Peated Malt Vinegar

Smoke, then sweetness

Peat is what gives some whiskies their smoky, bonfire character, and it carries right through into vinegar. On the nose this one is rich and peaty. On the palate there’s a sweetness that balances the smoke rather than fighting it. It carries the same Dornoch Craft Vinegar roundness and layers of flavour that just keep on going.

Like the unpeated version, it’s fermented twice from malt wort, from scratch, and then aged in wood. This time that’s a Glen Garioch cask. It’s unpasteurised, so it’s still a living vinegar, with the mother.

What to use it on

Anything off a grill or barbecue. Pulled pork, grilled asparagus, charred veg. It works wonders in a homemade barbecue sauce, and a splash can stand in for liquid smoke. It brings acidity as well as smoke, so go easy on any other vinegar in the recipe.

The story behind this one

I work hand in hand with Dornoch Distillery, and what they’re mashing when I go to collect is what I get. When I won the grant to start Dornoch Craft Vinegar, there was a lot of planning about organic malt, how much to collect, when, and how long it would take to fill my solera, the system of casks every batch passes through. So when the day came and the wash was peated, I had to take a minute to recalibrate. Any peat going into the solera would carry through to every batch after it. So the peated wash got a home of its own: a 1998 Glen Garioch cask, well away from everything else.

That’s the whole game of working with a distillery. What they make is what I use, and that’s the beauty of this vinegar: collaboration, experimentation, playfulness and curiosity. What would a peated vinegar taste like? Well, six months on, I can tell you: absolutely glorious.

From my time behind the whisky bar at Dornoch Castle, I know plenty of people don’t like peat, but those who do really, really do. It needs the right moment, and this vinegar knows its moment. Picture a hot summer barbecue and a dripping pulled pork roll: a dash of this gives the whole thing a sweet smokiness. Or a haddock supper with a light hint of real peat smoke, not the bottled kind. Next, I’m pickling onions with it, and I’ve a feeling it’ll be something special in a hot sauce.