Field-to-Bottle Distiller, Arbikie Distillery has been short-listed for the prestigious BBC Farming & Food Awards. Arbikie was selected as one of three finalists from 400 entries in the ‘Best Drinks Producer’ category.
The BBC Food & Farming Awards were launched in 2000, to mark the 20th anniversary of BBC Radio 4’s ‘The Food Programme’. The mission statement is “to honour those who have done most to promote the cause of good food”.
The Stirling family has been farming for over 400 years and brothers, Iain, John and David carry on the Stirling tradition of respecting the land by reviving their farms distant history of field-to-bottle distillation. Arbikie grows, distils, matures & bottles their world award-winning, family of super-premium spirits at Lunan Bay on Scotland’s East Coast. This gives their spirits exceptional provenance & traceability and helped their ‘Kirsty’s Gin’ win world gold at the San Francisco World Spirit Awards and their ‘AK’s Gin’ to win the ‘World Martini Championship’.
Arbikie has capitalised on the rising demand for terroir, provenance-focused spirits by using the existing crops on their farm to create unrivalled traceability in their products and recently created the first Scottish Rye Whisky for over 100 years, distilled from Arantes Rye grown on their farm.
Director, Iain Stirling commented: “As both Farmers and Distillers, our family are absolutely delighted to be short-listed for such a prestigious award. Whatever we’ve produced over the years, from barley to gin, our values of sustainability, innovation and quality have been the foundation. Our new Arbikie Highland Rye embodies everything our family has been doing since we started farming 400 years ago.”