Beer and Gin production in Scotland is booming – we are in a golden age of premium drinks. Anyone who grew up before 2000 will remember the turgid, chemical filled beer we ‘forced’ ourselves to drink. Mass wine sales consisted of the the rubbish that other countries didn’t want and because we couldn’t get anything else easily then that is what we drank.
Now going into most bars in Scotland and off licences you are tripping over the craft beers and seaweed infused botanicals. The growth behind the gin revolution is a book waiting to be written, but it is the boom in whisky drinking that has encouraged people to start new distilleries. Some such as Glen Wyvis is a community owned distillery. Whisky, of course, takes years before it can be bottled, so what do you do with your equipment whilst you are waiting for the golden nectar to mature? You head off to local forest / beach – grab some botanicals and get cracking making some of the tastiest gin you can find.
These small producers and are bringing new life into old places – beer and gin production in Scotland is, in general, a success story of small scale producers – people who are doing it for the love of the job.
Germany has, of course, had their purity laws for 100s of year and their beer has been great for 100s of years. But they are too finding the craft revolution is hitting traditional mass producers as modern brewing techniques makes it easier to produce small batch craft beer.
So let’s raise our glasses to the new kids on the block and recognise a real success story. Is it too much to end this blog post with Cheers! – I’ll drink to that.
PS if you are looking for whisky glasses to fit your dram then check out this blog post
