When the sixteenth century French navigator and explorer Jacques Cartier, in his hunt for a passage to China, first laid eyes on ‘the country of the Canadas’, his disappointment was palpable: ‘I am inclined’, he said, ‘to believe this is the land God gave to Cain’.
Cartier never did find the way to China, and nor did he succeed in his secondary aim, the discovery of the fabled Kingdom of Saguenay, land of rubies, gold and diamonds. Rather, having claimed ‘Asia’ for France on his first trip, penetrated as far as the rock of Quebec on his second, and on the third established, after the Vikings, ‘Kanata’, a second European colony, Cartier’s legacy is to have mapped a 1000 mile stretch of the St Lawrence river. ‘The world’, he said, ‘is big and still hides a lot’.
THE SECRET BIG WORLD OF CANADIAN WHISKY
That Canada should seem to hide itself from Cartier will come as no surprise to anyone who knows anything about this vast and staggeringly beautiful country. Canada has always suffered the impression of being unknowable, and not least its whiskies, which ‘like Canadians themselves’, says whisky writer Davin de Kergommeaux, tend ‘to fly under the radar’.
Truth is, Canadian whisky hides in plain sight, and in a big way. The most efficient method for the then largely English miller-settlers to recycle their grist, the nineteenth century saw a phenomenal growth in distilleries making ‘common’ (wheat) and barley whiskies, the most prominent of pioneers being Thomas Molson, who grew an enormous business off the back of exports to London.
And not just Molson. In its heyday the Molson Distillery in Montreal was huge, one of the world’s largest, but what followed was something else: Gooderham and Worts, in Toronto, their mid-nineteenth century distillery a state-of-the-art facility capable of seven and a half million litres a year. Corbys in Hayden’s Corners. Wisers in Prescott. Seagrams in Berlin, now Waterloo. Walkers in Windsor. Many prospered as a result of America’s civil war, a select few during Prohibition, and Seagrams had a good go at taking over the twentieth century. All were giants.
A WONDERFUL LIGHTNESS OF BEING
Seagrams’ Sam Bronfman’s much quoted shirt-sleeve-to-shirtsleeve in three generations philosophy holds true not just for his own empire, but also for the majority of the aforementioned giants, sold off either by uninterested grandchildren or out of necessity, there being no one to take up the family reins – Corbys being an excellent example.
However, whatever the change of guard, Canadian whisky was a twentieth century success story. Prohibition America may not, as previously thought, have been awash with Canadian, with many a producer suffering the loss of its largest export market, but it certainly made the most of an American consumer turned onto lighter blends. As de Kergommeaux says, it played a significant role in the cocktail revolution, its subtlety of character perfectly attuned to the general shift in palate, the propensity of certain whiskies for ‘leaping’, as Dave Broom says, ‘into life’ once mixed.
Canadian whisky is a grain-based distillate that must be mashed, distilled, and aged (for at least three years) in Canada. Caramel colouring and flavouring is permitted. Extra defining criteria may apply depending on province of origin.
Present large-scale distilleries include Alberta, Black Velvet, Highwood, Gimli, Hiram Walker, Forty Creek, Valleyfield and Canadian Mist. This list is slightly complicated by the fact that different companies may own brands produced in distilleries owned by the competition. Glenora Distillery is smaller and Canada’s first single malt distillery. A clutch of micro-distilleries have also just got off the ground. The vast majority of Canadian blended whiskies are single distillery whiskies.
Unlike their bourbon counterparts, Canadian whisky producers generally do not mix their grains before fermenting and distilling, preferring to distil and mature grains separately, and then blend the matured spirits to create the final whisky.
These matured spirits consist of the ‘base’ whisky and the ‘flavouring’ whisky. Normally corn, the base whisky comes off the stills at around 94% abv. The flavouring whisky – usually rye, but also wheat, corn or barley – comes off at much lower levels of alcohol content. The base whisky is matured in used casks, while the flavouring utilises either new or a mix of new and old casks.
Traditionally, the base whisky draws most of its flavour from the barrel and interactions within the barrel, which accounts for why a Canadian whisky is referred to as a rye, it being the most commonly used flavouring grain.
Variations on the above: Canadian Club and Black Velvet whiskies are made by blending the new make base spirit with newly made or partially matured flavouring spirit. A small but growing number of products are indeed 100% rye. The single malt productions at Glenora and Shelter Point are pot stilled as opposed to column.
Light, elegant and eminently consumable, Canadian whisky was a rocket between 1945 and 1980, outselling nearly all, and in particular bourbon, for which its corn-base sweetness was frequently mistaken.
THE FALL AND THE RISING
As with the rest of the world, the 1980s saw Canadian whisky suffer the rise of white spirits, its count of 22 distilleries falling away to what has ended up as nine major distilleries.
Even so, while it may have been similarly affected, Canadian whisky’s relative success prior to the rise of vodka has, until recently, had the effect of labelling the product as eternally light, its reputation for ease of sipping, for being good to mix with, giving the impression of being less than suited to a resurgent heavy duty palate. Thus, whatever the success of its sales, the last two decades saw it perceived by the noisy world of the whisky enthusiast as not possessing the sipping gumph of either single malt or bourbon whiskies.
Which is unfair – and not at all reflective of a market as enamoured by blends as it has always been. Truth is, Canadian whisky has long hidden its gems behind size as volume, and behind a specifically historical predilection for semi-anonymity – so much so that even Canadians are only really just beginning to access that which it offers by way of depth and quality. So, less Cain’s lot, more a liquid Kingdom of Saguenay, Canadian whisky is full of wonder, and beginning to show it. Watch this space.