Pacult, F. Paul (1949–), is a spirits expert and reviewer who came to wield wide influence in the early years of the spirits and cocktail revivals through his newsletter Spirit Journal, his extensive consulting with spirits brands, and his role in the BAR trade educational outfit. Born in Chicago, Pacult attended the University of California at Berkeley in the late 1960s. After graduation he spent the next decade working for Sonoma County winemaker Rodney Strong, who encouraged his writing. He moved to New York City in 1982 and opened a wine school. While conducting wine classes, he was approached by the New York Times to write about spirits for the newspaper’s Sunday magazine. A lengthy article on scotch whisky and its distilleries led to several other such articles, including a story about cognac. He also spent nearly a decade as a spirits columnist for Wine Enthusiast. In 1991, at the urging of the wine critic Robert M. Parker Jr., Pacult and his wife, Sue Woodley, launched Spirit Journal, a subscription newsletter in which Pacult offered reviews of a wide variety of spirits. The publication, which did not accept advertising from liquor brands, began with a few dozen subscribers; in 2016, it boasted more than thirty thousand readers.
Beginning in 1997, with Kindred Spirits, Pacult began publishing books on spirits, including A Double Scotch, a history of Chivas Regal and the Glenlivet, and American Still Life, a history of the bourbon-making Beam family. For a time in the late 1990s, Pacult and fellow spirits writer Gary Regan cohosted The Happy Hour, a New York radio show that gave early exposure to important bartenders and distillers like Dale DeGroff. In 2005, he joined forces with DeGroff, Doug Frost, Steve Olson, Andy Seymour, and David Wondrich to form BAR (Beverage Alcohol Resource), an organization that presents a yearly immersive, five-day course in spirits tasting and cocktail history and practice. BAR was soon after combined with BarSmarts, a joint program from BAR and the spirits firm Pernod Ricard that trains bartenders for basic competence in modern mixology and tests them in person, in cities across the United States. Pacult is also the force behind the Ultimate Spirits Challenge, a spirits competition; teaches popular traveling seminars on rum, brandy, and other spirits; and as a consultant has helped to create numerous spirits brands and expressions.
Beverage Alcohol Resource (BAR) and BarSmarts.F. Paul Pacult. Interview December 14, 2016.
By: Robert Simonson