Eigashima Distillery Akashi Goju 50 Sherry Cask Malt & Grain Whisky

Goju means "fifty" — the ABV, and the whole point. Akashi Goju 50 takes Eigashima Shuzo's flagship blended whisky and gives it two things the standard bottling lacks: a two-year finish in ex-sherry casks and a proof jump from 40% to 50%, twenty points higher, which is exactly what sherry influence needs to arrive with intensity. The whisky comes from White Oak Distillery in Akashi, Hyogo Prefecture — Japan's first licensed whisky producer, dating to 1919, and still one of its smallest, running just two copper pot stills seasonally alongside sake and shochu. The blend of wheat, rye, and malted barley is lightly peated to around 10 ppm, double distilled, matured roughly three years in a mix of new oak, ex-bourbon, and ex-shochu casks, then finished two more years in sherry wood for an average age of five. What comes out is a constant dance between floral sweetness, saline dryness, and gentle smoke — the coastal signature of a distillery sitting on the Seto Inland Sea. Expect raisin, smoked sea salt, and vanilla pastry on the nose, opening into assertive baking spice and well-integrated sherry with savory, oxidative depth, finishing dry and nutty with flinty dark chocolate that lingers. Skurnik calls it destined to be a classic. Neat, or with a few drops of water to unfold it.

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