Nagahama 4 Years Old 2019

Nagahama 4 Years Old 2019 is a single malt from Nagahama Distillery, the small pot-still operation opened in 2016 beside Lake Biwa in Shiga prefecture. Distilled in 2019 and bottled in 2023 at 62.3% cask strength for the German market, it is a single cask expression selected for the distinctive character of its vessel rather than the distillery's typical unpeated profile. The use of an Islay quarter cask introduces peat into an otherwise unpeated house.

The cask is described as an Islay quarter heavily peated, meaning the barrel previously held a heavily peated Islay malt whisky and has been cut down to a smaller quarter cask format, both of which accelerate wood and flavour extraction. Over four years the Islay-derived peat smoke, maritime salt and iodine have migrated into the Nagahama spirit, sitting alongside the fresh fruit and vanilla character typical of the distillery. Quarter cask maturation also intensifies the oak contribution, giving the spirit a more concentrated and spicy edge at its very high cask strength.