Nikka Taketsuru Pure Malt 25 Year Old

The Nikka Taketsuru 25 year old represents the epitome of Nikka’s expertise in the art of whisky making, a remarkable tribute to Masataka Taketsuru – the founding father of Nikka. Made up of malts aged for at least 25 years from Nikka's Yoichi and Miyagikyo distilleries, this is sweet and rich with hints of both sherry and peat.

Miyagikyo

Just over 30 years after Mastaka Taketsuru founded the Nikka whisky company, he opened his second malt whisky distillery in Miyagi, Sendai. Seeking an expansion to the types of malt whisky available for his blends, Taketsuru looked to build a distillery site that was the polar opposite of his first site Yoichi. Situated in between two rivers and surrounded by mountains, the Sendai distillery, renamed Miyagikyo in 2001, was constructed and finished in 1969. Unlike the Yoichi distillery which utilised a direct flame and was coal powered, the Sendai distillery used indirect steam heating. Additionally, Yoichi utilised worm tub condensers which produce a heavy spirit, so Miyagikyo chose to use shell & tube condensers to produce a lighter spirit. More unpeated and light peated barley is utilised at Miyagikyo, with the majority of the barley imported from Scotland.

The pot stills at the Sendai site are considerably bigger than Yoichi and include boil balls along with an upward sloping lyne arm. This all contributes to a considerable amount of copper contact, stripping out the heavier compounds in the spirit and leaving a light and delicate style of newmake. This means that Miyagikyo is typically a fruity and floral expression whereas Yoichi is a dirtier and heavier style of whisky. Grain whisky production was also moved to Sendai when the Coffey stills at Nikka’s Nishinomiya bottling plant were closed in 1998. A huge pair of stills, Nikka primarily utilises maize imported from the US as well as running malted barley through them. This has led to the exceptionally popular Nikka Coffey grain & Coffey malt releases.

Yoichi

The original distillery founded by Masataka Taketsuru, the Yoichi distillery began producing whisky and brandy in 1936. Originally beginning with just 1 still at the site, Nikka started by selling apple juice products produced from their orchard, only to have much of the apple juice returned. Instead of disposing of the returned bottles, Taketsuru chose to distil it and create an apple brandy. The apple production at Yoichi was phased out in 1945, with the focus instead being on malt whisky production. Taketsuru chose to build Yoichi in the cold north of Japan in Hokkaido, picking a location just near to the Yoichi river. He wanted to create a style of whisky similar to that of the Campbeltown distilleries in Scotland that he had trained at such as Springbank and Hazelburn. Hokkaido was chosen for its climate, being very similar to that of Scotland, with Yoichi chosen specifically as it was 1km from the sea.

Yoichi’s production methods are unique amongst global producers. Up until 1974 maltings took place on site, utilising peat taken from the nearby Ishikari River. Unfortunately the requirements for barley became too much and so imported barley from Scotland is used now, with peating levels ranging anywhere from unpeated to 20PPM. The majority of the production schedule is lightly peated, with a small amount at the end of the year being heavily peated. The most unique factor about Yoichi’s production methods however is that their stills are still direct flame powered by coal. This practice was typical in Scotland until the 1970s, with many distilleries then choosing to switch to indirect steam heating. Nikka believes that the coal fire component is the secret to Yoichi’s excellent, heavy style of spirit. Just the same as the rest of the Japanese whisky industry, Nikka has seen huge demands for its age stated expressions. This has meant that age-stated Yoichi bottlings have been discontinued, with a non age-stated core expression instead being released. Yoichi has also been seen in a few limited edition bottlings such as an apple brandy and rum wood finish in recent years.