Macallan makes similar claims as Glenfiddich as to why their whisky is so smooth and clean: smaller pot stills (once featured on the Bank of Scotland £10 note) and a tightly selected 'Heart of the Run' (only 16% of the 'new make'). The critical difference here is the emphasis on cask selection, a factor that Macallan claims determines 60% of the flavor.
The 'Sherry Oak Series' produced by Macallan is wholly matured in Oloroso (seasoned) sherry casks from Jerez, Spain. Not until 2004 did they release the 'Fine Oak Series' featuring malts aged in bourbon casks, so the former would be considered by most the more definitive Macallan. After spending 12 years in the Spanish sherry casks, you will notice quickly that the finished product is a completely different animal from the 'Glen brothers'.
If you haven't found a Glencairn glass yet, this would be a good time to make a Crate & Barrel run. Alright, just order it online already so you don't have to put on pants. Besides, you've been drinking.
Swirling it around, Macallan 12 has the deep amber coppery color of a Cajun roux. You can still read the newspaper through it, but it will at least make you strain a little. Long legs like a brandy, you can tell it's a full-bodied malt just by looking at it.
The sherry cask aging really comes through in the aroma as well. I'm getting golden raisins and dried apricots. Plums perhaps. Really a deep sweetness, like a tawny port dessert wine. Light notes of mulling spices and wood smoke that bring to mind Colonial Williamsburg for some reason (in a good way, not like a bus full of 5th graders in tricorner hats).
Some scotches have mismatched aromas and flavors. Not this one. It's a warm, coating of silky rich sherry flavor with just enough smoke and spice to make it tingle a bit. Vanilla and toffee notes give it a long, creamy finish. The fruit comes though well too. An ideal autumnal scotch, perfect for Thanksgiving.
I have had the good fortune to have tasted the Macallan 18 in the Sherry Oak Series as well, it's my high water benchmark for Speyside malts, but I'll save that for another day. Same goes for the 10 year old Fine Oak Series, although with much less enthusiasm. Macallan has recently announced they will be discontinuing both of these single malt lines (only keeping its flagship 18 y.o. malt), as well as doing away with age-statements altogether, an extremely controversial marketing move. Smaller brands have done so already with some success, but this would be the first of the large scale producers to make the switch. If successful, this might actually change the way scotch is rated, marketed, and priced. Wait and see, I suppose.
In the meantime, consider yourself initiated. You've tasted and contrasted the big three. Your experiences with these single malts may have been completely different than mine (read some online reviews for an amusing range of wildly contrasting opinions). It doesn't matter what I think though. I'm just trying to share my thought process and what kinds of things to be looking for. Your adventures with scotch should be different. So now let's branch our a little, try out a different region, maybe something older. The foundation is there, time to start laying bricks.
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