Old Pulteney 10 years Single Malt

About the Old Pulteney 10 years Single Malt

Old Pulteney 10 years Single Malt is a Highland single malt from the far north of Scotland. It comes from Wick, a working fishing port in Caithness. Pulteney was licensed there in 1826, inside a newly built harbour district called Pulteneytown. Few Scottish distilleries sit in the middle of a town like this one. Bottled at 40%, the ten year old opens the core range. Pulteney runs a single pair of stills, and both are unusual. The wash still has a flat, truncated top with no swan neck. Large boil balls on both stills send heavier vapours back down for a second pass. Vapour then cools in a pair of stainless steel worm tubs. Worm tubs are an older, slower method that keeps the spirit oily and full. That shape and that cooling give the malt its weight. Malty freshness leads, with green apple and a lift of citrus behind it. Honey and vanilla sit underneath, soft rather than sugary. Sip it and the whisky turns sweeter and rounder, fruity with a light oily coat. A thread of sea salt runs through the middle and stops it going flabby. Light spice and dry oak close things out. Salt hangs around longest, and that is the part people remember. Most of the core range starts at twelve years and climbs from there. Old Pulteney 10 years Single Malt sits below that, younger and more direct. Less time in wood means the salty, malty spirit stays out in front. You taste the distillery here more than you taste the cask. Anyone curious about what worm tubs and a flat topped still do should start with this bottling.