The Uk Tour is a continuation of our 10th Anniversary celebrations. The Land Rover has been given a short rest after returning from Europe and now George will be driving it around the UK carrying out a series of tastings and in store pouring. To commemorate the Tour we have bottled a cask Strength Machir Bay which is only available from the shops we visit during the tour. This is a limited release of only 648 bottles. Follow us on Facebook and twitter for updates during the tour.
Follow the link to our ‘Events’ page to find out when we will be near you – http://kilchomandistillery.com/events
Here it is everyone… our confirmed schedule for the 10th Anniversary Tour which kicks off next week in Belgium. Don’t forget to follow us on Facebook and Twitter for more info. You can also see our route on an interactive map here. Not sure what to expect? Take a look at our video from last year here.
SEPTEMBER
Tues 1st Belgium Heusden Bonding dram http://www.thebondingdram.eu/
Wed 2nd Belgium Knesselare Malt Whisky Corner http://www.maltwhiskycorner.be
Thurs 3rd Belgium Wechter BU-V – Werchter /
Fri 4th Belgium Frameries Distri Dubuisson – Frameries /
Sat 5th Luxembourg Shopping-Center Massen http://www.massen.lu/cms/index.php/de/
Sun 20th Netherlands Vroenhoven http://www.drankenshopbams.nl/schotsiersedag.html
Mon 21st Netherlands Wageningen Woudenberg http://www.woudenbergdranken.nl/
Tues 22nd Netherlands Bilthoven Verhaar whisky shop http://www.whiskyshop.nl/
Wed 23rd Netherlands Musselkanaal Frans Muthert http://www.fransmuthert.nl/
Thurs 24th Netherlands Bergen op Zoom DH17 http://www.dh17.nl/2015/07/kilchoman-european-tour-2015-komt-naar-dh17/
Sat 26th France Whisky Live Paris
Sun 27th France Whisky Live Paris
Mon 28th France Whisky Live Paris
Wed 30th Germany Schwetzingen Barbara’s Wine Yards www.barbaras-wine-yards.de
OCTOBER
Thurs 1st Germany Würzburg Scotland’s Glory www.scotlands-glory.de
Fri 2nd Germany Gifhorn wiertz genussvoll www.wiertz-genussvoll.de
Sat 3rd Germany Hamburg Weinquelle www.weinquelle.com
Sun 4th Germany Kiel Mc Lang’s www.mc-langs.de
Tues 6th Denmark Herning Uhrskov Vinhandel http://www.uhrskov-vine.dk/
Wed 7th Denmark Aarhus Chas-E, Vinkyperen and Mahlers Vinhandel
Thurs 8th Denmark Ballerup Skjold Burne Ballerup og Skjold Burne Stenløse
Fri 9th Sweden Malmo Bishops Arms, Gustav Adolfs Torg
Sat 10th Sweden Stockholm The Swedish Whisky Society
Sun 11th Sweden Sodertalje Telje Whisky Society
This year Kilchoman sponsored the first ever UK Saltwater Fly Fishing Festival in St Mawes, Cornwall. Competitors who came from as far as the Czech Republic competed over 2 days to catch Sea bass and Mullet from the shore around St Mawes using saltwater flys. Kilchoman’s Kathy Wills was one of the competitors but sadly didn’t manage to come top of the leader board. Kilchoman will be sponsoring the event next year, the dates are 15th -18th September. Follow the link to a video of this years event put together by Angling Active.
The 2015 harvest is finally underway here at Kilchoman. In the coming weeks around 100 tonnes of malting barley will be harvested from the fields surrounding the distillery and after a bit of shovelling, bubbling, maturing and bottling it will become Scotland’s only single malt created on-site from Barley to Bottling.
We are yet to analyse this year’s crop however after a rather damp June and July the weather was much improved from early August and hopes are high that the 2015 harvest will be as good as ever! Once the harvesting is complete the barley will be dried and stored ready to be floor malted in two tonne batches here at the distillery throughout 2016. Click here to see an animation showing how we transform our barley into Kilchoman single malt whisky.
This year we released the 5th Edition of our annually released 100% Islay range, despite being the newest and smallest distillery on Islay we are proud to be the only distillery in Scotland producing Single Malt Whisky using traditional farm distillery methods. We look forward to tasting this year’s crop sometime in the 2020’s but we have quite a bit of work to do between now and then…
On Monday September the 7th at 10am we will release our first ever 7 year old whisky. The Limited Edition 2008 Vintage is a vatting of fresh ex American bourbon barrels filled in July 2008 and bottled in August 2015. This latest release is a continuation of our by-annually released Vintage range, having previously bottled 2006 and 2007 Vintages in 2011 and 2013.
Anthony Wills, Kilchoman Founder and Managing Director; ‘The 2008 Vintage is a classic bourbon barrel aged Kilchoman however the additional maturation has added layers of soft fruit and sweetness not seen in previous releases. This latest vintage release makes me very excited about the future development of Kilchoman single malt.’
The 2008 Vintage will be available to buy from our Whisky Shop on Monday at 10am priced at £55.50. It will also be available through our retail partners worldwide in the coming weeks. Please contact us it you’d like more info.
Due to the limited number of bottles the 2008 Vintage will be limited to one bottle per person from the Kilchoman website.
The Kilchoman barley is ripening nicely in the recent good weather we have been enjoying on Islay. The good weather appears to have disappeared for the time being but the barley continues to grow nevertheless. In a few weeks the combine will be dusted off and put into action, all being well the barley will be dried and stored within a month.
Smoked Gigha Halibut use old Kilchoman barrels to smoke their delicious halibut with and we would like to congratulate them on just winning 3 gold stars in the Great Taste Awards as well as being in the top 50 foods of the awards.
To be in this lofted company each of these products has been part of an exhaustive judging process: 10,000 entries blind-tasted by over 400 judges at 49 judging days in six different locations.
We like to believe the Kilchoman barrels made the difference!
(Smoked Gigha Halibut with the Inaugural Release)
We are delighted to announce that all three of our ‘core releases’ as we call them, Machir Bay, Loch Gorm and 100% Islay have won medals at the 2015 IWSC (International Wine and Spirits Competition). Machir Bay won a Gold, Loch Gorm a Silver Outstanding and 100% Islay won a Silver. We are very pleased to have done so well at what is widely considered the foremost whisky and spirits awards of the year. We’re on a bit of an awards hot streak! Always nice to win awards.
Machir Bay has been awarded Master of the under 12 year old Islay Single Malt category in The Spirits Business 2015 Scotch Whisky Masters. Gold Medals were also awarded to Kilchoman Loch Gorm and 100% Islay 5th Edition completing a full house of medals for our current range.
Anthony Wills, Kilchoman Founder and Managing Director; ‘It is a fantastic achievement for Kilchoman to go up against such tough competition and come out on top. It is testament to all the daily hard work done by the distillery team’
The local bragging rights are ours! Take a look at the official results here
Most at the distillery have now recovered from the chaos of Feis Ile, the distillery seems almost calm in comparison to the craziness of festival week. We hope everyone who made the journey enjoyed a week of Islay merriment! At Kilchoman we had a fantastic week of events which culminated in our open day on Thursday when music, food and most importantly Kilchoman single malt were heartily appreciated from dawn to dusk. A record number of visitors to Kilchoman had free rein to snoop around (almost) every corner of the distillery and taste our full range of whisky including many early releases and exclusive single cask samples which are no-longer available.
Our thanks go to everyone who came along to celebrate 10 years of Kilchoman and we hope to see you all again next year… if not sooner!!
Below, a very proud Anthony Wills stands with the first cask ever filled at Kilchoman! It has been an eventful 10 years since Anthony founded Kilchoman back in 2005 and we look forward to many more years to come!
