Next week, we will have a blog post on the new Whisky Enlightenment Tour which The Scotch Whisky Experience in Edinburgh is launching.
However, for this 5pm Dining blog, we are going to stick with whisky but make tracks, perhaps unexpectedly, for South Tyrol at the foot of the Italian Alps.
The PUNI Distillery in Glurns has just released what they claim to be Italy’s first single malt whisky. It is made using local rye rather than barley. This blogger was always sure that the use of barley was one of the key defining characteristics of a single malt whisky but we are happy to be corrected.
Ex-bourbon barrels
Matured for three years in American ex-bourbon barrels and then finished in European oak casks, PUNI Nova is billed as a ‘wonderfully delicate yet spicy single malt with warming and sweet aromas of honey, banana and vanilla’.
By contrast, PUNI Alba was matured for more than two years in Marsala dessert wine casks and one year in ex-Islay casks. It is said to offer ‘a complex bouquet of candy fruits, sultanas and exotic fruits entwined with warm, reassuring hints of smoke’.
The first batch are on sale at a possibly ambitious 126 Euros for the Nova and 154 Euros for the Alba.
We haven’t tasted it and it may be a fantastic whisky but does seem a lot for a spirit which is a mere stripling at three years old.
Apparently, the distillery’s location leads to considerable seasonal temperature variations so the Italian whisky matures much faster than whiskies in other parts of the world.
Tasmanian whisky
This blogger has drunk whisky from Wales, Ireland, France, Denmark, Japan, India, Texas and even Tasmania.
Some were excellent, others were rank.
I appreciate that Scotland doesn’t have a monopoly on making whisky but I always find it slightly hard to swallow that these spirits produced by other countries are actually whisky. Even if they are technically whisky and taste very good.
For me, whisky is always Scotch although I have no problem at all with Irish whiskey with an e.
Having said that, Grey Goose vodka – made in France – is definitely vodka so maybe I’m just being a bit chauvinist.