Does Terroir Exist in Whisky? The Cask Debate

Always a controversial topic... so we thought we'd give our thoughts on it!

Can grain, yeast, and water create a unique “terroir” in whisky? Or is the cask the real determining factor for flavour?

Bari & Gareth explore the concept of terroir and whether it truly exists in whisky production. Does the location of distilleries—like Islay—matter, or is the maturation cask where the magic happens? Plus, the challenges of building efficient cask warehouses. They delve into designing spaces for optimal whisky storage and making the most of each square meter.

Is terroir just a myth, or is the cask the real heart of whisky?

• Read the Full Transcript

  Gareth Roberts:
  Terroir.

  Bari Reid:
  Does it exist?

  GR:
  Do you remember in that pub in Ireland? That was where it was that we were told that grain makes a difference, yeast makes a difference, water. Yeah. Fermentation time makes a difference, but after, say, three or four years, the cask is the only terroir that exists, because it's got such an overarching influence on the spirit that's inside the cask. Discuss.

  BR:
  Yeah. I mean, like, it is interesting because does it really, like, I always have that issue, it's like, you know, that a lot of whisky producers, produce whisky, you know, maybe on, like, Islay or up the west coast or in the Highlands. And then it all gets put into casks in central Scotland. Like, surely that then feeds into that, could you really say that it's an Islay malt if you're saying all of that flavour is coming from casks.

  GR:
  But that also proves that same point, doesn't it? If the cask is the only terroir, it's the cask it's in that is determining the quality of the product. It's not where that cask is held. Because I used to think, I used to hope, I used to argue that you were near the sea in Bowmore and that the salt air was coming in and all that.

  BR:
  There must be something to that.

  GR:
  Yeah, if the cask is in Bowmore. But if it's in Rutherglen, much less so.

  BR:
  Yeah, definitely. But then it's like, where are you making that argument? Is it like, if you're saying where the grain's grown, the field that that comes from, you know, All of those constituent parts, like are you taking water out of the ground underneath your distillery? Then if it sits in a cask 100 miles away, you know what I mean? I always have a bit of a kind of issue with that.

  
  And then all of the stuff with casks is like if you've got them racked or palletised.

  GR:
  So tell us about, you've been doing some work on a system for a specific maturation type of maturation building, right.

  BR:
  Well, what we were looking at is trying to figure out the most efficient way. Like you've got the way that the kind of building regs are written is you've got these thousand meter squared cells, if you like. That's what it has to be. You've got fire protection around.

  GR:
  Unless you have sprinklers.

  BR:
  Well, yeah, you can double it if you have a sprinkler system. But. A thousand square meters isn't. isn't all equal if you if you know what i mean like if it's trying to work it back to be a almost like a modular size from the cask or the racking to make sure that you can maximize the amount of storage that you get in there so it's not just here's a thousand square meter shed that happens to be this dimension by that dimension yeah but then you lose you know you lose i don't know 50 casks because you can't get the forklift in to the end bay because you've got primary steelwork in the way and all those kind of things so it's just trying to really like break it down to that that tiny bit of detail to say well actually we could build a warehouse that's 800 square meters but it's got as many casks right everybody else's thousand square meters.

  GR:
  and that sort of thing it doesn't matter if you're building one warehouse very much but see if you're building 10 20 50 warehouses it starts to save one or two off the end i mean it's still you know like for.

  BR:
  you’ll still be like, £1,500, £2,000 a square metre. So any saving is a good saving if you're storing more casks per metre squared you're building.

  GR:
  Yeah. That reminds me of a housing project I was working on and one of the salespeople came in really late. The thing was being built and said, we need bigger wardrobes. And they said to me, what's the effect of putting bigger wardrobes in these houses? Well, you know, add a metre to every house and you lose two or three houses off the end of the site. It does have a massive effect. So that's the efficiency that you're working up there.

  BR:
  Yeah, and obviously most distilleries, when they start, they'll build one warehouse or maybe two so you have a kind of stunt warehouse, maybe like a traditional dunnage. Then you have the hard-working warehouse out the back.

  GR:
  Yeah.

  BR:
  And then it's making sure that what you build there is efficient and then you can duplicate it. And as you say, like on year four, you might have four or five of those warehouses. If you've saved 200 square metres per warehouse by year five, that's a whole warehouse you've saved building.

  GR:
  Just say a few words about why a cask store warehouse is not just an agricultural building. What makes it different.

  BR:
  Well, the rules and regulations on storing spirit really take it away from being just an agricultural shed.

  GR:
  So it's like ATEX-rated electrics.

  BR:
  Yeah, I mean, generally they try and, you know, even your fuse board or your switchboard or whatever would be outside the building. So then you don't need to worry about having to ATEX that. But then, yeah, like all your lighting, you need to have security cameras and alarms and, you know, it's an electric forklift usually. So, like, where do you store that outside of the zoning and everything? And, you know, like, there's all of these different... Yeah. and what you do on the floor, and if you decide to insulate the building. Some people will have a small amount of insulation on the panels.

  GR:
  That's my realisation. You've got a building with a thermal mass of stored whisky, so it's basically solid mass inside, and the building outside is doing very little compared to the mass of that stored liquid.

  BR:
  Yeah, but that's only when you've got a full warehouse. So depending on how quickly you're filling warehouses, then that's maybe one of the considerations, because your traditional dunnage would have been stone-walled, open floor, maybe a slate roof.

  GR:
  So much lower density, much lower mass.

  BR:
  Yeah, and you're talking about a one-degree change through the seasons, or that's what was ideal. Yeah. But now you're seeing big steel sheds have got a huge temperature swing from if you're up at eight meters high versus being on the ground, people rotate their casks and you've got like your bourbon rickhouses which have got an even bigger temperature swing, but they kind of lean into that and it's part of what helps them age their product. So there's lots of kind of nuance and opinion and people trying out different ways of maturing casks or maturing spirit, I guess.