Suntory Whisky
For The Review, an audience with Mike Miyamoto, Ambassador for Suntory whisky, is to gain a portal to over thirty-nine years’ experience in the industry. Having undertaken everything from running a cooperage business to blending, and eventually running Japan’s most important whisky distilleries, Mike can be seen as an sensei of grain-based spirits in his own right. During the eighteenth century, the Japanese began to discover a taste for whisky, with small-scale production beginning in Japan around 1870. But Mike is keen to point out that the first commercial production was in 1924, with the opening of the country’s first distillery, Yamazaki, near Kyoto. Food and whisky are inextricably linked…