Mars Whisky 'Y.A. Bakemono #07 - Single Cask 2178, 2324 - Umashika'

51% ABV

Producer Notes:

• Limited edition blended malt Japanese whisky produced by Mars Whisky
• The 7th release in the Mars Bakemono series, which highlights illustrations from the famous Bakemono Zukushi “Monster” Scroll, an illustrated text (emaki) from Japan’s Edo Period (17th–19th centuries) by an unknown artist featuring various yōkai (magical creatures from Japanese folklore)
• Blend of two single malt casks, one distilled at Komagatake Distillery (fka Mars Shinshu) in Nagano and one distilled at Tsunuki Distillery in Kagoshima
• 100% malted barley lightly peated to 20 and 50 ppm and twice distilled in copper pot stills
• Aged 6–8 years: whiskies aged separately in ex-bourbon barrels exclusively at the Mars Yakushima Aging Cellar before blending and bottling; distilled in June 2017 and June 2019 and bottled in June 2025
• Non-chill filtered; 51% ABV

The seventh release in Mars’s Bakemono series, and the third matured at its Yakushima Aging Cellar (denoted by the initials “Y.A.”), this vatting of two single malt casks depicts Umashika, a monster described as a combination of horse and deer with a protruding horn and single eye. Often associated with foolishness, silliness, or idiocy, Umashika remains elusive in their narrative context but presents a lighter side to the imaginings in Japanese folklore. There’s nothing silly or foolish about this marriage of geographical influences, however—the house distilling styles of both Mars Komagatake and Tsunuki combine with the humidity and subtropical temperatures of Yakushima Island to create a whisky as delightfully ethereal as the creature it portrays.