‘HERESY’ SMALL BATCH DELIGHTS

Spanish Splendour

Spanish Splendour is the latest addition to the Society’s non-standard ‘Heresy’ series of small-batch bottlings, and even for this collection, it is a bit of an unusual expression as it is a single malt rather than a blended malt. Hailing from the Scottish Highlands, Spanish Splendour will provide you with just the right amount of fruity decadence to celebrate the arrival of autumn, as Julien Willems explains

PHOTOS: PETER SANDGROUND AND DUNCAN GORMAN

As forests will soon be turning copper and gold, I’m reminded to focus on wood for a second and delve into the casks used to create Spanish Splendour, Batch 26 in the Society’s series of small-batch bottlings.

All the sherry casks used to mature the single malt in this recipe were supplied by Tevasa cooperage. As it turns out, Tevasa, much like the Society, was founded in 1983. Beyond a birth year, both companies also share a dedication to traceability and quality. At its very beginnings, Tevasa was mainly a sawmill installed in the north of Spain, before moving on to bespoke cask manufacturing. They still own the same sawmill and now also employ 85 coopers. They operate under the control of the Programme for the Endorsement of Forest Certification (PEFC), allowing full traceability of the source of the oak – to the individual tree level. We can therefore trace an individual cask back to the forest.

There’s more still. While it’s great to have traceability, it’s all for nothing if the quality isn’t there. For them, as for us, quality is paramount, though. To ensure that, Tevasa run a programme allowing us to decide what oak a cask is made from, how it is treated, but also which wine is used for seasoning the cask, and how long that seasoning should last. Once felled, oak logs will be air dried in the north of Spain for two to three months before being shipped to the much drier and hotter south of Spain where air drying continues for around another 18 months.

While Tevasa specialise in Spanish and European oak, which accounts for 70 per cent of their production, they also use American oak. Typically favouring control and traceability, whole logs (rather than processed staves) are shipped whole from the US to their sawmill in northern Spain for processing into staves, air drying and seasoning.

ABOVE: All the casks for Spanish Splendour came from the Tevasa cooperage in Spain

PICTURED: SMWS head of whisky creation Euan Campbell in the yard at the Tevasa cooperage

But I digress. What’s the significance of all this for Batch 26 Spanish Splendour, you ask? By combining seven casks distilled on the same day at a Highland distillery, this single malt achieved a full and decadent flavour thanks to the cask make up in this recipe. After being filled into bourbon hogsheads on September 10, 2013, and slowly matured in these American oak vessels until May 2021, they were rehomed into fresh Spanish oak oloroso hogsheads for four of them and the rest in equally fresh American oak oloroso hogsheads.

These whiskies then remained in their new homes for three years, before being combined for the elaboration of Spanish Splendour. The sherry is strong in this expression, true, but the interplay between the different oak characteristics is quite something too. Spanish oak brings in cocoa-dusted chocolate truffles, and some slightly salty spiciness. These aromas and flavours typically accompany the more robustly tannic Spanish oak casks.

Whereas, at the other end of the aromatic spectrum, the rich creamy, custard-like aromas and flavours of Crema Catalana and Far Breton – a traditional cake from Brittany – are a reminder that this whisky spent roughly seven years in bourbon casks and that three of the final casks were made from American oak, contributing sweet creamy flavours and textures to the final whisky.

In a nutshell, Batch 26 showcases the delightful flavours to be expected from a selection of Tevasa casks from either Spanish or American oak and weaves a flavour tapestry of Highland distillate and sherry. Like many casks in history, these vessels have sailed from Andalucia to Scotland, bringing us a bit of sunshine as the days shorten, so that we might at our leisure sip in and gaze upon a bit of Spanish Splendour.

Find out more about Tevasa and how the cooperage works in our Scotch & Sherry documentary