JIM BEAM SIGNATURE CRAFT 12 YEAR
Bottled February 13, 2014MASH BILL – 77% Corn, 13% Rye, 10% Malted Barley
PROOF – 86
AGE – 12 years
DISTILLERY – Jim Beam
PRICE – $43
WORTH BUYING? – Heck yep!
I agree with those who consider any whiskey bottled at least 10 years ago to have embarked on its “dusty” status. Others believe it ain’t a dusty unless it was bottled in the Twentieth Century. That requirement would obviously need revision as Time continues its endless march, and the early Twenty-first Century gradually recedes into the dusty past. Whatever your view, pour a glass of something “dusty” for some fellow whiskey fans and let the debates commence.
I found this bottle last summer, literally coated in dust, on the bottom shelf of a liquor shop in San Francisco’s Tenderloin district.
When I handed it to the clerk, his brow furrowed at the 12 Year age statement. He scanned the bar code three times, triple checking the price. Luckily he didn’t hop on his phone and Google it, like other corner store pirates have done when I’ve presented them with some dusty old treasure they’d forgotten. Had he done, he’d have found shops selling it for up to 10x the price, which is absurd. But at the 2014 price? Yes please.
Attentive Jim Beam fans will notice the mash bill on this Signature Craft 12 Year release is slightly different than the usual Beam 75/13/12 ratio. Around 2015, Jim Beam put out a series of experiments. Most of these fell under the “Signature Craft Harvest Bourbon Collection” rubric, which featured alternative secondary flavoring grains, swapping out the usual rye for brown rice, red wheat, triticale, rolled oats, and six-row barley, all aged 11 years.
The Signature Craft 12 Year had first been released in 2013. It kept with the rye, but upped the corn ratio a smidge and lowered the barley proportionately. Its “Signature Craft” insignia presaged the Harvest Collection, then still in their barrels and 9 years old. Alongside the 2013 inaugural release of the 12 Year, Beam released a one-off, the Rare Spanish Brandy Bourbon, also under the new Signature Craft series label. So there was a lot of experimenting coming to fruition around this time.
But this was also right around when the Bourbon Boom was really sounding its boom. Whiskeys with impressive age statements at affordable prices were discontinued in rapid succession as distillers realized they could jack up prices alongside the spike in demand. This Jim Beam 12 Year soon figured among the casualties.
Ten years later, we’re still feeling the impact. Try finding a 12-year bourbon for $40 today, from Beam or any other distillery. Beam’s current Knob Creek 12 comes close at $65 msrp. George Dickel has their 15 Year priced at $55 on average. Bulleit comes closest with their impressive $45 msrp 12 Year Rye. These releases demonstrate that well-aged American whiskey at decent prices is entirely possible, and profitable—otherwise they wouldn’t do it. With the Boom now waning, hopefully we’ll see more of this sort of thing.
But anyway, here we are with this debatably “dusty” 12-year bourbon on the table. It’s now three days after uncapping (that’s right, not even a cork for this special release) and two pours into the bottle. These brief notes were taken using a simple brandy glass.
COLOR – a soft and rusty orange
NOSE – old-school herbal funk right up front, then cinnamon laden baking spices, sugary vanilla, sweet baked cherry, dried strawberry, a nice layer of oozy caramel, a bit of orange zest; altogether it smells like an Old-Fashioned cocktail in some excellent dive bar
TASTE – the caramel and vanilla slide forward here in a thin but still very syrupy texture, a dash of black pepper grit in the mix, and offering a milder rendition of the nose’s range of sweet and spice notes, now also some oak, and the funk less notable
FINISH – black pepper, the oak now more prominent, tart thick caramel, orange zest, a mild peppery tingle, cinnamon roll dough, and a return of that dusty herbal funk
OVERALL – this should be the baseline for quality, satisfying, bottom-shelf bourbon
Amazing? No. Great? Oh yes!
And why? Because I paid $43 for a well-aged, easy-drinking bourbon offering utterly classic Kentucky bourbon notes, and with just the right amount of that old-school herbal funk I associate with Twentieth Century dusty pours. It’s a variant of the same funk I’ve gotten from prior-century Wild Turkey and Heaven Hill. Yet this Beam 12 Year was distilled in 2002, the dawn of the current century.
“Funk” is a counter-intuitive range of aromas that shouldn’t be enjoyable. Coming in endless variations of herbaceous, mildewy, dusty, and downright dirty, when it’s present in small doses it can serve to accent the more dominant sweet and savory notes. Kentucky whiskey funk can have that nice effect a light smoke or peat note has on scotch and Japanese whisky. It draws a bit of interest around the edges, adding complexity to the more central, mainstream appeal of the expected fruit and cask notes.
So if you’re a fan of the funk, or you just like a good deal, if ever you come across a bottle of Jim Beam Signature Craft 12 Year at or near it’s original msrp, it’s a no-brainer buy. North of $50, I’d think twice and assess how crowded my home-shelf was at that moment. Certainly at $100+ I’d walk away, no question.
Then again, as the years continue to roll by, I can see this bottle commanding the kind of prices 1990s and 1980s Wild Turkey and Heaven Hill do now. As I said, some online retailers already think it’s worth $400+. It’s not. Neither is Twentieth Century Wild Turkey or Heaven Hill. But when you’re a dedicated whiskey fan with a historical bent, sometimes your curiosity gets the better of your $enses.
But in this instance, I nabbed a deal. My favorite kind of unicorn: hard to find, tasty, and affordable. And I happen to know there are a handful more bottles still sitting there 🤫, so, when this bottle is done…
Cheers!
The Right Spirit 