You may remember that last fall, The Glenrothes Distillery ran a contest offering a few lucky single malt Scotch lovers the opportunity of a a lifetime.  If they were chosen from the thousands of eager whisky drinkers who applied, they would be immersed in the whisky making experience at The Glenrothes Distillery.

My original blog post on the contest can be found here.

From the thousands of entries from as far afield as Albania to Zimbabwe, this huge group was winnowed down to four finalists from Taiwan, England (where two hailed from) and Ohio, USA, and they were selected to go head to head, and nose to nose, in the glens of Speyside, the home of The Glenrothes Single Malt Scotch Whisky.

Finalists faced off in everything from gauging the purity of the water source at the distillery’s two springs to milling the malt to achieve the golden proportions of husk, grits and flour to making casks at the cooperage and rolling them into the warehouse. The contest culminated in a blind tasting, and individual blending and bottling, in the distillery’s fabled Inner Sanctum, where Eliott Edelstein, the American representative, remembers “sniffing and blending [our] way through three casks that had never been used for bottling before. We then took on the holy grail of taste-tests: every vintage whisky ever put out from The Glenrothes, from Vintage 1975 through to the new 1995; it was truly a religious moment.”

Ronnie Cox, The Glenrothes’ Global Brand Heritage Director, declared all the entrants winners, meaning this duel ended in more of a draw than an all out thrashing. “The Glenrothes is a whisky un-rivaled in terms of heritage and uniqueness, from its distinctive vintage offering through to its commitment to unearthing the next generation of would-be master blenders, via programs such as Whisky Maker. Not only does something like Whisky Maker unite the passion felt globally by people for The Glenrothes, it ultimately invests in the quality of the dram in the bottle, to be enjoyed by enthusiasts of The Glenrothes for years to come.”

The Glenrothes is bottled only in vintage year marked bottles, so they have no “standard” 10 or 12 year old bottling. Glenrothes was founded in 1879 and is a Speyside distillery owned by the Edrington Group who also own The Macallan, Highland Park, Glenturret and The Famous Grouse. Glenrothes is the signature single malt of the Cutty Sark blend. About 2% of their output is bottled as a single malt.

Below is a video of the Glenrothes Whisky Maker experience.

For more video logs from Whisky Maker, search “The Glenrothes Whisky Maker” on YouTube or www.theglenrothes.com