The Whisky Club Australia managed to get their hands on the inaugural release of Fuji distilleries single malt which coincides with Fuji’s 50th anniversary. On this release a mixture of ex-Bourbon, French oak red wine barriques and beer casks have been used. And that is all the premium subscription club have made known for this dram. How helpful. Anyway… N: Quite a powerful sweetness with a bit of acetone. Sharp apple and tinned pineapple, crisp biscuity malt, a bit of berries and maybe some nutmeg-cinnamon spiced toasty toffee barrel notes. P: Slightly zingy and almost effervescent? Honeydew melon, tart apple, oaty and honied malt, cinnamon and cloves. A late bright berries and caramel. F: Medium. Juicy fruit fades quickly and leaves an aggressive gripping alcohol presence at the back of the palate that reveals youth in the liquid. Perhaps some lasting honey and chewy malt, but masked by the alcohol heat. If this hadn’t of been a free bottle, I likely would be annoyed. Maybe it needs longer to oxidise a little and soften, but this feels like a middle of the run Irish whisky at best, not Scottish influenced Japanese mastery. Perhaps I have been to long spoiled by recent Skye based sorcery and now things pail in comparison, or perhaps not. Perhaps this is just an average, rushed, newcomer struggling to find its own place? @cascode, I look forward to your thoughts. Distiller whisky taste #265 [Pictured here with an Osumilite from Matsugase, Japan; about 80 km from Mt Fuji. It may not look like much, but the tiny black cog wheel hidden amongst the rhyodacite volcanic matrix is massive for this mineral, which is already exceptionally rare but also typically only exists microscopically. Osumilite is known from high temperature volcanic rocks and very high temperature metamorphics].