Aberlour
Part of Chivas Brothers' portfolio, Aberlour is best known for its cult expression, A'Bunadh.
Glen Keith
Distillery & brand
Experimental from the start, the distillery produces a gentle, fruity whisky.
Glen Keith distillery
Speyside Single Malt Scotch Whisky
Although Glen Keith's stills are slender with long, upward-angled lyne arms indicating this is a light site, it has produced a wide variety of different makes thanks to its role as the pilot plant for many of Seagram/Chivas Brothers’ distilling trials. Today its character is light and fruity.
Glen Keith History
With sales of Chivas Regal rising throughout the 1950s, Sam Bronfman felt that he needed another distillery to supply juice for his blends – not just Chivas but Passport and 100 Pipers. He picked the site of a former meal mill in Keith, directly behind his existing Strathisla plant. As well as providing fillings for blends, Glen Keith became the Seagram’s experimental plant and still houses the Chivas Brothers lab.
It ran triple-distilled malt from the word go and alternated it with double distilled until the 1980s, ran trials with a wheat mash, was the first distillery to use gas-fired direct heating (all its stills are now steam-driven) and in its time also produced heavy peated variants [Glenisla] one made with peat smoke being passed through water which was then concentrated and the other in the normal manner. There were also trials with different yeast types. The fact that the stills were different shapes and sizes helped in these innovative trials.
It was mothballed in 1999, only reopening (under new owner Pernod Ricard) in 2013 after a complete refit which saw a new mash tun and washbacks being installed.
While there was a 10-year-old bottling it was never a front-line malt. There are occasional sightings of it (and Glen Isla) from independent bottlers.
Timeline
- 1957-60 Glen Keith distillery is built by Seagram
- 1970 Two more stills are added, making five in total. All are direct gas-fired
- 1994 A 10-year-old expression released
- 1999 The distillery is mothballed
- 2013 Glen Keith officially reopens with five stills operational
Glen Keith Facts
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- Capacity (mlpa) i
- 6
-
- Fermentation Time i
- 55 hours
-
- Filling Strength i
- 63.50%
-
- Grist Weight (t) i
- 8
-
- Heat Source i
- Steam
-
- Malt Specification i
- Unpeated
-
- Mash Tun Type i
- Briggs lauter
-
- New-make Strength i
- 69.30%
-
- Spirit Still Charge (l) i
- 9,250
-
- Stills i
- 3 wash; 3 spirit
-
- Wash Still Charge (l) i
- 11,760
-
- Washback Charge (l) i
- 35,300
-
- Washback Size (l) i
- 46,000
-
- Washback Type i
- 9 wood; 6 stainless steel
-
- Washbacks i
- 15
-
- Water Source i
- Crossburn and Newmill Springs
-
- Wort Clarity i
- Clear
Owners
Parent company
- Pernod Ricard 2001 - present
Current owner
Previous owner
- Seagram Distillers 1957 - 2001
Contact
- Address
-
Glen Keith Distillery
Station Road
Keith
Moray
AB55 5BU
United Kingdom - Phone
- +44 1542 783044
- Visitor Opening Hours
- Not open to the public
Map
See also
-
Distillery & brand
-
Distillery & brand
GlenAllachie
Delicate, fruity Speysider recently relaunched as a single malt whisky.