Terms like ‘secondary maturation’, ‘double maturation’ and ‘wood-finished’ mean the same in the world of whisky – all refer to the word ‘cask finish’!
As you know, whisky needs to be aged for a minimum of two to three years for the liquor to develop character, taste and colour. For this purpose, it is aged in oak barrels to obtain the flavour of the wood in its flavor profile. While many distilleries use new oak barrels, many reuse their barrels for the liquor’s maturation process.
But that’s not all. After the liquor has been matured for the desired years in the oak barrels, distillers will use a second barrel in the hopes of adding complementary notes, aroma and colour to the whisky. For instance, Glenfiddich uses Caribbean Rum casks to mature their 21 Gran Reserva, and Bruichladdich uses Bordeaux red wine casks to finish their 10 Year Old Port Charlotte, while The Glenlivet uses never-used-before American and French casks to give their whisky potent flavour notes.
Here’s the tricky part – even whisky experts haven’t been able to conclude in unison that cask finishing adds any flavour to the distilled spirit. Distillers who use wine, beer and rum barrels for the double maturation process believe that the indrink (the liquid absorbed in the casks from the previous maturation process) does react with their whiskies to add complementary elements to it. For this reason, some distillers opt for a third round of barrel maturation as well.
New whisky players in the market, like Kinahans, are even experimenting with using casks made out of five different trees to give their spirit a unique touch. Either way, cask finishing is just a way to play with subtle flavours and aroma that most amateurs drinkers can not even distinguish between. It takes a whisky enthusiast to cherish every note of the liquor they are sipping.
Now, that you know what ‘cask finish’ means, pay attention to your single malts and blended scotch bottles next time to know a little more about what you are drinking!
