Coillmór – the Bavarian single malt

Experienced whisky lovers know it already: there are other places apart from Scotland where good whiskies are made. The place we would like to introduce to you today is Bavaria in Germany. All over this country there are about 20 distilleries producing whisky. Some of them do it on a very small scale and have a distilling permission for 300 litres pure alcohol a year only. But there are also a few bigger ones: bonded distilleries which are allowed to produce as much as they like. In return they have to pay higher taxes on alcohol.

The heart of the Bavarian forest is the small town Bad Koetzting with about 7.500 inhabitants. This village is roughly two hours by car from Munich and it is not too far from the Czech boarder. What makes it so special is the stunning nature surrounding it, although it offers a great variety of traditional hotels and inns to host a countless number of tourists, who frequent this village every year as a starting point for hiking or biking tours.

Close to the historic old town is the Liebl-distillery, which is family-owned by the third generation. Connected to the big shop, where all products of the company are offered, the traditional spignel and fruit brandy production is found. A few hundred meters away from the company’s headquarter a brand new distillery for “whisky only” was build 5 years ago. It does not look like a Scottish distillery because it is much smaller and the shape of the stills varies significantly from what you are used to. But the way this single malt is made is pretty much the same as the traditional method.

This young man above is the junior owner of the distillery, his name is Gerhard Liebl and he is in charge of the whisky!!! His father is also in the family business but Gerhard is “the man at the still”!

Let’s start with the raw material: The spring barley is cropped in Bavaria and malted by a Franconian (northern Bavaria) maltster. A certain part of the green malt is dried over a beech wood fire instead of coal or peat. It gives the malt a slightly smoky taste and is a traditional malting technique used for Franconian beer. The water for mashing is very soft and comes from a mountain spring close by. So far it is a local product through and through and there is no big difference to any Scottish single malt.  The stills are made of copper, too, but their shape is influenced by the long tradition of fruit brandy making in the German speaking countries. But the most obvious difference is the size! The wash still has a capacity of 400 litres whereas the spirit still holds 150 litres. Scots might call it “cute”. After the traditional double distillation the new make is slightly diluted and filled into a great variety of casks. In this distillery you’ll find all kinds of oak barrels which are used in the world-wide whisk(e)y business – everything from fresh American white oak casks to first fill bourbon barrels, ex-Sherry butts, Port pipes or former Cognac- or Bordeaux-casks. The standard bottling is a single malt, which was matured for more than 3 years. It is always a batch of four casks of fresh American white oak which were heavily toasted. Additionally there are changing single barrel bottlings from the best matured casks – whether it is Sherry, Bordeaux or American white oak. All whiskies are not coloured nor chill filtered and usually bottled at 43 % – to 46 % abv.

The Liebl distillery launched their first whisky in May 2009 and right from start they catapulted themselves into the top three of all German whisky distilleries. In the meantime their brand name “Coillmór” is on everyone’s lips amongst whisky enthusiasts in Germany. The name “Coillmór” has a Gaelic origin and means “big forest” – an excellent adaption to the great Bavarian forest, where the distillery is located. And because it is Gaelic this name is easy to remember for Scots, isn’t it?! www.coillmor.de