​Japanese Whisky: Its Definitely a Thing Over Here Now! Part 02

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Nikka Whisky 01Follow on Twitter:@WhiskyPassions
I'm no expert on Japanese whisky, but I have sampled a range of products from the land of the rising sun and so have put together this as introduction, this beginners guide to Japanese whisky. The distillers that you are most likely to come across in specialist stores and online are:
  • Hakashu
  • Hibiki
  • Nikka
  • Yamazaki

Nikka: Nikka is Japan's second largest distillery behind Yamazaki and offers a range of frankly better value and generally more interesting options to the UK market place than Yamazaki. The cheapest Japanese whisky you'll find on these shores is the Nikka Blended Whisky, which is fine. I might be damning this whisky with feint praise but the sweet whisky with hints of orange blossom and other floral arrangements is considerable superior to the awful Hibiki Harmony mentioned in Part 01; and getting on for half the price.

A few more shekels however will buy you a 50cl bottle of Nikka From The Barrel. Bottled at an ABV of 51.4%. This is a beloved whisky on both sides of the world and is the best entry into Japanese Whisky as the quality is high, the intensity is there, and you can own a bottle for less the £40. I personally want the 3 Litre bottling of this; complete with wooden stand and syringe for extracting your dram.

Nikka Whisky 02
Other interesting offerings include the Nikka Coffey Malt bottling. This is nothing too do with the caffeinated bean; Coffey refers to the still created by Alexander Coffey to industrialise the grain whisky making process. More information on this is available in my article Whisky: Nature Vs. Nurture Part 01:


Despite being distilled purely from malted barely, the Nikka Coffey Malt cannot be marketed as a Single Malt Whisky as a result of this process. The results however are interesting, different, enjoyable, and at less than £50 is worth investigating. You should not confuse this with the Nikka Coffey Grain bottling. Now I had the remnants of a bottle; but I found it weak, watery, and the only flavours being a weird combination of Hubble Bubble pink bubble gum and acetone; like a bottle of Scapa, but much worse. People may disagree as I've had people tell me that it is really good; however I am conveying my experiences on these pages rather than conjecture.

Nikka Whisky 03
Finally I'm going to mention the Nikka Taketsuru Pure Malt; again slightly more expensive, but still affordable at around £55. This is once again a blended whisky with a quantity of Sherry casked whisky in the recipe. I've both enjoyed this whisky and been left unimpressed (on separate occasions) which suggests a touch of variation between batches, but the primary style of this whisky is too be rich and spicy with stewed fruits and chocolate being prominent amongst the flavours.

What would I buy? Probably the Coffey Malt as I'm not really a blended whisky guy. That said; Nikka seems very much the Japanese equivalent too Compass Box in that they are at least committed too making interesting whisky; whatever it's origin.

Follow on Twitter:@WhiskyPassions

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