
THE FOUNDER of a craft distilling success story from Sydney sees specialty malts from Australian grain playing a big role in his company's whisky range.
Will Edwards, Archie Rose Distilling Co, said while the focus with the company's gin range was on the botanicals used to flavour the product with the whisky the malt was the critical factor.
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"With whisky there has historically been a lot of focus on the casks the product is aged in, but without a great malt to start with you can't make a great whisky," Mr Edwards told the Australian Grains Industry Conference last week.
In good news for Australian grain producers looking to become involved in the burgeoning craft distilling sector Mr Edwards said malt was the fundamental building block for whiskies.
"The grain is critical, it is where the whiskies start their life."
"Casks can only shape the flavour, not change it, so malts matter, they are so critical to the end result," Mr Edwards said.
"Traditionally it has always been about the casks but we're making it more about the grain."
He said the company was sourcing all Australian barley malt for its whisky range, including collaboration with Riverina-based specialty maltster Voyager Malt and used Aussie wheat for the base for its gin.
In recent times it has moved away from using Canadian rye to Australian rye, making some interesting discoveries in the process.
"We've had some fun recently, they were able to source a small parcel of a particular variety of rye that has been grown over time on one farm near Sandigo (NSW) so it has almost developed as a separate land race.
"This rare rye has been malted and we're using it in our Sandigo rye malt whisky, which has a really unique taste as a result of this rye malt."

There are also plans afoot to launch Australia's first native grain-based whisky, using Mitchell grass.
"Basically there is no research using Mitchell grass so it will be a matter of doing our own work to see if we can develop something we can bring to market."
In order to retain authenticity to Australian conditions, Mr Edwards said the company was moving away from the use of peat, a key flavouring in Scottish and Irish whiskies, to using Australian hardwoods to create a similar smoked flavour.
Mr Edwards said it had been a tumultuous couple of years for his business, including having to close a cocktail bar in Sydney due to COVID-19 and pivoting into the manufacturing of hand sanitiser.
"Not many businesses had the relevant dangerous goods permits to make the sanitiser, we already had them for our distilling so it was something we could do and we ended up making ethanol, the key ingredient in sanitiser, from scratch."
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In person business has once again started to flow in with the post-COVID-19 opening of venues.
Mr Edwards said the public was ready for a more open distilling experience.
"Traditional distilling is really kept behind closed doors, we really want to show people how the process works, there's a lot of interest in things like our blend your own gin workshops, people really want to get involved."

Gregor Heard
Gregor Heard is ACM's national grains industry reporter, based in Horsham, Victoria. He has a wealth of knowledge surrounding the cropping sector through his 15 years in the role. Prior to that he was with the Fairfax network as a reporter with Stock & Land. Some of the major issues he has reported on during his time with the company include the deregulation of the export wheat market, the introduction of genetically modified crops and the fight to protect growers better from grain trader insolvencies. Still involved with the family farm he is passionate about rural Australia and its people and hopes to use his role to act as an advocate for those involved in the grain sector.
Gregor Heard is ACM's national grains industry reporter, based in Horsham, Victoria. He has a wealth of knowledge surrounding the cropping sector through his 15 years in the role. Prior to that he was with the Fairfax network as a reporter with Stock & Land. Some of the major issues he has reported on during his time with the company include the deregulation of the export wheat market, the introduction of genetically modified crops and the fight to protect growers better from grain trader insolvencies. Still involved with the family farm he is passionate about rural Australia and its people and hopes to use his role to act as an advocate for those involved in the grain sector.