Chichibu Single Cask #3851 6 Years Old 2014 (Ex-Bourbon)

Ichiro Akuto built Chichibu in 2008 in a landlocked basin in Saitama, carrying forward a distilling line that ran back through the lost Hanyu distillery. Water comes off the Arakawa river system, filtered through the surrounding mountains to a clean mineral balance that lets the fruit and oak show. Production is small, around a third of a million litres a year, with floor malting done by hand on occasion and every stage run under one roof.

This is unpeated single malt, matured in ex-bourbon American oak. At 6 years, helped by an angel's share near double Scotland's, the make tastes older than it is, the esters rounding into stone fruit and the oak settling. Ex-bourbon vanillin reads as vanilla and oak lactones as coconut. The body is medium and the fruit clear, baked apple and citrus peel running into a warm, lightly spiced finish.

This bottling was distilled in 2014, from cask 3851 and bottled in 2021. It is a run of 207 bottles, released for Australia. Each cask is bottled on its own terms, a snapshot of how a particular wood shaped the Saitama spirit. Bottled at 62.3%, natural colour and not chill filtered.