“Do you want the truth or do you want the story?” asks Daniel Pi, paraphrasing the overarching sentiment of Life of Pi – no relation to himself, yet possibly just as great a philosopher in many other ways. We are sitting around a long wooden table, discussing our favourite films over a highland dinner at the very beautiful Ballintaggart Farm – a private ‘restaurant with rooms’, found in Scotland’s Perthshire.
Here, over 7,000 miles away from Pi’s hometown of Mendoza, our feasting menu offers us four locally sourced courses, including Aberdeen Angus beef, bravely forging a subtle connection between two cultures as we celebrate the great and the good of both Scotch whisky and wine.
Ballintaggart Farm
Daniel Pi, arguably one of Argentina’s most-accomplished winemakers, working for Grupo Peñaflor under which sits household names such as Trapiche and El Esteco, amongst his work on other more boutique projects, meets Stephanie McLeod, Scotland’s most awarded Master Blender with a similarly impressive career. ‘Two houses, both alike in dignity’ to quote another favourite film of the evening (no surprises that this one is mine), are brought together by a group of 11 friends, former British American Tobacco employees.
In 2002, they fell in love with Argentina, and in 2011 started to make wine under the label Finca Ambrosia, from fruit grown in Gualltallary – set up high in the Uco Valley where near-perfect, cool conditions exist for making quality wine. At least one of these friends had roots in Scotland, and so the idea was born to create a Malbec cask-finished whisky. 21-year-old Aberfeldy Single Malt Scotch was selected to go into barrels formerly housing ‘Viña Unica’ Malbec, and thus, recent history was made.
This is not the first time Aberfeldy has made a wine finished whisky, but it is the first time the wine estate has been named. The current range includes a 15 year old Aberfeldy aged in white wine Semillon barrels from Bordeaux, an 18 year old Napa barrel finished whisky from California and two 15 and 18 year old Tuscan finished whiskies – one from the enchanting appellation of Bolgheri, where international grape varieties prevail, and one using barrels formerly housing the Sangiovese grape.
The resultant liquids have the power and weight of the Aberfeldy house style, yet are bolstered by pretty suggestions of fruit – softening the overall impression on the mouth and providing a perhaps more elegant gateway into this world of Single Malts. Lifted red berry aromatics meld with the more robust and muscular strength of the whisky. “We want people to explore the characters of our whisky through the vehicle of wine,” says McLeod, adding ‘I’d hate to make a whisky that was boring.’ The Malbec cask whisky gives notes of deep red fruited, lightly spiced flesh with a weighty, cereal and cinnamon-rich depth.
Photo by Fran Mart (courtesy of Dun Aluinn)
To launch this new addition, a collective gamble of wine and whisky, friends old and new gather together in this most picturesque part of Scotland. We begin our study of this newly unveiled venture at Dun Aluinn, a beautiful grey-stone private house hotel overlooking the extended views of Perthshire’s undulating landscape. The eponymously-named distillery here was founded in 1896, and has a long heritage and lively history of promotional campaigns, extending, we find to serendipitous surprise, to as far as Argentina, amongst other far-flung countries still served today.
Today, its visitor attraction sits alongside its more serious working parts, including the currently ‘silent’ waterfall while the reservoir is dredged, otherwise connecting river to spirit. While sipping on a raw version of this, a honeyed liquid that we turn into hot toddies by adding a flask of water, the cereal weight of our drink provides suitable body for hearing the production process that paves waterway to bottled finish.
This water is, of course, another reason why people visit the area. Sir Rabbie Burns himself, Scotland’s most lauded poet, has a seat enshrined to him at the Birks of Aberfeldy, a series of pretty birch trees, fringing gushing waterfalls that span out along a brilliantly textured, moss-lined walk that ties the far end of the village to its more urban heart. The poetry here doesn’t just live here in the natural surrounds. The Aberfeldy Distillery clan will surely claim it lives within their bottles, while Ed Sheeran’s ‘The Hills of Aberfeldy’ immortalises his affection for the place, citing the frozen water and ground slowly melting.
Water has a huge impact on making wine, too – and in Argentina, where the days are hot, even when the nights are cool, irrigation is required, here mostly using water that runs down from high up in the Andes mountains, surrounding the Uco Valley vineyards. Through this, Pi spins his own winemaking beliefs, working as much as he can with what nature brings and harvesting his vines under a full moon, to raise bottles as determinedly authentic in nature as he.
The romance of this region is whipped into further literary gaze, when we travel with kilted knights (drivers and tour guides) thanks to the team behind Highland Safaris, up a series of redwood-lined dirt tracks to arrive at a perfect viewing spot. Gloved fingers clasp quickly-acquired clear bulb-shaped glasses containing aromas and flavours of an ‘Exceptional Cask’ 9-year-old whisky, bottle number 182 of 1152 – a whisky of signature fruity, cinnamon and vanilla notes aged in Speyside Scottish oak, reminiscent in muscle memory from our pine-scented backdrop. Once known as ‘dock’ glasses, nodding to the merchants who would nose their whiskies ‘dock-side’, this afternoon we are rather, almost, loch-side, close to the waters of Loch Tay.
These crystalline waters, that in late March reflect a brilliant shock of winter sun, feed the nearby river Tay, the body of water that flanks Aberfeldy village. The name Aberfeldy is said to mean ‘Pool of the water god.’ If ‘in vino veritas, in agua sanitas’ – in wine there is truth, and in water, health, then amongst all this lyricism and people world-wide to bring them together, perhaps with the addition of this cask aged finish, a liquid philosopher’s stone is found.
All best sipped to the words of Robert Burns;
Bonie lassie, will ye go,
Will ye go, will ye go,
Bonie lassie, will ye go
To the birks of Aberfeldy!
Now Simmer blinks on flowery braes,
And o’er the crystal streamlets plays;
Come let us spend the lightsome days,
In the birks of Aberfeldy!
Aberfeldy 21 Malbec Red Wine Cask Finish Limited Edition is a celebration of two crafts coming together. You can find it for sale at The Whisky Exchange (£190) and from the Aberfeldy shop directly (£230). For more information on Dun Aluinn visit www.dunaluinn.com and Ballintaggart Farm or check out www.dewars.com to find out how to visit the distillery. For more information on the Finca Ambrosia wines, also available from L’art du Vin and other reputable retailers, please visit www.fincaambrosia.com.
