Today’s topic is the first “official” distillery of the tour: Port of Leith Distillery! Being championed as the world’s tallest distillery, Port of Leith certainly earns its reputation as it goes up 9 stories (including the ground floor of course), with a bar on the top floor and even an extra basement area for a total of 10 floors!
The view from the top floors is absolutely fantastic, and the distillery knows it. Most floors have as many panoramic windows as possible to allow for the best view of the beautiful port Leith is well known for! It was here I got to meet my tour guide for the day, Ellie (who I unfortunately couldn’t get a full name for).
The tour started on floor 4, the highest floor in the whisky making process. We were given the backstory behind the founders of the distillery, Ian Stirling and Paddy Fletcher, and what lead them into practicing illicit distilling in their house share’s communal garden; in turn, this laid the groundwork that would later become Port of Leith Distillery. It’s a fun, down to earth origin story that I take quite a liking to.
Heading into the facility we find out that, as this is a vertical facility, most of the operations are gravity fed from top to bottom, so the order of operations starts on the 4th floor and works its way down to floor 1. Floor 4 focuses on both the procuration and storage of the water used in the distilling, but also the milling of the grain, which is nice to see being shown to the public! This floor is also used to make the mash, which is then funnelled into two hot liquor tanks off to the side. Whilst we were on this floor, the guide also showed us how close geographically their grain supplier and their malting facility was using a map on the wall; handy!
Next we were led to floor 3, which is responsible for fermentation. In the centre of the room is the main mash tun, where the wash is fermented, and dotted around the room are washbacks that hold the wash until it’s ready to be used. Each wash is fermented three times at different temperatures, which steadily rise up in heat each step. However these washbacks have a unique quality about them compared to other distilleries’ equipment, as we were shown on the next floor down.
Floors 2 and 1 were combined into one floor which is used for distilling, with floor 2 being the one we could access freely as guests and floor 1 being a restricted area just below us and the stills, which is where all the actual hard work was being done to extract the alcohol from the pots and get them where they needed to go.
The stills are beautiful, and the process of distillation was explained incredibly well, especially the benefits behind specifically shaped still necks, such as the one used in this distillery’s spirit still (the right hand still).
This floor also demonstrated that unique feature I mentioned a moment ago: Port of Leith’s washbacks are suspended! They hang above the distillation area and are fed into the still straight from there through gravity! How cool is that!
Anyhow on this floor we are also given the opportunity to bottle our own new make whisky, a really neat feature that also demonstrated the simple methods used to bottle a spirit for real! But this then leads us up to floor 5, where we get to do some tasting!
The tasting features 5 main subjects and a bonus sixth one at the end. The first 2 are new make whiskies using different yeast strains (Voss Kviek and BE-256 to be specific). This does a great job showing guests how big of an impact changing the yeast has on the whisky’s flavour, as all this spirit is made of currently is water, grain and yeast. Personally, I preferred the Voss Kviek new make to the BE-256, however they were certainly both palatable.
Also the BE-256 new make is the one you bottle and get to take home with you, in case you were wondering.
The third and fourth tastings are fortified wines, being sherry and port respectively. This is due to an interesting business decision Port of Leith took to get their casks: they bought full casks of fortified wine, then bottle and sell the wine in their store whilst using the freshly emptied casks to age whisky. It’s honestly an ingenious business strategy to earn money while waiting for your whisky to age. This also gives the guide an opportunity to explain the nuances of fortified wines too, a gap in my knowledge I didn’t realise I had. Out of the two the port tickled my tonsils the best, but both were again very good.
The fifth spirit we get to try is something a bit special. See, Port of Leith is a young distillery, and so currently don’t have any single malt whiskies to their name. Mainly they’re selling the aforementioned port and sherry, as well as their sister brand of gin “Lind & Lime”. However that doesn’t mean they don’t have any whisky to sell.
Spirit five is something they call “Table Whisky”. It’s a single grain whisky that’s designed to be enjoyed casually whilst also paying homage to the heritage of whisky in the area of Leith. I’ve gotta say, this whisky is good, really good. It’s sweet and complex, powerful but not overwhelming, all the things I love in a whisky. If this is Port of Leith’s “intermediary” whisky then I am stoked to see what their single malts will turn out like.
Finally you are brought back to Floor 6, which is the shop and reception area, where you can buy some merchandise, bottles or books that happen to take your interest. It’s here you get your final taster to enjoy: a white port, something I was unaware even existed. It was nice, but a little dry for me, though my partner absolutely loved it!
Also I did indeed buy a bottle from the shop, which I will be reviewing at some point down the line, but I’ll reveal which one I took another day!
Overall, Port of Leith is a great distillery that shows some really neat business practices in the distilling industry. I certainly took notice, but as for whether the average consumer will appreciate it I’m not sure. The branding of Port of Leith is also very modern and sleek, oozing with personality and utilising a colour scheme I adore, I just wish this was presented throughout the distillery a bit more as there are certainly a fair number of blank concrete walls. Personally I can’t wait to see how this distillery evolves over time, and I look forward to returning when their first batch is scheduled for release in 2027!
This post’s recommended song is: “Sunshine On Leith” – The Proclaimers
