Karuizawa 33 Years Old 1979

Karuizawa single malt distillery, which produced whisky in Nagano Prefecture from 1956 until closure in 2000, was run by Mercian and relied heavily on imported Golden Promise barley and Spanish Oloroso sherry casks. This bottling, a 1979 vintage matured for 33 years and released in 2013 to the global market, is a product of that defining combination.

After more than three decades in an Oloroso sherry butt the whisky carries the concentrated dried fruit, dark chocolate and leather that characterise Karuizawa's most iconic sherry-aged releases. At 59.9% cask strength from a single butt, bottled by the distillery's custodians, it is a globally distributed example of a finite stock whose remaining casks diminish with each release.