A pretty great name for a shochu (one grain of barley!), made by Nishi Shuzo, the distillers (and sweet potato growers) more famous for the imo shochus Tomino no Houzan and Tenshi no Yuwaku. It’s an unaged 100% barley shochu with white koji that expresses with very sweet notes but without any harshness. It delivers barley richness and an oily mouthfeel that goes great with water. Ice is not recommended, but that of course does work.
JC 09/21: The prevailing wisdom is that you introduce people to shochu with aged mugi shochu since it’s so similar to whiskey. I don’t think that’s totally wrong, but the appeal of unaged mugi shochu is also significant. You get a unique malty sweetness filled with wheaty oils (better than it sounds), that simply doesn’t exist in other types of alcohol. Hitotsubu no Mugi is another great example of this, and the barley koji imparts a sweetness I don’t think you get with rice koji/barley-main ingredient mugi shochus. There’s also a noticeable heaviness from the barley oils that makes it incredibly well-rounded. Do not waste the subtlety of this drink by having it with ice.
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