How the Sherry Whisky cask industry works today

[der wo]

In a Rum thread we are currently discussing about flavoring with Sherry. A bit off-topic there.

I found interesting informations on a German website:
http://www.fassstark.de/page-778993-59.html" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;" rel="nofollow

A few things loosely translated:

Der weltweite Sherrykonsum ist seit den späten 70iger Jahren rückläufig, die Nachfrage nach schottischem Single Malt jedoch steigt beständig und damit auch die Nachfrage nach Sherryfässern - ein ungesundes Verhältnis.
Since the 70s less and less Serry is consumed, but Sherry aged Malt Whisky sales rise and rise. This cannot work of course.

Die Whiskybrennereien begegnen diesem Trend damit, indem sie Abkommen mit den Sherry Bodegas treffen. Diese stellen zum Teil im Auftrag der Whiskyindustrie Sherry her, der einzig und allein dem Zweck dient, aus Eichenfässern Sherryfässer zu machen. Dafür kaufte Macallan zum Beispiel sogar eigene Waldstücke, um aus den dort wachsenden Eichen Fässer herzustellen und übergibt diese Fässer an Sherry-Bodegas, um aus den Fässern Sherryfässer zu machen. Die Bodegas und Küfereien lassen sich die Herstellung der Fässer durch monatelanges Befüllen mit Sherry teuer bezahlen.
So the distilleries make deals with bodegas. The bodegas build barrels payed by the Whisky industry or even a Scottish distillery buys a forest in Spain, builds there barrels and gives them to the bodegas. The bodegas get money for aging Sherry in it. Sherry not for selling/consuming, only for flavoring barrels.

Nicht nur die Vorbefüllung macht die Sherryfässer teuer, sondern noch viel mehr die Tatsache, dass die Transportfässer ursprünglich aus europäischer Eiche hergestellt wurden. Europäische Eiche wächst langsamer als amerikanische Weißeiche. Für die im Solera Verfahren eingesetzten Fässer verwenden die Bodegas schin seit langer Zeit amerikanischer Weißeiche. Die Eichenart hat wie oben beschrieben einen erheblichen Einfluss auf den Charakter des darin gereiften Whiskys. Der unabhängige Abfüller Gordon MacPhail gibt in der Kampagne "the wood makes the whisky" sogar an, dass mittlerweile der Großteil der Sherryfässer (auf der Webseite steht "majority", in der gedruckten deutschen Übersetzung von Walter Schobert steht 97%) aus amerikanischer Weißeiche hergestellt werden.
97% of the Sherry for consuming ages in american white oak, because it's cheaper (grows faster) than european oak. But the whisky industry wants european oak. So a Sherry matured Whisky is normally aged in a barrel, which never held Sherry for consuming.

Um den großen Bedarf der Whiskyindustrie nach Sherryfässer zu befriedigen werden mittlerweile "künstliche" Sherryfässer hergestellt. Dazu werden Fässer für nur fünf Monate mit Sherry gefüllt, der nur dem einzigen Zweck dient, aus einem Fass ein Sherryfass zu machen. Der Sherry wird danach gar nicht mehr als Getränk verkauft, sondern, nachdem er mehrfach dafür verwendet wurde, Fässer zu Sherryfässern zu konditionieren, zur Herstellung von Essig verwendet. Dieser Prozess heißt "Seasoning" und wurde im Jahr 2015 von TheDrinksReport in einem Artikel beschrieben.
The Sherry casks for the Whisky industry are filled for 5 months with Sherry. This Sherry will be reused for the next barrel for the Whisky industry. After a few uses this Sherry is undrinkable and is used to make vinegar.

Deshalb hat man diese Fässer bis 1989 damit aufgebessert, indem man sie mit Paxarette behandelt hat.
Paxarette (something like dewatered Sherry) was used to rejuvinate Sherry casks before using them another time for Whisky until 1989.

Dazu wurde Paxarette mit Druck in die Holzwände der Fässer eingespritzt.
For this Paxarette was pressed with overpressure into the wood before filling it with Whisky.

[Fart Vader]

Wow, interesting little bit of 'business' engineering.
Where there's a will, there's a way I guess.

Thanks Der Wo.
P.S. Glad you came back.

[kiwi Bruce]

Perhaps there is a legal way to use paxarette in Scotch Whisky

The mental lighting bolt...
It's a case of Occam's razor...it's not just paxarette, it's syrup in whisky, it's so simple it's brilliant. It should have been obvious from the location...Spain...Let me explain :-
There is a desert syrup used in the middle east from Morocco to Turkey, India to Spain. It's made from black cardamom and it tastes almost exactly how the single malts from Islay taste and smell. For two decades I've chased that illusive, wonderful taste. Was it the yeast or the wood, is the stillage infected...what phenol or ester could produce the amazing taste of black cardamom... I've never come close...then the mental lighting bolt ...and of course Occam's razor..."the simplest solution to a problem is most probably the correct solution" Could it be that simple, I do think it could. If the use of syrup was universally restricted in the Scotch industry, and not just paxarette, the end-around would be an herbal tea, one could use water, wine or stillage...it could be added to the spirit run or to the liquid to cut back from cask strength. I love Indian and middle Eastern food, and I have the recipe for this syrup in one of my cook books.
This opens a whole new chapter in my Single Malt quest...WOW what a day1

[zapata]

This source tells a similar story:
https://www.whiskynotes.be/sherry-casks ... dustry.pdf" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;" rel="nofollow
But states the cask is seasoned for 6months to 2.5 years, 18 months being "standard". The sherry may be reused to season multiple casks, distilled into sherry brandy, or even discarded.
The guy runs a sherry blog, so it is interesting to hear about from his perspective since I don't know if I've ever met anybody that drinks sherry OTHER than the little bit that makes it into scotch!

[der wo]

Thanks zapata,

your source looks even more interesting than mine. A bit more complete and plausible.

[fizzix]

Thus ends the romantic myth of mature drinking sherry barrels making their way to whiskey distillers.
Zapata's article ups my desire to get a new American oak barrel and age some moderately priced sherry for a couple of years,
and destine that barrel for a good whiskey.

[Expat]

Really interesting read!

Makes me think about adding small amounts of Sherry directly to my whiskey, since it seems to be about selective contamination.

[der wo]

Makes me think about adding small amounts of Sherry directly to my whiskey

Try it. I was surprised how original it tastes.
Start with 10ml Sherry per liter barrel strength. So at 40ml it starts to become too much probably, at least for an original taste.

[aircarbonarc]

I did hear of this from a few distillers, I have a stave of one of these barrels. I heard they actually use pressure and steam to impregnate the Barrel

[zapata]

Sherry makes a GREAT additive for "cheating" a malt whisky. It's good in American styles too, though just a dab to my tastes. With malts I think its fine at the level where a whisky drinker recognizes it, but for American styles I like just enough that it flies just beneath the threshold of detection.

http://whiskyscience.blogspot.com/2013/ ... t.html?m=1" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;" rel="nofollow
Goes into types of sherry, sugar levels, and the pressure treatment of barrels

The wine-treatment of new casks became common in early 20th century and in 1929 it was reported that all of the new casks to be used for Johnnie Walker whiskies were seasoned with approximately 35 litres of sweet dark sherry per hogshead for 6 weeks. The casks were stored in an individual warehouse and turned regularly for even distribution of sherry into the wood. After the seasoning the casks were lightly pressurised ("with 0,2kg pressure", probably per one square inch?) and after that the remaining sherry was poured out. About 20% of the casks were said to be new, all of which apparently were UK-coopered wine-treated hogsheads made from import oak staves from the US or the Baltic. Older UK-coopered puncheons and Spanish-coopered butts were still being used as refill casks at the time.

As imported sherry casks became scarce due to the second World War in the 1940s and especially due to the increased bottling of sherry in Spain during the 1960s and early 1970s, the distillers rejuvenated the exhausted casks with pajarete. According to Philp in 1989 "a typical cooperage procedure was to add 500ml Paxarete per hogshead or 1 litre per butt, pressurise at 48 kPa / 7 psig for 10 minutes and then disgorge any absorbed paxarete.". Until 1972 the DCL also coopered their own sherry casks, which were made of American oak to a size of a puncheon (~558 l), wine-treated with paxarete and then used primarily for grain whiskies before used for malt whiskies. The American ex-bourbon barrels often received the same treatment; first fill with grain whisky, then after wine-treatment refilled with malt whisky.

Wait, read that last sentence again, even bourbon barrels can become "sherry" barrels!
Although, maybe not so much any longer?

According to a rumour the Scotch Whisky Association banned the use of paxarete in the late 1980s or early 1990s, but there is no official evidence of that. The Scotch Whisky Order from 1990 bans the use of additives other than water and caramel E150a, so the blending of whisky with sherry wine including pajarete was indeed banned at that point. PX sherry casks are still quite often used especially for single malt production, but the use of sherry concentrates and high pressures in rejuvenation and seasoning has apparently ceased or at least diminished greatly. Philip Hills wrote in 2000: "wine-treatment of worn-out casks has been widely used to simulate the effects of new sherry wood... a sweet dark sherry such as pedro ximenes [sic] is introduced and the cask is pressurised in order to force the potion into the wood. For many years, a potion called paxarette was used, which combined sweet dark sherry with other flavourings and colourants... the results are not impressive: whisky from a treated cask of this sort smells slightly sulphurous and sweet, but that is all. Of the lovely aromatic flavours of a true sherry-cask maturation, there is no trace.". It is likely that the wine-treatment was dropped because of the poor results rather than an SWA order.

But let's remember that it's not that unusual for even relatively young single malts to have a small % of much older barrels. A 12 year age statement may actually include a barrel or 2 of 30 year old malt. So even if they stopped the wine pressure barrel rejuvenation, we may still be tasting it in bottles released today.

[Expat]

Makes me think about adding small amounts of Sherry directly to my whiskey

Try it. I was surprised how original it tastes.
Start with 10ml Sherry per liter barrel strength. So at 40ml it starts to become too much probably, at least for an original taste.

Perfect, thanks der wo! That will make things much easier to dial in

[kiwi Bruce]

Sherry makes a GREAT additive for "cheating" a malt whisky.

Not "cheating" if the pro's are doing it. Wonder what the alternative to syrup is, after the "ban", and are they policing this themselves?

[der wo]

Funny that the Malt Whisky distilleries are wining since centuries, that they don't get enough Sherry casks, so they have to rise the prices for Sherry Whiskies. Just look at the incredible money you have to pay for a Macallan 12 Sherry Oak today. BTW Macallan used the rare Sherry cask argument for bringing out the Fine Oak series aged partially in Bourbon barrels. It's bullshit. At least since 1981 (when they forbid to export Sherry in casks), but probably much earlier (since 200 years, since they use American white oak for aging Sherry and european oak for transporting Sherry), the Sherry Whisky cask industry is completely independent from the Sherry industry. Even if noone would drink Sherry anymore, they would still produce casks for the Whisky industry. Seems the real reason for the high price for Sherry Whiskies is, that they must not paint their old casks with paxarette anymore.

[kiwi Bruce]

William Phaup Lowrie (1831-1916) pioneered the whisky cask management in the late 19h century. Lowrie was a merchant for both Port Ellen whiskies and González Gordon sherries, a cooper and later a co-founder of Glentauchers distillery.

The plot thickens... Port Ellen distillery was on Islay.

[der wo]

But let's remember that it's not that unusual for even relatively young single malts to have a small % of much older barrels. A 12 year age statement may actually include a barrel or 2 of 30 year old malt.

Yes, that's what they tell us (the same people, who are wining about the lack of Sherry casks). Look what a money they can make with a 30yo Macallan... 1000 bucks the bottle? Only if the barrel has a huge failure and would ruin a small 30yo edition from only a few barrels, they would mix it in a large 12yo edition from a few hundred barrels.

[jonnys_spirit]

On the hobby level I keep a mason jar with toasted oak fingers and top up with sherry. I top up another with port. Looking for some more ideas too. I will selectively include one or two of those oak fingers and 10-20ml of sherry/port in a bottling of my house blend when I make a bottle. I also keep 1/2 stick of that oak in the house blend bottle. Never really lasts long enough to take on much oak but the sherry and port have been in there for quite some time and are also over oak’d so they do add some depth into the blend. Ymmv.

-j