Westland Distillery, located in SODO neighborhood, has been launched in 2010. The distillery produces single malt whiskey, derived exclusively from malted barley. The company has been acquired by French group Rémy Cointreau in 2017.
With similar weather conditions as the ones in Scotland, co-founder and master distiller of Westland Distillery, Matt Hofmann, has chosen the PNW region to launch his company, whose climate is ideally suited for the production of single malt whiskey. Hoffman has learnt brewing and distillation techniques in Scotland.
The different types of malt used in Westland Distillery are: Washington Select Pale Malt, Peated Malt, Pale Chocolate Malt, Brown Malt, Munich Malt, Extra Special Malt and Washington State Peated Malt.
The distillery uses extremely pure water in the process of whiskey that comes from Cedar river, near Tiger Mountain.
The 5 steps of Whiskey making process you can see in Westland Distillery are malting, brewing, fermentation, distillation and ageing.
Westland distillery focuses more on whiskey quality that production. The fermentation time is about 48hrs in a industrial processed distillery. The fermentation process takes over 100hrs in Westland distillery.
The greatest attention is given to the selection of barrels. This includes the Sherry Butt (Xérès) barrel, the most expensive one and the hardest to find.
Single malt distilleries, such as Westland, have launched a commission to highlight single malt whiskey against false single malt that use other cereals as barley in their process.
Innovation plays an important role within the distillery and a lot of experiments are being held in order to create new single malt and new flavors.
Guided (1-2hrs) visits of the distillery are organized, followed by a tasting of 4 different whiskeys: American Oak, Sherry Wood, Peated Malt, Peat Week. You can check Westland Distillery’s Website for more information on the company or to book a tour.
Ariane
