sake master blog
MAEDAYA monthly special sake
KOKUSHIMUSO TOKUBETSU JUNMAI (limited stock) is sold out now. Thank you for your interests and tasting. Hope you enjoyed it a lot.
To replace,
KOKUSHIMUSO, I pick up another great Junmai from
Hokkaido,
KITANOHOMARE JUNMAI GINSHIN. This sake has a light fruity Ginjo fragrance even though it’s Junmai. Probably, the combination of Hokkaido original sake rice
Ginpu and a pure snow water from Tengu Mountain in
Otaru City makes this refreshing fragrance naturally. (Otaru City is very famous for its beautiful natural water in Japan. It’s called
“For water, Kobe in West & Otaru in East”) KITANOHOMARE JUNMAI GINSHIN has a strong styleJunmai flavour comes from rice itself. Even though Nihonshudo is only +2 but it has a good sharp dryness. This will be a good choice to go with any strong flavour dishes. I prefer to drink it cold, however, you can still warm this up to your body temperature to be enjoyed nicely in cold winter. (But no hotter than that Because the balance of flavour will be totally destroyed by heat.)
Please come and try Hokkaido’s pure clean sake. Happy Sipping!
MAEDAYA SAKE OF THE MONTH (JULY) PART 2
KITANOHOMARE JUNMAI GINSHIN
Glass $8.50 / Bottle (720ml) $43
In Melbourne, it’s getting still cold these days and indeed its perfect time for ATSUKAN (warm sake). However, this cold weather is not so bad comparing Japan’s Northern Island HOKKAIDO’s snowy cold winter. HOKKAIDO has a few great sake breweries such as Kitanohomare Shuzo, Otokoyama Shuzo, Takasago Shuzo & Godo Shuzo. With its cold climate, sake brewing must be a very hard work in Hokkaido but the result is very outstanding.
This month, we will feature SAKE from HOKKAIDO. One is called KOKUSHIMUSO RETSU TOKUBETSU JUNMAI (Takasago Shuzo
http://www.takasagoshuzo.com/) from Asahikawa City. This special Junmai sake is Takasago’s signature bottle. It’s made from Miyamanishiki rice and it has light and dry flavour. Good dry sake to be warm and you may be able to drink a few glasses with soy flavored dishes or deep fried dishes.
The Other one is called KITANOHOMARE OYADAMA NIGORI (Kitanohomare Shuzo
http://kitanohomare.com/ ) from Otaru City. This sake is unfiltered cloudy sake, looks white as powder snow, and it has a sweet and milky flavour. However, comparing to other classic Nigori sake such as Shirakawago Junmai, this one is much smoother and lighter in taste. You will be surprised how easy it can be drunk. This could be a perfect sake to end your meal as desert.
MAEDAYA SAKE OF THE MONTH (JULY)
“HOKKAIDO SAKE SPECIAL”
- KOKUSHIMUSO RETSU TOKUBETSU JUNMAI (ASAHIKAWA CITY)
Glass selling only $8.00 (Very limited / until stock lasts)
- KITANOHOMARE OYADAMA NIGORI (OTARU CITY)
Glass selling only $8.50 (Limited / until stock lasts)
Last Saturday, I had a very special guest visited MAEDAYA. It was M san family and actually Mrs. M is a niece of the president of RANMAN AKITAMEIJO! It was very exciting thing for me to meet people from my favorite sake brewery surprisingly in Melbourne!
So today, I would like to introduce RANMAN AKITAMEIJO here in my blog.
AKITAMEIJO was established in 1926 in Yuzawa City, Akita Prefecture. Yuzawa City is famous for Onsen (hot spring), Ski and Akita Bijin (Akita beautiful ladies. Famous one is Onono Komachi 9 century’s poetess.) Most importantly, Yuzawa City has a perfect environment for sake brewing such as good rice, beautiful pure water and cold climate in winter time.
AKITAMEIJO believes that the most important thing about sake brewing is “Love and passion for growing sake based on human relations”. They also believes that stable supply of stable quality items are very important to satisfy the consumer’s needs so they have 2 different Kura (brewing house), one has fully automatic computer system (Mitake Kura) and the other one has human manual system (Ogachi Kura).
Most of RANMAN sake is made from Akita local grown rice such as Akita Sake Komachi, Akita Komachi and Menkoina with traditional strong style sake brewing method succeeded by Sannai Toji and beautiful Akita snow water. Its flavour is generally soft sweet and rich in body. In Melbourne, we have 4 different bottles DAIGINJO HANARANMAN KOMACHI, GINJO REIRYO, JUNMAI FUNAOROSHI & KIMOTO TOKUJO ONJOZO available from Sake Japan, Taxi Dinning, Vue De Monde and Maedaya.
Please come and try one of the finest sake from Akita, Japan!
http://www.ranman.co.jp/
Last night, one of the regular customers at Maedaya “J” san and me were talking about the history of sake. Then suddenly one of the question occurred in our minds “Who is the oldest sake brewery that is still existing in Japan?” To be honest, I didn’t know who is so I promised J san to make a research for it.
As far as I can find out on internet, the answer will be Sudohonke from Obara city, Ibaragi prefecture. They have been brewing sake since 1141 (Heian Era). It’s over 850 years!! The head of brewery, Yoshiyasu Sudo is the 55th generation president and he is the only person who can succeed to Sudo family’s top secret original brewing method. (Even other veteran Toji sake artisans can’t know everything of it.)
Sudohonke has 5 words of “Sake, Rice, Soil, Water, Tree”. It means to make good sake, good rice is necessary. To make good rice, good soil is necessary. To make good soil, good water is necessary. To make good water, good tree is necessary. That’s why cutting trees are prohibited in Sudohonke and over 600 trees in their property are transplanted only when it is necessary.
To make sake, sudohonke use their well water in property and contracted premium sake rice only. To keep the original flavour and freshness of sake, most of their sake is delivered unpasteurized as Namazake. I can see their famous bottles must be very popular and will be delivered quickly to all over Japan.
Unfortunately, I haven’t tasted any of Sudohonke series yet but I will try my best to introduce Sudohonke sake bottle to Australia one day.
Sudohonke (Ibaragi) http://www.sudohonke.co.jp/ (English site)
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