CRAFT by Under My Host® Issue No. 18 Made in America: Part III | Page 98

W W W. C R A F T BY U M H . C O M
D A V E
P I C K E R E L L
T he R ise of
A merican S ingle M alt W hiskey
In order to fully understand the rise of American single malt whiskey, it is
helpful to take a peak back to the early days of craft beer. When the craft beer
movement kicked off, the bigger companies were essentially making water
and light water. There was no real competition from the big boys in a wide
range of products … IPA, APA, witbier, kolsch, and so on. There was plen-
ty of room for the nacient craft beer guys to make great tasty beers without
having to compete directly with the larger companies. This was not the case
when the craft spirits movement kicked off. The big companies were already
competing with good quality products in every single spirit category … except
American single malt.
Competition in the American single malt arena is a bit like the hunters that
were out in the woods setting up a base camp. They heard a bear off in the
distance and decided that it might be wise to leave and come back later to
finish up. As they were leaving, one of the hunters stopped to put on running
shoes. Someone looked over at him and said, “What are you doing? You can’t
outrun a bear!” He replied, “I don’t have to outrun the bear, I just need to out-
run one of you!” Many, if not most, of the craft spirits in the American single malt
space are not trying to be “American Scotch”, they are just trying to carve out
a unique space where they can make a good, tasty spirit and stand out a bit
from the crowd.
Federal regulations in the United States further complicate the landscape of
American single malt whiskeys. The standards of identity for American dis-
tilled spirits are spelled out in 27 CFR 5.22 which requires that malt whiskey
be stored in charred, new oak containers. The United States is the only coun-
try in the world that requires malt whiskey to be stored in charred new oak
containers; everywhere else in the world, malt whiskey is stored in previously
used charred oak barrels. This means that American producers of single malt
must either comply and start the maturation process with new charred bar-
rels or employ used barrels for aging and call the product “whiskey distilled
from a malt mash”, a rarely used and even less understood category.
Some consider these regulations over restrictive, others see this as an oppor-
tunity to set their own course to make delicious products that are not neces-
sarily conforming to global expectations for single malt. Balcones Texas Sin-
gle Malt Whiskey, Corsair Small Batch Triple Smoke, Hamilton Distillers Del
Bac Dorado Mesquite Smoked Aged Malt Whiskey, Hillrock Estate Distillery
Single Malt Whiskey with OPX finish, and Wasmund’s Single Malt Whiskey
are great examples of distillers who are bringing American single malt whis-
key to the forefront.
Balcones uses 100-percent unpeated malted barley, ages this whiskey first
in several different sized barrels, and then marries these spirits into one big
barrel to finish out the maturation process. Corsair smokes their malt with
three different fuels: cherry wood, peat, and beechwood, then marries these
malts and ages in new charred oak barrels. Hamilton Distillers Del Bac Do-
rado malts their barley over mesquite instead of the traditional peat. Hill-
rock takes a more traditional approach with estate grown barley malted and
smoked with Speyside peat, fermented in a traditional washback system,
aged first in new charred oak barrels then moved to once used bourbon bar-
rels, and finished first in Pedro Ximenez barrels and then Oloroso barrels. Fi-
nally, Wasmund’s uses apple and cherry wood to smoke their malted barley.
All these whiskeys have achieved high recognition, Balcones, Corsair Triple
Smoke, and Del Bac Dorado have scored double gold medals at the San Fran-
cisco International Spirits Competition. Wasmund’s scored 94.5 points in
Jim Murray’s Whiskey Bible. Hillrock Estate Single Malt scored 97 points
from Wine Enthusiast as the highest rating ever received in the malt whiskey
category globally.
The American single malt category has not yet achieved the status and recog-
nition accorded single malts from Ireland, Scotland, or Japan, but it deserves
consideration. There are many absolutely wonderful products using both
time-honored, traditional approaches and novel techniques to produce world
class spirits.
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