Crabbie Chain Pier Lowland Single Malt
The John Crabbie whisky brand was relaunched in January 2018. It has since released a range of independent bottlings aged from eight to 40 years old from third party distilleries, located around Scotland. Philip Day explores Crabbie Chain Pier Lowland Single Malt and includes his personal tasting notes.
Chain Pier Single Malt
Pioneering Scotch whisky brand, John Crabbie & Co, has announced the inaugural release from its Chain Pier Distillery in Edinburgh, with just 234 bottles entering the market.
The first Single Malt to be produced in Edinburgh for almost 100 years, Chain Pier Single Malt will be the first release from the Granton-based site, which was set up by Halewood Artisanal Spirits as an experimental pilot distillery whilst the larger Bonnington distillery for Crabbie Whisky was still under construction.
A brief history of John Crabbie & Co
John Crabbie was a leading light in the Edinburgh whisky scene during the 19th century, acting as distiller, blender and bottler from his base in Leith, and also producing the eponymous Green Ginger Wine for which John Crabbie & Co. later became famous. The whisky brand, founded in 1801 had disappeared like many others with the decline of the Scotch whisky industry and of the port of Leith during the 20th century. Today, the Crabbie brand is perhaps best known for its alcoholic ginger beer.
John Crabbie & Co. became one of the founding partners (together with Andrew Usher, William Sanderson James Watson and others) of Edinburgh’s North British Distillery, formed in 1885 to challenge the monopoly the Distillers Company Ltd (DCL) had over the supply of grain whisky. John Crabbie was the conglomerate’s first chairman.
Crabbie’s was eventually sold to DCL in 1963, and then again to Macdonald & Muir in the 1980s. It was purchased by its current owners Halewood International in 2007.
In 2017 Liverpool-based Halewood Wines & Spirits applied for planning permission to transform a disused warehouse on the Forth Industrial Estate in Granton Harbour, North Edinburgh, into a gin and whisky micro-distillery.
The distillery would produce a ‘modest’ amount of small-batch gin’, while the whisky made would also be on a ‘small scale’. The distillery began production in December 2018.
The John Crabbie whisky brand was relaunched in January that year and since the company has released a range of independent bottlings aged from eight to 40 years old from third party distilleries around Scotland.
Not long afterwards, Plans for a second new and larger distillery, close to John Crabbie’s original premises at Yardheads, Great Junction Street, were unveiled, with the company announcing that it intended to invest £7m to build a new distillery at Graham Street in Leith, to be named ‘Bonnington Distillery.’
John Crabbie distillery Leith
The John Crabbie distillery had originally been earmarked for Granton Harbour, but it was felt that the new site in Leith was a better fit with the heritage of the Crabbie name and Leith’s historic status as the epicentre of the Scotch whisky industry.
At the time the plans were made, David Brown, Managing Director of John Crabbie & Co. commented: “The senior management and family owners of Halewood felt that the time was right to bring Crabbie back to its roots in Edinburgh and in Scotch whisky, and the decision to build the distillery, in Leith was taken.”
Now that the Bonnington site in Leith is up and running, the facilities at the Granton Harbour distillery have now been dismantled.
In an online media tasting session Jamie Lockhart, Distillery Manager at Bonnington stated that the smaller micro distillery at the old site served a very useful purpose, enabled experimentation with temperature, yeasts, mashes, etc., in a controlled environment, in order to “create the spirit we wanted.”
James Stocker, Marketing director added: “Our Chain Pier distillery was only operational for just a year (2018-19), yet it gave our team a great opportunity to continue John Crabbie’s legacy of innovation – handcrafting unique distillations and trialling everything from malt types to custom casks, as well as developing our cask strategy”.
Speaking at the time the first new spirit was laid down at the Granton Harbour site, David Brown stated:“Laying down our first cask of spirit is a significant milestone for the rejuvenated business and signals the return of single malt whisky production to Edinburgh after an absence of nearly a century.”
When it comes to the whisky itself, David Brown said: “Our intention is to focus on single malts. John Crabbie was both an independent bottler and a producer, and we intend to follow in that tradition.” Not being drawn on further details of the new spirit, he simply stated: “I don’t want to give away too much about the style of whisky that we are aiming for at Leith, save to say that it won’t be a traditional ‘Lowland’ style.”
Let’s look at the expression in detail.
Crabbie Chain Pier Lowland Single Malt – detail
Over the year that the Chain Pier Distillery was operational, there was a yield of just 39 casks, making this release one of the scarcest launches to date. It had all been distilled on site using a 500 litre copper pot still.
The first barrels were filled in 2019. During the online media tasting, head distiller James Lockhart, referred to the production process as being “almost like a home-brew set-up.” He fermented the wash for around 40-72 hours and during distillation “we only cut the middle portion and didn’t use the feints or fore shots.” It’s “pure middle cut spirit.”
Matured in heavily charred (no.3 char) virgin American oak casks and bottled at 57% ABV, the Chain Pier Single Malt is light and fruity on the nose with hints of berries, forest fruits and green apples, boasting rich caramel and sweet malt and ginger spice on the palate, rounded off with a long, sweet and spicy finish.
Asked to comment on the profile of the whisky at the online media tasting, Master blender Kirstie McCallum confided: “We didn’t do anything apart from put it into a bottle. It’s the taste of whisky as it came out of the cask.”
Crabbie Chain Pier Lowland Single Malt – personal tasting notes
(Official sample kindly provided by Supplied by John Crabbie & Co. from their pilot Distillery in Granton Edinburgh, through Burt Greener Communications)
- Colour: Rich amber (natural colour)
- Nose: Engagingly rich cereal maltiness with fruity orchard fruit notes and a hint of citrus zest. A mixture of wood spices and vanilla with an added caramelised or burnt toffee aroma occasionally breaking through.
- Taste: Richly spiced – black pepper and ginger fire, sweet green apple and other fruity notes are discernible but do not overpower the smooth whisky spirit, vanilla flavours and dark chocolate with a hint of butterscotch adds further complexity. A dry mouth feel, unctuous, balanced and well-rounded, with a stylish, smooth and mellow sweetness. The addition of a few drops of water brings out a pleasant but distinctive waxy texture while ripe peaches are added to the fruit profile.
- Finish: A lengthy, sweet and spicy finish.
- It is hard to believe that this is a young whisky. In short, the maturation period has created a well-rounded, smooth, layered classic dram. The peppery warmth and the spiced fruity notes make it very accessible, at a reasonable price point.
- The quality of the liquid is really a testament to the distilling team and Master Blender Dr Kirstie McCallum and a great preview of what’s to come from the Crabbie whisky brand.
- ABV: It’s bottled at cask strength:57% ABV
- RRP: £65
- Crabbie Chain Pier Lowland Single Malt is available to order from specialist whisky shops. (NB. only 234 bottles will be available in total)
For all the latest news and launches
- Facebook: @HalewoodArtisanalSpirits
- Twitter: @HalewoodIntern1
- Instagram: @halewood_artisanal_spirits
- Website: https://halewood-int.com/
References
- https://halewood-int.com/
- https://whiskymag.com/story/a-capital-revival
- https://scotchwhisky.com/magazine/latest-news/19139/john-crabbie-plans-7m-leith-distillery/
- https://www.masterofmalt.com/distilleries/north-british-distillery
- https://www.scotchwhisky.net/distilleries/chain_pier.htm
- https://www.scotsman.com/business/crabbies-confirms-first-edinburgh-whisky-100-years-1425175
- https://scotchwhisky.com/magazine/latest-news/15549/crabbie-s-owner-plans-edinburgh-distillery/
- https://crabbiewhisky.com/
Images
Images kindly provided with thanks by Burt Greener Communications