Nose: Fruit jubes, vanilla, a fishy note, oak, raisins, cashews, peach skins.
Palate: Golden syrup, ginger ale, walnuts, dry sherry, pepper coated mixed peel, BBQ sauce.
Finish: Fades quickly with a little mixed peel, pepper, walnut and ginger ale.
Last Word: Solid if not remarkable, at least this is a Karuizawa sherry cask without sulphur!
Rating: 80/100
Thanks to Clint at WRU for the sample. You can check out Clint’s review here.
I have an unopened bottle which I bought at Isetan in Shinjuku which has a very similar label, but with the border & fish in red & no “balanced sherry” description.
It is a sherry cask, much darker in colour, distilled in 1999 & bottled in 2012 at 61%
I tried a sample before I bought the bottle & thought it a very enjoyable sherried whisky.
The only problem is that since I only bought one, I’m reluctant to open the bottle!
And the reason I only bought one was because I bought two of a Mizunara Head Hanyu.
I just wish I could have bought a couple of dozen bottles, then beamed home a la Star Trek!
Sometimes these decisions are just too difficult!
Hi Alan,
I’ve tried 2 or 3 of these Isetan young Karuizawa and have to say even though they were available to buy I wasn’t that fussed. That made my decision a little easier and indeed bought 2 bottles of the Mizunara Head Hanyu. Of coarse I bought other stuff to fill my duty free quota and my girlfriends and her dads, oh and her uncles. The one I wish I could have bought a spare of at the time was a Yamazaki Sherry Cask from Isetan Umeda Osaka. A different cask to the one’s I tried at Isetan Shinjuku and definitely superior!
Likewise Brian thank you. What was with the fishy note, as in like a fish sauce?
Not like fish sauce Clint as I usually write as such. More like a baked fish note I’d say! I still have a little of that sample left.