Chichibu Munich Release 2014

In the Saitama mountains northwest of Tokyo, Chichibu has made malt whisky since 2008 under Ichiro Akuto and his Venture Whisky company. The make is double distilled in copper pot stills built by Forsyths, from mostly unpeated barley, and matured on site in dunnage warehouses. The basin climate swings from humid summers near 35 degrees to winters below freezing, so the casks expand and contract hard and the spirit takes on wood faster than it would in Scotland.

This is unpeated single malt, matured in ex-bourbon American oak. Carrying no age statement, it leans on wood extraction, vanillin and oak lactones to the fore, with the basin climate pushing the spirit into the oak quickly. Ex-bourbon vanillin reads as vanilla and oak lactones as coconut. Underneath the wood, the make keeps its clean, fruity core, green apple and stone fruit with a light floral edge.

This bottling was distilled in 2014, from cask 3201. It is a run of 208 bottles, released for Germany. Single casks like this are the heart of the Chichibu name, each one a different reading of the same young, fast matured spirit. At 63%, best read neat first, then opened with a little water.