The English Distillery

Bleak Ridge is a family-run business, selling country clothing and workwear
I'd also recommend trying the Lakes Distillery - although their prices have gotten rather steep from when I visited them a few years ago...

I do not like the fact that they don't have a "house" bottle, just focusing on their limited runs - but we got to try their 4th and 5th editions of the reserve and both were excellent.
 
Over the years colleagues have worked on financing a few of these distillery companies and drinks businesses.

The actual costs of what goes into the bottle is very low. Often the bottles and packaging cost quite a bit more. Then of course is the alchemy of the different tastes. A lot of cost is the time the money is tied up for whilst it is maturing in the barrel. And then there is the branding.

Wine on the other - there is real skill in the whole process of growing vines and picking grapes etc.
 
Heym SR20 said:
Over the years colleagues have worked on financing a few of these distillery companies and drinks businesses.

The actual costs of what goes into the bottle is very low. Often the bottles and packaging cost quite a bit more. Then of course is the alchemy of the different tastes. A lot of cost is the time the money is tied up for whilst it is maturing in the barrel. And then there is the branding.

Wine on the other - there is real skill in the whole process of growing vines and picking grapes etc.
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And then the inevitable Tax of course. Seeing the economics of a winery, one is baffled as to how any of them make money.
One of my friends grows grapes, has the wine made for him and sells some (not all) directly. Quite good drinkable stuff. Costs £10.50 a bott. to him. Was selling to a local restaurant at £11.00 a bott. And they have it on the menu for £42/bott!!
 
Stalker1962 said:
@chriswjx

A pal recommend the Lakes about a year or so ago.

I bought a couple of bottles, but have not yet got around to tasting them. They live in a lovely old wooden bottle carrier; my wife picked up at a junk shop for £5...

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I have the very same bottle sat in the drawer - although have to say that wooden case is rather jazzy.

Funnily, I was loading on a sim day the other month up in Fife, and the keeper was trying to get rid of a bottle of the stuff ("Not having any of that English pish in my bothy" 😂). Was trying to get me to swap with him for "any £30 bottle of Scottish stuff out of the supermarket". Sadly I drink so little nowadays that I declined - we visited them I think back in 2021, and I am yet to open the bottle!

Edit: I still have a bottle of tawny port I bought in Portugal what must be getting at least 5 years ago now. I can't bare to open it as I bloody love the stuff and that bottle in particular (I bought a half bottle at the same time and have slowly slowly been drinking it one small glass at a time)
 
There is a whisky from Kent that found its way into one of those taster packs I get given now and again. It stole the show can’t remember which of the two they make it was. All from a single field apparently.

copperrivetdistillery.com

Masthouse Whisky - Copper Rivet

Made in accordance with the Invicta Whisky Charter® Masthouse Whisky is a rare single estate whisky which is natural, unfiltered and strikes the perfect balance of rich complexity and approachability. Masthouse Whisky Single Malt – Pot Distilled is made with specially grown Kentish grain, and is...
copperrivetdistillery.com copperrivetdistillery.com
 
The old girl in the house attached to mine confessed she had a little drop of scotch (I doubt malt) first thing in the morning. “Sort of gets you going, you know”. Ran on to somewhere after 95 so may be something in it!
 
Foxyboy43 said:
Indeed so. Problem is that Lady FB now knows what it would cost to replace it; soooo a pivotal question - does cold tea really look like malt whiskey?
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Absolutely, and Roibos tea looks just like Johnny Walker Red Label.

I reckon the British Empire, the World Wars and many of the key business, military and political decisions were taken whilst the individuals concerned were pickled on Whisky.

Indeed its not that long ago when board rooms and offices had drinks cabinets. I remember a day when we had the final pricing meeting in small old fashioned merchant bank to float a business on the Ofex exchange. We had the cornerstone investors around the table. At 10 am we had a deal - we were millionaires on paper. Then in came the newswire on Boo.com crashing. Down went the whisky bottles and levels of cigarette smoke as the dot.com bubble unpacked in front of us. Our underwriting price followed suit as the deal was rewritten many times.

By the end of the day most of end investors were broke and pickled. We survived but we parked the company in the reeds and went off to do other things.

Personally I have never liked whisky, and never liked how it affects peoples behaviour.
 
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Foxyboy43 said:
Problem is that Lady FB now knows what it would cost to replace it...
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So don't replace it.

Drink it (with or without friends), or just look at it for the rest of your life.

I know what I would bloody do with it.

And it doesn't involve looking at it - or friends...:evil:


Unknown-1.webp
 
Stalker1962 said:
So don't replace it.

Drink it (with or without friends), or just look at it for the rest of your life.

I know what I would bloody do with it.

And it doesn't involve looking at it - or friends...:evil:


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Sage-like advice sir.
A rhetorical question - does one really need Dutch Courage to tell one’s darling that the very expensive whiskey has gone?
Just curious…
Meanwhile I have to contend with this…
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and this…
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chriswjx said:
Edit: I still have a bottle of tawny port I bought in Portugal what must be getting at least 5 years ago now. I can't bare to open it as I bloody love the stuff and that bottle in particular (I bought a half bottle at the same time and have slowly slowly been drinking it one small glass at a time)
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Port ! Now you’re talking!

One of my many vices 😂

I have/had a case of 1977 grahams that is delicious, six bottles left now entirely down to my willpower having the tensile strength of a warm mars bar 😂
 
tackb said:
I fed some Scottish stalkers some English whisky and after much eye scrunching and frowning the response was ‘I’ve had worse’

They then proceeded to poison me with whyte and McKay that left me unable to even smell whisky ever since without gipping! (I maintain i was dehydrated from a long difficult drag which in fairness was self inflicted and it’s certainly nothing to do with the quantity drunk!)
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I'm sensing a Monty Python reference here... LOL!
 
Foxyboy43 said:
One day I will find the courage, one day….
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Get on with it man, your heirs will swill it down with coke at your wake otherwise.
Bring it on your next jaunt to Scotland and show them what you can do with whiskey if you don’t obsessively pollute it with peat smoke.
If it makes you feel better, you can flog the empty box and use the proceeds as a deposit towards your next investment in one the finest examples of the blenders art available on this planet.
 
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