A mate pours you a finger of something golden at the end of a long week, no label in sight, and asks you to guess. It is soft, sweet, faintly tropical. You land on The Balvenie 14 Caribbean Cask, and you are right. Then he tells you what he actually poured, and it changes how you shop.
Here is the thing worth knowing. The bottle most like The Balvenie 14 Caribbean Cask, for less, comes from the same house. The Balvenie 12 American Oak is $99, and to someone who loves the Caribbean Cask it gives about 97% of what their own bottle does. Same distillery, same soft hand, a fair bit less across the counter.
So what is the Caribbean Cask itself? It is a fourteen-year-old Speyside malt finished in casks that once held rum, and it tastes like it. The nose is vanilla and toffee with a ripe banana note — banoffee, near enough — and given a minute it settles into something like egg custard, with nutmeg and baking spice behind it and a sweet coconut lift from the rum wood. The palate arrives soft and silky: vanilla and toffee first, then a wash of tropical fruit, pineapple and papaya and mango. It is an easy, generous dram.
1/If The Balvenie 12 American Oak is your bottle, I reckon the one that tastes closest is Glenfiddich 14 Bourbon Reserve. By the words in both reviews and by what drinkers pick, it gives you about 95% of what the Balvenie does, and costs $14 more.
2/In the glass the Balvenie leans sweet and fruity: dripping honey, navel oranges, a little caramel and vanilla. The Glenfiddich goes woodier, oak under heather and barley, floral with a citrus zest. Where they meet is honey, vanilla and oak.
3/This week at Dan Murphy's the Balvenie is $99 and the Glenfiddich is $113 for members, about $14 between them. A yes for each: stay with the Balvenie if it's your dram; reach for the Glenfiddich when you want a change. Which way would you lean?
Glenfiddich 14 Bourbon Reserve, $113 for members at Dan Murphy's. Woody yet floral, oak underpinning heather with honey, vanilla and a twist of citrus. Well balanced, a long and easy finish, the daily dram you reach for without a second thought. More on it in this week's piece.
Like Glenfiddich 14 Bourbon Reserve? The Balvenie 12 American Oak, $99, gives a Glenfiddich 14 Bourbon Reserve drinker about 94% of it, at 88% of the price. Honey and navel orange. More on Glenfiddich 14 Bourbon Reserve in this week's piece.
Hand a Glen Moray 18 drinker the Glenfiddich 14 Bourbon Reserve and they'd pay 88% of what their own bottle costs. They dock it a touch for the younger years, not the dram: oak, heather, honey. Worth a pour? The full read on Glenfiddich 14 Bourbon Reserve is in this week's piece.
A Glenfiddich 14 Bourbon Reserve poured at home works out at $4.76 a standard drink, about 24 to the bottle. A pint at the pub sits nearer $6.28 a drink, so the couch is quietly ahead. That's the price per pour; the full tasting is in this week's piece.
The Macallan Sherry Oak 12 usually sells around $170. This week it's $160 at Dan Murphy's. In the glass: Christmas cake, jaffa oranges, old leather. Full and smooth, a long finish, a last hint of smoke. Want to know who else it suits? That's in this week's piece.
The Macallan Sherry Oak 12, poured after a long Tuesday: sherry, Christmas cake, old leather, a wisp of smoke. Want that without the full $160? The Macallan 12 Double Cask, $137, gives a Sherry Oak drinker 98% of it for 86% of the price. Fair swap? More in this week's piece.
Hand a Glenfiddich 15 drinker The Macallan Sherry Oak 12 and they'd pay 68% of what their own bottle costs, a generous nod from a neighbour and reason enough to pour one yourself. The rest of the story waits in this week's piece on The Macallan Sherry Oak 12.
Christmas cake and Jaffa oranges, a little old leather, then a last hint of smoke: The Macallan Sherry Oak 12 is one to pour slowly of an evening. This week it is $160 at Dan Murphy's; it usually sells around $170. More on where that price sits in this week's piece.
The odd part: The Balvenie DoubleWood 12, at $105, hands a The Macallan Sherry Oak 12 drinker about 87% of what their own bottle gives, for 66% of its price. Honey, almonds, a touch of nutmeg. The rest of the story on The Macallan Sherry Oak 12 is in this week's piece.
Like The Macallan Sherry Oak 12? Glenfiddich 15 gives you about 74% of what it does, for 87% of the price, at $140. Cooked plums and stewed rhubarb on the nose, then hedgerow fruit and a little grip on the palate. More on The Macallan Sherry Oak 12 in this week's piece.
Had them both open this week. Love The Balvenie 14 Caribbean Cask? Glenfiddich 14 Bourbon Reserve gives you about 95% of it for 75% of the price, $113 for members. Oak, heather, a little vanilla. Which one's on your bench tonight? More in this week's piece on the Balvenie.
Pour The Balvenie 14 Caribbean Cask: soft and silky, vanilla and toffee sliding into pineapple and mango from the rum casks. A Glenfiddich Gran Reserva 21 drinker would put 67% of their own bottle's price on it, a younger whisky than theirs. More in this week's piece.
The Balvenie 14 Caribbean Cask is $6.36 a standard drink, about 24 to the bottle. That's 242nd of 310 at Dan Murphy's per standard drink. A pint at the pub is about $6.28 a drink. A pour at home lands just over. More on The Balvenie 14 Caribbean Cask in this week's piece.
The Balvenie 14 Caribbean Cask is $151 at Dan Murphy's this week, a little under the $161 it usually sells around, so if those sweet-and-tropical notes are where you want to be the price sits in easy reach right now. More on it in this week's piece.
Here's the surprise: Craigellachie 13, at $111, gives a The Balvenie 14 Caribbean Cask drinker about 93% of what that bottle does, for 74% of its price. Grilled pineapple, caramel, a twist of grapefruit. Tempting before you reach for the Balvenie? More in this week's piece.
Two Speyside malts to put side by side this week. The Balvenie 14 Caribbean Cask is $151, soft and silky, vanilla and toffee up front before the rum casks bring pineapple, papaya and mango through. Craigellachie 13 is $111, a touch funky under the caramel and grapefruit peel, with candied pineapple coming through. At Dan Murphy's the pair come to $262 this week; they usually sell around $272, and the same two are $270 at Liquorland. If you're after both, that's your week to grab them, $262 for the pair.
The Balvenie DoubleWood 12, $105 at Dan Murphy's this week; it usually sells around $100. Floral and honeyed on the nose, then silky sherry, nutmeg and dried fruit, with a hint of orange drying out the long finish. Robust and elegant at once. More on it in this week's piece.
Two 21-year-olds, side by side. Glen Moray 21 costs $12 more a bottle than Glenfiddich Gran Reserva 21, but at 46.3% against 40% it's the cheaper drink: $13.41 a standard drink against $14.98. They rhyme more than they differ: one on Tawny Port, summer berries and honey, the other on toffee, dried fruit and a Cuban rum cask. Across the group the pour runs from $8.14 for the Glenfiddich 18 to $27.37 for the Balvenie Stories 21. Want the Port and the strength? Glen Moray 21, $343. Want the sweeter, creamier 40%? Gran Reserva, $331.
In-laws over for the roast, me on drinks duty. Father-in-law swirls his glass. 'Woody, little bit floral, oak and honey under it, touch of citrus. Well balanced, this. What've you poured me?' Glenfiddich 14 Bourbon Reserve, $113 for members at Dan Murphy's, I tell him.
Friday night, the heavy glass comes off the bench. The Balvenie DoubleWood 12 is $105 at Dan Murphy's. Twelve years, floral and honey on the nose, silky with nutmeg and dried fruit. For a Macallan Sherry Oak 12 drinker it gives about 87% of that bottle, for 66% of the price.
The Balvenie Stories 21 'The Second Red Rose' is a $727 bottle on the shelf this week — top-tier Speyside, priced like a trophy.
If Glenfiddich 14 Bourbon Reserve is your pour and you'd like to spend a little less without leaving the taste behind, you don't have to go looking at other distilleries. The answer is one cupboard over in the same range. Glenfiddich 12, at $75, gives a Glenfiddich 14 Bourbon Reserve drinker about 96% of what their own bottle does. Same house, smaller number, nearly all of the whisky.
Here is the short answer before the long one: the bottle most like The Macallan Sherry Oak 12, for less money, comes from the same still house. The Macallan 12 Double Cask, at $137, gives a Sherry Oak 12 drinker about 98% of what their own bottle does. Same family, same warmth, a little less at the counter.
Pour The Balvenie DoubleWood 12 on a slow evening and you get the Speyside house style in full. Floral first, then honey, oak and almonds on the nose. The palate is silky: spicy sherry, nutmeg, dried fruit. The finish runs quite long, a hint of orange under drying spices. Twelve years in ex-bourbon casks, nine months finished in Spanish oak oloroso sherry. Elegant, and robust with it.
The two cheapest Balvenies on the shelf are also the two priced under the whiskies they taste like. Climb the range from there and the premiums arrive fast.
Two Balvenie 12-year-olds sit side by side at about $100. One is tagged right where its peers are. The other, the famous sherried one, is tagged well under them.
Of the five Balvenies here, only the entry bottle undercuts its neighbours. Every step up the range from there adds not just dollars but a wider gap over the whiskies the model rates as its kin.
A two-year age gap should not add much to a bottle. At Balvenie this week it adds sixty dollars, and the years are not where the money went.
| bottle | region | latest ticket | read | window price | CE 360° mean | premium | shelf rank | per std drink | drink rank | content |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| The Balvenie 12 Year Old American Oak Single Malt Scotch Whisky | Speyside | $99.00 | observed | $99.00 | $93.91 | 5.1% | #32 of 79 | $4.17 | #32 of 75 | 15 |
| The Balvenie 14 Year Old Caribbean Cask Single Malt Scotch Whisky | Speyside | $150.99 | observed | $160.99 | $139.79 | 13.2% | #59 of 79 | $6.36 | #52 of 75 | 9 |
| The Balvenie DoubleWood 12 Year Old Single Malt Scotch Whisky | Speyside | $104.95 | observed | $99.95 | $94.54 | 5.4% | #33 of 79 | $4.75 | #39 of 75 | 10 |
| The Balvenie Stories 21YO 'The Second Red Rose' Single Malt Scotch Whisky | Speyside | $726.99 | observed | $726.99 | $627.07 | 13.7% | #61 of 79 | $27.37 | #72 of 75 | 2 |
| The Balvenie The Balvenie 21 Year Old Portwood Single Malt Scotch Whisky | Speyside | $452.99 | observed | $452.99 | $398.88 | 11.9% | #54 of 79 | $20.50 | #69 of 75 | 1 |