Making Whiskey (Whisky)

Making Whiskey: Malting, Mashing and Fermentation

“Glenlivet it has castles three,
Drumin, Blairfindy and Deskie,
And also one distillery,
More famous than the castles three.”
Anonymous



Whiskey is made around the world from Scotland to Japan, the United States and Finland and even the French have gotten in on the act, but there are three things which all distilleries share for their product to be called “whiskey”:

  • The fermentation of grains, usually barley but others too;
  • Distillation to an alcohol content below 95%; and
  • Ageing of the liquor in wooden casks.

If you don’t comply with these three requirements then you are not making whiskey.

Typically, whiskey is made by distilling a fermented “mash”, made from cereal grains, and after distillation, wooden casks are used to age the liquid to produce a more rounded, smoother finish.  There are a lot of variations on this theme, which accounts for the wide variety of whiskies available on the market, but this variation also confuses many drinkers as to what they are actually imbibing.

To summarize, whiskey making involves:

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