The Charred barrel in Bourbon and Scotch

There's a lot of history and 'lore' behind bourbon so discuss both here.

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The Charred barrel in Bourbon and Scotch

Unread postby bourbonv » Sun Jun 04, 2006 10:47 am

Gary,
I am starting this new thread here because we were getting too far away from the subject in the Library. You mentioned aging whiskey in charred barrels and Scotch whisky. I want to continue that line of thought here.

When I was at United Distillers, my ultimate boss was Nicholas Morgan, the head of the archives in Edinburgh. I had a chance to here him discuss Scotch whisky history at a presentation to the U.D. North America people. He points out that until the 1830's or so Scotch whisky would be unaged product that would often be flavored with herbs and such - more akin to gin than whisky as we know it today. At that point a little light went off in my head and I realized that aging of whiskey originated in North America and went back across the ocean to Scotland. The reason for this development here instead of in Britain is simply taxes! The excise tax was collected in the Highlands in the 18th and 19th centuries without a break. There was no excise tax in the United States from 1817 to 1861. Americans could experiment with aging whiskey and loss of product it causes without it costing them tax money. A question I never had answered was when did a bonding period start in for Scottish distilleries? That would be an indicator as to when they started to age their product. I never received an answer because the answer probably would not be appreciated by the powers to be at U.D. who saw bourbon as the little brother of Scotch who always immitated but never matched the older brother, Scotch Whisky.

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Unread postby gillmang » Sun Jun 04, 2006 4:11 pm

Well, these are good points. I think though (without being able currently to show) that the best scotch whisky was kept in barrels before 1800, either illegally or legally at the instance of wealthy aristocracy who could afford to do so. There is also evidence it was aged in bottles "long unstoppered". Not quite the same thing, but aging is the point. Also, the mere transport in ships which would have taken months was a form of aging and M'Harry mentions that foreign liquors coming to America benefitted from the "friction" and "heat" (his words) in the "hold" of the ship. So barreling and moving whisky around (which later became methodical in the warehouse as you know) were extensions of that idea I think. But your tax argument makes sense Mike and it is possible that the methodical (at any rate) aging of whisky in Scotland was influenced by American practice - and surplus American barrels! But here we get further away from any German, Dutch or Russian notions of spirits manufacture, where spirits were sold and are to this day shortly after manufacture absent a couple of specialties. However the French cognac matter is different and I fully acknowledge the possibility of its influence on whiskey maturation in America (but I also think that must have happened in Scotland too, to a point anyway and regardless of the tax regime at any specific time).

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Unread postby bourbonv » Sun Jun 04, 2006 7:23 pm

Gary,
Good points as always. I am not sure that used barrels from America were part of the original Scotch whisky production. I would think that surplus barrels in the United States would be a factor until after 1935, but used barrels of one sort or another would be a factor. Do you have any idea as to when they started using wine and cognac barrels to influence their products?

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Unread postby gillmang » Sun Jun 04, 2006 10:30 pm

In the famous 1911 edition of Britannica (online free) under the whisky entry (see http://www.1911encyclopedia.org) it is stated that Scots whisky is aged in barrels that formerly held only whisky, barrels that held sherry and refill barrels (barrels that used to hold sherry but were last filled with whisky). So the practice of using sherry barrels goes back to the 1800's at least. I know in the 1933 article in Fortune magazine on the emerging post-Pro (U.S.) whiskey market it is said empty U.S. whiskey barrels are sent over to Scotland, so that practice must predate 1918. Brittanica in 1911 does not mention U.S. barrels being used for Scots whisky, so possibly that market developed only after 1900 or so, or maybe U.S. barrels fell into Britannica's first category, whisky barrels that previously held only whisky, in fact I think this is likely. This would explain Fortune's comment that ex-U.S. whiskey barrels were sent to Scotland for filling with malt or grain whisky.

The whisky entry in the 1911 encyclopedia is very interesting and it covers a number of aspects relating to bourbon. Note e.g. the statement that average congener content was much higher in U.S. whiskey than malt whisky of the day. It was noted that U.S. whiskey was "heavy", possibly (I imagine) like Woodford Reserve is today.

I take what Chuck said about the changing styles of distillation and whiskies over time but at least since 1911 the different types of Scotch and Irish whiskey seem remarkably consistent. This article is almost 100 years old but it reads (writ large) like a good description of modern Scots whisky practice.

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Unread postby bourbonv » Mon Jun 05, 2006 11:46 am

Gary,
The more I think about it the more the 1911 date does make sense. It was the bottling of whiskey that made surplus barrels a problem in the United States. Before the bottled-inBond Act only a small portion of the whiskey sold was bottled by the distillers. After the act passed more and more distillers were bottling their own product and they had barrels to dispose of. There was nothing to keep them from re-using these barrels themselves but the best whiskey was made using new barrels, so quality demanded a new barrel. The old barrels could be sold overseas to the Scotch whisky distillers.

Before this I suspect that Scotch whisky was aged in used Scotch barrels for the most part. When I was at U.D. they had a book on the early Scotch industry titled "The Whisky Barons". I do not recall the author. In this book they point out that most of them made their fortunes with blended Scotch whisky and they started in the mid 19th century, as Chuck states in his post. The column still and the ability to make cheap neutral spirits did fuel this growth. By the time the column still was developed, Americans were aging their whiskey for over 20 years and there was plenty of time for the practice to pass back across the ocean.

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Unread postby gillmang » Mon Jun 05, 2006 12:06 pm

Yes but since sherry barrels were used initially (and always for the best malt whisky) the practice must have predated the blending revolution which indeed started in the mid-1800's (this is well documented, Andrew Usher was the first blender I believe or one of the first and his Vat 69 is still sold, then grocer Johnnie Walker, etc.). Malt whisky needed long aging to acquire quality. This would have occurred before anyone thought of blending. Malt whisky was and is the Scots specialty of country and the well-off classes who bought barrels of it to keep in their estates. Blending appealed more to the mass market in England and working cities such as Glasgow which were full of new customers who could not have afforded malt whisky. Malt whisky was regarded as a regional specialty and aquired cachet beyond Scotland with the romantic Scots renaissance of the 1800's (the fashion for tartans started then, visits of Queen Victoria to the Highlands (she famously drank some malt whisky)), the fashion for Scors literature, etc.). Alfred Barnard's book perhaps goes into some of the history we are discussing. Extracts are online but not the full book and I don't have a copy of it. I don't doubt that increased U.S. barrel availability assisted the development of blended whisky but the maturation of malt whisky in a sound used oak container long pre-dated these other developments IMO.

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Unread postby bourbonv » Mon Jun 05, 2006 1:00 pm

Gary,
The only objection I have to your arguement is that Dr. Nicholas Morgan, my former boss and head of the U.D. Scoth whisky archive said in his talk on Scotch whisky that aging whisky was pretty much happening at the same time as blending whisky. Earlier in the 19th century the whisky would be white dog whisky that may be flavored with herbs or sugar. He had access to the papers of many Scottish distilleries with papers going back to the 18th century. If he could have made a case for an earlier date for aging whisky, he would have. This could have helped market their products using the archive - a goal all of us pursued.

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Unread postby gillmang » Mon Jun 05, 2006 2:58 pm

I know what he means about flavoured white dog (in fact that may be the origin of the mint julep and I always said or rather felt one shouldn't make a julep with liquor that is too good). E.g., in Byrn's book written in the 1870's, he gives a recipe for Irish "uisquebaugh" (as a compound drink) which is a highly spiced and a sweetened drink. Clearly this hearkens back to the kind of drink that gentleman is referring to. However I know that many spirits were aged in wood in 1809 because M'Harry refers to them being imported in the holds of ships and being improved by the voyage. These had to have been shipped in wood. M'Harry refers to their "natural" colour, i.e., evidently from oak. He does not specifically refer to whisky (Irish or Scots) but certainly to brandy and rum and I believe there would have been Scotch whisky imports too. Even if there wasn't, British whisky merchants would have learned from shipping reports of the improvement of spirits when consigned by ocean voyage and would have wanted to secure that for the domestic market. How? By shipping the spirits out of the country and then back, this is when the clippers were used for this purpose and this was done well into the 1800's including by American wholesalers of rye whiskey and bourbon. It is still done for a Norwegian acquavit, the Linie brand, and possibly for one or two Scotch blends still on the market. It must have been done early on with malt whisky. Malt whisky came before grain whisky and there had to be a luxury market for it in Britain, and that is why sherry barrels were used, from Spain, once the sherry was gone. That had nothing to do with America or (IMO) with blending. What he is talking about is I think more what the crofters drank. People who distilled in the rural areas especially illicit makers probably covered the spirit in spice and sugar to make it more palatable, creating the first toddy. I think what he was talking about in terms of the onset of cask aging (or may have been) is the first industrial-scale, i.e., methodical, aging of whisky, and I agree with that. The Scots Lairds in my view in 1800 would have kept whiskey in a wooden cask, probably one that used to hold a sweet fortified wine.

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Unread postby cowdery » Mon Jun 05, 2006 8:18 pm

I have a fondness for bad historical novels set in Kentucky. In most of these, the gentlemen typically dissolve a spoonful of sugar into their whiskey.
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Unread postby gillmang » Mon Jun 05, 2006 9:59 pm

Even well-aged bourbon benefits from a tad of sugar. But that whiskey was unlikely to be white and raw in my view, not if drunk by gentlemen.

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Unread postby gillmang » Tue Jun 06, 2006 7:16 am

I was looking again at M. La Fayette Byrn's The Complete Practical Distiller (1875). In his comments on building a distillery he states that "everyone knows" an aged spirit is preferable to a new one. He says when supply of aged spirits is short, ways should be found to imitate the effects of age. Then he engages in a familiar discussion (it appears in various parts of the book) on coloring spirits or hastening their aging by artificially cooling and heating rooms in which barrels are stored for a short period (only weeks, which he says equals one year's aging). From this I infer spirits were generally aged 1-2 years. M'Harry (1809) as I said referred to two years aging of spirits in his extended remarks on "common gin". Two years, depending on the type of cask, will produce a tolerable bourbon or malt whisky. McCarthy's made a 3 year old malt whisky in Oregon a few years ago as a microdistillery and it was very good. Byrn also says that the "barrel staves" remove the "essential oils" (the fusel oils in new spirit). Also, in discussing a column still which was new apparatus then (relatively new - M'Harry in 1809 referred also to an early form of patent still) he says it is 18 feet tall. One can see that the spirits even twice rectified in such stills would have had some congeneric character because the stills were too small to rectify perfectly the spirit. So in other words the understanding of the effect of wood was advanced, it was known that spirit and wood interacting converted congeners over time to more flavourful results, and aging was practiced even with regard to column still spirits. Byrn seems to suggest that "cisterns, presumably large wooden vats, were the main storage vehicle in distilleries. He says they were used to "save room" (in relation to small barrels that is, now I see where the expression "small wood", used in Scots and Canadian distilleries, comes from). But even spirits held a year or two in a large vat (possibly in some type of solera arrangement) would age, maybe not as fast as if held in small barrels, but aging would occur and its benefits were recognised.

I recall too Mike posted some time ago an amusing exchange about a competition, around the same time or earlier, between 21 year old bourbon and rye whiskeys, so long-aging was known then too. Byrn was a francophile and the part of the book devoted to distillery contruction is actually an extract from a French writer on the topic. In other words, there is no reason to think spirits were aged differently in Europe. Brandy especially, which is an old article of commerce, would have been long aged, and clearly according to Byrn geneva gin and I believe malt whisky received some aging in wood big or small too. This was 1875 and the question is, did the same occur in 1775? I think it did on a small scale.

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Unread postby cowdery » Tue Jun 06, 2006 5:12 pm

gillmang wrote:This was 1875 and the question is, did the same occur in 1775? I think it did on a small scale.


I wouldn't be so cavalier about the extent to which things can change in 100 years.

My personal belief is that the benefits of aging in wood were not unknown in the 18th century or even earlier, either generally or on the western frontier. That aging would have been generally practiced in 18th century Pennsylvania, Kentucky or Tennessee is unlikely simply because the supply/demand curve was such that aging was a luxury they couldn't afford. My contention all along has been that speculation about when aging was "discovered," at least in the context of the western frontier in the 18th century, begins with the false assumption that it was "discovered" in that place and time.

We shouldn't be talking in terms of knowledge. Let's take as a given that the benfits of aging were known, if not universally, then at least widely.

The more I learn, the more convinced I become that the benefits of aging in wood were known, if not to all then to many, but aging was not generally practiced until the mid-19th century for a variety of reasons.

Taxes or no, the producer wanted to sell the product as soon as possible after it was made. If we want to talk about aging by producers, we're talking about something that didn't become universal until the end of the 19th century, when people like Taylor began to see the benefit of the producer, rather than the distributor, controlling the product.

With distributors, it is very had to separate aging from doctoring.
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Unread postby cowdery » Tue Jun 06, 2006 5:16 pm

gillmang wrote:Even well-aged bourbon benefits from a tad of sugar. But that whiskey was unlikely to be white and raw in my view, not if drunk by gentlemen.


Quite right. The gentlemen in question generally have a couple of barrels in the cellar and when the age is mentioned, it is not unusual for it to be double-digit.

How historically accurate are these novels? Hard to tell, but I'm talking about fiction written in the 20th century.
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Unread postby gillmang » Tue Jun 06, 2006 7:51 pm

On being cavalier, I don't think so, since I suggested in my posts that before the mid-1800's, whiskey aging could not have been methodical because there was no mass production as later occurred. But even the horse-drawn carts and packhorses that delivered whiskey to market in the early 1800's and later 1700's (and there was a market - see M'Harry) delivered it, often labouriously and over long distance, in wood. When it got to where it was going, it was (to a greater or lesser degree) matured. I believe too inventory in any business doesn't always move fast. If a barrel in a small charred keg was transported 20 miles in a bouncing cart and held in a basement for a year, that whiskey would have been matured, it would have encountered friction, temperature change and the effects of wood, all mentioned in M'Harry as contributing to maturation. It would have been recognisable as bourbon, in fact. Was all whiskey sold like that then? No, much of it was sold new, I know that. But some was aged (as M'Harry said, had an "aged taste"), and that would have been the best of it. I think only the scale of production changed in 100 years.

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Unread postby cowdery » Tue Jun 06, 2006 11:15 pm

I think we're saying the same thing.

In the 18th century, some aging occurred incidentally and some may have been done deliberately by end users who had the wherewithal to put down a barrel of whiskey, just as they might put down a case of wine. As I said, the benefits of aging were not unknown, so it wouldn't have been a big revelation when they tasted some that had been aged. There never was a eureka moment.
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