WhiskyCast

Irish Whiskey once dominated the world, but several factors combined to nearly wipe the country's distillers out over time. While it's now the fastest-growing segment of the whisky industry, Ireland's distillers only have a 4% share of the global market - and now have ambitious plans to triple that over the next 15 years. Irish Whiskey Association chairman Bernard Walsh explains just how he and hi...

Gordon & MacPhail reopened Benromach Distillery in Speyside in 1998 after 15 years of inactivity, and Keith Cruickshank has been there since the stills were fired up. After two years as a stillman, he was promoted to distillery manager, and remains one of the three men who tend the stills at Benromach. He'll take us on a tour of the distillery on this week's WhiskyCast In-Depth. In the news, a law...

The labels on whisky bottles often give us more than just the legal description of what's inside the bottle. Good ones convey the character and heritage of the spirit...perhaps even a sense of what it tastes like. Author Noah Rothbaum has been looking at whisky labels from before Prohibition to the present day, and picked 100 of them for his new book "The Art of American Whiskey." He'll share the...

This episode wraps up our special coverage of the Spirit of Speyside Festival in Scotland, and we'll hear from soccer's Michael Owen. The former Manchester United and Real Madrid star is working with Speyside Distillery as a global ambassador for its Spey single malts, and surprised visitors touring the distillery last Monday. He'll tell us why his whisky is better than David Beckham's Haig Club....

Lots of people try to pair whiskies with foods, but pairing whiskies with music? That's the challenge Neil Ridley and Joel Harrison took on when they curated the "Sound of Aberlour" tastings for this year's Spirit of Speyside Festival. We'll continue our special coverage from Speyside with Neil and Joel, along with the drams and musicians they put together. In the news, Glen Grant's Dennis Malcolm...

We're kicking off this weekend's special coverage of the Spirit of Speyside Festival in Scotland this time around! Thousands of people from around the world are in Speyside this weekend, and you'll hear some of them take part in a blind whisky nosing and tasting competition. With the "PappyGate" arrests fresh in the news, we'll get a glimpse into the ancient art of whisky thievery with Glenfiddich...

It's been a busy week in the whisky world, and there's a lot to talk about on this episode. We'll have the latest on Friday's explosion at the Silver Trail Distillery in Hardin, Kentucky that left distillers Jay Rogers and Kyle Rogers critically burned, along with the outpouring of support for them following the accident. Nine people were indicted in the theft of thousands of dollars worth of Papp...

If distilleries have ghosts, the ones haunting the former Old Taylor Distillery in Kentucky finally have some people to scare. After nearly 43 years, the historic distillery is being restored with plans to begin distilling by the end of this year and open to visitors in the spring of 2016. Marianne Barnes left Brown-Forman recently to oversee the project for the distillery's partners and will be t...

This week, we're on location at the Maker's Mark Distillery in Loretto, Kentucky for the annual Maker's Mark Handcraft Festival and the running of the Maker's 46 Mile at Lexington's Keeneland Race Course. Friday also brought an estimated 1,000 whisky and Kentucky basketball fans to Keeneland for the annual signing of the Maker's Mark Keeneland charity bottle. This year's bottle honors legendary Un...

Bacardi took a step into the Bourbon business this week with its acquisition of Angel's Share Brands, the parent company of Angel's Envy Bourbon and the Louisville Distilling Company's distillery under construction in Louisville. The deal is a friendly one, since Bacardi had owned a small stake in Angel's Share since it was founded by the late Lincoln Henderson and his partners in 2006. Henderson'...

Suntory Holdings CEO Takeshi Niinami is one of Japan's leading business executives. He's the first CEO from outside the founding Torii family, and is also a key economic adviser to Japanese Prime Minister Shinzō Abe. He inherited last year's $16 billion acquisition of Beam when he joined Suntory six months ago, and has been focused on making the deal work while changing Suntory's internal culture....

US President Barack Obama visited a whisky maker for the first time this week during his trip to Cleveland for a speech to the City Club of Cleveland. He visited the small business incubator that's home to Tom Lix's Cleveland Whiskey, along with nearly two dozen other small manufacturers. Lix's proprietary -- and controversial -- process takes young whiskey and gives it what Lix claims is the colo...

Anthony Bourdain is many things...a chef, author, journalist, and media personality. At heart, though, he's a hedonist seeking pleasure from everything he encounters - including whisky. The host of CNN's "Anthony Bourdain: Parts Unknown" was the lead juror for this year's American Craft Council Rare Craft Fellowship Awards presented by The Balvenie, and we spent a few minutes discussing whisky at...

Lawyers are circling around the whisky industry, much like sharks around a shipwreck. At least five different US distillers and bottlers have been hit with class-action lawsuits since last September accusing them of misleading consumers. The litigation largely focuses on whether their whiskies are "hand-made," "small-batch," or claim to come from a small-scale distillery that actually purchases bu...

Lots to talk about this week, with news from all over the world! Bruichladdich's Jim McEwan joins us on WhiskyCast In-Depth to talk about the world's peatiest whisky ever -- his Octomore 6.3 with a phenol level of 258ppm! We'll also hear about new whiskies from Tomatin, Duncan Taylor, Midleton, and Whistlepig...the latest on Teeling Whiskey's new Dublin distillery that could be ready to make whisk...

For the second straight year, a Texas whiskey has won Best in Show honors at the American Craft Spirits Association competition. San Antonio's Ranger Creek Brewing & Distilling .36 Single Barrel Straight Bourbon beat a field of whiskies and other spirits from around the US. Ranger Creek co-founder Mark McDavid joins us this week on WhiskyCast In-Depth to share the story behind that whiskey and the...

It's Valentine's Day, and who better to explain his passion for making whisky than Rifino Valentine of Valentine Distilling. His Woodward Ltd. Bourbon is named after Detroit's legendary Woodward Avenue, which runs just a couple of blocks away from his distillery in the suburb of Ferndale, Michigan. Valentine is preparing to move from his original site to a brand-new facility in Ferndale, and is pa...

Ian MacMillan has been overseeing the whiskies from Deanston, Tobermory, and Bunnahabhain for years...but Cognac casks were one thing he hadn't experimented much with until the opportunity presented itself several years ago. The result is the new Deanston 18 Cognac Matured single malt that's being released in the US this month. We'll discuss Cognac casks with Ian on WhiskyCast In-Depth, along with...

Graeme Macaloney gave up a secure career in the pharmaceutical industry to pursue his dream of making whisky, and the Scottish expat is getting closer to realizing his dream. He's hoping to begin construction on the Victoria Caledonian Distillery in Victoria, British Columbia soon, and has already brought Dr. Jim Swan and former Diageo distillery manager Mike Nicolson as consultants. Graeme explai...

Kentucky's Four Roses Distillery announced this week that supply problems will prevent this spring's release of the annual Four Roses Limited Edition Single Barrel Bourbon. In his first interview on the subject, master distiller Jim Rutledge explains why dropping the limited-edition release will make more single barrel bottlings available to consumers, along with the prospects for bringing back th...

In the second of our two episodes from this weekend’s Victoria Whisky Festival, we'll catch up on more of the week's news - including more details on the $50,000 bottle of The Balvenie 50 stolen in a Montreal robbery Thursday and a Scottish newspaper report that several distilleries are in hot water with environmental protection officials over using too much water. We'll also get the latest on new...

We're on the road for the first time in 2015 this weekend, with the first of two episodes from the 10th annual Victoria Whisky Festival in Victoria, British Columbia. The weekend kicked off with the annual Canadian Whisky Awards presentation Thursday night at the Hotel Grand Pacific, including a special Lifetime Achievement Award presented to Forty Creek founder John Hall. We'll hear from John and...

On New Year's Day, David Perkins and his team at Utah's High West Distillery fired up the still at their new distillery for the first time. High West has been making whiskey since 2009 at its historic distillery and restaurant in the heart of Park City, and while the current distillery will continue, the bulk of High West's production will eventually come from the new facility located on a dude ra...

Irish whiskey will take another step in 2015 with the first exports of Yellow Spot to the US market, still the strongest market in the world for Irish whiskey sales. While Yellow Spot is produced by Irish Distillers at Midleton Distillery near Cork, the brand is owned by Dublin-based whisky and wine merchant Mitchell & Son. Robert Mitchell is the latest family member to head up the 210-year-old bu...

As we close out 2014, we'll hear from the man some might call "The Whisky Whisperer" for his ability to coax young distilleries into producing spirit that's mature after just a few years. Dr. Jim Swan's client list includes Penderyn, Kilchoman, and Taiwan's King Car Distillery, which took the top two spots in this year's Malt Maniacs Awards with Kavalan Solist single malts. He's also involved with...