‘Terroir-driven distillation’ is no mere marketing wheeze. The logistics required to arrange our production around 40 individual Irish farms, keeping their grain separate, increases our raw material costs by 10% – before we even begin distilling. Yet this bespoke approach adds even greater challenges: it means we are totally at the mercy of nature.
This effect was felt most acutely for barley grown in 2018. As explained in our recent article, the 2019 harvest was a vast improvement from the year before, which had seen spring sowing hit hard by the Beast from the East, flooding, and then a disastrous drought in the summer. In many cases fertilisers were either simply washed away, or worse, delayed take up by the plants in to grain head rather than leaves.
Buying exclusively from Irish malting barley growers means we have to play the cards we’re dealt. Average protein levels for the 2018 harvest were much higher than usual – in the range of 10 -12% versus the much more favourable 6.9-9.4% for this year. Naturally in any growing season each terroir, each farm, copes differently with the elements; but year versus year, the protein trend was wildly different.
Normally a term that interests athletes or dieticians, ‘protein’ can be a rather abstract notion to those unfamiliar with the distiller’s domain. Why, then, are we so concerned about the ever-changing levels?