We melted butter and brown sugar together in a pan to make a butterscotch sauce which we then poured over rum and raisin ice cream. Yet before we finished the sauce, we added a bit of salt and tried it on a wooden spoon – “just about perfect!”. Water added a ‘dirty’ aspect on the nose, with tarry ropes, engine oil and hot pistons, before we got all cleaned up with carbolic soap. On the palate, we tried an alternative to foie gras: smoked cod liver in its own oil, smooth and pâté like, and not at all like a dose of cod liver oil. Following nine years in an ex-bourbon hogshead, we transferred this whisky into a first fill Spanish oak oloroso hogshead.