Nagahama Amahagan World Malt

Amahagan World Malt is a blended malt from Nagahama Distillery, a compact pot-still operation opened in 2016 in a brewpub beside Lake Biwa in Shiga prefecture. The World designation is honest and deliberate: Nagahama's own malt is vatted with imported whisky from other regions, and no single-country provenance is asserted. This NAS expression was produced for European markets at 47%.

The maturation follows the same route as others in the Yamazakura-finished edition, with Ex-Bourbon barrels providing a base of vanilla and lighter cereal notes before a finishing period in Yamazakura cherry wood. The noted coal-gas character is an unusual and intriguing element that sits alongside the floral, softly sweet notes typical of cherry wood, adding a sulphurous mineral edge to the profile. The combination of gentle sweetness and this more brooding undercurrent makes it the most distinctive of the Yamazakura-finished Amahagas.