Gerry Tosh, head of brand education for Highland Park single malt scotch whisky, talks to Caterer Middle East about a hypocritical church-goer, stories of smugglers and the upcoming launch of the brand’s 50-year-old whisky…
Tell us a bit about the background to the Highland Park brand.
Highland Park was started (legally) in 1798 by a man called Magnus Eunson.
Magnus is infamous in whisky history as he is a bit of character — basically he had three jobs: flesher (butcher), beadle (works in the church) and smuggler (smuggler).
He worked in St Magnus’s Cathedral on the Islands of Orkney and on a Sunday would stand up and say “Thou shall not kill, Thou shall not steal and thou shall not make whisky” because whisky was illegal.
But at night Magnus would climb a hill called High Park — which is how we got our name in the years to come — and he distilled whisky illegally and hid the casks under the pulpit of his church; the last place anybody would look!
Why do you think it is particularly appropriate for the Middle East market?
This is a very new market for us.
Highland Park is a connoisseur’s whisky, which means the real whisky lovers and aficionados of single malt whisky know all about us.
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However there are parts of the world that are developing their whisky knowledge and the Middle East is such a place.
We have watched the market develop with patience and have dipped our toes in the water, but hopefully in the years to come the interest for the more ‘connoisseurial’ complex whiskies will begin to grow.
Many whisky brands have made their debut here over the past few years; what sets Highland Park apart from the rest?
That would be our five key stones of production, which ensure we have created and will continue to create the ‘Best Spirit in the World’.
These five areas of production are areas where almost every other distillery have taken short cuts or cost savings.
At Highland Park we do not aim to save money, we aim to make the best whisky we can. We are probably the most expensive whisky to produce!
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