Natural Selection prepares to launch 2017 beer

By Reporter | June 5, 2017

Peter Ranscombe finds out more about Natural Selection, a partnership between Stewart Brewing in Loanhead and Heriot-Watt University in Edinburgh to train the next wave of brewers. SCOTLAND’S craft brewing scene is thriving – there are more than 115 breweries dotted throughout the country, the highest number for more than a century. Gordon Brown’s introduction…

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The Marriage of Kim K comes to the Edinburgh Festival

By Reporter | May 25, 2017

Leoe & Hyde, the pioneering contemporary music theatre company renowned for mixing dramatic innovation with pop-cultural subversion, will tour their most ambitious project yet this summer; a fearlessly caustic satire fusing the most vaunted production in the history of classical opera with one of pop culture’s most explosively tragicomic unions: The Marriage of Kim K.…

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Pioneering partnership honoured as Fusion Whisky unveils plan for future international releases

By Reporter | May 19, 2017

The team behind the first blend of Scotch and Japanese whisky have spoken of their plans for future collaborations after winning a national excellence award that honoured their partnership with a renowned independent distillery. Fusion Whisky last night received the Success through Partnership prize at the Scottish Food and Drink Excellence Awards in recognition of…

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Bringing a taste of Napa Valley to the UK

By Reporter | March 30, 2017

VISITING California with the Wine Institute – to learn more about its sense of place, environmental programmes and diversity of styles – demonstrated the sheer variety of quality wines produced in the Golden State. Yet much of the tastiest wine never leaves the United States – or even, in some cases, California. That’s why it…

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Going beyond bubbles

By Reporter | March 21, 2017

PETER RANSCOMBE FLICKING through the pages of a wine textbook sometimes feels like looking back at an old photo album. There on the pages are all the old friends – from Cabernet Sauvignon, Merlot and Pinot Noir through to Chardonnay, Pinot Grigio and that cheeky wee Sauvignon Blanc. Then you reach the pages about England…

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Brown-Foreman appoint new whisky maker for Scotch portfolio

By Reporter | February 21, 2017

Brown-Forman has announced the appointment of Rachel Barrie as whisky maker for its Scotch whisky portfolio which includes the BenRiach, The GlenDronach and Glenglassaugh distilleries, effective 1 March. She will succeed Billy Walker who helped grow The BenRiach Distillery Company into one which is recognized throughout the industry for innovative and exceptional quality single malt Scotch…

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Scottish Opera’s youth company present Purcell’s Dido and Aeneas

By Reporter | February 7, 2017

Scottish Opera’s Connect Company – made up of talented young singers, instrumentalists and stage managers aged between 16 and 21 – presents Purcell’s chamber opera, Dido and Aeneas, at the Beacon Arts Centre in Greenock this Spring. Over one weekend (8 and 9 April), the Company stages three performances of this tragic tale of love…

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Celebrate Burns’ Night 2017 with Aberlour A’Bunadh

By Reporter | January 4, 2017

Celebrate the birthday of Scotland’s most famous poet as he would have wanted you to, with a wee dram of exceptional single malt. On the 25 January raise a glass of Aberlour A’bunadh – the cult favourite expression from the world renowned Aberlour distillery. Robert Burns once said that ‘freedom and whisky gang thegither’, a…

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Glad we booked….

By Peter Ranscombe | June 9, 2011

Saturday May 21st…As revenge for dragging her to a Fleet Foxes concert Mrs A kindly took me to see Romeo & Juliet last night, a first class Danish production but the populus of Dunfermline must have different things to do on a Friday night. Cool but fair here today, horses working on the riverbank and the…

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