Locke’s Old Kilbeggan Distillery

As previously stated in my first post, I will periodically wax poetic about whiskey experiences outside the Carolinas. And a few months ago, I was fortunate enough to convince my wife to spend our tax refund vacationing in Ireland. Ireland’s whiskey heritage is equal to that of Scotland, although the debate over whose is older is beyond the scope of this blog. Regardless, due to circumstances that include (but are not limited to) Irish Independence, the invention of the column still, and American Prohibition, Ireland’s once proud whiskey industry was decimated and eventually reduced to two operating distilleries, both under the same ownership. Since that low point in the 1970’s, Irish whiskey has seen three more distilleries begin operating and the formation of the Ireland Whiskey Trail.

Of the four stops (out of 36) on the Whiskey Trail that I was able to indulge in, the first was Locke’s Old Kilbeggan Distillery in County Westmeath. This site is run by the Cooley Group, which until very recently was the only Irish-owned distillery in operation. Originally used for whiskey production beginning in 1757, Kilbeggan Distillery closed in 1957 but resumed operations in 2007, so none the whiskeys produced there will be ready for consumption until 2014. However, the facility is open for tours, serves as a museum, and other whiskeys produced by the Cooley Group at their facility in County Louth are available for tasting and purchase. Guided tours are available for pre-booked groups, and self-guided tours are available for walk-up visitors. The displays on the tour are quite disjointed, to the point of being completely worthless if not for the pre-printed guides leading one through the facility. I have a pretty functional knowledge of the distilling process, but found myself spending much time listening to Connie narrate from the guide as I was eyeing the exhibits. There are also several rooms that focus on non whiskey-related topics which were quite perplexing, but overall I found the tour to be incredibly rewarding, and not just because a careless employee inadvertently left a ring-full of facility keys in the lock leading to the room with the spirit safe, thus enabling unsupervised access to new-make spirit coming right off the still (molasses-type sweetness, a bit grassy on the nose, and VERY high proof). The smell of the Angel’s Share (whiskey evaporating during the aging process) permeates every corner of the site, giving the air a sweet, pungent aroma.

As far as the whiskeys themselves go, the Cooley Group takes tremendous pride in distilling whiskey that doesn’t conform to the classic definition of Irish whiskey. Most of their whiskeys are distilled through copper pot stills twice (unlike the usual three times). They offer a single-malt whiskey using peat-smoked barley in their Connemara line. There is also a single-grain whiskey called Greenore that uses corn as its principal grain. Inishowen is a peat-smoked blended whiskey, while the Tyrconnell and Locke’s Single Malt are their non-smoked single-malt lines. The rest of their blended whiskeys include Millars, Kilbeggan, and Locke’s. Since the Cooley Group is still a pretty young distillery, they have not yet made a habit of producing benchmark releases or specific vintages.

As for the rest of my travels along the Ireland Whiskey Trail, those will have to wait for a future post in the interest of saving space. I am planning on having a tasting with some of the whiskeys acquired during my trip, so all interested parties should send me a message indicating as such so you can be included in the planning process.

Now, I realize that it had been more than three weeks since my last Blog entry, and for that I apologize. The Ireland trip had me incredibly distracted leading up to it, but since my return I’ve decided to impose upon myself a hard deadline of one post every week-and-a-half. And even though my Ireland trip is still fresh in my memory, the next two Blog entries will deal with Charlotte whiskey venues, since this is after all supposed to be a local Blog. After that, the plan is to have another post dealing with a “101” type general whiskey topic before returning to my travels on the Emerald Isle. So if I fail to come through on any of these self-imposed commitments, feel free to call me out on it.

Salud.