![]() Only in the past two centuries has whiskey-making been practiced commercially in a way that is recognizable today. ![]() ![]() The vast possibilities in whiskey were beginning to be explored. The nascent human ambition to create something of great complexity, nuance and beauty fostered art in whiskey-making once the need for preserving grain was no longer necessary. Over time however, there has been an awakening. And bread, for many years, was life itself. Farmers, living on the edge of civilization, relying on themselves alone for survival, needed a way to preserve the value of the grain being grown in local communities. Unlike many other spirits, whiskey began simply to serve a utilitarian purpose. In part, what drew us to whiskey in the first place is its humble roots. To begin with, we must acknowledge in the midst of this modern day boom that whiskey has assumed an exalted status that it hasn’t always enjoyed. The answer is, of course, more complex than we’d all like it to be. Why has this perspective taken such a strong hold of our industry? Over the years, the chorus of voices championing maturation as the primary method for distinguishing one brand from the next has become not only pervasive, but nearly unanimous. The reason this particular point of view has taken root is because most distilleries do little to nothing to highlight the other raw ingredients. Many, however, are conveniences devised to serve marketing ploys or obscure shortcomings. There certainly has been no shortage of rules etched into the canon of whiskey. While this will not be our forum to debate it, rest assured the prevailing assumption that this is a hard-and-fast rule is something we categorically reject at Westland. ![]() It’s often said that 70% to 80% of flavor in whiskey comes from the cask. ![]()
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