by Fionnán » Fri Mar 02, 2012 8:49 pm
hey there Uffe and welcome to the forum--
Michael Jackson's description about the oats and rye is primarily a historical one. Today its a pretty clean sweep of mixtures solely between malted and unmalted barley. The ratio can varie but it tends to be around 40/60. In the past, small amounts of oats in particular were included in the "unmalted" side of that partnership (and this has been resurrected in modern times by the kilbeggan distillery's plans for SPS). The problem with oats is that they form a bit of a porridge like wash that in former times could cause the stills to blow.