Niall Culbertson
Distiller since 2017.
"Working here over the past nine years or so, you get to know the spirit really well - the stills, the smoke, the character that runs through everything we make."
NIALL CULBERTSON
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Niall grew up just a mile from the distillery and has lived on Skye his whole life - this is home. His father was a fisherman, and boats and the sea shaped how he remembers Torabhaig. With a background in biochemistry, he brings a technical eye to flavour, but says working at the distillery has taught him that whisky is as much an art as a science - getting a feel for the stills, the spirit, and knowing when to let it find its balance.
NIALL'S JOURNEYMAN DRAM
Base malt : Concerto
Speciality malt : 5% Brown Malt, 5% Dark Crystal
Yeast : Pinnacle MG+ and Safspirit M-1
Fermentation time : Long (90-120 hrs)
Fermentation temp : Standard (28-32 max temp)
Foreshots run : Short (5-10 minutes)
Spirit run : Longer (up to 4 hrs)
Spirit cut point : High for peated (66%)
Spirit phenols : 12 - 15ppm
The Distillers' Series is a chance to tell my story through the same stills I work with every day. When I got the chance to make a whisky for it, I wanted to do something that felt unmistakably Torabhaig, but reflected my side of Skye a bit more.
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I chose malts with sweet and caramel notes, and a lightly peated spirit, to build towards that idea of sweetness, smoke, salt and the sea. There's a softness to the smoke at Torabhaig that really suited that - something coastal and warming, rather than overpowering.
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The rum casks played a big part too. They brought more tropical fruit and sweetness forward, which worked really well with the coastal character I was looking for.
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The make: 90% lightly peated malt, 5% Dark Crystal, 5% Brown Malt. First fill bourbon, re-casked into refill rum barrels.
