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Does scotch get it's color from the distillation process or is it from being aged with wood?
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Re: Where does Scotch get it's color?
Fri, September 2, 2005 - 3:44 PMI THINK that it is aged in wood. Charred oak barrels would inpart a color to distilled water.
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Re: Where does Scotch get it's color?
Fri, September 9, 2005 - 4:31 PMIt comes from being aged in oak. On small batch whisky, you can use oak chips that are made from oak barrels. -
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Re: Where does Scotch get it's color?
Wed, September 14, 2005 - 10:48 PMScotch gets color from the oak but to go deeper into it comes from the charring of the oak. Depending on the brand of scotch it depends on the barrels they use. Usably the mane two most mass-produced scotches use is American oak barrels that once held wine. (Wine makes use barrels just once and then discard them or sell the off) the other main barrel the usably use is sherry barrels. Where as it is the char that gives it it’s color it the wood that the barrel is made of (French or American oak) and what was once produced in that barrel that greatly affects the carter of the finished product. It is just as impotent as the place they get the peat from (Highland, Lowland, Spay side, Isaly.) I know this goes a little deeper into the production of scotch than you asked and are sorry I have rambled on but have a bottle of LAPHROAIG that is now ½ empty. -
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Re: Where does Scotch get it's color?
Fri, September 16, 2005 - 1:14 PMThat's not entirely correct.
The charring does not create the color. Various resins and other solvent organics come out of the wood to create the color and impart the flavor.
You can change the flavor of the whisky by aging it at different alcohol levels for different amounts of time in the same barrel. For instance, aging at 60% abv will pull different flavors from the oak than aging at 48% will.
Only Bourbon barrels are charred. Sherry casks are not. Since Bourbon barrels are made from new barrels and can only be used once for Bourbon, many scotch distilleries now use used Bourbon barrels for their scotch. The charring creates a layer of "carmelization" between the raw wood and the char, which imparts vanillins and other specific flavors.
Sherry casks and charred new oak casks are the two primary casks used for aging. Some single malt distilleries will use other types of casks for a specialty finish, such as port, Madeira, cognac, Cuban rum and even
various wines. -
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Re: Where does Scotch get it's color?
Sun, September 25, 2005 - 7:28 AMOne missed note on charred barrels, the charcoal surface acts as a carbon filter to help remove fussels from the raw product.
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Re: Where does Scotch get it's color?
Mon, March 20, 2006 - 6:42 AMscotch gets its colour from being aged in sherry barrels that have been coloured with caramel, or they are coloured with caramel themselves (plus a very, very small amount of colour from the tannins in the wood). in fact some(although few) of the better single malts are quite pale.. (almost clear)...
