The Weekly Mash, Friday September 19th
Here we are again … and a week which has brought a cocktail competition, a new/old book, plus the first whisky event of the autumn. Busy busy! Read on my dears, read on….
Whisky-do
Gabriel Tucker was saying to us that the most important thing that he’d learned in his bartending apprenticeship was to try and improve by 1% a day. ‘Don’t try for the 5%,’ he’d been told. ‘If you do, you might get 6% one day and 0% the next. Just do the 1% and do it well.’
Gabriel, of London’s Amaro, was the top student in this year’s Suntory Dojo programme. Each year, 20 bartenders are given a six-month immersion in Japanese culture. The tea ceremony, ikebana, sake (at the Dojima Sake Brewery) ceramics (at Miles-Moore) and dashi blending. At the end they use all of this knowledge to make and elevate a classic cocktail which is judged blind. This year, I was one of the judges. 20 cocktails in an afternoon? Bring it on!
It was a fascinating exercise, unlike any other ‘cocktail competition’ I’d judged where where the focus is always on the drink and the story behind it. Dojo steps back from that terrifying moment in the spotlight and breathes.
What the bartenders are taught is that the art isn’t just about making drinks, or following a recipe. It is about hospitality, understanding, precision, improvement. It is about creating the best drink you can at this time, and then improving it the next time. Each of the other elements: pottery, flower arranging, cooking are part of this – a holistic training.
It shows that no matter where you are in the world you can draw on these founding principles of Japanese bartending and adapt them to your own culture. You make it your own and you keep making it better.
In one of those moments of synchronicity, the final came around just as my book,‘The Way of Whisky (a journey through Japanese whisky)’ has been reprinted. It’s now called ‘The Japanese Way of Whisky’ just to make it clear what it’s about. Apparently that wasn’t obvious.
There’s a new cover and two new forewords – from Tomo Yoshizawa and Jim Meehan. While the main text has remained the same, each chapter has been updated, and there are two new sections looking at what has happened in Japanese whisky since the original came out in 2017.
It was never intended to be a distillery guide – Stefan van Eycken’s superlative ‘Whisky Rising’ does that. My angle was to try and discover what makes Japanese whisky ‘Japanese’.
I came to Japan not through drink but literature, specifically that of the American poet and essayist Gary Snyder (the hero of Jack Kerouac’s ‘Dharma Bums’). The portrait of this mountain-walking Buddhist poet appealed to this hill-tramping teenager. In 1955, Snyder went to Kyoto to live as a Zen monk. I followed though at a distance. Japan for me was poetry, Zen, then film, and music.
Japan was the Other, seemingly untouched by America’s growing cultural influence. It had its own codes, behaviour and aesthetics. It was exotic and fascinating. In a homogenised world, Japan was the outlier. We knew of it, but we didn’t know it. That was exciting. It still is.
My going to Japan on a yearly basis on whisky work was grounded in this wider fascination with the culture. It was here, rather than in Scotland, where this idea that whisky was a tangible cultural asset began to seed itself. That Japanese whisky was Japanese because of the mindset of its makers and how their thinking was aligned to traditional craft.
As I was pulling this piece of shameless self-promotion together, I read an interview with the late David Thomas of Pere Ubu. He was a curmudgeonly soul, but I always liked the angle of his thought. The interviewer asked him about how the media had changed from regional, to national, then global in his lifetime.
‘It used to be that isolation was caused by geography,’ he replied. ‘Mountains and rivers and streams. Well, in the 60s, isolation was caused by reception limitation. So everything was regional. Now it’s all syndicated, all national, so there are no pockets of isolation. When you have pockets of isolation, interesting stuff happens. You get characters coming along, and they ferment, and it breeds and it creates.’ Maybe it was the word ferment that made me think about the parallels between American radio stations of the 1960s and Japanese whisky.
I’m not suggesting that Japan remains isolated, or that its whisky-makers approached their craft with no knowledge of what was happening in Scotland. What I am suggesting though is that their ‘isolation’ allowed them to create their own vernacular, tied to the aesthetic framework seen in ceramics, design, fashion, food etc.
Japanese whisky was different because of climate, science and economics, but it also couldn’t help but being Japanese because it was being made in a culture where these principles were engrained.
The book, then, was/is a road trip with my friend the photographer Kohei Take to test that theory. His images, like those of Christina Kernohan’s in ‘A Sense of Place’ are part of the narrative. Tea leaves were rolled and crushed, the qualities of clay and sand and paper were explained, the technique of eating soba, how to indigo dye, and the desirable dullness of pewter.
We ate, we drank and met amazing people who talked about tradition and technique and whose words mirrored those of the distillers and blenders because this is still a book about whisky. Kaizen, moving things forward.
It was an interesting time to go. By 2017, Japanese whisky had been rediscovered at home – Highballs were everywhere – and was increasingly popular around the world. The 25 year slump was over, new distilleries were being mooted and there was an awareness from the distillers that legislation was badly needed.
The book is, in retrospect, the portrait of an industry at the crossroads, about to take another step forward but whose principles remain the same. This gentle update shows that the Japanese Way of Whisky continues.
‘The Japanese Way of Whisky’ is available through all good booksellers. Support your local store or buy through bookshop.org!
I’m on a wee tour this autumn {tickets here}
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It’s show time folks!
Autumn is the season when brand ambassadors pack their bags and bid farewell to their loved ones and pets with the vague promise that they should be back by Christmas. Though my schedule is light compared to theirs, the diary is thick with events.
Hey, we don’t mind doing it. If whisky is to get itself out of the doldrums, then shows will play an increasingly important role. They’re only one element though. Shows are filled with folk who are already committed. They need to be sufficiently enthused so that they can tell their friends. The work goes beyond celebrity endorsements. It has to be grassroots is well.
Anyhoo, the Midlands Whisky Festival was my first stop. Run by the estimable Nickolls & Perks it saw over 1,000 folks dramming over the two days. It was a fun, relaxed vibe, with a crowd who were both interested newbies and geeks (and all points in between). A nice balance in other words.
You never get a chance to taste properly at a show. It gives you a series of snapshots and tips from other attendees. Anyway, if you’re giving talks and working behind a stand – I was pouring N&P’s bottlings – there’s precious little time to explore. I can however heartily recommend their 13yo Highland Park (sweetness and smoke in perfect balance), White Peak Madeira 4yo (dusky fruits, flowers and nuttiness), and for a treat a supremely elegant Springbank 31yo
I also helped out at two classes. The first, on Bowmore and Laphroaig, was with the ambassadors’ ambassador Mr David Miles. My top hits were the new 18yo from Bowmore’s core range: richly dark fruited, but with tropicality and gentle smoke in the back and, though pricey, Laphroaig’s 33yo ‘Strong Characters, Donald Johnston’ that melded the distillery’s herbal notes with shoreline wrack, raisin and honey.
The second class, with N&P’s spirits specialist Steven Cook, mixed three of the firm’s own bottlings with a trio of rarities, including a remarkable Naval rum from a flagon which was extricated from its case with an angle grinder. Big Guyana depth with a distinct whack of (added?) molasses. There was also a Caroni 2000 (in magnum) which was less petrol-like (maybe more paraffin?) than many and had long balancing sweetness.
Back on the shop floor, top plaudits went to Dan Priseman for his hugely approachable new brand ‘The Story of Bourbon.’ The ‘standard’ release is ludicrously drinkable and manages to avoid both the aggressive wood and pricing of many in that category. Rye, wheated and limited releases are following. Dan knows Bourbon inside out and he also knows bartending, people’s palates and wallets… Quality a bargain price.
… and so onwards to Paris.
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In My Glass
On My Shelf: The Hearach Decade Edition (46%/£75)
Just to clarify, though the name is ’Decade’, this isn’t 10 years old, but a celebration of 10 years of distilling – the gin came first. This comes from 2018, and is the first to use only Harris peat.
The smoke is more obvious than on the standard Hearach, a fine gentle reek drifting in soft air along with a lightly marine quality. The distillery’s floral elements are there alongside smoked scallop, and light clover honey.
The palate strikes a lovely balance between drying woolly smoke and the sweetness of the spirit. It starts softly fruited, then adds weight in the middle with some citric elements (flamed orange oil) and shiso leaf.
The smoke is fully integrated, while on the sides of the mouth, a numbing Szechuan pepper adds another dimension. The peat breaks free towards the back, while crystallised ginger appears on the finish along with heather and a salty tingle. A cracker.
On My Shelf: Bunnahabhain 12yo Cask Strength, 2025 release (56.4%/£90)
The 2015 issue of this always welcome annual release is a vatting predominantly of second-fill oloroso casks, with refill and first-fill making up the balance.
Bunna’s mix of gingerbread, nuts and malt extract are there, with some toffee, sultana cake and dried flowers. The palate starts with a thick, almost oily, touch then some of the wet leather you can get from ex-sherry casks. There’s a sweet mid-palate that mixes prune, candied walnut and chocolate.
The extra strength adds heft and also length with every element magnified. The tannins are supple tannins and a slightly more savoury note with the sweeter elements being dialled down. Things finish with red pepper flakes. This, you feel, is the real Bunnahabhain.
In The Cupboard: Mortlach 21yo, Signatory Vintage for The Whisky Exchange (58.3%/£245)
The influence of an ex-Bourbon cask is what comes across initially, adding Caramac bar and golden syrup to a wooded dry note, while behind is a signature meaty note given fragrance by thyme and a waft of After Eight mint. Water adds in some estery notes and a hint of mixed nut.
The palate is chewy and bold, but Mortlach’s wilder more beefy elements have been sweetened – now you’re faced with Moroccan lamb roasted with honey and ras el hanout. A geosmin-like note adds depth and an almost fibrous quality to the structure. Elegant and complex with a finish which goes into sage flower. There’s some tangerine peel, sweet oak, vanilla, and sandalwood when water is added, along with an almost smoky edge (maybe the remnants of new make signature). Recommended if you have the cash.