Ireland’s Slane Distillery Coming of Age (Episode 833: August 23, 2020)

It’s been almost three years since Brown-Forman and the Conyngham family fired up the stills at Slane Distillery on the family’s Slane Castle estate near Dublin. While their flagship Slane Irish Whiskey has been made using sourced whiskies since its debut in 2017, the day is coming closer when some of the distillery’s own maturing whiskey will be blended into the final product. We’ll check in with Alex Conyngham on the distillery’s progress in a summer that would have normally been filled with visitors to the distillery and the estate, but it’s become clear that 2020 is no normal year.

In the news, the coronavirus pandemic continues to plague small-scale distillers in the U.S. with estimates of lost sales now reaching $700 million this year, and the past week also saw more cancellations of whisky events worldwide through the end of 2020. We’ll also check the court dockets for updates on several cases involving the whisky industry, and there’s a bright spot in the form of new whiskies coming from around the world.

Links: Slane Irish Whiskey | Distilled Spirits Council | American Distilling Institute | Ardbeg | Bunnahabhain | Tobermory | Deanston | GlenDronach | Great Drams | Little Book | The Lakes Distillery | Three Ships | Preservation Distillery | Secret Spirits | Bacon & Bourbon | Post & Courier | PappyRaffle.org | Old Forester | Maker’s Mark