🧠 Whisky Quiz

Scotland's whisky-producing regions each have their own distinct character — Islay malts are famously peaty and smoky, while Speyside whiskies tend to be sweeter and more fruity.

New-make spirit that comes off the still is actually clear — it's entirely the time spent in oak barrels that gives whisky its characteristic amber hue, with longer maturation generally producing a deeper colour.

The 'single' in single malt refers not to the barley but to the distillery — it means the whisky comes from one single distillery, as opposed to a blended malt which combines whiskies from multiple distilleries.

In a typical Scottish warehouse, around 2% of a cask's contents evaporate each year as the angel's share — meaning a whisky matured for 12 years loses roughly a quarter of its volume to the heavens.

Islay, pronounced 'Eye-lah', is home to nine active distilleries on an island of just over 3,000 inhabitants, making it one of the most whisky-dense places on Earth.

The three-year minimum for Scotch whisky is enshrined in law — a spirit bottled even one day short of three years cannot legally be called Scotch whisky.

Speyside is home to over half of Scotland's malt whisky distilleries, with the River Spey and its tributaries providing the exceptionally pure water that many credit for the region's distinctive style.

In whisky production, the wort is typically cooled before yeast is added, as too high a temperature would kill the yeast — the resulting fermented liquid is called 'wash', which is then distilled.

The 2009 Scotch Whisky Regulations replaced a patchwork of older rules dating back to 1990, and for the first time gave legal definitions to all five categories including the newly named 'Blended Malt' (previously called 'vatted malt').

Shinjiro Torii founded Suntory and built the Yamazaki distillery — Japan's first malt whisky distillery — choosing the site near Kyoto for its exceptionally pure water and misty climate.