year.

And the Glengarioch single malt of those days was a peculiar beast. A peated Highland malt (despite being close to the region, it’s not classed as a Speyside), the distillery possessed - and still does - vast floor maltings dominating the jumble of distillery buildings, tucked away and divided by regularly used roads on the edge of the market town of Oldmeldrum. I remember the only dram you could easily get then being extremely redolent of melted Caramac bars, full of Murray Mint butterscotch flavours, and oddly sweet.