Oak

Old Pulteney 12 Year

Old Pulteney 12 Year

Wick is a town by the sea, and Old Pulteney is a distillery in and of the town, nicknamed The Maritime Malt. Built in 1826, Old Pulteney uses a Porteus mill that is a century old to process the barley used in distillation. Named after the Pulteneytown district of Wick, the distillery is one of the most northern on the mainland. After almost 200 years of near-constant operation, albeit closed temporarily during times of war or temperance, the distillery currently produces 900,000 liters of whisky a year. The flare near the top of the bottle is meant to evoke a copper pot still. The Old Pulteney 12 year is the definitive offering in their core portfolio and is aged exclusively in ex-bourbon casks.

Kingsbarns Doocot

Kingsbarns Doocot

Kingsbarns was founded in 2014 by Douglas Clement and is currently owned by independent bottler Weymss Malts, which purchased it in 2022. The placement of the distillery in the Lowland region, where there have been remarkably few active distilleries in the 21st century, was purportedly done to help provide comfort to golfers at the nearby famous courses around St. Andrew’s. The first whisky launched in 2018 and after a number of limited in development expressions, a limited core range emerged. The Kingsbarns Doocot is their flagship release and is the Scottish word for the dovecot that sits at the center of the distillery. It is a blend of whiskies matured in (90%) ex-bourbon and (10%) ex-Portuguese red wine barriques that have been shaved, toasted and re-charred (STR), both first-fill.

Glenmorangie 13 Year Cognac Finish

Glenmorangie 13 Year Cognac Finish

Glenmorangie was founded in 1843 and has gone through numerous permutations over time. Boasting the tallest stills in Scotland, they produce 6.5 million liters of single malt whisky a year fed from the nearby Tarlogie Springs. For the past few decades, Glenmorangie has also been one of the best selling single malts in Scotland itself and expanded into the luxury international market, driven by cask finishing started in the 1980s. This history of cask management is evident in the “Barrel Select Release” Series, where this Glenmorangie 13 Year Cognac Finish was released in 2021. A little different than many finishes that occur at the very end of maturation (hence the term “finishing”), the initial maturation in ex-bourbon casks lasted 8 years before being transferred to ex-Cognac casks that had been used already several times for the remaining years.