Bruichladich have set out to rectify this with a single malt that was made from barley reassuringly sown and grown on the Isle of Islay.
The unpeated barley was distilled in to Bruichladdich whisky, warehoused and matured, and finally bottled still on the Hebridean island at Bruichladdich Distillery.
The terroir for this whisky is a desolate place known as the 'headland of the the gallows'. This lonely field is a rare patch of fertility amongst the barren, rocky outcrops and peat bogs tilled continually since Neolithic times.
Evidence of Islay's earliest farmers, dated to 6,000 years ago, was discovered in this soil only last year.
In this remote, unsullied earth, Chalice barley was grown by farmer Jim Logan in what is now called the Jubilee field (Queen Victoria's, not Elizabeth's), on Dunlossit land owned by Bruno Schroder, a Bruichladdich shareholder. It was harvested in September 2006 and distilled eight weeks later.
Bruichladdich's Islay Barley Series is the ultimate in whisky terroir - where once again land and dram are united.
Non chill-filltered, and colouring-free, Bruichladdich's Islay Barley Series "Dunlossit" was bottled at 50% ABV and retails at around £38.
Notes:
In the mid nineteenth century, 4000 acres of malting barley were grown on the island of Islay, but due to The Great War and its Islay casualties, the yield collapsed to zero.
The programme by Bruichladdich to re-establish the cereal on the island now means 800-1000 tons, a quarter of the Victorian era yield, is now harvested for Bruichladdich.
About Bruichladdich.
Bruichladdich is an innovative artisan distillery producing Islay single malt whisky. Privately-owned, it distils 700,000 litres annually from mainly un-peated barley from 28 Scottish farms, half organically grown, half from Islay itself. Exceptionally tall, narrow-necked stills make the renowned elegant and floral Bruichladdich spirit, which matures in both French and American oak casks, breathing Islay's marine Hebridean air. Bruichladdich is bottled on site at 46% with Islay spring water, free from colouring and non chill-filtered. Botanist Gin, peaty Port Charlotte and Octomore, the world's most heavily peated whisky, are also distilled here.
