0102. MACALLAN EXCEPTIONAL NO.12 2005 (12 YEARS)
MACALLAN EXCEPTIONAL SINGLE CASK 2005 – 2017 NO. 12
The Macallan does an especially great job of hanging on to some of its older stock for as long as possible without compromising quality. Managing that fine balance, being able to predict when a whisky is at its peak of aging, is a special skill, and one that the Macallan seems to value even more than other distilleries. This latest addition to the Exceptional Single Cask range was distilled back in 1950 and put into a first fill sherry butt. The distiller’s notes— we haven’t had a sip yet of this incredibly rare $58,000 elixir—speak of peach and vanilla flavors, some orange zest and ginger, as well as antique oak with a trace of lingering peat.
While peat isn’t normally a character you’d find in a Macallan, back when this was distilled, peat was being used in drying the barley. It’s a wonderful marker of time and the difference history makes. The 1950s saw construction of new buildings at the Macallan estate, as well as the acquisition of more farmland and the property’s first long-haired, highland cows—an appropriate bookend to the opening of its new distillery and visitor’s center last year.
Distilled in 2005 and bottled in December 2017 after maturation in a European Oak Sherry butt, Exceptional cask No.12 was finally bottled at natural strength with a tiny outturn of just 257 bottles. Fantastic colour (in fact, almost as deep as number one in the series) suggesting some serious sherry at play.
Strength: 59.4%
Bottle Size: 75 cl
Distillery / Blender: Macallan
Region: Speyside
Bottler: Official Bottling
Cask No: 12
Cask Type: European Oak Sherry Hogshead
Lot Type: Full Size
