Arran 10 Years Old Cask #18-RUM-1007

The Distillery Exclusive programme at Arran is the format under which the visitor centre and online shop release small volumes of single cask whisky drawn from the Lochranza warehouse inventory. These bottlings are not distributed through trade channels and are generally available only to visitors to the distillery or through direct purchase from the distillery shop. This 10 Year Old single cask carries an internal cask code beginning 18 RUM 1007, the prefix indicating a 2018 transfer into a rum cask for finishing or full maturation, with 1007 the individual cask serial within that programme.

The spirit was matured in a single ex rum cask for approximately ten years before bottling. Ex rum casks at Arran are typically American oak Bourbon barrels that have had a second life ageing aged rum in the Caribbean before being shipped back to Scotland and refilled with new make or transfer spirit. Bottled at single cask strength without chill filtration and without added colour.

Rum cask interaction delivers residual molasses derived sugars absorbed into the cask wood during rum ageing, along with the elevated ester load typical of Caribbean rum maturation, particularly ethyl octanoate and isoamyl acetate. The combination with the Arran new make pushes the resulting whisky into a tropical, brown sugar and banana ester register, with the Bourbon underlay from the original cask life providing vanillin structure underneath.