![]() Smooth as hell with a sweet and pleasantly bitter finish, it lingers on the tongue like a passionate kiss. Then, the wonderful, slightly salty oak notes, a defining characteristic of Yamazaki’s Mizunara cask single malts, remind you that this is indeed an old and treasured whisky. Like a bit of Parmigiano Reggiano and pear, just smokier. There’s an immediate funkiness, with fruity, umami flavours dancing across your tongue. The smell of Yamazaki 55 alone is intoxicating.īut the taste. It reminded me of sandalwood like a really good men’s cologne. First, the aroma: it was heady and pungent stronger than any other spirit I’ve encountered. So what was it like? Unlike any other whisky – hell, unlike any other liquid – I’ve ever put past my lips. The pink thing was a Roku gin-based cocktail. L-R: Yamazaki Distiller’s Reserve, 12, 18, 25 and 55 Year Old in the Burgundy glass. Tetsuya’s signature dish – the confit of Tasmanian ocean trout – framed by the Yamazaki tasting flight. ![]() The hardest part? Waiting with bated breath for Tom Scott, Beam Suntory brand ambassador and our captain for the night, to guide us through the flight to the big one. Like suave scientists, our waiters popped open small ampoules of the 55 and poured them into the wine glasses with a deft flick. While the Yamazaki Distillers’ Reserve, 12, 18 and 25 years were all presented in Glencairn glasses, the show-stopping 55 was actually served in a large Burgundy glass – with whisky that old and rare, you want that space to swirl and let aromas develop. Or with a spoon, like we cut our tuna with. Someone knocked over a vase early in the night the sense of relief that washed over the room when we all worked out it wasn’t a dram of the good stuff was palpable. Just a cheeky few thousand dollars of whisky. Most Expensive Japanese Wine, Sake and Whisky Wine Label of Karuizawa The Splendid Age 35 Year Old Single Cask Malt Whisky. No, the main event was the Yamazaki tasting flight immaculately laid out in front of us. RELATED: I Tried Sydney’s Most ‘On Trend’ Date Spot & It Was A Disasterīut as good as the food and overall haute cuisine experience was (and trust me, it was good – the ocean trout, “the world’s most photographed dish”, lives up to the hype), it was background noise. It’s like a parcel of Japan that’s somehow glitched into the middle of the Sydney CBD a palatial, zen-like escape from the skyscrapers and grit of the Harbour City. If you’ve never been, it’s a fantastical place. Indeed, the building that now hosts the award-winning Japanese fine dining location was once owned by Suntory. Tetsuya’s, one of Australia’s best and most famous restaurants, was the ideal place for such a rare and luxurious whisky. So you can understand how nervous and excited I was to have the chance to try some of the liquid gold myself at an exclusive event at iconic Sydney restaurant, Tetsuya’s. Hopefully, this all sets the scene for you. Officially, it retails for AU$90,000, but that doesn’t tell the whole story: a first edition bottle of the stuff sold for a whopping US$795,000 (~AU$1,111,445) at a Bonhams auction last year, smashing the previous auction record held by a first edition Yamazaki 50. Yamazaki 55 Year Old is officially the oldest and most expensive Japanese whisky of all time. If the 25 is already perfection, then something over twice as old… The mind boggles. So when I heard that the House of Suntory was releasing a Yamazaki 55, I was gobsmacked. So much so that in 2017 the Japanese whiskey Suntory Yamazaki Single Malt was awarded as the best whiskey in the world.Indeed, I used to think that Yamazaki 25 Year Old was about as good as whisky could possibly get – and at around AU$10,000 a bottle, you’d kind of hope so. Japanese whiskey has moved quickly to develop its own style and has met with growing acclaim in the West in recent years and has quickly become a benchmark in the new geography of world whiskey. The Japanese passion for whiskeys began in the nineteenth century, today a few large distilleries such as Nikka and Suntory and some artisan distillers, whiskey artists such as Chichibu and karuizawa have developed.Īlongside these famous distilleries which, according to experts, produce the best Japanese whiskeys, today new and interesting fine whiskeys have been added such as Kamiki, Akashi, Hibiki, Kura and Mars Komagatake with its single malts. If Scotland once held firmly the primacy of the best whiskeys in the world, now Japanese whiskeys have beaten the European competition with some really interested labels.
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