Shackleton's Whiskey Reborn

I just ran across this article (thanks, Shanghaiist) about the whiskey makers, Whyte & Mackay, who have re-created the Scotch found by archeologists intact and unfrozen (!) after a more than 100 years.
They were able to leave the actual bottles undisturbed, except for a sample removed by syringe through the cork. An analysis determined the type of peat and the wood used in the aging barrels. This Scotch is now available at several places in the Chicago area, including Binny's. Shackleton's stash is being returned to its earlier resting place.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/01/2 ... 03&ir=Food

And, if you are interested, you can follow the adventurers who are attempting to recreate Shackleton's voyage on Facebook. They began the sailing portion of the trip today in a boat based on the one Shackleton's team used. Fortunately, they have survival gear not available to Shackleton and his men. But still. . .

https://www.facebook.com/shackletonepic?ref=ts&fref=ts

Thanks for posting these, Josephine. I'm a big Shackleton fan. The man, I mean, not the scotch.

Very interesting, about the reconstruction of the blend. I imagine they have enough for DNA sequencing and the like.

Food and drink are at the center of the whole "heroic" age of polar exploration. Roland Huntsford's books about the subject make this very clear, as do Evan Connell's essays. The cultural chauvinism which kept them from learning from the Inuit--Amundsen was a notable exception to this--and the un-anticipated limitations of preserved food in their time, particularly the earliest Industrial Age explorers like Franklin, did them in, literally.

Scurvy was the big threat. It had been known before Captain Cook in the 18th century that fresh food was sooner or later necessary, and that limes and other citrus foods were antiscorbutics--it's where the nickname "Limeys" comes from. But the mechanism, the existence of vitamins, was not known. Victorian Britons felt that their technology, canned food for instance, had solved the problem but it hadn't.

Malnutrition, either deficiency or downright poisoning, as in the celebrated Douglas-Mawson-dogs-liver story, was at the center of every arctic disaster in that age, and there were a lot of them.

Very interesting; thank you, Cabbagehead!

Lately I have been watching and reading everything I can find (you could say I'm hooked ) about the polar exploration era (Shackleton, etc.), as well as 19th century British sailing (Captain Cook, Captain Bligh, the mutiny on the Bounty, Longitude) and American sailing, especially Moby-Dick and the voyage of the Essex--speaking of malnutrition and starvation! Now there's a harrowing story, and one that highlights, by contrast, just how amazing and unlikely Shackleton's accomplishments, and Bligh's for that matter--namely, getting their men home alive--truly were.

And remember that the original purpose of the voyage of the Bounty was originally all about food.

Shackleton's Whiskey was featured last night prominently in an excellent episode of White Collar.
They talked quite a bit about how to duplicate the taste and color...
in between the eye candy of course....
mm Matt Bomer.

Kind of reminds me of a scene in the movie version of 'Mr Roberts' where Henry Fonda(Mr Roberts) is making some 'Scotch' out of grain neutral alcohol and flavorings for the Jack Lemon character!-Dick