Aichi Prefecture-based Fujikei Kyoi Co. Ltd. has announced the release of Single Malt Whisky White Oak Akashi Sake Cask, a 3-year whisky that spends all of its time maturing in American white oak ex-sake casks. You are unlikely to find this one available online in […]

Another new Japanese gin comes out today: 9148 recipe #3891 from Sapporo’s Benizakura Distillery. It’s a release designed to highlight the autumn foliage of Japan’s northernmost prefecture. The Benizakura Distillery makes pretty awesome gin! They were shutdown for a few days following the power outages […]

Suntory is back with their annual Zodiac bottlings, and 2019 is the Year of the Boar. 2018’s Year of the Dog bottles were really popular, at least according to the pageviews on this site! The Suntory Whisky Royal is a ceramic boar, 600ml at 43% […]

Though we’ve already known about it for nearly half a year now, Beam Suntory has officially announced the US release of Haku Vodka. A 750ml bottle will go for $27.99 according to Kyodo News, putting it around the same US price point of Suntory’s Roku […]

Just under a year since the release of The Lucky Cat Mint, Mars Whisky is back with the fourth entry in the blended whisky series: The Lucky Cat May. Distilled Blended (ed: thanks for the correction) at the Mars Shinshu Distillery, the liquid gets finished […]

The latest whisky release out of Kobe prefecture’s Akashi Distillery is an exclusive for Mitsukoshi and Isetan department stores, dubbed Akashi Cabernet Franc Cask. Pretty young at 4 years, the first three are spent in bourbon casks, and the last is spent in a Cabernet […]

Nikka Whisky is back with another special edition for their Yoichi and Miyagikyo single malts: Manzanilla Wood Finish. This year it’s Manzanilla wood, using casks of sherries of the same name that hail from the Spanish port town of Sanlúcar de Barrameda. The casks were holding […]

Suntory and furniture maker Karimoku have teamed up to sell a version of the K Chair made from whisky casks. Slated to be released on September 28, each chair uses plenty of cask wood: 4 casks in the armrests alone, according to Karimoku. They have […]

2018 definitely has not been a banner year for Japanese whisky. Here in Tokyo it’s only gotten more and more difficult to find age-statement Japanese whisky at bars, let alone buy a bottle for a decent price. While we are watching several new distilleries this year, it’s going […]

Japan’s first and only Old Tom Gin comes from Japan’s first craft gin maker, the Kyoto Distillery. It’s named “Ki No Tou,” and uses brown sugar from Japan’s westernmost inhabited island of Yonaguni. That may sound familiar to anyone who visited this year’s Tokyo BarShow, […]