Suntory Toki

I’ve been trying to improve my Japanese whisky tasting catalog over the last few months so I decided to bring a few of the cheaper, blended malts into the fray. This Suntory offering is a blend of undisclosed age Hakushu and Yamazaki malts, along with a healthy dose of Chita grain whisky. It’s bottled at 43% ABV and is a pale straw color that appears oily while leaving water droplets on the sides of the tasting glass when you give it a little spin. Some legs form slowly, but they don’t run very long. The Hakushu malt makes up the biggest percentage here. It was aged solely in American white oak barrels. The second largest component is the Chita grain whisky, followed by trace amounts of Yamazaki malt aged in both Spanish and American white oak. Take note that none of the ingredients have been aged in traditional Mizunara oak. In my opinion, that is the biggest downfall in the overall quality of this blend. The nose is initially overpowered by pure, grain alcohol. It’s only after a lengthy rest in the Glencairn do the faintest florals appear, along with some perfume and vanilla oak. It’s both too little and too late (even this early in the overall experience). The nose is a fail. The palate is unnecessarily harsh. Oak bitterness abounds here with a weird sense of artificial vanilla extract. There’s no malt quality at all. It’s intense grain the entire time. Thankfully it’s blended down because at any higher of a proof this would be completely unbearable. This must be the only reason some Yamazaki malt was blended it- to take the edge off. Sadly, not enough was used. The finish is long and bitter. Raw oak notes even left my throat feeling scratchy. This thing is a mess. Overall, I think the absence of any Mizunara oak whisky robs this thing of any chance it had to be a tolerable whisky. @ScotchingHard called this the Johnnie Walker Red of Japan and that’s a fair and just assessment. This should only be drank after it’s been mixed into some sort of a sweet cocktail. Period. I’ve drank through over half of this bottle and I can even add that the little bit of oxidation has also affected this in a negative way. It’s even more dull than when it was freshly opened. I think that Suntory needs to blend in some Mizunara cask whisky to not only infuse some tropical fruitiness, but to help calm the harshness of the grain. I’m sure that’ll take the price point up $5-10, but even at $40 US this stuff is highly overpriced. You can at least get JW Red for $20... As the great Bill Murray once said in Sofia Coppola’s Japanese travelogue movie about jet lag: For Relaxing Times, Make It Suntory Time- So Long As It Isn’t Toki. Okay, okay he didn’t say that last part. But he should have. 1.5 stars. Cheers, my friends.