lantern See ⇒pot still.
leaching/leeching As a transitive verb, to leach is defined by the OED as 'To cause (a liquid) to percolate through some material'. The first recorded usage occurs in Jedidiah Morse's 1796 book The American Geography. 'Cider ... is first separated from the filth and dregs, either by leaching through sand, or straining it through flannel cloths'.
Leaching or leeching (the latter spelling is sometimes preferred in North American usage) is a US term for the practice of charcoal mellowing, also known as the ⇒Lincoln County Process, characteristic of ⇒Tennessee whiskey. New spirit, fresh from the stills, is allowed to trickle slowly through vats filled with deep beds of sugar maple charcoal for several days before it is filled into barrels. This process removes some of the heavier ⇒fusel oils, leading to a 'cleaner' spirit.
'In the manufacture of whiskey, perfect leaching is an important adjunct. No matter how well the liquors have been distilled, they must be leached well before they can become high-grade goods. Jack Daniel has built up his reputation by great care in leaching the sour mash whiskey he produces'. (The Nashville American, 6th March 1896).
legs The trickles of whisky that run down the inside of the glass after it has first been swirled around during evaluation. The process is normally undertaken prior to nosing.
As a rule of thumb, if the legs of the whisky are thin, close together and run quickly, it is likely to be light-bodied and/or comparatively young. If the legs are slow, quite thick and further apart, it is probable that the whisky is heavier-bodied and/or older. However, the high alcohol content of a cask- strength whisky, or the presence of a heavily sherried whisky, are also likely to lead to slow-moving legs.
'Apparently a quality whisky is like a virtuous woman; the longer she takes to show her legs and the closer together they are, the classier the whisky'. (Maximillian Kaizen - www.thoughtleader.co.za, August 2007).
The patterns made by the legs of a whisky in a glass are also sometimes known as cathedral windows due to their distinctive shape. 'Glengoyne Limited Edition Scottish Oak Wood Finish … Appearance: Amber, with well developed cathedral windows in the glass'. (www.glengoyne.com).
lightning Now used almost exclusively in the United States and with the qualifying adjective 'white'. ⇒White Lightning is a synonym for ⇒moonshine, white implying new, unmatured and therefore usually illegal whiskey. The expression is first recorded in 1921, and was adopted for the vocabulary of the drugs culture in the early 1970s to refer to a kind of LSD.
Lightning is first attested in 1781 as a slang term for gin, 'Noggin of lightning, a quartern of gin', though it later came to mean 'any strong, often low-quality alcoholic spirit'. (ODoMS) In 1851 'The stimulant of a flash of lightning' is recorded, and it is clearly that sense of lightning which is valid in this context; a swift, sharp and even dramatic drink of spirits, which makes the expression particularly apt for application to the often 'rough and ready' product of moonshine stills. White lightning is celebrated in the eponymous song, recorded by American country singer George Jones.
Another whisky-related use of the term lightning occurs in Alfred Barnard's book How to Blend Scotch Whisky, published between 1895 and 1905. 'During the American War, new and raw whisky was sold in large quantities to the hangers-on of the troops, which got the name "Jersey Lightning," from the rapidity with which it would prostrate a man'.
Lincoln County Process The distinctive charcoal ⇒leaching or ⇒leeching process characteristic of ⇒Tennessee whiskey. The name derives from the fact that this method of producing a smoother style of whiskey is thought to have been invented in Lincoln County, Tennessee. Today's Moore County, in which the Jack Daniels' Distillery is situated, was formerly part of Lincoln County. The process is often said to have been developed around 1825 by one Alfred Eaton, but there is also evidence that it was actually in use a decade earlier.
' … it was this charcoal mellowing process which came to identify whiskey made by the Lincoln County Process in the mid-nineteenth century'. (CAW)
liqueur The French word for ⇒liquor, but now with a substantive meaning, given by Henry McNulty as 'a flavoured spirit, usually sweet, which can be based on any grain alcohol, brandy, whisky, rum, vodka, or any other pure alcohol'. (V:L&S) The flavouring agent, which can be herbs, flowers, fruit, seeds or roots, is introduced to the spirit base by re-distillation, infusion or maceration. While the term liqueur is used in the United States, American drinkers also often use ⇒cordial as a synonym, and the Encyclopaedia Britannica records the use of 'liquor' as a synonym for 'liqueur' in 1797: 'Liquors of various sorts are compounded and distilled on Montpelier'. Almost a century later the Encyclopaedia noted that 'bitters form a class of liqueurs by themselves'. The first attestation of liqueur occurs in 1742: 'He ... Try'd all hors d'oeuvres, all liqueurs defin'd, Judicious drank, and greatly- daring din'd'.
Some whisky blenders have been known to describe their product as 'liqueur whisky', but as Jackson points out, ' "Liqueur whisky" has no real meaning, and such terms are falling out of use. A whisky liqueur is another thing altogether'. (WGtW) Presumably the term 'liqueur' applied in the context of blended whisky was intended to convey a sense of sophistication - perhaps the French sound of the word was itself enough - and an 'after dinner' quality to the product. Dunkling makes the point that 'By implication, a liqueur is of high quality, to be savoured rather than hastily gulped'. (GDC) (See also ⇒deluxe) Ireland, Scotland and the United States all produce whisky-based liqueurs, a number being internationally known by their trade names and the romantic stories attached to their creation.
Irish Mist was the first Irish liqueur to be commercially marketed, being developed by the Williams family in the County Offally town of Tullamore, with the aid of a German refugee and liqueurist towards the end of the Second World War. The recipe which this liqueurist brought to Ireland is sometimes claimed to be the long-lost original Irish liqueur recipe which was taken to Europe by Irish refugees fleeing from the Tudor armies of England. Irish Mist is made from a blend of four ⇒pot still and ⇒grain Irish whiskeys, which are subjected to maceration with clover, heather, herbs and honey.
During the last few decades a new type of cream-based Irish liqueur has gained substantial sales around the world, and most drinks cupboards house a bottle of Bailey's Original Cream Liqueur around Christmas time, and frequently for many months afterwards. Though there have been a flattering number of imitators, Baileys was the first Irish cream liqueur, launched in 1974, and it is made with whiskey, cream, chocolate and additional flavourings. Grindal is less than flattering in his judgement on this particular drink, describing Bailey's as 'that Anglo-Irish low-alcohol milk shake'. (SoW)
The Scottish whisky-based liqueur Drambuie - considered by Jackson to be 'the oldest and most famous whisky liqueur' - can claim an even more romantic provenance than Irish Mist. It is reputedly made to a recipe given to the Mackinnons of Skye by Prince Charles Edward Stuart as a reward for their service during the failed Jacobite rebellion of 1745-6, when a Captain Mackinnon of Strathaird helped the prince escape from Skye to sanctuary in France. The prince's recipe had been devised for him when he was living in the French court. The distinctive, squat Drambuie bottle carries the slogan 'Prince Charles Edward's Liqueur. A link with the '45' and though the Drambuie Liqueur Company is now based in Edinburgh, it is still in the hands of the Mackinnon family, who are Britain's largest producers of liqueurs. The name Drambuie is usually said to be an Anglicisation of the Gaelic an dram buidheach which translates as 'the drink that satisfies', but dram buidhe in Gaelic means 'golden drink', and the name could have originated with either phrase. Milsted suggests that the phrase 'the drink that satisfies' is merely a marketing man's invention which sounds more acceptable than the 'true' and slightly off-putting definition of 'yellow drink'. (BGtW) Drambuie shares stylistic characteristics with Irish Mist, being made principally from malt Scotch whisky and heather honey, flavoured with herbs.
Southern Comfort is the classic American liqueur, produced in St Louis, Missouri. 'One of the few indigenous American liqueurs, and surely the oldest', according to Jackson (PBB), Southern Comfort is thought to have originated in a ⇒cocktail of ⇒Bourbon and peaches in either New Orleans or St Louis. The modern drink is certainly Bourbon-based, being flavoured with peaches, oranges and herbs, and Jackson considers it to be more of a flavoured whiskey than a true liqueur, due to its strength (50% in the United States, though sold at 40% in Britain) and its comparative dryness. The manufacturers of Southern Comfort recommend it for a number of cocktails, such as the ⇒Manhattan, ⇒Old-fashioned and ⇒Whiskey Sour.
liquid fire See ⇒firewater.
liquor In old French licur, licour, likeur, and modern French ⇒liqueur, adopted from the Latin liquor - liquidity. Used in the primary Latin sense of simply a liquid, matter in a liquid state, liquor is obsolete, though it is interesting to note that in ⇒brewing 'liquor' is still used to mean water. The first record of this usage occurs in 1741, 'The Day before you intend to brew, you should boil a Copper of Liquor, (Water being an improper Term in a Brew-house)'. In the current sense of liquid for drinking, and specifically a drink produced by ⇒fermentation and/or ⇒distillation, liquor is first attested prior to 1300, 'Dranc he neuer ar sli licur', and the first use of liquor with reference to its intoxicating effect dates from 1529, 'Thou hast wylde lycoure, the whiche maketh all thy stomacke to be on a flambe'. The phrase in liquor to connote ⇒drunk is first attested in The Scots Magazine in 1753. The term liquor-back - a synonym for the ⇒washback - is recorded in 1691.
Liquor gained currency as a slang term for an alcoholic drink from the 1860s in the United States, with liquor-up - an American equivalent of a ⇒booze or ⇒piss-up - being first attested in 1872, and though compounds such as liquor store are first recorded in Britain (1815), their use is now largely confined to America: 'on Sundays the bars did not open till two in the afternoon and the liquor stores did not open at all'. (Charles Jackson, The Lost Weekend, 1944).
Some interesting extensions of 'liquor' occur in English usage, with Thomas Hardy coining the phrase 'Her liquor-fired face' in Wessex Poems (1898), whilst 'Some getting liquor-seasoned as they grow older' occurs in 1894, and from 1894 we find the transferred sense of liquor as a verb, meaning to adulterate spirits with water: 'They will be obliged to "liquor" their spirits - that is to say, they will dilute them with water.' The sense of supplying or plying with liquor is also recorded, first occurring c.1560 as, 'I thinke, he is at Alhouse, a lickeringe ones brayne', and the intransitive use of liquor as in, 'It's a bargain then ... come let's liquor on it' is recorded in 1839. The adjectives liquorsome - 'Men of shallow minds and liquorsome bodies'. (1656) - and liquorish - 'A rare seaman but liquorish'. (1894) - also occur. Ogden Nash observed in 'Reflection on Ice-breaking' in 1931 that 'Candy is dandy/But liquor is quicker'.
loch, whisky A phrase first coined in the mid-1980s to signify the Scotch whisky industry's equivalent to the European Community's notorious wine lake. The loch was created by overproduction of both malt and grain whisky as demand for brown spirits fell due to changing consumer preferences during the late 1970s and early 1980s. The term 'whisky lake' has also been used, but generally by English commentators who failed to grasp the aptness of the Caledonian alternative.
Skipworth writes that, 'In April 1985, the size of the "whisky lake" was believed to be the equivalent of two years' supply to the UK market alone!'. (SWB) Relatively drastic rationalisation took place within the industry, the Distillers Company alone closing 11 of its 45 operational malt distilleries in May 1983 and a further ten in March 1985, in an attempt, as they put it, to 'attain the requisite balance between maturing stocks of whisky and the anticipated level of future sales'. Neil Wilson noted that, 'The malt sector had shrunk from 83.7% of its potential output in 1978 to 38.6% in 1982 … ' (S&W) and victims of the two rounds of DCL closures included such famous names as Dallas Dhu on Speyside and Port Ellen on Islay, while the Highland capital of Inverness lost its entire distilling capacity with the closure and subsequent demolition of Glen Albyn and Glen Mhor in 1983 and the demise of Millburn in 1985.
In a Daily Telegraph feature of February 1985, John Williams profiled the Highland village of Carron where 'Imperial is one of 10 SMD plants scheduled to close with the loss of 180 jobs from Montrose to Alness because of a "whisky loch".' Imperial reopened in 1991, but was mothballed again seven years later and is now defunct. With the ongoing development of a number of dynamic international markets for Scotch whisky, malt production rose from a mid-1980s low of less than 100 million litres of pure alcohol per annum (lpa) to around 185 million lpa in 2007.
Lomond still A short-necked type of ⇒still developed by Hiram Walker & Sons Ltd to increase the variety of malt whisky they could produce for blending purposes. Lomond stills produce a comparatively heavy and oily malt whisky; the short neck gives a low degree of ⇒reflux - the condensing of vapours in and on the neck of the still. The name Lomond was given to this design of still (which was first installed in Hiram Walker's Dumbarton complex in 1956 as part of the Inverleven malt whisky distillery within) as the plant draws its water from nearby Loch Lomond. The whisky it produces has never been released as a ⇒single malt, going exclusively for ⇒blending. Lomond stills were also subsequently installed at Glenburgie, Miltonduff and Scapa distilleries, with Scapa being the only site where a Lomond, albeit significantly modified, remains in use. The stills at Inverleven were salvaged in 2003 by James MacEwan and Duncan McGillivray of Bruichladdich in order to reinstall them in the new Port Charlotte Distillery on Islay.
Jackson describes the still as having 'a passing resemblance to a brandy alembic' (WGtW) and Morton describes it as resembling 'an oversized, upside-down dustbin made of copper, or the expanded head of Dorothy's tin man. Instead of being boiled with heat applied from below, the Lomond still has steam pipes inside its jacket, thus giving, so it is said, a heavier, oilier result'. (SoA)
low flyer A colloquial name for the popular blended Scotch whisky The Famous Grouse, principally used by Scots ghillies or gamekeepers, and emanating from the game bird's characteristic low flight, though no written attestation can be traced. The grouse is the national game bird of Scotland, so it is fitting that it should have been adopted for the country's national drink, first being used in 1897 by Perth whisky company, Matthew Gloag and Son Limited, who marketed their whisky as The Grouse Brand. According to Morrice, 'As its popularity increased in and around Perth it was increasingly referred to as "The Famous Grouse" until that was eventually adopted as the registered brand name'. (SGtS)
The International Ornithological Congress has announced the aim of standardising the international English names of bird species, with the red grouse to be officially designated the willow ptarmigan. It seems unlikely, however, that The Famous Grouse's inheritors, Highland Distillers, will take to marketing their product as The Famous Willow Ptarmigan!
low wines In the ⇒pot still whisky-making process, low wines are the product of the first distillation in the ⇒wash still. They are impure and weak, consisting of ⇒alcohol, secondary constituents and water, and a second distillation in the ⇒spirit or ⇒low wines still is subsequently necessary. McDowall notes that 'Every 2,500 gallons of wash will produce from 500 to 600 proof gallons of low wines ... '. (WoS) The low wines are stored between distillations in a low wines ⇒charger. The term 'low wines' is not exclusive to the whisky industry, being current, for example, in Jamaican rum-making circles.
'Low' here clearly has the sense of wanting in strength, weak; a sense first attested in 1398, 'Dryness makyth the body lene and lowe', and the term 'low wines' first occurs in 1641: 'There will come forth a weak Spirit, which is called low Wine'. The plural use, which is now always employed, is first recorded in 1657, 'wines' being used because rectified spirit alcohol is also known as spirit(s) of wine. The first specific reference to low wines in the context of whisky ⇒distillation occurs in 1790, with the Scots spelling variant lowins, 'Whauks o'gude ait - far'le cowins, Synt down wi' whey, or whisky lowins'. (See also ⇒congenerics, ⇒singlings)
Lowland As with the other generally recognised Scotch whisky-producing regions, Lowland is a strictly interpreted geographical area and also has a style of its own. 'Lowland' was first applied in relation to Scotland in 1631, 'The necessitie of his advis doeth ofttymes invite him to the Lowlandis'.
The Lowland appellation is applied to whiskies produced in that mainland area south of the theoretical ⇒Highland line, and it is fair to say that Lowland whiskies can be characterised as the lightest of the Scottish malts, Jackson writing that 'The Lowlands tend to produce whiskies in which the softness of the malt itself is more evident, untempered by Highland peatiness or coastal brine and seaweed'. (MWC) Grindal is inclined to view rigid categorisation of malts with some suspicion, making the perfectly valid point that 'The division of distilleries into Highland and Lowland was originally made for licensing purposes and not because of any differences in the whisky'. He also remarks that 'Glengoyne is only fractionally north of the Highland Line, just as Auchentoshan is fractionally to the south of it, and to pretend that this purely geographical division should have any material effect on the whisky that the two produce seems absurd'. (SoW)
Historically speaking, Lowland malts have received a far from generous press, Robert Burns famously describing in a letter of 1788 the products of such southern stills as 'a most rascally liquor'. The no-doubt real inferiority of much Lowland whisky was in many ways attributable to the iniquities of the ⇒excise laws which served to discriminate against it until 1816, when Highland and Lowland duties became the same. There was, however, a phenomenal level of growth in Lowland distilling in the wake of the ⇒Wash Act of 1784, many new distilleries being constructed and ambitious programmes of expansion taking place at existing plants. It is interesting to note that not all of the ⇒make was whisky: James Stein's Kilbagie Distillery in Clackmannanshire being equipped to produce nearly 5,000 gallons of gin per day for sale to London.
More than half a century after the levelling of duty across the Highland Line, Alfred Barnard was little more impressed with Lowland whisky than Burns had been. Writing about blending, he was of the opinion that 'Lowland malts alone, without Highland whiskies, would be of little use; the best makes are useful as padding when they have considerable age and not too much flavour, for they not only help to keep down the price of a blend, but are decidedly preferable to using a large quantity of grain spirit'. (quoted in CCtW) This negative view of Lowland malts has persisted until more recent times. When McDowall wrote The Whiskies of Scotland in 1967, he remarked that of the Lowlands only Bladnoch and Rosebank were available as ⇒single malts, commenting that, 'It is of some interest that the Lowland malts were the first whiskies to be drunk in quantity in England, and about 1850 most larger towns in the south of Scotland had a distillery'.
Doubtless the Lowland malts found favour in England because of their lightness when compared with the more intimidating Highland malts of the earlier 19th century. Cooper is of the opinion that the Lowland malts may have suffered because the distilleries where they are made tend to be less visually pleasing and dramatically situated than their counterparts north of the 'Line', a view echoed by Daiches, who admits that Highland malts are whiskies 'of greater character and grander flavour', (SW1) but considers that 'a well-matured Lowland malt is - especially for those who do not prefer a heavily peated whisky - a pleasant and civilized drink of distinctive quality and makes a good all-purpose whisky.'
As interest in malt whiskies has increased during the past few years, a modest though welcome renaissance in Lowland fortunes has been in evidence, with United Distillers choosing the previously very elusive Glenkinchie from Pencaitland near Edinburgh for its heavily promoted line up of 'Classic Malts'.
Since the closure of the highly-regarded Rosebank Distillery near Falkirk in 1993, the only surviving Lowland distillery to use a triple-distillation process has been Auchentoshan, which lies almost in the shadow of the Erskine Bridge, to the north of Glasgow. Until it fell terminally silent in 1992, nearby Littlemill staked a strong claim to being Scotland's oldest licensed distillery, reputedly established in 1772. Interestingly, a new distillery is being planned in the Falkirk area as this edition goes to press.
Bladnoch is Scotland's most southerly distillery, situated in the village of Bladnoch in Galloway, though that distinction did not prevent it from becoming a victim of United Distillers' decision to close four malt whisky plants in early 1993. However, Bladnoch represents one of the modern success stories of the Lowland classification, as the distillery was purchased in 1994 by Northern Irish entrepreneur Raymond Armstrong, and small-scale distilling recommenced in 2000. Bladnoch single malt is described by Jackson as having 'a very delicate aroma, with a distinctively lemony character, but (it) becomes bigger in its sweet palate'. (WGtW) Since the reopening of Bladnoch, there have been further signs of a modest Lowland revival, with the farm-based distillery of Daftmill in Fife beginning to distil in 2005, while William Grant & Sons Ltd created a large malt whisky distillery called Ailsa Bay within their Girvan grain distilling, blending and maturation complex in 2007.
lush The principal current drink-related sense of lush is, as the Dictionary of Drink states, American slang for 'a heavy drinker, especially a female one (an alcoholic)', which perhaps reflects its more usual sense of juicy, luxuriant. The OED also considers it to mean alcoholic liquor, or, as a verb, to ply with alcoholic liquor, though these uses are now almost obsolete. The Oxford Dictionary of Modem Slang when referring to lush as an alcoholic or drunkard notes, 'From earlier sense, alcoholic drink; perhaps a jocular use of lush (adjective), luxuriant'.
Lush is first attested in 1790 as a slang synonym for alcoholic drink itself, and the OED suggests this usage may have its origins in the earlier sense of lush as a stroke or blow, first recorded in the 14th century Morte D:'Arthur, 'With the lussche of the launce he lyghte one hys schuldyrs'. (cf. ⇒shot, ⇒slug) By 1841 'lush' had also taken on the meaning of a drinking bout - Colonel Hawker recording in his diary, 'We ended the day with a lush at Vérys' - and it had also developed a transitive sense of plying with lush or drink, just as ⇒liquor took on a verb sense. 'We had lushed the coachman so neatly, that Barney was obliged to drive'. (1821) Intransitively it had the sense of to drink, or indulge in drink (1811), 'Smoke, take snuff, lush', and in 1829 Sir Walter Scott wrote in his journal of 'Cigars in loads, whisky in lushings'. Lushy or lushey as slang for ⇒drunk is attested in 1811, and in 1861 the adjectival sense of lushing is applied to a London prostitute known as 'Lushing Loo'.
Partridge notes the use of lush-ken or lushing-ken (suggesting that ken may be 'a corruption of Romany tan, a place, or a corruption of the original whence tan itself springs') to connote a low public-house or bar in the late 18th century. The term is synonymous with lush-crib (Partridge here suggests crib as lodgings, public house, from crib as a low synonym for bed from c.1810), lushery and lush-house (pre-1896).
The principal modern sense of 'lush' as a synonym for a drunkard is almost certainly a contraction of 'lushington', which comes from a punning use of the surname Lushington, itself alluding back to 'lush'. In 1840 'The Lushington of each young Doctor's Commons' is recorded, though in 1823 'dealing with Lushington' had been noted as meaning taking too much drink. Partridge considers 'Lushington the brewer' to be one possible origin, and the OED records that 'The City of Lushington' was the name of a convivial society (consisting chiefly of actors) which met at the Harp Tavern, Russell Street until about 1895. It had a 'Lord Mayor' and four 'aldermen', presiding over 'wards' called Juniper, Poverty, Lunacy, and Suicide. On the admission of a new member, the 'Lord Mayor'. (of late years at least) harangued him on the evils of excess in drink. As the 'City' claimed to have existed for 150 years, it may be that lush in any of its drink-related forms actually dates from a period considerably prior to the first attestation.
lye arm/pipe See ⇒lyne arm.
lyne arm The wide-diameter pipe which attaches the head of the ⇒still to the ⇒worm or ⇒condenser. Also known as a 'lye arm' or 'lye pipe'. Explaining the process of whiskey distillation, Magee likens the still to a large copper kettle: 'When the wash comes to the boil the vapours are conveyed along the lyne arm or "spout" of the kettle into the worm ... '. (IW) The lyne arm is far more than just a connecting pipe, however, as the angle at which it is raked is considered to be a significant factor in the style of whisky produced. Cooper recalls being told by one distiller of a plant where the lyne arm was on a pulley, with the angle being altered depending on whether heavy or light spirit was required. (CCtW) He was unable to decide whether this anecdote was a significant addition to his knowledge of distilling or simply a skilful joke. Grindal lends the story credibility by recalling a visit he made to an unnamed distillery where the officials claimed 'that by adjusting the heads of the stills they were able to produce different whiskies'. (SoW)
Some lynne arms [sic] curve like the tops of coat hangers. Others wiggle away in right angles. Some are narrow, some wide. The lynne arms at Talisker go straight out horizontally, as if to suggest there will be no nonsense at Talisker. The lynne arms at Macallan are extraordinarily thick - about fourteen inches in diameter - and slope downward on a gentle grade.
(McPhee, In The Highlands and Islands)
At several distilleries, including Ardbeg and Glen Grant, a condenser known as a ⇒purifier has been fitted into the lyne arm to increase the ⇒reflux of condensing of vapours in and on the neck. The lyne arm is also sometimes known as a 'lying arm', 'lying' having the sense of reclining, resting, being in a horizontal position, which is approximately physically appropriate in the distilling sense. Obsolete now except in distilling circles, 'lyne' is a form of lean, from the Old English lean, and arm in the sense of what the OED terms 'a narrower portion or part of anything projecting from the main body', first recorded in c.885 relating to an arm of the sea. In the context of machinery, or any references not applied to sea or land, arm is first attested in 1833, 'On a projecting arm ... '.