Balvenie Single Barrel 12 Year Old Single Malt Scotch Whisky 750ml

The Balvenie Single Barrel 12 Year Old is a single malt Scotch whisky bottled at 47.8% ABV (95.6 proof) from The Balvenie distillery in Dufftown, Speyside. Each bottle is drawn from one first-fill American white oak ex-bourbon barrel that has held the spirit for twelve years, bottled without chill filtration so nothing stands between the drinker and the cask.

This is whisky with full provenance printed on the label. Every barrel in the program is individually selected by Malt Master Kelsey McKechnie, and no more than 300 individually numbered bottles are filled from each one, with the cask reference and bottle number stated on every label. Because this is a general listing for the expression rather than one specific cask, the numbers on the bottle you receive will be unique to it, and no two casks in the series taste exactly alike, by design.

First-fill bourbon wood is the most expressive American oak there is, giving up its vanilla, coconut and honeyed sweetness generously on its first meeting with Scotch spirit. Filled with malt from the family-owned Dufftown distillery founded in 1892, where barley is still grown on site, malt is turned on traditional floors and dried in Balvenie's own kiln, those barrels yield a whisky of honeyed depth layered with sweet fruits and subtle spice, vivid at its near-natural strength.

Single Barrel 12 is the purist's entry into Balvenie: no marriage of casks, no wine finish, just one barrel's account of twelve Speyside years. It rewards side-by-side tasting with other bottlings of the same expression, since each cask tells the story a little differently. Take it neat or with a few drops of water, and keep the numbered label in mind; it is the whole philosophy of the whisky in miniature. The expression left the range for a time when suitable stocks ran short and returned in the fall of 2024, which says everything about how uncompromising the barrel selection is: when the right casks were not ready, the whisky simply waited.

• Size: 750ml
• Proof: 95.6 (47.8% ABV)
• Age: 12 Years
• Origin: Speyside, Scotland
• Distillery: The Balvenie (William Grant & Sons), Dufftown
• Whisky Type: Single Malt Scotch Whisky (single cask)
• Cask/Finish: First-fill American white oak ex-bourbon barrel, full-term maturation; non-chill-filtered
• Series: The Balvenie Single Barrel range; max 300 individually numbered bottles per cask, cask number on each label
• Tasting Notes: Honeyed depth with sweet fruits, vanilla oak and subtle spice; character varies cask to cask