In recent years, China's whiskey market has experienced explosive development. Foreign manufacturers such as Pernod Ricard and Diageo have invested in and built factories in China. Many whiskey distilleries have also appeared in China. However, these whiskey distilleries currently use basically the production process of Scotch malt whiskey. The whiskey produced cannot be called Chinese whiskey, but can only be called Scotch whiskey produced in China.
Chinese whiskey refers to whiskey produced in China using traditional Chinese distilling techniques combined with Scottish oak barrel aging techniques.
Chinese whiskey does not come out of thin air, but has a long historical tradition. Qinghai Huzhu Tianyoude Highland Barley Liquor Co., Ltd. is a distillery that has been brewing distilled liquor using plateau naked barley as raw material and Daqu as saccharifying agent and alcoholic agent for more than 600 years. In ancient China, malt was used as a saccharifying agent to make wine. Malt was called "niè" and the brewed wine was called "lǐ". At the same time, distiller's yeast was also used as a saccharifying agent, including Daqu and Xiaoqu. Later, due to the taste of wine brewed with malt, It is relatively bland and thin, and was basically no longer used in the Ming Dynasty.
Huzhu Tianyoude Company has always used naked barley as the raw material, Daqu as the saccharification starter, solid-state fermentation, and solid-state distillation. Historically, the fermentation containers used were wooden wine cellars, and the containers for storing wine were wooden wine seas. The brewing raw materials, fermentation vessels, and wine storage vessels are very similar to those of Scotch whiskey. Nowadays, Tianyoude Company adopts a combination of Chinese and Western methods in terms of aging and aging, first storing it in pottery jars for one year, and then aging it in oak barrels. The wine brewed by this process is Chinese whiskey.
Chinese whiskey has the following six characteristics in terms of craftsmanship:
1. Water for brewing. There is a saying that "water is the blood of wine" in Chinese winemaking. The water used is very particular. Chinese whiskey uses snow water and glacier water from the Qilian Mountains. The water quality is clear and pure. Tianyode Distillery is the closest distillery to the snow-capped mountains. The factory area is not far away. At 30 kilometers, there are snow-capped mountains that are covered with snow all year round.
2. Grain for wine making. Chinese winemaking has a saying that "grain is the meat of wine". The grain used in Chinese whiskey is plateau naked barley grown at an altitude of about 3,500 to 4,000 meters. This is the highest altitude barley in the world, with rare varieties and unique flavors.
highland barley
3. Daqu. Chinese whiskey uses Daqu specially made by Tianyoude. The characteristic of this Daqu is that the grain used to make the koji is the same as that of the wine. It is composed of naked barley and adds a small amount of peas. Daqu brings together a variety of natural wild bacteria that can produce complex fermentation substances.
Daqu
4. Fermentation container. Currently, the fermentation vessels used for Chinese whiskey are cellars that combine granite and pine boards, which not only inherits the tradition of ancient wooden cellars, but also makes the wine purer. At the same time, traditional solid-state fermentation methods are adopted. Solid-state fermentation is a characteristic of Chinese whiskey.
A cellar with granite as the cellar wall and pine board as the cellar floor and cover
5. Distillation. China's unique steamer barrels are used for solid-state distillation, and the wine is distilled in one go, gathering richer aroma and flavor substances.
steamer barrel
Solid-state distillation and solid-state fermentation are Chinese whiskey brewing methods that are different from whiskeys from any other country in the world. They make Chinese whiskey have rich acids, esters, alcohols, etc. from the time of distillation that foreign whiskeys do not have. Taste substances. Scotch whiskey is liquid fermentation and liquid distillation. It requires two to three distillations to obtain the original wine with a degree of over 60 degrees. Moreover, the distillation is not as effective as the Chinese solid-state distillation method in collecting aroma.
6. Aged. Chinese whiskey is aged in pottery jars for one year and then aged in oak barrels, which combines the advantages of Chinese and Western aging vessels.
oak barrel
The above-mentioned technological characteristics are the unique flavor characteristics of Chinese whiskey. The launch of Chinese whiskey series products has filled the gap that there is no Chinese whiskey on the world whiskey map.
Dave Blum's "World Whiskey Map" talks about whiskeys from all over the world, but there is no Chinese whiskey. The birth of three Chinese whiskey products from Tianyoude Company has filled in the Chinese production areas in the "World Whiskey Map". blank.
