MARS Tsunuki Peated

Launched in 2020, Single Malt Tsunuki represents the emergence of Mars Whisky’s southern Japanese distillery as a standalone single malt producer. This release marks the second bottling in the series and reflects the distillery’s fifth year of production, a stage at which the whiskies are beginning to reveal their true maturity and identity.

For this edition, Mars has chosen to bring peat to the forefront, an element that was more restrained in the previous release. The result is a whisky that balances gentle peat smoke with natural sweetness, allowing honeyed and cereal notes to coexist with soft smokiness. This deliberate stylistic shift highlights Mars’ growing confidence in shaping Tsunuki’s house style.

Approachable yet characterful, this expression offers a clear snapshot of how Japanese peat can be expressive without overwhelming, appealing to both newcomers and seasoned drinkers exploring Japanese whisky beyond the classics.

Mars Whisky is one of Japan’s most intriguing producers, with a history as complex as it is distinctive. Its roots trace back to Kiichiro Iwai, a pivotal figure in Japanese whisky history and the man who facilitated Masataka Taketsuru’s journey to Scotland. Iwai was also the owner of a spirits company specialising in shochu, laying the foundation for Mars’ diversified approach to distillation.

The company’s original Shinshu distillery, perched 800 metres above sea level, benefits from a harsh mountain climate and exceptionally pure water filtered naturally through granite rock over centuries. Economic pressures in the 1980s led to its closure in 1992, before it was reborn in 2011.

Mars expanded further with the opening of the Tsunuki distillery in 2016, located in southern Japan, and an additional ageing cellar on the island of Yakushima. With three distinct ageing sites across Japan, Mars has developed a unique ability to study the influence of climate on maturation. In terms of scale, Mars remains highly artisanal—approximately 60 times smaller than Japan’s largest distillery—allowing for experimentation and precision.