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Fellow Drammers!
Exciting news — we’ve got a J.J. Corry Irish Whiskey event on the books! And our guest speaker is none other than their founder Louise McGuane. It will take place on Saturday, April 10th, starting at 2pm Pacific / 5pm EST / 22:00 in Ireland where Louise will be joining us! This company was founded in 2015, and Louise and her team are bringing back the lost art of (the once dominant) Irish Whiskey Bonding traditions. What is Irish Whiskey Bonding you ask? See the segment below copied from JJ Corry’s website for more details on that. But this company is kicking ass and taking names — their 27yo single cask Irish whiskey release “The Chosen” sells for North of $7,000/bottle on the secondary market to give you an idea. We won’t be drinking that, I’m afraid, but we will be drinking a fun array of their releases, almost all impossible-to-find older releases:
The Armada (a limited blend done with the Armada Hotel)
The Gael, Batch 3
The Battalion, Batch 2, mezcal and tequila influenced, one of 600 bottles, 46% abv
The Lock In (limited edition 500ml quarantine release, technically Batch 1, though there aren’t other batches other than a cask strength version), we will be drinking 2 of the 464 500ml bottles that were released. 43.86% abv
Half of those of you who sign up will get The Whisky Thief, one of only 100 500ml bottles released in honor of International Women’s Day 2020, 46% abv, the other half of the group will get The Cross, a blend of 40% malt and 60% grain Irish whiskey finished in an IPA seasoned American Oak cask, of of only 102 500ml bottles, Batch no. 1, released Summer 2020.
That’s our lineup! We are absolutely thrilled that Louise has agreed to join us as our guest speaker, so we wanted to share the exciting news right away so folks can plan accordingly. We hope you can join us!
$50/person for Drammers Members
$70/person for Drammers Observers
What is Irish Whiskey Bonding?
There was a time when every town in Ireland had its own particular flavour of whiskey. The Golden Age of Irish Whiskey (the late 19th century) saw hundreds of distilleries operating on the Island of Ireland. Most did not have their own brands of whiskey at that time, rather the distilleries simply made their whiskey and sold it wholesale to the Bonders. Bonders would have been jacks of all trades, the publicans, grocers, mercantile owners. They would travel to their local distillery with the empty barrels they’d have from their pub trade, fill them up with new make spirit and then cart them home and store them for ageing and blending. This business model was extremely accessible as there was no expense in building or running a distillery, which meant that there were Whiskey Bonders in every town across Ireland. Because so much of whiskey's flavour comes from the barrel in which it is aged in and from the climate where that barrel is stored, this meant that there was huge variety of regional flavours within Irish Whiskey. The Irish Whiskey industry collapsed in the early 1900's and with it came the closure of all but 4 distilleries in Ireland. Those distilleries since bought by multinational organisations have made almost all the Irish Whiskey produced ever since. They created individual whiskey brands and turned off the tap to Grocers thereby shutting down the practice of Whiskey Bonding.