Ishigaki Distillery “Nagura” Unaged Japanese Rum – Review

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Jul 132026
 

The rum under discussion today is a rum from Japan, which had something of a renaissance in the making of rum since the post WW2 years, when privations and restrictions on the use of rice for alcohol when food was scarce, forced a re-evaluation of which alcohol they should be making. That’s not me being flippant, just pointing out that while some form of rum has been made ever since distillation technology first came to the islands in the 16th century, it never quite dethroned sake, awamori or shochus from the local pantheons.

Probably the best known of the Japanese distilleries is Nine Leaves, which recently (2024) shuttered its one-man operation.  But there have always been others, most (but by no means all) in Okinawa. A relatively new kid on the block is Ishigaki Distillery (named after the island on which it is located and the main city of the same name), founded in 2023 by a French expat named Francois Combes, who chucked a hybrid copper pot-column still into a small place just outside the city, sourced local cane for crushing and making juice from which to produce rum, and just started playing around. Like Rainforest Distillery in the Philippines, Francois is really looking hard at varieties of cane to use, and is also experimenting with several different kinds of barrels in which stock is being laid – Mizunara, chestnut, new and used white oak… this is not a man we want to let loose in Brazil, I think.

The inaugural expression of the distillery was in 2025, a white 56% cane juice based rum called the Nagura. I have no details of the varietal of cane Francois used – although it is supposed to be quite resistant to the vicissitudes of the elements, which is why, with dry tongue-in-cheek humor, it is referred to as being “typhoon resistant”. After a 6-10 day fermentation period, the wash is run through the still and what comes frothing out the other end is slowly reduced down to 56%.  That’s the rum we have here

Right away, that strength puts us into “serious” nosing territory. The initial “attack” (as the French reviewers call it) is quite strong, and has at scent of seawater that has seaweed and kelp in it, accompanied by a sort of medicinal iodine scent – lovers of strongly peated whiskies like Octomore might like this one just fine, methinks. One just has to be patient, because even though there is a ton of salt and olives to it, like the world’s filthiest martini (now we’re courting mezcal and Tequila aficionados too, apparently), once it opens up, we start to get quite a buit more. Cinnamon, white watery fruit, pears, guavas, watermelons, papayas, melons, figs – something light and not too sweet but quite aromatic and pleasant.

The palate, oddly, diverges quite a bit from this elegantly rough street rowdy we just smelled. On the nose you got a whole lot of salt and olives and oil and brine, which melded off into something quite pleasant and sweet over a quarter of an hour.  But now when tasted, that 56% comes much more into play, providing a sold, firm base upon which everything subsequent rested. It is quite sere, as dry as my Grandmother’s acerbic wit, and it takes a while for the tastes to start breaking through, you may sense oatmeal raisin ginger cookies, the salt has almost completely disappeared; some citrus, key lime pie, lemon zest and again, those watery fruit – watermelon, ripe papaya, white guavas, some cashews, that kind of thing. And there’s a bit of brine and olive oil, sure, leading to a nice, completely agricole-like finish that channels these fruits and salts and umami flavours to a relatively serene conclusion.

Well now. Clearly, this is not some one trick pony (like those filtered anonymous and tasteless mixing whites I regard with such disdain), it’s got a whole range of tastes, and they elevate the experience… a lot.  I don’t seem to be the only who thinks this way because the ISWC in 2025 awarded it a gold medal and 95 points — and while I’m not quite that generous and have no idea what it was rated against, I must say that I really like what Francois has done here. And believe this is a rum maker we should not only watch, but a rum that we should actively seek out.  It impressed me that much.

(#1151)(85/100) ⭐⭐⭐½

Commentary

I’ve been paying attention to the Asian rum scene for quite some time, because I find that as the Caribbean and American (north and south) rum scene matures and we are more familiar with the profiles of individual distilleries and nations, we are are – or should be – on the lookout for something new, something interesting, that would maybe blow our hair back and our socks off, and show where rum can go. 

To a greater or lesser extent, the Naguro isn’t quite it, but I want to make the observation that a number of new little artisanal distilleries from the Asia-Pacific region that I’ve been following, are all run by Frenchmen. Other nations’ expats too, true, but look at this list: Bellamy, Sampan, Issan, Renaissance, Ishigaki, all micros with serious rums in their portfolio, getting greater renown through co-bottlings, brandings, collaborations or releases of their own. It seems to me that either they don’t have enough interest in sticking around in France and open up a microdistillery there, there’s the Gauguin-esque romance of Asia, or maybe it’s just that the bureaucracy is not as onerous so they take their love of wine or cognac or whatever and taking it to a place where they can get things done faster.  Who knows?

But the important thing to understand is that while there is an inflow of expertise to Asia, it’s not a question of “saving” that region’s rums (as one producer rather tactlessly once said of Barbados), but a way of melding one kind of expertise from Europe, with traditional ones of Asia, using local ingredients and modern tech to produce a fascinating synthesis that will, one day, lead tum in a different – or at least new – direction.

I don’t want to make this sound like some kind of neo-colonialist screed – it’s not that, really it’s not – because these guys and all the others from other nations who go there, they love what they do, they’re in love with the craft and the joy of making rum generally, and new and interesting ones specifically. And in utilizing older and less hybridized varieties of cane, melding older and traditional ways of making rum and combining that with modern techniques, biology, chemistry and what have you, we are getting the results of that and it’s giving us the best of both worlds.

Other notes

  • YouTube video review link
  • The Nagura name is interesting: it refers to a secondary whetstone which is rubbed against the primary whetstone to get a sort of abrasive slurry that makes sharpening knives, razors and swords easier.
  • Some other rum making Distilleries in Okinawa and elsewhere in Japan:
    • Nine Leaves (now closed) – Chiba prefecture
    • Grace Distillery (Grace Rum): Located on Minamidaito Island, famous for its Cor Cor brand. They produce two expressions: Red (made from molasses) and Green (made from 100% sugarcane juice).
    • Iejima Distillery: Located on Iejima Island, producing the Ie Rum Santa Maria line (Crystal, Gold, and Premium) using 100% locally grown fresh sugarcane juice.
    • Helios Distillery: Located in Nago on the Okinawa mainland, recognized as the pioneer of Japanese rum production (started in 1961). They produce the Teeda aged rum series.
    • Taragawa Distillery: Located on Miyakojima Island, famous for crafting Makugan, a rum made from native sugarcane and coral-filtered water.
    • Yamada Distillery – located on Amami Oshima Island in southern Japan, exclusively produces artisanal kokuto shochu. Labels are “Nagagumo” and “Ichibanbashi.”
    • Nishihira Shuzo Ltd (shuzo is a Japanese word meaning an alcohol producing company) makes the Tomoet Moi kokuto shochu
    • Kamiki Spirits – Miniki rum in Mizunara casks, located in Nara city.

Cor Cor “Red” Okinawan White Rum – Review

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Mar 052020
 

Given Japan has several rums which have made these pages (Ryoma, Ogasawara, Nine Leaves, Helios, Seven Seas), by now most should be aware that just about all of them source their molasses out of the southern islands of Okinawa, if not actually based there themselves. The Grace distillery, who make the Cor Cor line of rums, conforms to that informal rule, yet is unusual in two ways – first, it is still very much a manual operation, somewhat surprising for a nation with a massive technological infrastructure; and it produces rums from both molasses (the red labelled rum we’re looking at today) and cane juice (the green labelled one). 

Cor Cor as a title has no deep transliterative meaning — it is derived from English (the opposite is true for games maker Atari, as a counter-example) and uses the first letters of the words “coral” (the island where it’s made is formed from a coral reef) and “corona” (which the island resembles). Grace Distillery itself was formed in 2004 in a building that used to be a small airport terminal, on the tiny Okinawan island of Minamidaito, and use a steel pot still, and do not practice ageing – another point of departure. Instead, their rum is rested in inert tanks and after a suitable period determined by their master blender, it’s bottled at 40%, as-is, unfiltered, uncoloured, un-added-to.

Some of my research shed some interesting light on the profile of the rum, but I think I’ll leave that for the end: suffice it to say that this was both normal with respect to other Japanese rums, and abnormal with respect to what we in the west are used to. The nose was sweet, light and faintly briny, with a metallic medicinal hint to it.  I knew there was more to come, and so set it aside and came back to it over time, and picked out black pepper, vegetable soup, biryani spices, seaweed. And, later, also dry cereal, butter, olives and flowers. Frankly, I found it a little confusing – it was nice and a ways better than the rank meatiness of the Seven Seas which had shuddered and put away – but nosed at a tangent from the norm of “regular” rums I’ve had more often.  

Palate – oh, much nicer.  Dry dusty citrus-infused sugar water, peas, salty cashews. There was a dusting of salt and cooking spices and miso soup, with lemon grass and sour cream somewhere in there.  I liked the development better, because what had been confusing about the nose gelled into a better harmony. Still a little off-base, mind you…but in a nice way. I particularly enjoyed the herbal and iodine background (not overdone, more a hint than a bludgeon) which set off the light fruit and brine in a way that complemented, not distracted.  Finish was long and dry, sugary and watery, redolent of delicate flowers and fruit. It was surprisingly durable, for a rum at 40%.

The Cor Cor Red was more generous on the palate than the nose, and as with many Japanese rums I’ve tried, it’s quite distinctive. The tastes were somewhat offbase when smelled, yet came together nicely when tasted.  Most of what we might deem “traditional notes” — like nougat, or toffee, caramel, molasses, wine, dark fruits, that kind of thing — were absent; and while their (now closed) website rather honestly remarked back in 2017 that it was not for everyone, I would merely suggest that this real enjoyment is probably more for someone (a) interested in Asian rums (b) looking for something new and (c) who is cognizant of local cuisine and spirits profiles, which infuse the makers’ designs here. One of the reasons the rum tastes as it does, is because the master blender used to work for one of the awamori makers on Okinawa (it is a spirit akin to Shochu), and wanted to apply the methods of make to rum as well.  No doubt some of the taste profile he preferred bled over into the final product as well.

The Cor Cor duo raised its head in the 2017 and 2018 rum festival circuit, and aside from a quick review by Wes in the UK – he commented that it was a pair of rums that engendered quite some discussion – it has since sunk almost completely from public consciousness.  I have to give it a cautious endorsement just because it’s so damned interesting, even if I couldn’t entirely find it in my heart to love it. Years from now Japan may colonize the rumisphere, the same way they have made themselves space in the whisky world. For now, this probably won’t get them there, however intriguing it might be to me personally.

(#708)(80/100)

Other Notes

  • I reached to to several friends in Japan for background: thanks in particular to Yoshi-san, who managed to get in touch with Grace directly on the question of the still and the master blender.
  • Grace also releases a Cor Cor Premium and Koruroru 25 rum variations, but I have never seen them for purchase.
  • Yuko Kinjo is the CEO and founder of Grace Rum. She was introduced to rum whilst sitting in a friend’s bar in the early 2000s, and asked herself “Why not make rum right here, a unique spirit made completely of local ingredients?” Cor Cor Rum is made only of sustainable local sugarcane and is a joint effort between Kinjo-san and the Minamidaito Island Chamber of Commerce. 

Helios Distillery “Teeda” 21 Year Old Japanese Rum – Review

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Feb 032020
 

The Okinawan Helios Distillery came to greater attention (and reknown) of the western rum scene in 2019, when they presented a white rum and a 5 Year Old that were impressive right out of the gate.  Perhaps we should not have been surprised, given that the company has been in the business since 1961 – it is supposedly the oldest such distillery in the country. Then, it was called Taiyou, and made cheap rum blends from sugar cane, both to sell to the occupying American forces, and to save rice for food and sake production. In the decades since, they’ve branched out, but always continued making the good stuff, and you can’t be in rum for nearly sixty years and not pick up a thing or two. To me, the only question is why they waited so long to move west make a splash.

Aside from beers and awamori, for which they are better known in Japan, rums make up a good portion of the portfolio, with the 5YO and white leading the charge – both, as noted, are pretty good.  But in the back room skunkworks there was always the desire to go further, and age longer, as I was told in Paris in 2019 when a commercially-complete but as-yet-officially-unbottled sample was passed over the counter for me to try.  Most distillers would go in easy increments up a graded “age-curve” – you know, 10 years old, maybe 12, or 15 or something like that. Not these boys. They went right up to 21 and planted their flag firmly there.

And they had reason to. The rum was a noser’s delight, soft and yet firm, with a remarkably well balanced amalgam of caramel, ripe (but not overripe) fruits, cola, fanta, citrus…and that was just in the first thirty seconds. I stared at in some wonder – I’d never seen or tried a Japanese rum this old, and had thought that perhaps the company’s experience in making aged whisky would make it more malt-like than rum-like – but no, this thing was uniformly all round excellent. As if to prove the point, when I left it standing and came back to it there were also notes of bitter chocolate, Danish butter cookies, sweet aromatic tobacco, leather, and smoke. And behind all that, like a never-materializing thundercloud, there was a vaguely rank and hogo-y meatiness, sensed rather than directly experienced, but rounding out the nasal profile nicely.

Clearly twenty one years of careful maturation in ex-bourbon barrels had had its effect, and had sanded off the rougher edges evident on the aromas of both the Teeda 5YO and the white.  Did this continue when tasted?  

Photo (c) Nomunication website.

Yes indeed. Granted 43% was hardly cask strength (the 48% official version would likely be more emphatic), but the tastes were as smoothly crisp as anyone could hope for, with a creamy, salt-buttery lead-in that was almost silky.  The wood influence was clear – vanilla, smoke, leather – yet not overbearing; the bitter tannins run which could have run amok in something this old were tamed well. Standard and well-defined notes of an aged Caribbean molasses-based rum paraded across the palate one after the other – stoned ripe fruits, caramel, toffee, strong black tea, port-infused tobacco – and bags of delicately handled spices like cinnamon and cumin jeteed around them.  These were set off by cola, and light licorice and meaty hints, just enough to make themselves known, before the whole thing came to an end in a gentle finish of all these flavours coming on to the stage for one last bow in a sort of integrated unison that had me asking for seconds and thirds and vowing to get me a bottle when it finally became available.

That bottle has now been released. One of 2500, says Nomunication, and they mention a price tag of 28,000 yen, which is about ‎‎€240. I imagine it’ll be a bit more expensive by the time it gets over to America or Europe when taxes, tariffs and transport are tacked on — but I think it’s really worth it, especially since it’s stronger, and older than anything we’re likely to see from Japan that isn’t a whiskey. Tasting it, I was reminded of a well-made Damoiseau, or other rums from Guadeloupe – with it’s own quirks and originality, not adhering to a regimen or a strictly enforced code, but simply made with passion and without additives and with a whole lot of skill, in a country that keeps making ‘em better all the time.

(#698)(90/100)

Other Notes

  • The official release of the  21 Year Old Rum is 48% ABV, while the sample I tried was 43%, one of three bottles made for the festival circuit in 2019.  I was told back then that no changes were envisaged to what I was sampling – the blend had been “locked” – aside from tinkering with the strength; so I’ll take it on faith that any difference between what I based my notes on and what’s out there for sale, is minimal.
  • The 5 Year Old review has a brief background on the distillery and some notes on its methods of production. As far as I know this is a rum from molasses, and comes from a stainless steel pot still.
  • Jan 2025 Video Recap