Karuizawa 15, old bottle.

This vatted release hails from the days of old, before the domimeering blitzkrieg of Karuizawa single casks from Number One Drinks. I guess to make sense of everything, a brief semi-summary of Karuizawa is in order. Although there are events and issues that pre-date our starting point, I will begin with the winery, Daikoki Budoshu (大黒葡萄酒). DB released post-WW2 whisky products under the name "Ocean" and started plans to make it's own whisky products. Due to good fortune, DB was able to import Golden Promise barley from the UK, as well as sherry casks from Spain (the Macallam model), after relocating to a winery in the western area of Karuizawa from their old distillery in Nagano. This mountainous area (Mt. Asama) was a little special and some people believe that location was the reason why old Karuizawa products aged so well (low/fluctuating temperatures, high humidty). Operations improved greatly from there on out. In 1962, DB was acquired by Mercian, who were more interested in wines than anything else (Japan is still interested in wines and I have no idea why). Mercian generally blended the Karuizawa malts with foreign malts for the market, but released their first single malt in 1976. Unfortunately, with worsening market conditions, Karuizawa closed in 2001. Again, with a motivation in wine, Kirin Fuji-Gotemba acquired Mercian around 2006/2007 and more or less dashed all hopes of a Karuizawa revival.

Nose: old coffee grinds, lime, sour green apples, not too sharp, wood polish.

Palate: burnt toast, sweet, cherry flavored cough syrup, small amounts fruit, mid palate has light smoke, later on hints of vanilla, back palate is old apple juice. Becomes vegetative later.

Finish: moderate, cereal, hot. Later on there are notes of prune juice.

Its a little plain, in between fruity and vegetative. Nothing interesting, but a good entry level dram. I guess it's a typical young Karuizawa from the Mercian days.

Grade: C+

Malt maniacs, 82 from 3 reviews on ~2007, 40% abv.