Pittyvaich 30 Years Old 1992 Cask #4025 (Gordon & MacPhail)

Bottled at a natural 48.9% in an outturn of 88, this 30 year old is a Gordon and MacPhail Connoisseurs Choice single cask, a 1992 vintage from ex-Bourbon cask 4025. Distilled a year before Pittyvaich closed, it is a thirty year record of one of the distillery's final casks, a close sibling to their 1992 bottled at twenty nine years and one of the smallest outturns in the range.

A single ex-Bourbon American oak cask held the whisky for three decades, carrying it into an oxidative and evaporative maturity. The angel's share has quietly concentrated the spirit and eased the strength below fifty percent, while the refill oak keeps the grassy, citric Speyside make in view even at thirty years, the wood seasoning rather than dominating a naturally light spirit.

At 48.9% it is mellow and waxy. Vanillin from the lignin gives vanilla, caramelised hemicellulose a honeyed depth, and the long ageing brings fresh orchard fruit and a soft cereal note over old oak. The finish is long and gently fading, a tiny outturn from a vanished distillery whose late casks are now among the harder ones to find.