There is a whiskey distillery in Lannion (called Distillerie Warenghem) that we’ve known about since we arrived and, although mentioning it to both sets of friends – all of whom were highly interested – somehow we never did find the time to visit. Well, today was the day, even if it was only the 2 of us and even if only 1 of us likes whiskey.
Because of our fiasco trying to find the Palais in Perros yesterday, we left earlier than we needed to and, wouldn’t you know it, the GPS worked just fine. We were there early and had to hang around outside for about 20 minutes. There was the most interesting rock that had been painted by a local artist which was an homage to “Man” and was called “The Dance of Time”.
Whiskey production is fairly recent in France (“recent” being compared to how long wine has been produced here). This particular distillery is just over 100 years old and is owned and operated by 3rd generation of the Warenghem family. It’s also quite small, both in size and output. It’s so small, they cannot buy large volumes of malt from French sources and have to rely on the Belgians to supply it in small quantities. Regardless, they must be doing something right as they have several awards proudly displayed in their showroom and they produce enough to fulfill French needs as well as some other countries, including Quebec and Ontario in Canada.
Warenghem runs a tour and tasting every hour on the hour in the afternoons, which is why we went. We’ve been on several wine tours and tastings, both in France and Canada, but have never been to a whiskey facility. And, I should mention that all this is free, with no obligation to purchase.
Whiskey production takes about half a day before the golden liquid is poured into barrels for a 3-year nap. Barley is fed through a hopper into a vat where the malt is added, along with water. This mixture is transferred to another vat where something happens with temperature, then to another vat where something else happens with temperature, all to do with sugar content. (I realize this description is a little vague, but the tour was in French so I got the gist but not all the details.) The warehouse where the barrels are stored is quite impressive but I was disappointed that we didn’t get to see the bottling process as I enjoy watching production lines. (I know, kinda weird. I used to work in the pharmaceutical industry and, at least once a month, I would wander down to production and take the self-guided tour spending most of my time watching the pills spill into bottles, cotton get stuffed into bottles, caps be secured onto bottles, labels be affixed to bottles, bottles be counted and dropped into shipping cartons, cartons be sealed and labeled and rolled off to be shipped.) But I digress…
(The hoses are used to move the liquid from one vat to another.)
Back in the showroom and we were able to taste as many different whiskeys as they produce. I tried, I really did, but I still don’t like whiskey. Steve, however, was quite happy and ended up buying 2 bottles of their award-winning Classic – one for him and one as a gift. (Just in case you’re wondering how fit we were to drive… the samples were in those teeny, tiny plastic cups that medication comes in in hospitals and we only got about 1cm in the bottom of this vessel with each taste. All together, I might have had 1 oz and Steve might have had 2 ozs.)
After a quick snack at home, we were back at the beach for a little R&R – like we haven’t had enough of that yet 🙂 – followed by our turkey leftovers from a couple of days ago, followed by an apple flan with fresh strawberries. I don’t know what it is about this vacation but I’ve had more dessert in the past 3 weeks than I’ve probably had in 3 years!!! And I’m loving it.