It was a tense moment. Martin Lynch, the brand ambassador for Teeling Irish Whiskey, was sitting down at a lunch gathering where he intended to introduce the spirit to the press. Addressing a Scottish magazine editor sat apposite, Lynch joked: “I hope we’re not going to have any trouble with you. You will, of course, concede that the Irish invented whiskey?” “I will,” she said, “as long as you concede that we perfected it…”
It is undeniably true that Ireland’s production of whiskey predates that of Scotland – with the two commencing at opposite ends of the 15th century. It is equally undeniable that, over the last century or so, Scotch whisky has largely eclipsed its Irish counterpart.
At one point, until Scotland began to produce and export blended whiskies in the 1860s, Irish whiskey was the world’s best-selling spirit. The varieties produced legally under licence from the early 17th century were also internationally seen as being of far better quality than Scotch.
It was, however, too good to last. Civil unrest in the 19th and early 20th centuries took its toll on the industry, with prohibition all but finishing it off in the US, its biggest export market. While the Scots maintained their presence by supplying bootleggers, the Irish distillers largely demurred. Sadly, their exports were never able to recover their previous levels.
The Irish disitillers also stuck stubbornly to using only traditional pot stills, rather than the more efficient column stills that became current in the 1820s. This is despite the fact that the man who perfected the column still was Aeneas Coffey, a full-blooded Irishman.
At one time, it was estimated that Ireland had more than 1,000 active distilleries, albeit not all of them legal. By the mid-1950s, this had dropped to just five. By the mid-1970s, there were just two – both owned by Irish distillers.
Not that this monopoly would have been immediately apparent, given the multiplicity of brands that were on offer. The New Middleton distillery in County Cork produced a wide variety, all of which were widely available in Ireland. These included Powers, dating back to 1791, Tullamore Dew (1829), and Paddy (1879), although its brand name wasn’t introduced until 1912.
By far the biggest brand – and the world’s best-selling Irish whiskey – was Jameson. Established in 1810 (by another Scot), it remains the world’s most popular Irish whiskey, although confusion remains about the exact date of its introduction.
The Bushmills Distillery in Northern Ireland’s County Antrim is also slightly disingenuous about the date of its establishment. It currently cites a licence to distill issued in 1608 by England’s King James I (Scotland’s James VI) as the basis to its claim to be the world’s oldest distillery.
In fact that original distillery’s buildings were destroyed many years ago, with the Bushmills company not established until 1784. Today, it produces both the Bushmills and Black Bush brand whiskeys.
In the international heyday of the prefabricated Irish pub – examples of which are still more than in evidence in Hong Kong and most major cities on the Chinese mainland – Jameson and Bushmills were typically the only Irish whiskey brands to be seen behind the bar. Others were, at best, an occasional sighting. As a result, Martin Lynch argues, the world sees Irish whiskey very much in Jameson’s image – a smooth triple-distilled spirit which many lovers of Scottish single malts, for example, would consider to be bland.
Now that idea of just what an Irish whiskey ought to be is being challenged. In fact, the Irish Distillers’ monopoly began to fracture in 1987, the year when John Teeling, an Irish businessman, established the Cooley Distillery in County Louth. This saw him introducing a number of new brands, all distilled only twice, on the grounds that too much flavour was lost to the third distillation.
Today, Cooley’s brands, include Kilbeggan and The Tyrconnell, the latter a single malt. Collectively, they have started to change the world’s view of Irish whiskey.
Other factors have also changed the face of the Irish whiskey sector. Back in 1988, Pernod Ricard acquired Irish Distillers and, in 2005, Diageo bought Bushmills from them. Today, Pernod Ricard continues to make and market Jameson.
Since that time, the number of working distilleries in Ireland has risen to 12, with two of them opening last year. Planning permission has now been granted for several more.
Since 1990, international sales have been growing at around 20 percent per annum, making Irish whiskey – albeit from a modest base – the fastest growing spirit category in the world. Around four and a half million cases were produced in 2008, with that figure projected to triple by 2018.
In the face of this, it is perhaps surprising that Diageo, which had built up the Bushmills brand over the previous decade, exchanged it in 2015 with the owners of Jose Cuervo. In return, it received that 50 percent stake of the Don Julio tequila brand that it didn’t already own..
Another big international spirits brand entered the Irish whiskey market in 2011 when Beam Suntory bought the Cooley and Kilbeggan distilleries from the Teeling family. Despite this, the Teelings were far from finished with the whiskey business, a sector where the family has considerable history.
Their family connection dates back to 1782 when a Walter Teeling established a distillery in Dublin. Fast forwards almost 250 years and, last year, two of his descendants – Jack and Stephen, John Teeling’s sons, opened the first new distillery in Dublin since 1976. That was the year when Irish Distillers closed the last two, moving the production of Jameson to the New Midleton Distillery.
At present, the spirits distilled at the new Teeling distillery – set very close to the location of Walter Teeling’s original operation – are still rather too young to be released. Despite this, a Teeling Whiskey brand was formally introduced in 2012 and has bottled a range of Irish whiskeys from a number of undisclosed distlleries.
These have attracted considerable interest from whisk(e)y aficionados all around the world. As a result, the brand is now being launched across Hong Kong and parts of greater China by Summergate Fine Wines and Spirits.
Overall, Teeling Irish whiskeys go against the grain of the Jameson model, with the company describing itself as an “independent Irish whiskey company dedicated to bringing choice and breadth back to the Irish whiskey category through small batch releases of interesting and flavoursome bottlings.” Ultimately, though, the company’s stated goal is to “revive the independent spirit of Dublin.”
To date, the range consists of three single malts – a 15-year-old, a 21-year-old and one released without an age statement. It also offers a single grain, and a Small Batch Blend matured in barrels previously reserved for and containing rum.
Its Small Batch Blend won Double Gold at the San Francisco World Spirits Competition in 2015. Another winner is its Single Grain, matured in Californian red wine barrels. This took the World’s Best Grain Award at the 2014 World Whiskies Awards.
It wasn’t the company’s only triumph at the World Whiskies Awards – the NAS Single Malt won Best Irish Single Malt, while the 21-year-old Vintage Reserve single malt won a 2013 Gold Award from The Spirits Business. None of these whiskeys are chill filtered and they are all bottled at a ratio of 46 percent alcohol by volume.
The Teeling whiskeys are certainly recognizably Irish with their smoothness and that particular touch of sweetness. They also have a depth of flavour which sets them apart from the better known Irish whiskey exports. They are not, however, the only spirits from the Emerald Isle worth seeking out.
Particularly recommended are the Midleton Old Pot Still range, Kilbeggan and Green Spot – although production of the latter is limited to 6,000 bottles per year and it is difficult to obtain outside Ireland. Then there is Redbreast, again made with a traditional Irish mixture of malted and unmalted barley and well worth tracking down.
Among the single malts, Connemara is notable for its peatiness – Irish whiskeys are generally assumed to eschew peat although this is not always the case – while the Tyrconnell is also widely acclaimed. Both come courtesy of the Cooley Distillery.
With the emergence of new distilleries and new brands, Irish whiskey has once again become a category to watch. Expect to see some new names appearing on back bar whisk(e)y shelves – and not only in the more ersatz Irish pubs.