Glenburgie

The Kilnflat distillery was built near Forres in 1829. It operated without major incidents until 1870 when its owners faced financial difficulties and renamed it Glenburgie. The distillery was sold several times between 1878 and 1890. On that year it was refurbished. After a further change of ownership, the distillery operated without interruptions until 1925 when the distillery closed down twice in 5 years.

During the inter-war period Glenburgie became the first in Scotland to appoint a woman as distillery manager. Hiram Walker from Canada acquired Glenburgie and Miltonduff distillery. The idea was to have a constant supply of whisky for the Ballantine's blend. This approach seems to be the norm until today given the rarity of official and independent bottlings

Under the ownership of Hiram Walker, a pair of Lomond stills were installed in 1958. The spirit produced by these innovative stills was called Glencraig. Bottlings bearing this name are incredibly rare. The Lomond stills were used at Glenburgie distillery until 1981 when they were replaced by regular stills. Production stopped in the year 2000 and the distillery was rebuilt three years later. As of 2006 over 4 million liters of alcohol are produced each year at Glenburgie. It is now one of the most technologically advanced distilleries in the Pernod-Ricard portfolio.

The style of Glenburgie is shaped by its use of a long fermentation period (54 to over 90 hours) and its onion-shaped pot stills. The few and rare expressions seen from this distillery showed a grassy, hay and apple rich nose with a nutty palate. Some cask strength releases have shown notes of sulphur.

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