When speaking of the many new distilleries to have set up and commenced operations in the last 10 years, we often refer to them as “the new kid on the block”. Which is fair enough if you set up in the Highlands and you’re one of many distilleries already established in the area. But what happens if you’re the new kid on the block and the old kid on the block has had the block all to himself for over 187 years? Such is the lot of Torabhaig Distillery.
Torabhaig Distillery is many things but, to a lot of whisky enthusiasts, one suspects it will long be referred to as the other distillery on the Isle of Skye. It is just the second distillery on the island, joining, of course, the long-established Talisker. Talisker has waved the flag on Skye since 1830; Torabhaig’s spirit first started flowing from the stills in 2017. So how does a new distillery get going in the shadow of a bigger and long-established neighbour? The formula is pretty simple: Do things properly and do them well. And Torabhaig doing things both properly and well is precisely what I observed during a very pleasant morning visit to the distillery on a warm summer’s day.
Torabhaig Distillery is in Teangue on the south-eastern side of Skye, and shouldn’t be confused with the village of Toravaig, which is an hour’s drive away to the north, just outside Portree. The distillery is less than a 10 minute drive from the Armadale ferry port – meaning that the best / fastest way to get to Torabhaig if you’re driving up from Edinburgh/Glasgow is to head to Mallaig and get the ferry across to Armadale from there. It’s all subject to ferry timetables, of course, but this approach saves going the long route up around via Kyle of Lochalsh, and cuts about 64km / 40 miles off the drive. (And you can unwind / relax on the ferry!)
The first thing that strikes you about Torabhaig Distillery when you arrive is that (1) it’s relatively small, and (2) it’s extremely scenic and pretty. The distillery buildings are former farm buildings that had long-fallen into disrepair and were in quite a dilapidated state. However, heritage obligations required that the buildings be restored rather than demolished, and the owners have done a brilliant job in not just bringing the buildings back to life, but re-purposing them brilliantly to accommodate the fit-out of a Visitor Centre, a working distillery, and an extremely good restaurant / café. If you’re travelling with a partner who’s less enthusiastic about whisky than you are, they’ll have a wonderful and tasty time either sitting in the café or out in the beautiful courtyard enjoying a coffee and a bite while you’re inside having fun.
The distillery’s cafe and welcoming courtyard. (Click on images to enlarge)
Torabhaig is gaelic for small hill by the bay; the distillery is set in off the headland, just up from the bay, and has wonderful views out to the south where you can see the mainland beyond. The ruins of Knock Castle (aka Castle Camus) set a striking foreground. The castle was officially abandoned at the end of the 17th century; it’s believed some of the stonework used to build the farm buildings may have originally come from the castle. The distillery was founded by Mossburn Distillers, independent bottlers who – like many other independent bottlers in recent times (e.g. Gordon & MacPhail, Douglas Laing, Adelphi, etc) felt that producing your own spirit and having casks of your own spirit to trade was an advantageous arrangement.
The distillery has a maximum capacity of 500,000 litres per annum if firing on all cylinders; they’re currently working through 23 tonnes of malt per fortnight – production being slightly down in the current depressed climate. The barley comes from Aberdeenshire and is peated to 78ppm (Highland peat, so very different in character to the 35-55ppm peated malts from Islay). All the production equipment – mashtun, washbacks, and stills – are a deliberate size, determined chiefly by needing to fit into the available space of buildings that were originally intended for farming, not distilling!
On the production floor. Every stage flows linearly from one end of the old steading to the other end. (Click on images to enlarge)
The mashtun is a cute and cosy 1.5 tonnes, producing 8,000 litres of wort. Each mash fills one washback, of which there are eight – all Douglas Fir. Fermentation is a generous 72 hours, and distillation is very conventional through a wash still then a spirit still. It seems very few distilleries stick to just the one thing these days; Torabhaig is intended to be a peated whisky, but they were indeed doing an unpeated campaign at the time of our visit.
There is a single warehouse for 1,000 casks on site, built 100m or so away from the distillery down the hill and closer to the water. All other casks/spirit is matured down south in the central belt.
The distillery’s warehouse, just down the hill. (Click on images to enlarge)
As a brand and single malt, Torabhaig is marching towards its 10th anniversary, and the intention is obviously to release a 10 Years Old age statement bottling when the time comes. In the meantime, Torabhaig has had a number of work-in-progress releases under various subsets and liveries such as the Legacy series, the Distillers’ series, and the Club Reserve releases (exclusively for Club Members).
Torabhaig whisky
Where Torabhaig stands apart from many of its peers and contemporaries is the information and transparency on the bottlings. There are no vague statements here (e.g. “Matured in oak”, which is up there amongst the most useless bits of info I’ve seen on a label elsewhere). Rather, the labels on each bottle detail such information as the malt (even when the barley varieties used are a combination, e.g. Concerto and Anchor), the yeast strain(s) used, the cask regime (e.g. 80% 1st-fill bourbon and 20% refill barrels), the original phenols in the malt (e.g. 77pm) and the final phenols in the whisky (e.g. 17ppm), and whether or not the whisky has been chill-filtered or had colouring added. Not only is this information interesting in its own right, it’s useful for comparison purposes if you’re tasting different Torabhaig releases head-to-head and you want to understand how the differences in production affect the differences you note in the aromas and flavours. I tried three drams during my visit; three previous “Chapters” from the Legacy series, and they all displayed that appealing combination of peat, smoke, florals, brine/salt, and barley sweetness.
Production is small and the early spirit laid down has to be carefully managed so that there’s still stock to release older age statements in the years to come. That said, the whisky is available in many markets and is definitely worth seeking out. And if you’re planning a whisky pilgrimage to Scotland and the Isle of Skye is on your itinerary, this is definitely a distillery you want to include in your travels. A range of different tours are on offer, each with different features, tastings, durations, and price points; you can book in directly via Torabhaig’s website.
As a personal observation, this is a distillery that exudes a warm and friendly welcome – from the chap that greets you in the carpark, to the staff in the Visitor Centre, and then also the production staff working across the floor, who all said a cheery “hello” with a smiling nod. And the crew in the café are the right people to have in hospitality. It all goes hand-in-hand with the whisky, which is equally welcoming.
Torabhaig: Good distillery, good people, and already good whisky. There’s definitely room on this block for the new kid.
Cheers,
AD
