The Nikka Yoichi 15 Year Old Japanese Single Malt Whisky

Tasting notes:
Subtle and inviting, like a neighborhood movie theatre with art deco style, cool posters, and a balky exit door into the alley through which you could sneak in to watch things like the Wide Sargasso Sea. Deep, rich, and round; imagine an acorn the size of an acorn squash roasted slowly for days. The smell of a new sponge pulled off the ocean floor. Doll house furniture lightly lacquered by the tongues of an awful lot of ocelots.

Mouth is fantastic. Copper throat lozenges (oh, wait, you mean those are “pennies”). Undercurrent of almost empty wine glasses left behind two weeks after the party, next to a common ficus tree. The leather handle of a church hand bell whose anxious handler had forgotten her gloves. Burning incense with the windows open.

The finish surfaces quickly. I’m smoking a caramel-glazed bamboo pipe with ground up lotus leaves with a group of matrifocal bonobos whose social-reinforcement through grooming is peerless. Wheat chaff given to a parakeet for a dust bath. Dark chair legs hiding a grinning child who holds up a finger to shush you. Big and aggressive, but it walks ever so softly.

Rating: