BenRiach The Twelve Review

BenRiach was originally built in 1898 by John Duff (who also owned the nearby Longmorn Distillery). It didn’t end up running for very long before it was closed down in 1900, one of the casualties in the wake of the bankruptcy of Pattison’s Whisky, which had been a large whisky purchaser. BenRiach only began to produce spirit again in 1965 when it was reopened by Glenlivet Distillers Ltd. The distillery changed hands a number of times since then, with the whisky it produced being used almost exclusively for blends for other whisky brands.

Perhaps the most notable development for the distillery in recent years was its purchase in 2004 by two South African businessmen, Geoff Bell and Wayne Kieswetter, in conjunction with Billy Walker, a scotch whisky expert (who later became the master distiller at GlenAllachie). This was because the new owners decided to have the distillery sell its very own range of single malts. According to Bell and Kieswetter, when they bought the distillery it actually had an abundance of whisky-filled barrels in stock. These dated all the way back from 1966 up to 2002 – some of which was said to be very good – and this enabled them to relaunch BenRiach as a producer of its very own range of single malts without too much trouble.

Benriach Distillery was sold again in 2016, this time to Brown-Forman Corporation, which also owns Jack Daniel’s.

Benriach The Twelve was first launched in 2020 as part of their new core range of single malts. It is “triple cask matured”, which means it’s made up of whisky that has aged in three different types of casks, which is then married together before bottling. The Twelve is aged in a combination of bourbon, sherry and port casks. This 12-year-old single malt is non-chill filtered, naturally coloured, and bottled at 46% ABV.