Whisky Dynasty: George Grant

The sixth generation of one of Scotland's famous whisky families, George Grant tells us what makes their malts so special.

As told to Estella Shardlow on Monday 16th January, 2012

I really started to take really notice of my family heritage when I was about 12 or 13 and finding 55,000 casks of whisky with my name on it. I didn’t really think of it as being unusual, it was just always home. The distillery smells are very memorable though; you always knew the first day you were malting because there was a lovely sort of warmth in the air and a malty scent. I don’t specifically remember my first sip of whisky, but I am told it was put on my dummy when I was a baby!

The key thing about Glenfarclas is that we’re an independent, family owned and run distillery, not part of a multinational. Family values are important here. We haven’t changed things unless we really have to – we want to make the same whisky today as we did 100 years ago.

My father and I are at the helm of the business today. I’m brand ambassador and director of sales, so I travel about six or seven months a year. I’m off to Canada on Thursday and I also go to the States, Asia, India and around Europe. The number one whisky market is actually France. It’s just always been a brown spirit market as people really don’t drink vodka or gin there.

It used to be that Islay whiskies were peaty and Speyside ones smooth and sherried, but I think all those rules have been sort of thrown out the window now. There are a lot of Speyside distilleries that now use peated malted barley, for example. Islay became a hugely popular region for whisky about 25 years ago so several distilleries decided to do something similar to tap into that trend. Then there are people putting whisky into different types of wood to change the flavours.

We used to have seven whiskies in our range but we now have more than 55, so it’s more difficult to sum up. But the typical Glanfarclas to me is a very balanced whisky, with good sherry sweetness coming through and a nice demerara, crème brûlée sort of finish.

Normally you’d expect an older bottling to have a bigger, richer, more intense flavour, but sometimes you get young ones that come up that way as well, so it’s not all that clear cut. Quite often you pick up a whisky and it doesn’t smell very much, and you might think ‘oh, this isn’t going to be very good’, but then you taste it and it just sort of explodes in your mouth.

We came up with the Family Casks idea in 2007; we just wanted to show people what we had in the warehouse. We selected a range of whiskies from 1952 to 1994, all bottles at cask strength, all in natural colour. We initially released ten of the casks and they were a huge success.

The great thing about whisky is that you’re not tied to specific vintages – with wine you have to ask is there a vintage to start with and is it a good one – whereas with whisky you could have any year you want from Glenfarclas. We’re not affected by weather; the only thing that really would be a problem is drought, but that’s why we’re in Scotland! The other advantage is that once you open it you can just put the cork back in, you don’t have to finish it, you can take a year or two to drink it.

Most people are buying their whisky for the year that’s on the bottle – whether it was the year they were born, the year they got married or the year their child was born – so that’s something that’s preordained which whisky they chose. People want years that are specific to them. Besides that, do read the tasting notes, or go find a bar that sells it and taste it to find out what you like. I always joke that the 1976 is the best one because that’s the year I was born, but I do like some of the really old ones from the early 50s and there are also some great ones from the 90s.

The best thing to enjoy your whisky with is good company. Everyone always asks me how to drink whisky though, whether they should have it straight, or with water. I always say it should be like your food: taste it and nose it first, then decide if you need to add a drop of water to it. Just like red wine, if you make the whisky too cold you won’t get the nose or any of the bouquet off it.

QUICK FIRE QUESTIONS:
What's your favourite type of classic car?
A Bentley – my father has a 1934 and I like that, he won’t let me drive it. We also have a 50s Green Goddess fire engine at the distillery.
Classic watch?
I like old Heuers.
Favourite city?
Hong Kong and Chicago – I lived in Hong Kong for two years and had an absolute blast of a time and Chicago because it’s such a fun, friendly, diverse place.