The advent of Japanese whisky has been widely attributed to Masataka Taketsuru who began his whisky pilgrimage in 1918, when he journeyed to the illustrious liquid’s spiritual heartland, the Celtic nations. Masataka’s family ran a sake brewery, still in operation today, and as such he was taught the skills of alcohol production, furthering his education at the University of Glasgow where he studied chemistry. This and his apprenticeships at Scotch whisky distilleries afforded him a great depth of knowledge about production and blending. In 1920, Masataka Taketsuru married Jessie ‘Rita’ Roberta Cowan and the couple lived for a few months in Campbeltown. They travelled to Japan later that year. Finish: Fades into soft malt and vanilla oak, with a slight nuttiness. Tasting notes for Nikka Taketsuru Pure Malt (you can buy it here) Founded in 1934 by Suntory's first master distiller, Nikka has risen to become Japan's second largest distiller, producing a wide range of single malts as well as their impressive blended whisky range. In 1918, Masataka Taketsuru embarked alone on a long voyage to Scotland. In this distant land the secrets of whisky-making would be imparted to this young Japanese man.

No partnership, joint venture, agency, or employment relationship is created as a result of your use of the Service. We may sell, license, transfer, assign or in any other way dispose of the Service (including Members) to any third party without any notification to you, e.g. (but without limitation) in connection with any reorganization, restructuring, merger or sale, or other transfer of assets. Nikka Taketsuru Pure Malt, meanwhile, sees re-made American oak casks from Miyagikyo blended with sherry cask-aged liquid from both Miyagikyo and Yoichi. “So it’s still predominantly Miyagikyo, but they’ve upped the Yoichi quantity to add a bit more body and smoke,” Holt says. The sherry cask influence is also a little lower than the previous recipe. “The last Taketsuru was quite heavily sherried, and it didn’t have much Yoichi in it,” she explains. “The Yoichi was almost like seasoning, just a tiny hint of salty oiliness. They felt that that was a bit of a departure from the original Taketsuru flavour profiles, which were a little bit more equally balanced.” Regardless of whether the Service offers the functionality to contribute, you are solely responsible and liable for any content and information that you create, upload, post, publish, link to, duplicate, transmit, record, display or otherwise make available on the Service or to other Members, such as chat messages, text messages, videos, audio, audio recordings, music, pictures, photographs, text and any other information or materials, whether publicly posted or privately transmitted (“Contributions”).

About Nikka

In 1934, Masataka established Nikka Whisky and his first distillery was built in Hokkaido and named Yoichi. The area was well-suited to whisky production, though its location was remote. In 1969, a second distillery was founded, Miyagikyo Distillery, or Sendai Distillery as it has been known. Its first whiskies were sold as Sendai Single Malt and it was not until Asahi Brewery’s acquisition of Nikka in 2001 that the Miyagiko Distillery was expanded to cope with national demand. The Nikka range includes the single malts from the pair of distilleries as well as a range of vatted and blended malts. Whiskybase B.V. is the Dutch private limited liability company, having its statutory seat in Rotterdam, The Netherlands and its office at Zwaanshals 530, 3035 KS Rotterdam, The Netherlands. Whiskybase B.V. is registered with the Dutch Chamber of Commerce under no. 52072819. The cask programme follows Scottish tradition – American oak and sherry casks – but with plenty of different options to maximise flavour. Once an ex-bourbon cask has been used a couple of times, the coopers will remove the ends and replace them with new oak, says Holt. “That’s called a remade cask,” she says. “So you get a combination of old and new casks. And then what they’ll also do is re-char casks – scrape the insides out and re-char them.” When it comes to sherry, Oloroso and Pedro Ximénez reign supreme. Occasionally, Nikka will create finishes with Japanese oak (Mizunara) though none have made it to the UK.

Like Yoichi, the inland distillery uses non-peated, lightly peated and medium peated barley (no heavily peated here, though) and five yeast strains to create its whiskies. Miyagikyo is also home to two Coffey stills, which are used to distil the grain whisky according to a recipe of 95% corn, 5% malted barley, before ageing the distillate in used American oak barrels. Speaking of, not only do both distilleries have their own cooperages, but they also share a third cooperage halfway between the two, which makes brand new casks from virgin American oak. Using four different peat levels – unpeated, lightly peated, medium peated, and heavily peated barley – five different yeast strains, and a huge variety of casks, Taketsuru could make more than 600 different whiskies, explains Stef Holt, head of education and whisky ambassador at Speciality Brands (Nikka’s UK distributor). However, Yoichi’s coastal location lent its own influence to the whiskies, so three decades later, in 1969, the company built Miyagikyo distillery in Miyagi Prefecture, Northern Honshu.Unless mandatory applicable law provides otherwise, your use of and membership to the Service are exclusively governed by Dutch law. We shall first try to settle any dispute over a dram of whisky. Disputes that cannot be settled over multiple drams of whisky shall be solely submitted to the court of Amsterdam, The Netherlands unless mandatory applicable law provides otherwise. The Service has been prepared by us solely for information purposes to Members and the Service is based on information we consider reliable and we obtain the contents of the Service from a number of different third party sources (including Contributions), but we do not endorse, support, represent, warrant or guarantee the completeness, truthfulness, accuracy, or reliability of the Services and any information therein. However, soaring demand for Japanese whisky began to outstrip supply, and in early 2019 it was announced that Nikka was axing Nikka 12 and temporarily suspending the Coffey Grain and Malt whiskies. 2019 was also the first year that the Yoichi plant started distilling in January, as opposed to the traditional four-month distilling seasons from March until June and again from September to early December, in an effort to increase production. If we decide not to exercise or enforce any right or provision of these Terms, such decision shall not constitute a waiver of such right or provision.