Chichibu Intergalactic Series – Edition 3 8 Years Old 2012

Founded in 2008 by Ichiro Akuto, Chichibu has risen fast from a small mountain distillery to one of the most sought names in Japanese whisky. Chichibu loses roughly three to five per cent of each cask a year to evaporation, near double the Scottish rate, so a young whisky here carries the depth of a much older one. Wide day to night temperature swings drive the wood interaction, which is why Chichibu reads older than its years suggest.

This is unpeated single malt, matured in ex-bourbon American oak. By 8 years the spirit and oak have started to integrate, rougher notes softening as esters build into orchard and tropical fruit. Ex-bourbon vanillin reads as vanilla and oak lactones as coconut. The palate leans on tropical and orchard fruit, mango and apple, with a clean cereal note beneath.

This bottling was distilled in 2012, from cask 2012 and bottled in 2020. It is a run of 162 bottles, an event release. It is the kind of single cask that built the distillery's reputation among collectors in barely more than a decade. Bottled at 63%, natural colour and not chill filtered. It remains one of the most collected names in modern Japanese whisky.