The Single Cask – home to a warehouse in Glenrothes of over 3000 casks – have picked eight whisky experts to become their first-ever specialist panel of Taste Masters to help in the nosing, tasting, bottling and creation of their single cask whiskies.
Each Taste Master brings something unique to the table and they will work closely with The Single Cask specialist team as an ensemble of flavour experts, whose job is to tell the story behind each unique whisky they taste and help profile the whisky into a mood category.
Among the panel is whisky writer, presenter and judge, Dr. Christopher White, and Imogen Russon-Taylor, who brings an understanding of and experience in the fragrance and perfume world, selected for her fascination with scent and story-telling.
Mark Watt brings years of experience in cask selection after he and his wife Kate founded the Campbeltown Whisky Company, an independent company bottling under the Watt Whisky brand, while Maria Scala will use her wealth of spirits knowledge and personal experience acquired from time spent working in fine dining restaurants across London.
Offering a fresh perspective – Lucy Connor, a recent graduate of the OurWhisky Foundation mentorship programme – will use her bartending & tour guide background, a role that helped her interact with whisky lovers and introduce Scotch whisky to people across the world.
Jan Damen, General Manager at The Single Cask, said, “It is with great excitement that we announce our first-ever panel of ‘Taste Masters’. We only bottle exciting and entertaining whiskies worth talking about, so we wanted to work with exciting and entertaining flavour experts. All of our selected candidates have the charisma and creativity we were looking for. We are already so impressed with our talented Taste Masters, there’s lots of excitement on the horizon for The Single Cask!”
Picture: Taste Master Mark Watt and wife Kate