What is a Sensory Team you ask? Archie Rose’s Senior Spirits Blender, David Fisher (Fish) is here to answer that and all your other burning questions re: spirits blending at our Botany distillery, Sydney. Plus, some stellar recommendations for bottles to taste now.

What is the role of the Sensory team at Archie Rose?

In short, we’re responsible for ensuring the final product inside every Archie Rose bottle is as delicious as possible. That means endless checks at all production points to ensure everything we produce meets our internal quality standards. From the grain that’s going to be made into whisky, to the liquid off the still, to the casks that the liquid goes into, to picking those casks when they’re ready and then blending them together to create our delicious products. It is a tough and ever-changing role that requires a thirst for quality and the tenaciousness to keep chasing that quality every day.

How is Archie Rose’s sensory team different from others in the business?

We’re really lucky as we get to look after a broader range of spirits than most others in the business do. We look after all our vodka, gin, white cane, aged rum, brandy, rye and single malt whiskies as well as any other special projects that get dreamed up by the team. On top of this, we’re still a relatively new company, so whilst most sensory teams in the business are basing their programs and recipes on centuries of notes and data, we’re starting from scratch. So part of what we do differently is how we’re fast-tracking that process, a huge amount of thinking and planning has and is going into how we’re approaching bridging that gap.

How about the most challenging part of the job?

The nature of production means there’s never really an end, there are always milestones, but production never ends. Keeping that in mind and continuing in our quest for improvement and quality is and will always be the biggest challenge we face.

What’s your favourite part of the job?

When I see the first bottle of any product filled, it could be the 20th batch of our Rye Whisky, the 280th batch of our Signature Dry Gin, or batch one of a new product. Knowing everything that has gone into that product, the enormous amount of work that goes into every single product we make, and seeing that first bottle of a batch fill-up always brings me joy.

Archie Rose is known for experimenting with unique ingredients and techniques, what’s the wildest you’ve worked with so far? And the most challenging?

The wildest and the most challenging to work with would be Sea Lettuce and Sea Celery. We used these products in our Sea Salt Gin. Essentially we were charged with creating a gin that was salty, without adding salt. We went through a whole stack of cultivated seaweeds and coastal plants to give us the impression of saltiness. The two we landed on were Sea Lettuce, which gave us a lovely seaspray and sweet seaweed character, and Sea Celery, which gave us a lovely celery leaf, and celery salt profile.

Is there anything you’ve been dying to experiment with that you haven’t had a chance to yet?

We have an excellent R & D program at Archie that the sensory team have great exposure to and there are some amazingly weird things that we get exposed to by our distilling team. We have a running tally of all the botanicals that smell or taste like elements of a Sunday Roast, the dream is an unlikely one, but if you ever see the Sunday Roast spirit land on shelves, you can rest assured that there will be a lot of silly grins and happy faces in the sensory team.

What is your biggest source of inspiration in your work?

My job is super wide-ranging, so naturally, there is a heap of different inspiration sources. For creativity and flavour inspiration, it’s what I eat and drink, in a way, spirits are like music, it’s generally the same ingredients we’re all working with, it’s more about how you’re using them. From a process and data management perspective, we look to other spirit traditions and other industries to try and see if there are any little concepts or nuances that could spark improvement.

Which Archie Rose bottles do you find yourself restocking in your personal collection most often?

Bone Dry Gin, White Cane and Rye Malt Whisky. You can entertain just about anyone with those three in good stock!

How do you get into spirit blending (assuming there is no such thing as spirit blending school)?

Great question! There’s no Hogwarts of spirit blending, unfortunately, traditionally it works in a system closely aligned with a trade, with an apprenticeship of sorts leading you into the role. In terms of actually making the jump into the role, we would be looking for someone that has a good nose and palate, a passion for spirits and the tenacious attitude it takes to do our job.

If you met someone who had never tried an Archie Rose spirit, which bottle would you recommend they start with?

It totally depends on what they normally drink. If they were sighted unseen, I’d recommend anything in our Fundamentals range as a great introduction to our brand. It gives you the option of a vodka, a gin or a whisky and are all great examples of their categories. They are all delicious, whilst being accessible from a flavour point of view, but still uniquely Australian, and most importantly, a great price point!