Christmas 2021 Shopping Lists, the Japanese Whiskies: Hakushu 12

The first half of this week was all about rye, but Japanese Single Malt & Blended Whisky has the spotlight for the rest of the week.

This is also a good place for my disclaimer about Japanese-branded whiskies writ large: just because a bottle came from Japan or was bottled by a Japanese whisky company doesn’t mean that the bottle actually contains Japanese whisky. For decades Japanese distilleries have imported single malt, blended, and single grain spirits from Scotland (and reportedly also America in the more recent past) and created blended whiskies with those spirits +/- adding some domestic grain whisky. Additionally, other companies will label Shochu as a “whisky,” despite it in no way being what Scottish, Irish, or American law would legally consider a whisk(e)y. Just because there’s some lovely art work and kanji with PRODUCT OF JAPAN in gold leaf on the label, it doesn’t mean you’re actually getting the goods. Thankfully the new Japanese Whisky trade guidelines enacted on April 1, 2021, are going to start cutting down on this nonsense, but it’s still early.

So, let me make it easy for you. Memorize these names: Suntory and Nikka. These are the giants of Japanese distilling, and both helpfully have websites explaining which bottles are blended “world” stocks and which are all-Japanese spirits. They also possess the best bottlings from Japan, in my opinion.

So, here’s one you can take to the bank/gift wrap counter: Hakushu 12 Single Malt Japanese Whisky. This bad boy is the real deal — single malt, all-Japanese distillate made at Suntory’s Hakushu Distillery, and blended from barrels aged 12+ years. It’s also magnificent whisky. Wielding a peat sledgehammer with a ballerina’s grace, Hakushu 12 is simultaneously dense and bursting with light. It’s intensely arboreal, brimming with pine, hay, and wet earth but also boasting an entire orchard of delicate sweet fruit notes. It’s an Islay scotch as interpreted by a wheated bourbon. One of my private soapboxes is that everyone goes ham for Yamazaki 12, when for my tastes Hakushu 12 blows its sibling out of the water.

This is absolutely beautiful whisky that would make a wonderful gift from you to you. But should you decide that someone is worth this bottle’s SRP of $120 Federal Reserve Notes, what you’ll be gifting is a top of the line, authentic expression of Japanese whisky that is entirely its own beast. Anyone will know you got them a nice gift, but a whiskey nerd will know you got them a *spectacular* gift.

Image courtesy of Jon who also writes on Low Class & High Proof.

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