Duncan Taylor

Duncan Taylor began as a cask broker in Glasgow and built up a large stock of maturing whisky. Under its current ownership it moved to Huntly in Aberdeenshire, on the edge of Speyside, where it bottles its whiskies.

The company buys filled casks from many distilleries and bottles them under its own labels, often as single casks with the cask number and vintage on the label. Its stock includes old single grain whiskies from distilleries such as North British and Strathclyde, as well as single malts from Glen Grant, Glen Moray, Glentauchers, Bunnahabhain and Highland Park.

The Octave range shows the company's own work in the warehouse: whisky is re-casked into small octave casks for a further period of maturation before bottling. Rare Auld and Tantalus are for older single casks, and Dimensions covers single malts and blended malts. The Big Smoke is a peated Islay blended malt, with the 60 bottled at a higher strength.

Because each single cask differs, two Duncan Taylor bottlings of the same distillery can taste quite different. The label details of age, vintage, cask number and strength are the best guide when comparing prices.