Woodbrook, Co. Wicklow

Arcadian barley, from our secret garden of delights, explores the natural flavours, intensity & honesty of old ways. Out of necessity since the dawn of time, peat has been the primary fuel source in rural Ireland, with its sweet pungency familiar to generations gathered around the ancient hearths of thatch-roofed blackhouses. Farmer, & often illicit distiller, dried barley over peat smoke infusing the same heady aromatics, an ancient custom that died out from the 1850s. With this Single Farm Origin’s barley, Irish grown & Irish peated, we return to the earthy, wild & raw tradition rooted in the distant past.

However, one of the more curious notes about this bottling is that it uses barley grown on fields that no longer exist – indeed, these fields are now occupied by a modern housing estate, such is the need for progress. We’ll never have barley from here again. Therefore Woodbrook represents our first “lost” Single Farm Origin – hopefully there won’t be too many more.

Appearance: Pale straw with oils that are in no hurry.

Nose: Lemon skins, beeswax and recently-extinguished candles. Freshly-torched crème brûlée. Very fresh, with meadow flowers and hemp alongside a light, complex touch of medicine cupboard.

Taste: Dry spices, dry rub and shortbread biscuit. The ashes of a beach campfire. Preserved lemons and Lapsang Souchong tea. Very citrusy – lemon oils and thick-cut lime marmalade.

Finish: Long with more of the spices and comforting bonfire tones emerging.

This is one of our more unusual tracks, for the fields on which the barley was grown are been wiped from the map. So we begin on a bright, early summer day in South Dublin, to capture what’s left. This track opens up in some woodland at the south end of the field – familiar Single Farm Origin territory perhaps. A stream runs past ahead, and the Dublin road runs north from Wicklow alongside us. All sounds as it should. But as we get closer around the north side of the field, we hear the Excavators and Dumper Trucks that are working: what was once a Single Farm Origin is being turned over into a residential area. Nearby, to the east, golfers tee-off on the course as trains rattle through on the Dublin-to-Wicklow line. We move back around to the south, and closer in again where most of the building work is happening. Nearby we can hear the hedgerows and tree-lines full of life; at least they haven’t changed since barley was last harvested here. The track finishes up on the west side of the old field, where a new entrance, traffic lights and pedestrian crossings have been added. The building work continues beyond, as traffic passes by, north and south.