UNSUNG HEROES
Balmenach
The Speyside region is home to some of the most famous names in Scotch malt whisky – think The Glenlivet, Glenfiddich and The Macallan, to mention but three. It is also, however, home to a significant number of whisky-making facilities that are altogether more obscure, and Balmenach is most certainly one such distillery. In the start of a new series on lesser-known distilleries, Gavin D Smith shines the light on this unsung hero of Speyside
Balmenach’s location is as obscure as the single malt it produces, with the site invisible from the busy A95 road between Grantown-on-Spey and the heart of Speyside. The distillery is hidden in the peaceful folds of the Cromdale Hills, once renowned for illicit distilling, and any visitors who do find their way there have likely come to sample Caorunn gin, which is made in neighbouring premises. The doors to Balmenach remain firmly locked to visitors.
This may seem curious, considering that the distillery is owned by International Beverage, which hosts the public at its Pulteney, Balblair, Knockdhu and Speyburn sites. But then again, that quartet is well represented in the marketplace with a variety of expressions, whereas Balmenach has not been bottled as a single malt during nearly 30 years in various guises of the current ownership.
The reason for this is the whisky’s particular appeal to blenders, and ‘in house’ it is a key component of the Hankey Bannister blend. External customers include Diageo, William Grant & Sons and Whyte & Mackay, with some 60 per cent of new-make spirit being sold for blending.
In terms of character, Balmenach is meaty, heavy and sulphur-y as new make, maturing slowly, and with a particular fondness for sherry casks. The distinctive spirit profile – ideal for adding ‘weight’ to blends – is created by lengthy fermentation in the six Douglas Fir washbacks after mashing in a copper-domed semi-lauter mashtun. Distilling takes place in three pairs of relatively small stills, run quickly and feeding into worm tubs in cast iron vessels, rather than shell-and-tube condensers.
The distillery carries out 21 mashes each week, up from 15 a year ago, as demand for Balmenach spirit from blenders continues to grow, and seven-day working is now practised. As a result, the distillery’s annual capacity has risen from 2.1 million litres per annum (LPA) p to 2.9 million LPA. Mashing and fermentation operations are computerised, but when it comes to distilling, operators control all cut points.
International Beverage is at the forefront of whisky industry environmental programmes, and during 2023, a new Anaerobic Digestion (AD) plant which uses micro-organisms to break down the liquid co-products of whisky production, allowing them to be processed on site, came on stream at Balmenach.
This process produces bio-methane gas which feeds a Combined Heat & Power (CHP) engine to generate power for the distillery and the national grid. It is integrated with an existing biomass boiler which uses locally-sourced wood pellets to produce zero-carbon steam for the system. All of which makes the ultra-low-profile Balmenach one of Scotland’s ‘lowest carbon’ distilleries.
ABOVE: A new Anaerobic Digestion (AD) plant is now on-stream at Balmenach, making it one of Scotland’s lowest-carbon distilleries
BALMENACH THROUGH THE AGES
Today, Balmenach single malt is a rare beast indeed. However, it was a popular dram in British colonies around the world during the Victorian era, and it is recorded that in 1878 Queen Victoria sampled Balmenach while staying at the Gairloch Hotel in the West Highlands.
Turning to the past, Balmenach was first licensed in 1824, but was making whisky on an ‘unofficial’ basis for many years prior to that. The founder was James MacGregor, one of three brothers who crossed the hills from their home village of Tomintoul to farm and make whisky in the Cromdale area.
The distillery was in the hands of the founding MacGregor family until 1922, when difficult economic conditions forced its sale to a consortium of blenders. Both Whisky Galore author Sir Compton Mackenzie and writer, diplomat and secret agent Sir Robert Bruce Lockhart were members of the MacGregor family, and Lockhart spent much of his childhood at the distillery.
In his fascinating 1951 book Scotch, Lockhart recounts a visit by the local excise officer to Balmenach in 1823, during which he toured the farm and shared a couple of drams with James MacGregor. While looking around, he asked about the use of a certain stone building and was told by MacGregor that it was just the peat shed.
ABOVE: The SMWS offers a rare chance to taste Balmenach in single cask form
As he left, the excise officer said to MacGregor: “If I was you, I’d take out a licence of that peat shed.” MacGregor took the hint.
The distillery was acquired, along with the consortium that owned it, by the Distillers Company Ltd (DCL) in 1925, and Balmenach’s characterful spirit contributed to the Johnnie Walker and Crabbie’s blends. The capacity of the plant was increased in 1962 by the introduction of a third pair of stills, and a new mash house was also constructed.
Balmenach was mothballed in June 1993, but Inver House Ltd purchased it from DCL in 1997, with distilling recommencing the following year. Inver House ultimately became part of the International Beverage portfolio, but the current owners have no plans to release a ‘house’ bottling of Balmenach any time soon.
This means that Society bottlings offer a very rare chance to sample this intriguing and sadly overlooked single malt in all its unblended glory.