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Rice planting at the Terada Honke brewery.
Steaming rice at Nakashima Shuzō, Gifu.
Happily, the post-war period also saw the rise of jizake of unprecedented quality. It would be wrong to claim that Nada and Fushimi do not make good alcohol. Many makers in these areas have never compromised their principles and the mass-market makers still have very good products at the top of their ranges. However, the stark reality is that Kansai sake is no longer synonymous with quality in the way it was 100 years ago. Regions like Niigata and Akita have gained powerful reputations since jizake started to assert itself in the late 1970s, but great drinks are now coming at us from all directions: Aichi, Chiba, Fukushima, Hiroshima, Nagano, Saitama and Yamagata. Indeed, just about every prefecture would claim to be producing some good sake.
Sake making
Fortunately for the sake industry’s profits, enjoying sake does not require a detailed understanding of how it is made. After all, most drinkers only have the vaguest notions of how wine and beer are brewed. So, if the technicalities bore you, just read the “Quick guide” box on page 35 and skip ahead. For those who do like to know the technicalities, however, here is a quick, potted explanation of how that ricey goodness gets from the paddy field to your glass:
Sake rice has larger grains and is much more starchy than the rice Japanese people eat. It tends to be quite tall, often exceeding a man’s height, and is notorious for its vulnerability to storm damage. “Yamada Nishiki” (山田錦) is the most famous variety. Although particularly difficult to cultivate, it is still a favorite with many kura because of its flexibility and the complexity of its tastes. According to the sake writer John Gauntner (whose books are a must for anyone learning about sake), Yamada tends to produce drinks with fruity, lively and layered flavors— “a biggie in terms of enhanced sake flavor and fragrance profiles.” There are lots of other varieties, including the very popular “Gohyakumangoku” (五百万石, light and dry), “Miyama Nishiki” (美山 錦, strong flavors and acidity) and “Ōmachi” (雄町, full and smooth) rices.
The first stage of sake production involves milling or polishing the rice so that the outer portions are removed. More expensive sakes will have more of the outer layers of the rice taken off. The weight of the polished white rice as a percentage of the raw brown rice is called the seimaibuai (精米歩合) and is often displayed on bottles (see daiginjō and ginjō below). A low percentage generally means a more refined sake.
The white rice is washed, soaked, steamed and then cooled to prepare it for brewing. About 20– 30 per cent of this rice is then cultivated with mold spores called kōjikin (麹囷) for two or three days in a heat-controlled room. The resulting mold-covered rice (kome kōji, 米麹) is vital to sake making because, when it is added to the rest of the rice in the fermentation vat, it breaks down rice starches into sugars, which can be turned into alcohol by the yeast (kōbo, 酵母). Before the main business of fermentation begins, however, the yeast is given a chance to propagate and establish itself in a smaller vat. The yeast, small amounts of water, kōji rice and steamed rice are mixed in this side vat for 2–4 weeks to produce an extremely yeast-rich liquid called the moto or shubo. Lactic acid is often also added at this stage to suppress unwanted micro-organisms (yamahai and kimoto sake motos are different, see page 41).
Fermentation proper begins when steamed rice, kōji rice and water are added to the yeasty moto. The rice, water and kōji are usually added in three stages over four days, to give a chance for the yeasts to do their work (distilled alcohol and other additives are put in at this stage in some breweries). This moromi is then left to ferment for 2–5 weeks. Philip Harper, the first foreigner ever to earn the title of tōji (master brewer), described what happens next in a wonderfully lyrical passage in The Insider’s Guide to Sake: “The tank appears to contain a great swollen heap of very thick porridge. After a couple of days, the moist surface begins to crack in places, and a thin foam appears there. The mash begins to bubble.... The first fine, watery foam changes into a much thicker, creamier layer of bubbles. At its peak, this foam rises well over a meter above the surface of the mash.... This recedes a few days after reaching its peak ... the mix is much lighter and more obviously liquid by now, and it bubbles and seethes frantically for several days. Gradually, the activity subsides.” The sake produced can reach up to 19– 20 percent alcohol and is called genshu (原ケ酉) if it is bottled at this strength. Most sake is diluted to about 16 percent alcohol for sale.
What are the different types of sake?
The six main categories
Although the term “sake” is in such wide use among foreigners that it is impossible to avoid using it, “sake” is not a precise term. It is actually the general word in Japanese for any alcohol, including beer, whisky, wine, etc. Nihonshu (日本酒) is usually the term used if you want to refer specifically to the brewed rice beverage (although some shōchū makers don’t like it because it implies that sake is the national drink. “Shōchū is Nihonshu too!”). A more technical term is seishu (清酒). These two characters are useful, because they are printed on the labels of all refined sakes. To the uninitiated, sake and shōchū bottles can look quite similar, but shōchū always has 焼酎 printed somewhere and sake almost always carries the characters 清酒.
At the Terada Honke brewery, preparing the rice for sake making is still done using equipment and techniques that have changed little over the centuries.
Priests prepare doburoku unrefined sake at the Shirakawa festival in Gifu prefecture.
You are going to have to know a bit more than that if you want something interesting, however. As Yoram Ofer bluntly put it, there is a “lot of garbage and a lot of heaven” in the sake world. Let’s begin with the “garbage.”
Zōjōshu 増醸酒 The cheapest sake and the close bosom friend of technicolor hangovers. Hundreds of liters of distilled alcohol can be added for every tonne of white rice used in making this stuff. Other additives such as glucose are also often used. Since 2006, these products have been forbidden from calling themselves seishu, the technical name for sake, and are instead classified as a type of liqueur. They still sit on the sake shelves, though. Don’t touch the stuff.
Futsūshu 普通酒 The vin ordinaire of the sake world. Futsūshu accounts for the majority of sake sales. It contains much less added alcohol than zōjōshu. Like vin ordinaire, the futsūshu category encompasses tedious mass-market bottlings, but also quite interesting brews. It really depends on who is making it and for what reason. There are some bargains to be had, because prices are not being ramped up by prestigious classifications.
Honjōzō or Honjōzōshu 本醸造 or 本酗适酒 These are premium sakes made with polished rice, but with small amounts of alcohol added in the production process. The polished rice’s weight is a maximum of 70 percent of its unpolished weight and fewer than 117 liters of distilled alcohol per tonne of rice are added during fermentation. Unlike the cheap zōjōshu, the alcohol is not added for economy reasons. It helps the brewers create light but aromatic sakes. Fragrant components in the moromi dissolve in the alcohol and are brought into the final sake rather than staying in the lees.
Junmai or Junmaishu 純米 or 純米酒 Junmaishu
