{"id":31349,"date":"2019-01-11T03:43:26","date_gmt":"2019-01-11T11:43:26","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.jewishindependent.ca\/?p=31349"},"modified":"2019-01-09T15:21:28","modified_gmt":"2019-01-09T23:21:28","slug":"whiskys-ready-to-be-poured","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.jewishindependent.ca\/index.php\/2019\/01\/11\/whiskys-ready-to-be-poured\/","title":{"rendered":"Whisky\u2019s ready to be poured"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Milk\nand Honey Distillery was established in 2012. (photo by Dave Gordon)<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Milk and Honey Distillery\u2019s first\nthree-year-old batch of whisky is about to be officially tapped, to appear in\n150 locations across Israel, as well as the Netherlands, Belgium and\nLuxembourg. And plans are in the works to bring the product to North America.\nCurrent output is estimated at about a million bottles.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Milk and Honey\u2019s founders sought to piggyback\non what appears to be a trend of people wanting to try certain drinks from\nplaces that are not typically known for making them.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWhisky consumption is seeing a big shift\nhappening all over the world now,\u201d Milk and Honey chief executive officer Eitan\nAttir told the Independent<\/em>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

For decades, four countries have ruled the\nwhisky industry \u2013 Ireland, Scotland, United States and Canada. But many\ncustomers are seeking uniqueness.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cIt\u2019s what we call a \u2018new world\u2019 whisky,\u201d said\nAttir. \u201cSo, now you can find more and more countries, that never had a history\nof whisky, doing it.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Proof of Israel\u2019s new world whisky popularity was\nevident even before the first ounce of Milk and Honey\u2019s product was officially\navailable. In 2017, the distillery filled 391 bottles with its initial\nthree-year-old whisky single malt. Head distiller Tomer Goren created the batch\nin his workshop, and it was aged in the distillery.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Bottles numbered 1 through 100 were sold on the\nWhisky Auctioneer website and more than 30,000 people bid on the bottles. The\n\u201cnumber one\u201d bottle was bought for $3,000 US and number two, about $2,500 US.\nThe rest were sold for about $750 US each. Stock sold out in three months.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThat was a huge surprise, not only\nbusiness-wise, but also the attention it got,\u201d Attir said. Several media took\nnotice: the New York Times<\/em>, Boston Herald, CNBC and NBC, among others.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Fast forward a year to 2018, and the company\u2019s\n\u201ctriple cask\u201d \u2013 a combination of previously red wine, bourbon and Islay\nbarreled whisky \u2013 won best in show and second place at Whisky Life Tel Aviv.\nIts competitors were 15-, 18- and 20-year-old beverages from many different popular\nbrands.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

How Milk and Honey got there was as much a\nblend of perfect ingredients as a premier blended whisky.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In 2012, the company was started by Gal Kalkshtein, Milk and Honey\u2019s owner, and five friends, all previously in the Israeli tech and startup industry. With their million-dollar investment, the friends turned a former bakery into a distillery in 2014. (For more on the distillery, see jewishindependent.ca\/israels-first-whisky-distillery<\/a>.)<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWe were the first ones here, so there really\nwas no one to ask about how to build a distillery. So, they traveled all around\nScotland and studied a lot,\u201d said Gal Levin, manager of the visitor centre, who\noversees business development. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Then came the parts: a tailor-made whisky pot\nstill and a vintage still, each constructed in accordance with Scottish\ncoppersmith tradition. The wash drum was found online, on a German website \u2013 it\nwas sitting in a barn in Romania (Transylvania, to be exact).<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThe guys traveled all the way there to see it\nand buy it,\u201d said Levin. \u201cThey weren\u2019t sure it was going to work. They bought\nit, brought it here, and fixed it. We still don\u2019t know who made it and for\nwhat. It\u2019s mysterious. It\u2019s working, and that\u2019s the most important thing.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

During renovations, they began tinkering with\nwhat recipes to use. In 2013, they hired two professionals. One was Scottish\nmaster distiller Dr. James Swan, who guided the company on research and\ndevelopment. His experience included advising distilleries and brands all over\nthe world, from Jim Beam to Chivas. As well, he had expertise in aging and\ndistilling in other hot climates, like Taiwan and India. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The second person hired was Goren, who was\nstudying for his master\u2019s distiller degree in Scotland. (He is also a judge at\ninternational whisky competitions.)<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWe chose to adopt very strict regulations of\nthe Scottish method, that allows us to connect with the Scottish tradition, and\nalso so our whisky will be considered \u2018whisky\u2019 in many places around the\nworld,\u201d said Levin.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"photo
Milk and Honey Distillery makes whisky, gin and a liqueur. (photo by Dave Gordon)<\/em>\ufeff<\/figcaption><\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\n

Whisky, by definition, is made with four\ningredients: malted barley, yeast, water and the barrel. Milk and Honey\nmaintains the tradition, with no added ingredients. Barrel selection included\ncasks previously used for bourbon, a collection of new oak barrels, and former\nwine barrels (all kosher).<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cWe are aging for a minimum of three years\nbefore we call the product \u2018whisky.\u2019 That\u2019s an important rule. Of course, in\nScotland, the whisky is called \u2018scotch.\u2019 We don\u2019t do that,\u201d said Levin.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

As an added plus, Israel\u2019s climate allows for\nrelatively quicker fermentation, up to two and a half times faster than that of\nScotland, according to Milk and Honey. That means an Israeli three-year bottle\nmight taste like a six-year bottle from the Highlands.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

And Milk and Honey doesn\u2019t only make whisky \u2013\nthey also produce gin and a liqueur.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The gin is spiced with and inspired by Israeli\ningredients. The Levantine gin, for example, contains za\u2019atar, orange slices,\nlemon peels, black pepper, cinnamon, chamomile and lemon verbena. The Roots\nliqueur has typical Holy Land flavourings: almond, savory, coriander, jasmine,\ntarragon, thyme and cardamom. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

With all of this deliciousness, that\u2019s\nsomething to say \u201cl\u2019chaim\u201d to! <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Dave Gordon<\/strong> is a Toronto-based freelance writer whose work has appeared in more than 100 publications around the world<\/em>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Milk and Honey Distillery was established in 2012. (photo by Dave Gordon) The Milk and Honey Distillery\u2019s first three-year-old batch of whisky is about to be officially tapped, to appear in 150 locations across Israel, as well as the Netherlands, Belgium and Luxembourg. And plans are in the works to bring the product to North […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":31350,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4329],"tags":[8625,6739],"class_list":["post-31349","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-israel","tag-gin","tag-whisky"],"blocksy_meta":{"styles_descriptor":{"styles":{"desktop":"","tablet":"","mobile":""},"google_fonts":[],"version":8}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.jewishindependent.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/31349","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.jewishindependent.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.jewishindependent.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.jewishindependent.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.jewishindependent.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=31349"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.jewishindependent.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/31349\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.jewishindependent.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/31350"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.jewishindependent.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=31349"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.jewishindependent.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=31349"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.jewishindependent.ca\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=31349"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}