But before tasting this pure malt (I'll come back to that) let's get to know this bearded guy with a rocker look like uncle Zegut. He turned late to whisky. He was first a wizard brewer when he created in 1994 the Rouget de L'isle brewery (which means that we don't make cancoillotte in Franche-Comté -NDLR-).

In 2002, he installed it in the village of Bletterans in the Jura (just come back from there since it is in this village that the composer of La Marseillaise lived. In short, in 2002, after offering 13 different beers, he decided to go into whisky. 

The problem is that the rule is the rule: Bruno decides to distil his beer in an Armagnac still (a still that distills continuously on distillation trays) and therefore doesn't distil according to a double distillation by going through a wash and a spirit still and therefore doesn't have the right to call his whisky single malt: it will be pure malt (which doesn't prevent it from being very good and above all a distillate that comes out at 72°!!).

He has chosen to make a local whisky: barley almost entirely from the Jura, from the Jura yellow wine cellars, ageing casks made of Savagnin, Vin jaune, Vin de paille and therefore Macvin (a liqueur made from the blend of must and brandy from Jura marc) that we are going to taste today. If we are not in the presence of Jura whisky, we will never be.

Crédit photo @mizenboite

Today's whisky has been aged for up to 6 years in Macvin casks and bottled without filtration, giving it a dark straw yellow colour and a slightly cloudy appearance.

When one plunges the nose into the glass it is a bit like flying over a sweet quetsch pie. The aromas of caramelized plums stand out quite widely. At the second passage the nose penetrates into a cornucopia of ripe red fruits but also apples and pears, all mixed with honey. In a third and last passage we discover cherries with kirch and a hint of spice.

In the mouth the walk begins, first in an orchard with a taste of ripe pear and apple, then in an exotic forest with green woody notes, vanilla notes with a hint of bitterness (perhaps the wood from the macvin barrel).

Before descending into the throat it will leave the palate with spicy notes, and once it has gone down it will leave long green nutty notes and a hint of bitterness on a background of vanilla.

Frankly and to say that at the base La Rouget de L'Isle is a brewery, I think that the switch to a distillery is not too badly negotiated. There isn't, but whether the name Jura is French or Scottish, it rhymes well with whisky.

Besides, it's good to get out of the sofa for a little trip, but I'm going back there because you can't go out after all!