A single malt at the founding table

On a summer night in August 2014, I plated a four-course degustation at Brasserie Enfin against three expressions of Glenmorangie. Esquire Malaysia carried the evening under the title Whisky for Dinner. The maison's own line at the time — "the purveyor of all things 'unnecessary well made'" — sat exactly where I had situated my own discipline. It is the earliest single-malt-Highland evening I have on record, and one of the founding pairings of the wider Brasserie Enfin work.

What I work with — and why Glenmorangie

Glenmorangie is a Highland single malt from the distillery at Tain, Ross-shire, founded in 1843. The character is light, fragrant, and complex — drawn out by what the distillery calls the tallest copper stills in Scotland, just over five metres high, which give the spirit room to refine itself before it ever touches a cask.

Within Scottish single malt, Highland and Speyside are different worlds. The sherry-cask Speyside profile that defines The Macallan, or the 2.81-times-distilled Speyside profile that defines Mortlach, both sit in a heavier vocabulary than Glenmorangie. Highland malts ask for a plate that honours their lightness. Whisky for Dinner was that kind of plate.

The maison’s own line — the purveyor of all things “unnecessary well made” — matters here. It is a discipline of going past what is strictly necessary, into what makes the work earn its place. I read against that frame, course by course.

“Yoga of the Senses” — the discipline beneath the pairing

This was one of my first whisky partnerships. Pairing food with high-alcohol spirits is a battle most chefs avoid — the alcohol overpowers the plate, the plate flattens against the spirit, and a guest is left with neither. Asian ingredients and flavours opened a different door. The deeper aromatic notes I had from Malaysian and Borneo work — torch ginger, sambal heat, fermented complexities, pickled brightness — held their own against Highland malt’s depth. I learned, course by course, to train the senses and tastebuds to read whisky and food together. I called it Yoga of the Senses.

Luxurious Magazine, covering the evening for the international audience, framed the proposition cleanly — Glenmorangie Hosts The “Perfect Pairing” For A Celebration Of All Things “Unnecessarily Well Made”. The maison’s discipline of going past what is strictly necessary met my own discipline of training the palate to read what would otherwise be missed. Unnecessarily well made turned out to be the right phrase for both halves of the work.

Whisky for Dinner — Brasserie Enfin, August 2014

Esquire Malaysia carried the evening on 4 August 2014 in the Living section. Four courses, three Glenmorangie expressions, the bottle and the plate held in continuous conversation. Each expression took the centre of the table for the course it accompanied — never alongside, never as decoration.

iGlenmorangie The Originalthe ten-year-old, the Maison's signature

Canadian oyster, lemon and ginger gelée.

iiGlenmorangie The Originalthe same pour, second movement

Hokkaido scallop, Scottish salmon pearl, fennel and almond crème.

iiiGlenmorangie 18 Years Oldthe Highland aged statement

Charcoal-grilled duck leg, Enfin's honey-citrus reduction, fondant roots.

ivGlenmorangie Signetchocolate malt barley, the most layered of the range

Fire-roasted pineapple mille-feuille, handmade dark-chocolate truffle.

The format was private dining: the menu was offered on request, minimum ten guests, at Brasserie Enfin. Esquire framed the proposition with a single phrase that has stayed with me — “Glenmorangie has a suggestion for you.” The maison and I, jointly, were offering something the Kuala Lumpur dining-out scene did not yet routinely carry: single-malt Highland whisky at the centre of a four-course bistro evening in Oasis Square, in August 2014.

The four courses, photographed across the evening — scroll through them.

The founding year — what was already in motion

Glenmorangie did not happen in isolation. The Krug Ambassade work had begun two months earlier; the Hennessy Appreciation Grows programme would arrive two months later, between 30 September and 4 October 2014. The discipline that matured into the Krug Chef’s Table at Menara Hap Seng and the Hennessy Salon at Enfin was being practised, course by course, in a bistro on the western edge of Petaling Jaya, in August 2014.

Glenmorangie was where that work first reached the public record.

Glenmorangie at the rooms that came after

Brasserie Enfin held the Whisky for Dinner pairing, but Glenmorangie continued to sit at the table at the rooms that came after. At Enfin (Menara Hap Seng) and later at Shin’Labo, Glenmorangie returned in cocktail-led programmes — alongside contemporary serves like the Highland Sazerac, with Hennessy X.O and absinthe. A house spirit and a sister-maison cognac in one glass: the kind of cross-house serve the MHD architecture made natural.

Tatler Asia’s later Enfin coverage carried these cocktail-forward menus on the public record. The maison stayed at the table; the format evolved.

The Malaysian counterpart

Glenmorangie sits inside the Moët Hennessy / LVMH portfolio. In Malaysia, the Moët Hennessy Diageo Malaysia (MHD) joint-venture distributes the maison alongside its sister houses, and the same MHD-side counterpart team has carried this work across the years.

That continuity matters. The Glenmorangie evening of 2014 was not a one-off arrangement — it sat in the same maison-counterpart relationship that has held this spirits-and-champagne work together since.