type of aged distilled alcoholic beverage made from fermented (malt) wheat, corn (maize), rye, or barley, and containing approximately 40 to 50% ethyl alcohol by volume. Whisky is typically aged in wooden casks, generally made of charred white oak. The name whisky is derived from a Gaelic word that means, “water of life.” The spelling whiskey is common in Ireland and the United States while whisky is used in Scotland and all other whisky producing countries. Types include Bourbon, Scotch, Irish and their sub categories differing in the fermentation of grains, distillation and aging in wooden barrels. Scotch Whisky, for example, can be single malt, blended malt, single grain and blended grain.
Whiskey gets its ingredients determining its flavor, color and taste from the grains, products of microbial fermentation and constituents of the wood barrel that gradually dissolve into the spirit.
Main microbe in whiskey industry is Saccaromyces yeast, mostly S.cerevisiae although various secondary species have been used with it. The most used whiskey distiller's yeast in the latter part of the 20th century was a S.cerevisiae strain called DCL M, M-strain, Quest M, Rasse M, M-1, D1 or WH301. The M-strain is an intraspecies hybrid of S.cerevisiae (as S.cerevisiae covers the former S.diastaticus species). In continental Europe there were specific strains for grain wort and malt wort (Rasse M, Rasse XII) and rye wort (R-strain) and even a raspberry-flavor producing strain "A"
Notable bacterial representatives of whiskey include Lactobacilli: Lactobacillus brevis, Lactobacillus fermentum, Lactobacillus paracasei,Lactobacillus pentosus, also Lactobacillus buchneri and Lactobacillus ferintoshensis.
Whiskey gets its ingredients determining its flavor, color and taste from the grains, products of microbial fermentation and constituents of the wood barrel that gradually dissolve into the spirit.
Main microbe in whiskey industry is Saccaromyces yeast, mostly S.cerevisiae although various secondary species have been used with it. The most used whiskey distiller's yeast in the latter part of the 20th century was a S.cerevisiae strain called DCL M, M-strain, Quest M, Rasse M, M-1, D1 or WH301. The M-strain is an intraspecies hybrid of S.cerevisiae (as S.cerevisiae covers the former S.diastaticus species). In continental Europe there were specific strains for grain wort and malt wort (Rasse M, Rasse XII) and rye wort (R-strain) and even a raspberry-flavor producing strain "A"
Notable bacterial representatives of whiskey include Lactobacilli: Lactobacillus brevis, Lactobacillus fermentum, Lactobacillus paracasei,Lactobacillus pentosus, also Lactobacillus buchneri and Lactobacillus ferintoshensis.
 |  Process-oriented "aroma wheels" such as "Dewar whisky wheel" describe the change in whisky odor as it matures from peaty (partly decomposed vegetables) and cereal to floral (heather), estery, fruity (raisins and sultanas), feinty, sulphury, woody, and extractive (Oак, and Vanilla). |
Asian whisky wheel would probably be quite different providing perhaps umami, soy and more than one subcategory of spices. Trigeminal activity (camphor, burning sensation), mouthfeel, viscosity and texture are other notable features of different types of whiskey.
