There was a time when road trips south from Auckland came with an essential stop in Pokeno.
Before the Southern Motorway, the journey down Great South Road (possibly in the back of a Holden Kingswood, without air conditioning or much thought given to seatbelts) would eventually bring you to the little Waikato town famous for two things: bacon and enormous ice creams stacked three, five or even more scoops high.
These days, Pokeno is giving travellers another reason to take a look, as whisky has joined bacon and ice cream on the town’s calling-card list.
Pokeno Whisky Company, our country’s largest single malt whisky distillery, has built a reputation for innovative whiskies that reflect where they’re made, and offer a distinctly New Zealand take on the spirit.
The road to Pokeno
An ’80s whisky road trip
Nigel Kelly
That growing reputation has inspired this week’s event ‘An 80s Whisky Road Trip, an intimate tasting at Vivace at DeBretts in central Auckland as part of Restaurant Month.
It will take a nostalgic trip back to the Pōkeno road journeys of the 1980s, pairing four local whiskies with food, including nods to Pokeno’s bacon and ice-cream heritage, and a soundtrack of classic Kiwi hits.
Ahead of the event, LawNews has spoken to the host, liquor industry veteran and whisky educator Nigel Kelly, known as “The Whisky Baron” about the drink he describes as “the disinfectant of the soul”.
“I love it. It’s proof God loves us and wants us to be happy,” Kelly says.
Even the name ‘whisky’ can be traced to the Gaelic uisge beatha – the ‘water of life’, he says.
Kelly says part of his fascination with whisky lies in the transformation of something as humble as grain into a spirit.
And on a Restaurant Month calendar that’s heavy on wine, there’s something appealing about letting whisky have its night, he says.
The local whiskies Kelly will be sharing at the tasting are: Pokeno Revelation, Pokeno Discovery, Pokeno Totara and Pokeno Sauternes Cask.
A New Zealand expression
While Scotland is the place that’s usually associated with whisky, Kelly says New Zealand is finding its own voice.
Whisky-making isn’t entirely new here, but the last few decades have brought a new generation willing to take on the expensive and very slow business of establishing local whisky.
Geographically, Kelly reckons we have plenty going for us.
“If you fold the world in half, New Zealand fits right where Scotland is,” he says.
That means we sit in something of a whisky-making “Goldilocks zone: not too hot and not too cold.
But there isn’t much point in making whisky in New Zealand just to replicate what’s already found in Scotland. That’s where Kelly thinks Pōkeno has so much to offer.
He points to whisky industry veteran Matt Johns, who founded the Pokeno Whisky Company in 2017 with a vision to put New Zealand on the map as a whisky-producing nation.
The distillery’s location on was deliberately chosen, with everything from the volcanic spring water beneath the site to the local climate influencing how the whisky is made and matures.
“The whole distillery is designed around the very specific place it is,” Kelly says.
It’s all in the barrel
Experimentation with barrels is another feature of Pokeno whisky, with distillers looking beyond the traditional casks for a distinctly New Zealand approach.
Like whisky makers elsewhere, Pōkeno Whisky uses ex-bourbon barrels, which are widely used because US rules require bourbon
to be aged in new charred oak barrels. But it has also been looking much closer to home.
Its whiskies have been finished in New Zealand red-wine barrels, including casks from Craggy Range as well as ex-bourbon barrels from the US. But there’s also been experimentation with native timbers.
A cooper has even been brought to Pokeno to reconstitute barrels and make new ones, including from tōtara.
Kelly says the idea of whisky produced here and matured in a barrel made from New Zealand native timber is particularly exciting.
“To have a New Zealand whisky made from a New Zealand whisky barrel is awesome.”
At whisky tastings, Kelly likes to show people just how much the choice of cask can influence what ends up in the glass.
One example is the Sauternes Cask, which uses barrels that once held the rich French dessert wine or ‘stickies’. He describes the whisky these produce as somewhere between caramel, hokey pokey and “the best honey you can think of”, with an unusually creamy mouth feel.
A New Zealand red-wine cask will see the whisky head in another direction altogether, picking up recognisable fruit and wine notes.
A higher ‘angel’s share’
Pōkeno’s climate plays a big part in the story as the local conditions also drive greater interaction between the spirit and the wood, which is fundamental to what happens inside the barrel.
Whisky slowly evaporates through its barrel as it matures, the portion referred to as the ‘angel’s share’.
In Scotland, Kelly says, the loss might typically be around 2 to 4 per cent a year.
But at Pokeno it can be considerably higher: around 7 to 9 per cent.
This is a challenge for whisky producers, who have to accept that some of their precious spirit will simply vanish along the way.
“But the smell in the barrel hall is phenomenal,” Kelly says.
0 Comments