Macallan 12 Sherry Oak review, and I should say at the start that this is the bottle the whole brand was built on, long before anyone started auctioning a single bottle for the price of a house. It is the original sherried Macallan, it costs about £75, and it has to do a lot of work to justify the name on the label.
It does justify it, mostly. This is a rich, orange-and-spice malt with a lot of sherry in the glass and almost nothing to be nervous about, and it is the reason the distillery’s reputation exists at all.
The Macallan is made at Easter Elchies, near Craigellachie, and belongs to Edrington. The distillery is famous for small stills and for a very strong policy on sherry oak, with casks made in Spain and seasoned with sherry before they travel north. The Macallan distillery page has the history, the 2018 distillery with the grass roof and the visiting rules.
The Sherry Oak 12 is the classic expression: twelve years in sherry-seasoned oak, bottled at 40% in the UK, with a rich amber colour that comes from the casks. It sits beside the Macallan 12 Double Cask, which uses sherry-seasoned American and European oak and is the softer, honeyed alternative. The Sherry Oak is the darker and more traditional one.
Dried fruit and ginger, with the sort of sherry you can smell from across the room.
The nose opens with raisins, dried apricot and orange peel, then ginger, vanilla and a little wood smoke. It smells sweet and spicy rather than sticky, and the sherry comes through as a warm, nutty roundness and not a sharp edge.
The palate is rich and soft. Dried fruit and orange lead again, with wood spice, a little dark chocolate and a vanilla note that shows the oak. At 40% it is smooth almost to a fault, and it has less bite than the nose suggests.
The finish is medium to long, sweet and gently drying, with ginger and wood and a faint smoky note at the end. It is pleasant rather than thrilling, but it stays well-mannered from first sip to last.
Neat, in a wide glass, with a few drops of water if you want to loosen the fruit. I would not add ice, and I would not put it anywhere near a mixer. Water and ice explains why a little water is helpful and a lot of ice is not.
It works well after dinner and next to dark chocolate or a mince pie. It is a particularly good bottle to give to someone who likes sherried whisky and has not tried the brand before.
About £75 for 70 cl. That is a lot for a 40% twelve year old, and a Macallan tax is built into the price. The Macallan 12 Double Cask costs about £76 and scores 78 on my page. The Sherry Oak is darker and more traditional, and I score it one point higher, but I would not call either of them a bargain.
The sherried alternatives cost far less. Glenfarclas 12 scores 80 at about £48, and GlenDronach 12 scores 82 at about £50. Both have more sherry for less money. What you get from the Macallan is polish, consistency and the name, and for some buyers that is exactly the point.
It is hard to talk about this bottle without talking about the brand, because the brand is bigger than the whisky. Macallan has built one of the strongest luxury reputations in Scotch, and a twelve year old at 40% is the cheap end of a very expensive range. That context is why the price feels high.
I try to ignore it, because the liquid in the glass is a good one. Strip the name off the bottle and you have a well-made, sherry-led Speyside malt that is not quite as exciting as the best of its competitors. With the name on, you have the most recognisable single malt in the shop.
If you want sherry for less, or Macallan with a different accent, these are the four I would look at:
The softer, honeyed Macallan at about the same money.
About £48 and a lot more assertive.
About £50 and one of the best sherried malts for the money.
About £38 and a much better value sherry-and-bourbon malt.
Macallan 12 Sherry Oak is a good whisky with a very expensive name. It is rich, smooth, spicy and sherried, and it does everything a sherried Speyside twelve should do, with more polish than most.
I would buy it as a present, or if I wanted the Macallan experience without selling a kidney. If you just want sherry, there are cheaper and more thrilling routes, but none of them says Macallan on the label.
Caskable score: 79 out of 100.
Raisins, dried apricot and orange peel with ginger, vanilla and a little wood smoke.
Rich and soft, with dried fruit, orange, wood spice and a touch of dark chocolate.
Medium to long, sweet and gently drying, with ginger and wood.
A polished, sherried twelve with a very expensive name.
Thomas Grønvold is the founder of Caskable and a whisky enthusiast who believes the best way to learn about whisky is simply to drink it, compare it, and stay curious. From supermarket favourites to bottles from distilleries around the world, he writes about what he actually tastes and experiences, without pretending you need to be an expert to enjoy a good dram.
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