Benromach 12yo
New 2026 Core Range Release | 46% ABV
Score: 7/10
Very Good Indeed.
TL;DR
Restrained sherry, but perfectly pitched
The Nineties.
What’s about to follow is anecdotal. Obvs.
I’m never really ever capable of anything other than anecdotes, truth be told. But it’s worth pointing out that, if you’re after empirical thought, it’s unlikely to come from the writings of Wally Macaulay. An academic I am not.
Anyway, caveats out of the way, the best Johnnie Walker Blacks I’ve tasted in my time have all been from the 1990s. I can stab a guess at why that is, and I do find it very interesting.
These would be gifted bottles (from friends, or friends of friends whose parents kept them under the kitchen sink for decades etc; that kind of thing) and also personal purchases from auction. For a while I was really enjoying these and I even built up enough of a wee collection to share some at a large gathering a few years back.
While they didn’t win over the entire crowd for drams-of-the-tasting, they were the pick of the day for some. Also true was that not a single person picked them out as Johnnie Walker or even blends, with many suggesting they were old and complex single malts.
That’s understandable. It’s fair to suggest that it was better back in the day and - for many reasons - there will be truth in that. Some batches from that era were gorgeous, and I think their amplified quality was a direct consequence of the downturn in demand and a hangover from over-production during the 1970s. When the warehouses are full, the whisky going into the blends just gets better.
I have a recent Johnnie Black on the go here and, apart from being flat and uninteresting with very little depth or details, there’s nothing intrinsically ‘wrong’ with it. It’s… fine.
But incredibly I saw it for £20 in my local Tesco recently and, for that money, who could really have any truck with it? Especially when I share an illustration of just how ‘cheap’ that actually is, in today’s context.
Because what’s amazing to me is that I remember buying a bottle of Johnnie Walker Black in the 1990s and it was almost the same price as today. I bought it as a gift for a whisky drinking landlord’s birthday, and it was £17.99.
For me, back then, that was a lot of money and I felt like I was being generous indeed. His tipple was Johnnie Red and some other supermarket blends, so he also felt like the Black 12yo was a step-up and a fitting birthday treat, one that he was very appreciative of. He poured me a glass and I hated it. I’m stupid now, but I was even stupider in my twenties. He could’ve been a better whisky coach, but anyway…
The shop I bought it from may have been a pricier place at the time, we lived in a small village and I bought it from a booze shop because it felt posh and I liked their gift bags, but I don’t think £18 in 1998 for JWB12 was seen as particularly expensive.
So, it tracks that to keep the price keen and competitive over those years, corners have inevitably had to be cut, both in process and ingredients: cheaper grain, less valuable malts, more efficient production methods with potentially more homogenised whiskies. All of it. It just makes sense. It has to be so. It has been thoroughly squeezed over the years.
Worse than bananas.
Apologies, but this is another diversion that occupies my trivial head. I was in charge of a supermarket produce department in my teens and we sold bananas at 52p per lb. That’s roughly the same price they are today. How can that be? Almost forty years on and no appreciable increase in price? Something’s being squeezed. Loss-leaders usually mean ‘loss’ for suppliers, not for the supermarkets.
I think the Johnnie Walker scenario is another example of how the more premium side of whisky has helped boost profits while the margins on the volume side have had to become ever more razor thin; loss-leaders - more like bananas. Those prices tend to be negotiated based on the offer prices; the discounts. Not the regular retail price. In that scenario, quality cannot be maintained.
But you know what I think? Purely for no other reason than the fact that warehouses are chock-full in 2026, Johnnie Walker Black is about to get a silent boost in quality once more. If I’m right about the reason it’s not great today, it tracks that it should swing in the opposite direction after a downturn.
So, how much of a downturn are we in, actually? Well, it depends on your perspective and how you splice it, but how about this: Scotch whisky warehouses have gone from holding 400 million litres of stock to 1.4 billion in a decade. In most markets, demand is down compared to ten years ago.
However you look at it, that’s bad news. Unless you’re a drinker, a consumer, a whisky fan. Because for you, that news is good.
Prices will be what the prices will be, the industry will inevitably cut its cloth to a new normal and things, including jobs, brands, distilleries and infrastructure, will be lost. It happened in the 1980s and it will happen again. But, just as those 1990 Johnnie Blacks seemed to betray, I predict there will be a jump in perceivable quality in the years ahead too. And a jump in perceivable style. Not just for JW, not just for blends. For everything.
These jumps could manifest in different ways.
Review
Benromach 12yo, Exclusively Sherry Cask Matured, official bottling, 2026 new release, 46% ABV
£price & availability
I’m honestly not sure what motivated Benromach to suddenly capitulate and give us a standard, core range product in an all natural, age-stated package. We’d been asking for it for so long it transcended cliche and became a banality.
There’s no way they didn’t know we ached for it, they knew. But it’s just possible they didn’t need to do anything because their 10yo, 15yo and 21yo were selling just nicely at 43%, thank you very much.
Well, now they’ve done it and I, for one, am very glad. But I think we can all surmise that they’re suddenly in a position (stocks) and mood (demand) to finally get it done.
Bringing out a new 12 year age statement in the line up as opposed to switching up the existing expressions could prove smart for managing retail stocks; it’s a cleaner way to do things, especially when there’s a higher general demand for twelve year statements over ten.
There’s also a switcheroo on profile, because this one states it’s all first-fill sherry casks.
But there’s a final lily-white icing on our Speyside whisky cake today - it’s only £45.
As we stand in front of the shelf with the bottle in hand, it would appear they have nailed this mission. At least from our perspective. Now let’s slosh it into the glass.
Score: 7/10
Very Good Indeed.
TL;DR
Restrained sherry, but perfectly pitched
Nose
Oooh. Chocolatey. Some cinnamon and wafer too. Wood spices; in the cedar and sandalwood ballpark. Ripe fruits, like figs and passionfruit, maybe. More chocolate, and toffee, think Cadbury Eclairs. No edges, soft and rounded.
Palate
Soothing. Bizarrely chocolatey again, but darker this time, with some cherries thrown in. The softness and ‘roundness’ prevails; an easier going Benromach than we may be used to.
Iced latte, mocha, powdered chocolate and coffee grinds swirl with dried raspberries and cranberries. Everything is in check, nothing shouts particularly loudly. It’s just very… balanced.
Honestly, not a chance you would convince me this was all first fill sherry - and I mean that in a very positive way.
Also, this is (apparently) softly peated but, try as I might, the smoke is hidden from me - almost completely. I know from other house dwellers that there’s smoke here, but for me it’s subtle to the point of easily missed. I’m flawed. I hope you are less so.
I’ve had more detailed and engaging drams from this wee Forres delight, but I can’t fault them for this masterclass in crowd pleasing. It’s a charmer.
The Dregs
This is a cracking malt for the asking price. We could end here. But of course, we won’t.
Because we now need a dash of pessimism to temper our optimism. The whisky that was quietly maturing in warehouses from the 1960s and 1970s was made in a very different way and matured in very different wood. Today, everything is a lot more, ummm… ‘woodier’.
The casks are more active and the stocks cannot mature in the same way they once did. It needs to be managed by canny hands and developed into good products by skilled blenders. There’s far too much of a tendency to rely solely on these shouty wood flavours and those oh-so-tempting rich colours.
Thankfully, this is not the case for this Benromach, in terms of wood over spirit, there is at least some balance. If you’re of a sherry-loving disposition when it comes to your malt of choice, I think you’ll be sated, if not thrilled.
But I do think it’s a bit ‘safe’. We have a dialled down take on Benromach here, some of those big, slightly grimy, farmy and autumnal elements we’ve enjoyed from them in the past have been neutered.
But, all of that makes perfect sense. This is exactly what ‘the market’ wants. A 12-year age statement, an attractive price tag, rich colours and rich flavours. Nothing too ‘oooh’ and nothing too ‘ahh’. In many ways it’s perfectly pitched. It should sell very well indeed.
However, those who have been crying out for Benromach to unleash their natural potential for years are also on the look out for something a little more defined; a little special, a little unique. Benromach is one of the few Speyside distilleries to be able to do that - almost in their sleep.
So, while I do applaud this precision-perfect reading of the product development mission, I really hope we continue to be treated to more of the playful, geek-forward releases that bring out the very essence of what makes it such a unique distillery.
The 1990s wasn’t just the decade of the best Johnnie Black, it was also the decade that Gordon & Macphail saved and revitalised Benromach. And, truth-be-told - as a decade, it was also Peak Existence.
But those days are gone and we have to just find a way to get on with the absolute shitfuckery that’s thrown at us today. We’ll don our bucket hats and our little round, rose-tinted eyeglasses and mourn our kids’ futures as we yearn for the days of thirty years ago when the living was easier.
However, it doesn’t need to be bananas. Today, in this £45 bottle of first-fill sherry goodness, we have an example of how some things are continuing to get fairer, better and more available for us all.
Good job. You should probably buy it.
Score: 7/10
Tried this? Share your thoughts in the comments below. WMc
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