With John on vacation, I flew solo on this episode to welcome Ben Inglis, distillery manager and co-founder of The Islay Rum Company, to the show to get the full story on his unique approach to Scottish rum.If you listened to our Guide to UK Rum episode, you'll remember that John and I rated both of the Islay Rum Company rums we tried quite favorably, so we'd been hoping to talk to Ben ever since. We discussed:How Ben convinced the Vintage Malt Whisky Company to back his vision of Islay's first rum distillery instead of building a Scotch whisky distilleryScottish Gaelic pronunciationsThe pressure that comes with putting the word "Islay" on a bottle of rumContending with the island's flavor profile expectationsBuilding out the distillery in a historic lemonade factoryWhy getting a custom made double retort pot still was a mustCrafting their initial flavor profileExperiments with long fermentation, native bacteria, yeasts, and moreBalancing inspiration with originalityWhat's aging right now? And when can we taste it??And a whole lot more!You can learn more about The Islay Rum Company here: https://www.islayrum.com/Check out our episode on the wider UK rum scene here: https://www.rumcast.com/episodes/uk-rum-guideP.S. Did you know you can support The Rumcast on Patreon now and get bonus episodes, happy hours, and more? You can! Head to patreon.com/therumcast to check it out.