Western Isles: Mild west

Published on Tuesday 28 April 2009 17:47

VISITORS TO SCOTLAND will struggle to avoid the sweet whiff of a whisky distillery. The Cairngorms alone has around 50 of them. Islay, in the Inner Hebrides, has an impressive eight. Yet cross to the Western Isles, land of Whisky Galore!, and, until just recently, you would have found precisely none.

Former Laird Sir James Matheson, a teetotaller (and opium baron), shut the last distillery down 170 years ago, leaving illicit "hill" stills and, latterly, the likes of Whyte & Mackay, to soak up the slack.

Now a no-frills venture in wild west Lewis is promising to break the drought with top-notch single malt, set to hit the shelves when the National Mod – aka the "Whisky Olympics", returns to Stornoway in 2011. That is when Abhainn Dearg, or Red River Distillery, which fired up its copper "heads" last autumn, will be launched.

I met owner Mark "Marco" Tayburn, a scrappie turned businessman, on an unseasonably warm day. He waved me over like an old friend, rounding off a phone call and whistling a collie to heel as I approached.

"The spirit is just starting to run so excuse me if I dash off mid-conversation," he says, apologetically. His phone promptly rings again, followed by his mobile.

Leaving him to juggle twin conversations, one concerning his other passion, Highland cattle, I scan the signs of fledgling industry around me. Set in an old salmon hatchery, new buildings are cropping up among old, and it seems aesthetics are not, as yet, Red River's main concern. In fact, the twinkling distillery flue is currently the only clue to the venture's purpose.

The bigger picture, though, is staggering. The course of the Red River, said to have once run with the blood of Norse taxmen slayed by irked locals, runs from the distant north Harris peaks, passing a few metres from the distillery before snaking over Uig's golden sands, just a stone's throw away.

Equally staggering is the pluck of this small, privately funded venture that is set to rival multi-million-pound schemes in the pipeline for Harris and in Barra. No-nonsense Marco, who picked up distilling skills in Jura, bought the site, filed the relevant forms and plunged in wholeheartedly.

Reappearing with a mock mop of the brow, the 41-year-old ushers me into the warm hum of the distillery. "I was just organising the plough for our barley," he explains. "The plan is to be quite self-sufficient here, keeping the view that, historically, whisky was just one part of the agricultural system, particularly in a crofting community like this."

In addition to providing much of the grain needed to produce 25,000 litres of finest usquebaugh (the Gaelic name for whisky, translating as "water of life") a year, he also hopes to have on-site maltings. His cattle are already fattening on the chaff-like by-product, draff – and, to counter the wood used in cooperage, he is planting a forest of native trees.

"I'm a traditionalist, I suppose," he says, "and a bit of an eco warrior."

Barring the steel "mash tuns", the Red River Distillery uses only natural materials, from the 7,000-litre Douglas fir washbacks and oak spirit receivers to its giraffe-necked copper stills, designed along the lines of a traditional Hebridean hill still. Their unusual shape allows maximum contact between spirit and copper during the reflux phase, when alcoholic gases condense and shed impurities.

"Most distilleries, with the exception of one or two, have shifted to stainless steel, computerised systems for competition reasons," he says. "I am different. I am staying faithful to the hands-on, cottage industry ways."

An unexpected power cut brings a moment's panic at the stills, and put paid to 50 per cent of the phone calls, along with our cup of tea. But, deciding it is probably a bit uncouth to sup char in a distillery anyway, I shift straight to the hard stuff. I am no whisky buff, but can tell instantly that Red River is a goodie: kind to the mouth, lightly peaty with warm cherry overtones – and with a neat kick in its tail. By the time it has matured a further two years in the flavour-sharpening salt air, far away from any pollution, it promises to be mellow, dark and syrupy.

"I believe a good whisky will speak for itself," says Marco. So what of marketing or visitor centres? "Well, these can come later." Word of mouth, he claims, has brought hundreds to his door already. "People are popping in on a daily basis to see what we are about. It's encouraging at this early stage."

Marco's dream is to see three Western Isles distilleries in action within five years and the region included on the lucrative west coast whisky trail.

"Right now the isles are actually a drain on the wider UK economy. We could help turn that around by jumping on the bandwagon of one of Scotland's wealthiest industries."

• For more information, contact Red River Distillery, tel: [phone].