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Like building a Ferrari, there are many different components and stages to follow in order to create whisky. Up until the point of distillation these processes are focussed on crafting the building blocks of flavour though, in the same way that before a Ferrari can be built each component part must first be made. Where a Ferrari requires a crank shaft, pistons and spark plugs, scotch whisky requires aldehydes, esters and of course alcohols. These component parts that will become flavour in whisky are collectively known as congeners.

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Scotch whisky distillation is commonly a two stage distillation process, requiring two separate distillations to achieve a spirit of good quality, with high enough ethyl alcohol but yet is safe to drink. The second, or final distillation, is called the spirit distillation and is where a great deal of the magic happens. Hence it is the spirit distillation that we shall be looking at today and why it is like tuning a Ferrari. The following sections will take you from being a whisky novice to a pro in just a few minutes, so keep reading!

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The aforementioned building blocks of flavour, congeners, are all created during the fermentation process that uses yeast to transform sugar extracted from malted barley into a simple beer. This beer, called wash, is then distilled in the wash still to increase it’s alcoholic content to somewhere between 25% and 30% by volume. The resulting distillate is called low wines and is ready to be refined further during the spirit still distillation.

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How does distillation work? The pure stuff, ethyl alcohol, has a boiling point of 78.3°C, whereas water has a boiling point of 100°C. Therefore, within an extravagant giant copper kettle such as a whisky still, when the low wines inside are heated, the alcohol will begin to evaporate before the water. Hazzah!!! Although the vapour will carry water with it, this vapour will have a higher concentration of alcohols than the low wines from where it came. When the vapour is cooled, condensed and collected it will become clear new make spirit at around 70% abv, ready to be reduced in strength and filled into oak casks for maturation.

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These are the basics of whisky distillation and provide the foundations for us to move onto the really exciting stuff. Firstly let’s look at the whisky spirit still itself, because this is the V12 engine of whisky-making and the one we have at Crafty Distillery is just a wee bit special.

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Whisky stills are the copper monoliths of shininess that feature at the centre of most distilleries. They come in many different shapes and sizes, which is very important because the shape and size will impact the spirit’s flavour and quality. They are also heated in different ways. The ‘old method’, which is still used by a select few, is with a direct flame. The vast majority, however, heat the still via tubes within the still through which steam is forced through. At Crafty Distillery we have taken a different approach.

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When you visit us for a scotch whisky tour you will see that our whisky still has a lovely copper exterior and interior. Hidden inside the walls and floor of the still however, is an oil filled jacket that is heated with electric elements. Rather than heating the liquid from a relatively small area, like most stills, our whisky still is heated from the walls and the base too. The result is a greater surface area being introduced at a higher temperature, creating more Maillard reaction (the same reaction that browns food when cooking), that whilst being extremely energy efficient also helps us to tease the spirit out over a longer period. More time allows us to achieve much more accurate cut points too. The relatively smaller sized still allows much more control, to take across exactly what we want to.

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When Gioacchino Colombo, Ferrari’s first engine designer, set about creating the Prancing Horse’s inaugural V12 powerhouse, he had a blank slate on which to design. We had the same freedom when we set about designing our whisky still. Hence we created the still we have today based on our unique requirements and to raise the bar of spirit quality to the highest possible level. Now let’s talk about the all-important copper.

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Traditionally it was a great material, it was an available metal, which was easy to bend and shape (relatively) and as a really nice by product, it quickly and easily distributed heat evenly across its entire surface. Neither of which is really particularly relevant to the production in modern times. There is however still one effect that is very relevant. Copper acts as a catalyst for the spirit. It reacts with sulfur compounds, to actually remove some of them from the spirit.

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Among the Sulfur compounds you find an array of tasting notes which include – cheesy, cabbage, rotten, eggs, to name a few. Yummy eh? No!. So you may think, the more copper contact the better. But the answer to that is not so simple. As with anything in life there is balance, and finding it is key for this one. At Crafty Distillery, we looked long and hard at different levels of copper contact, from the most extreme surface area contact possible to the least. The exact tune finally being found, after no less than 12months. So what does this all have to do with tuning a Ferrari?

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Once all of the component parts of a Ferrari engine have been assembled by hand and fitted into the finished car, tuning that engine will take the performance to the next level. The fine skills of adjusting the air-fuel mix, valve timing and ignition system can make a denture-rattling difference to a car’s zero-to-hero performance. And it’s no different for making our whisky new make spirit either. Let’s take a look at why.

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Firstly lets look at the fusel alcohols, which are made up of a load of different alcohols, some rather tasty, but some very dangerous. All of which have their own unique boiling point either before ethyl alcohol (remember it boils at 78.3c) or after.

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Methanol is probably the most well known of the fusel alcohols, as at high concentrations it can make people go blind or worse, thankfully its boiling point is low at 65°C, so on the whole it is separated from the rest of the distillate. Lesser commonly heard of fusel alcohols like proponol which boils after ethyl at about 97°C, is musty and unpleasant. Other fusels surrounding ethyl can make it hot and spicy and generally unpleasant on their own. To sum up, some are tasty, as part of the mix and some are outright unpleasant, with one being very dangerous. This is where the tuning comes in – Where to start and where to stop?!

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This first part of this distillation run is called the foreshots or heads which includes the famous methanol, it will run for a good few degrees celsius after it’s boiling point and then the decision to cut/stop the heads is made, (pretty quickly in our case). We want to move to the next portion because the first part of the distillation simply has the most vibrant flavours. That being said it needs to be tuned for body and balance of flavour.

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The next portion is called the spirits cut, or hearts, this middle section in simple speak runs from a very vibrant start through to, well, depending where you stop a very musty and unpleasant end!  Of course the balance and where to cut is very important. We need to bring just enough of the more difficult latter part of the hearts, which brings balance to the vibrancy of the first part, without it overcoming that vibrancy. This hearts portion will be the new make spirit. This will be collected and set aside ready to go into the oak casks.

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The final portion of the distillation will become progressively more musty and intense. We call this feints or tails. The feints… well the less said about these the better, They’re disgusting on their own!

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Like the art of tuning a Ferrari engine, finding the balance between the heads, hearts and tails will determine the characteristics and quality of the new make spirit. When determining the exact points when the spirit’s cut, or hearts, should start and stop, Crafty’s master distiller Craig Rankin took hundreds of spirit samples throughout the distillation run. By carefully analysing the samples in chronological order, including testing with both scientific lab analysis and our founder club members (who were a very large squad of whisky lovers from the general public) he could clearly identify the precise boundaries between the desirable and undesirable balance within the new make spirit.

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From this process the actual portion of the distillation that we use for our new make spirit is very small. We never collect that extra bit of liquid just to up our capacity, and collect only the finest quality spirit for our Billy & Co whisky. We also take our cut relatively early on into the run to retain the fruity and vibrant flavours that were created in our lengthy fermentation process, and keep those heavy feinty notes in check.

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As Ferrari is well aware with their 11,500 annual production of sports cars, maintaining the highest quality is often at the sacrifice of quantity. The processes that we have chosen for producing our Billy & Co new make spirit takes a long time and costs a great deal more than the industry standard. But, like Ferrari, we feel it is necessary if you want to go the extra mile and offer quality that is without compromise.

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Large scale whisky production is a very industrial process that requires balancing quality and consistency with yield of alcohol. Like those skilled mechanics who have dedicated their lives to finely tuning performance engines, we are not striving for high yields and turnover. It’s a simple case of being passionate about performance, or in our case, quality and flavour. The difference is that at Crafty we will never be in a race. Our Billy & Co single malt takes time, patience and more time. Once we have done all the fine tuning possible during the spirit distillation, we let the oak casks work their magic. And maturation is a whole other story.

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On that note, if you want to deepen your knowledge further by learning a bit about whisky maturation, have a read of our other Blue Bolt Blog article: Does whisky really get better with age? And be sure to sign up to our Blue Bolt Bulletin to receive our regular articles and snippets of distilling straight into your inbox.