According to one of the Kashrus organizations single malt scotch is fine as long as the label does not say aged in sherry (or other grape based barrels).

I did a little snooping around and it doesn’t seem that the “reading the label” is any more accurate for scotch than it is for any other product without a hechscher.

I sent an email to a popular distillery and asked about their product.

Here is the email exchange:

Sent: 12 October 2009 14:24
To: theglenlivet admin
Subject: question

Good afternoon,

I read an article that in todays global economy many distilleries may use alternative raw alcohol bases for their scotch products. Does the glenlivet use either whey or grape based raw alcohol base in the process? Is the product aged in barrels that have contained grape or other products?

I appreciate your taking the time to read and respond to my query.

All the best,

_____

I am pleased to inform you that The Glenlivet is a single malt Scotch whisky, and as such it only contains three ingredients – malted barley, water and yeast.

When maturing our spirit, we use ex-bourbon barrels, and ex-sherry butts, both of which are oak.

I hope this answers your query. If you have any further questions please do not hesitate to contact me.

Kind regards

L. M.
Visitor Centre Deputy Supervisor
The Glenlivet Distillery

______

L,

Thank you this has been most informative. re: the barrels – does the product go through both the bourbon and the sherry oak barrels or does only a select variety get the sherry barrel?

______

The majority of our whiskies have some sherry influence on them. The Glenlivet 12 year old is mostly matured in bourbon casks, though some of the spirit is matured in sherry casks, and this is then married together. Our 18 year contains more sherried whisky than the 12 year old – as you will be able to see from the difference in colour (the 18 year old being much deeper). The Nadurra is purely matured in bourbon casks – none of the whisky in Nadurra has been matured inn a sherry cask.
Kind regards
L.

____

In addition I found this article by Gary Regan:

Over the past decade or so, many single-malt Scotch producers have issued bottlings of their nectar that have spent the last few months of their maturation period in a variety of different barrels: Port-, Madeira-, Sherry- and even Claret-Wood. Finished Scotches have captured the attention, and sometimes the hearts, of many a whisky buff, and there’s no doubt we’ll see more experimentation in wood management in the not-too-distant future.

Most malt distillers use bourbon casks to age their whisky before transferring it to a different type of cask, but one Speyside distillery insists on aging all of its malt exclusively in sherry butts from start to finish. Recently, I was invited to Spain to see what all the fuss is about.

The Tevasa Cooperage in Jerez, Spain, is responsible for keeping the Scots in Craigellachie, Scotland, supplied with sherry-seasoned barrels. The process is far more complicated than I’d ever dreamed. I always believed that it would be quite simple to buy some used barrels from sherry producers, but it turns out that nothing could be farther from the truth. The fact is that this particular distillery needs far more barrels than the sherrymakers can supply on a regular basis, so it’s up to the Scots to provide their own.

Here’s how it works: The Scotch distillery actually buys trees grown in Northern Spain and commissions the cooperage to construct a certain number of barrels per year. Then, because demand for sherry is low, they are forced to “rent” oloroso sherry to season the wood over a period of about two years. “They literally have us over a barrel,” quips master distiller David Robertson.

The sherry then is returned to the sherrymaker, and the newly seasoned barrels are shipped to Scotland to be filled with newly-made whisky that will remain in the wood usually for between 12 and 18 years before the distiller deems it ready for the glass.
How much does it cost? Quite a lot. According to the distillery’s calculations, if they used bourbon barrels, which can be filled three times before losing their aging capabilities, it would cost them around $45 per fill. But sherry butts, which can be used only twice before they’re spent, average a whopping $300 per fill — not a negligible amount. So what makes those barrels so special?

According to Narciso Fernandez Iturrospe, owner of the Tevasa Cooperage, it isn’t only the sherry seasoning that makes the barrels ideal for aging single malts. The wood itself plays a large part in imparting special flavors to the whisky.
Sherry barrels are made from Quercus Robur, a Spanish oak that is felled when it reaches 60 to 70 years of age and contains approximately 10 times more tannin than does the 30- to 40-year-old Quercus Alba, or American White Oak, which is used to make bourbon barrels. Research has shown the tannins in the wood act as a catalyst that aids oxidization during the maturation period and hence is highly desirable to malt producers.

Obviously, nothing is wrong with using bourbon barrels to age scotch whisky; it’s common practice in many Scottish distilleries, and it yields some spectacular malts. The barrels are relatively inexpensive because bourbon producers, by law, can use the barrels only once, and therefore they make them available at reasonable prices to Scotch, rum and even tequila producers. The exclusive use of sherry butts, however, goes toward differentiating one malt from all the others. And, just like the other whiskies, finished in all sorts of different barrels, that makes the whole category more interesting to the whisky-drinking public.

What’s next on the horizon for single malts? Whisky aged in Chardonnay casks, perhaps? Or maybe a malt or two finished in used Marsala barrels. Whatever comes, it’s bound to fascinate whisky buffs. The powers that be at one distillery, however, figure that their formula isn’t broken, so they aren’t planning to try to fix it.

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