In the bottle: The oak is quite soft here, by the slight tint of the what is in the bottle, it is clear that the time in the barrel was not very long; however, what is there is quite nice as the rice and the oak meld together beautifully. Once this opens up a bit, you get some cherry, vanilla and a bit of dried apricots along with a brisk sweetness, overall, Jyurin has a lot going for it, especially if you enjoy oak-aged rice shochu.

On the rocks: Bright and full of creamy oak notes, Jyurin starts with a nice punch of sweetness that quickly fades before becoming too heavy, this gives way to beautiful range of oak, vanilla, and a bit of cherry. As the ice melts, the cherry become a bit more like cherry cream soda, and the oak fades a bit to the background, letting the rice shochu rise to the surface a bit, not a lot but you can finally find it. 

Straight: Nice and smooth to start, the oak has a really nice balance that is not too forward but certainly lets you know its the star of the show. What I like about Jyurin is that you can still taste the rice shochu, a lot of times with oak aging a lot of the base shochu gets lost in the oak; however, here both play really well together. As with most oak-aged rice shochu offerings, these usually work quite well neat in the glass and Jyurin is not exception, especially the lower alcohol (25%) gives a lot more room for the vanilla, cherry and dried fruit notes to shine.

Paired with Chocolate: Tony's chocolonely 70% dark chocolate, at first this feels like a bit of a miss-match, but then the skies clear and this comes together, you are rewarded with a nice blend of chocolate and cherry, not the most mind blowing pairing but nice none the less.