One-horse town
Rothes is a one-horse town, with a single street and five - more or less invisible - distilleries (since they are tucked away off the road), and on the edge of the village are two more: Craigellachie and The Macallan.

Stand Fast Craigellachie
'Stand Fast Craigellachie' was the war-cry of Clan Grant, a name which features so largely in the distilleries of Scotland. So much so that the various owners were, until very recently, known simply by their distillery names -'Glenfiddich', 'Glenlivet', 'Glen Grant', 'Glenfarclas', and so on. The whisky made at Craigellachie Distillery has a distinguished pedigree, and was one of the best selling 'singles' pre-World War I. The village of the same name has an interesting cooperage, which is open to the public.

The Macallan
The Macallan is one of the world's great malts. Heavily sherried, rich and luxurious, it invites comparison with vintage cognac. Indeed, not long ago, a friendly challenge was issued by The Macallan's to Courvoisier to have a public comparative tasting. As a survivor of this event, I can report only that as the evening progressed it became increasingly difficult to identify the two spirits...

Mackessack
In Rothes itself is Glen Grant Distillery, founded in 1840 and highly regarded by blenders and single malt drinkers alike. A great-grandson of the founding Grant brothers, Major Douglas Mackessack, encouraged the sale of Glen Grant as a single malt from the time he took over in 1931, and as a result it has been more widely promoted than most.

The only other Rothes malt worth mentioning is the rare but excellent Glenrothes - profound and fruity, with a strong flavour of figs: "it quietly embodies all the nobility and complexity of a fine Speyside malt" (Michael Jackson).