What's The Deal With Mizunara Oak, Anyway?

Mizunara oak sure is pretty, but how the heck do you make a barrel out of THAT? (Image swiped from dekanta, with apologies)

The more of a whiskey nerd you are, the more you’ll hear about mizunara oak — the oak that was used to age Japanese whisky for decades before Western distilleries glommed onto it and made it synonymous with fancy, rare, and pricey booze — everyone from Bowmore to Chivas Regal got in on the mizunara action. Which was weird, because part of the appeal of mizunara was that you couldn’t get the damn barrels. There were a lot of reasons behind that, namely that it takes a very long time (I’m talkin’ centuries) for mizunara to mature, so there are laws against cutting down too much of it. Once you get your wood, it’s really hard to make barrels from it, because the trees, as you can see, are twisty and swervy, not tall and even like American oak. And once you’ve made the barrel, it leaks like a sieve.

Mizunara does, however, have a really cool and distinctive flavor which translates beautifully to whisky. So yeah, it’s overhyped, but it’s also delicious. And that’s why I reviewed not one but two new mizunara cask-finished whiskeys, as usual for the fine humans at Forbes. Take a look at the article, why don’t you! Link is -> HERE <-.