FNB Whisky Live Festival – put it in the diary!

Whisky Live Festival

I'm not a whisky fan. I's sad, but true. However, I can under­stand how the FNB Whisky Live Festival, now in its sev­enth year and held in both Jo'burg and Cape Town, might be some­thing every­one attends. I didn't know this, but South Africa is the fifth largest Scotch mar­ket by volume in the world. And last year's event had close to 17 000 vis­itor attend.

So, I obvi­ously need a bit of an edu­ca­tion in whisky, it seems, if I'm to join the tip­plers, and in par­tic­u­lar because I have a rather beau­ti­ful bottle of Three Ships sit­ting on a shelf gath­er­ing dust!

A quick wizz around the inter­net reveals that whisky is dis­tilled from fer­men­ted grain mash, and that dif­fer­ent grains, or cer­eals, are used for dif­fer­ent vari­et­ies. So, bar­ley, mal­ted bar­ley, rye, wheat and maize give rise to a dif­fer­ent type of whisky, which is then aged in wooden casks, nor­mally oak.

After a couple of years of matur­ing in oak, the liquid is then bottled and sent off to Scotland for matur­ing Scotch whisky. Scotch whisky (gen­er­ally dis­tilled twice, some even three times) can only be called 'Scotch' if its gone to Scotland for matur­ing, and this hap­pens for a min­imum of three years and one day in oak casks (I like the bit about 'one day'...).

But not every­one sends their matured liquid to Scotland. In South Africa, Three ships for instance, is matured here and then blen­ded with Scottish whiskies that are shipped in bulk to South Africa for this purpose.

Whisky Live Festival

According to news on the Whisky Live Festival web­site, South Africa is one of the mar­kets the Scots focus on as the demand here for premium whisky has escalated.

And fur­ther news is that the whisky I have on my shelf is the only 100% South African blen­ded whisky and won gold and Best In Class at the 2008 International Wine and Spirit Competition, announced last year in London.

Obviously whisky is some­thing I know very little about. But the Whisky Live Festival holds whisky work­shops, which, word has it, are voted the best learn­ing exper­i­ence / best value for money at the show. So, per­haps I should end my attempt at self-education and head off to learn all the whisky related jar­gon first-hand. There is a combo pack­age that gives one entrance to the Tasting Hall and a work­shop of one's choice – the way to go, for whisky idi­ots like me!

Other fest­ival favour­ites are: an inter­act­ive cock­tail mak­ing exper­i­ence, the Back to Basics Zone (speaks for itself), live demon­stra­tions of the dis­til­la­tion pro­cess by whisky experts, and, since 36% of last year's attendees were women, there will be more attrac­tions aimed at the fairer sex such as whisky cock­tails and liqueurs, foods, jew­ellery and a chance to win a trip to Ireland.

Sounds like a great way to spend an even­ing. The fest­ival will run from 18h00 to 22h00 daily in Cape Town at the Cape Town ICC from 4–6 November 2009, and in Johannesburg at the Sandton Convention Centre from 11–14 November 2009. Johannesburg gets an extra day this time around.

For addi­tional info see the Whisky Live Festival web­site at: www.whiskylivefestival.co.za

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