Happy New Year!

While it is not January 1, it is July 1, the first year of the Heisei 27 Shuzo Nendo, or H27BY.

There are fiscal years and calendar years. Often, these are different. Well, in the sake industry, they also have “brewing years,” or “BY.”

What’s the point? What’s the difference? Sake brewing begins in the fall and runs until the next spring, necessarily crossing into a new calendar year. In Japan, the fiscal year of most companies begins April 1, so it would straddle two fiscal years as well. So in order to capture one season cleanly – eliminating the need account for half-done batches et al – the B Y (brewing year) concept was formed.

If we were to use calendar years to refer to when a sake was brewed, saying for example a sake was brewed in 2014, well that could be February of 2014 or November of 2014. And these are two completely different brewing seasons, with different rice harvests, and maybe even different brewing personnel. Using the BY year eliminates that potential confusion.

Note that different kura (breweries) have different scales of operation. Some brew lots more than others. Accordingly, when each kura stops and starts for the year varies hugely. The less the brew, the later in the year they begin, and the sooner they finish. Conversely, the larger brewers start earlier and earlier, some approaching late summer as their starting point, and approaching early summer (of the next year) as their wrap-up for the season.

As such, the brewing industry here recognizes July 1 as the first day of BY, and June 30^th as the last. This way, the brewing season of all kura is caught neatly and cleanly between.

The “27” refers to the year Heisei 27, or 2015 in the Japanese calendar. So ring in BY27 with a glass of your favorite sake on this day, New (Brewing) Year’s day, 2015.

Should you frequent sake retailers with anything resembling a good selection of sake, you will often find for sale bags of sake kasu: beige chunks and chips of something resembling cheese or tofu. Sometimes, the unmistakable fragrance of sake wafts up from the clear plastic bag as it sits on the counter.

What is sake kasu? In short, sake lees. What the heck are lees? In short, dregs. What the heck are they dregs of? In short, the brewing process.

After a tank of the white fermenting mash called moromi has run its course– anywhere from 18 to 32 days –what remains is a white mixture of sake and the solids that did not or could not be fermented. This must now be pressed to separate the slightly amber sake from these suspended solids.

There are several methods of pressing, but all accomplish the same thing: the fermenting mash is filtered, and the sake is squeezed out, leaving a compressed form of the solids, or lees, behind. This caked stuff is kasu.

When sake is pressed by machine, the kasu comes out in nice, tightly pressed, square pancakes. Usually this kasu is drier, having been manhandled by the high pressure of the pressing machine. Sake pressed in the older methods, using a big wooden box called a fune, in which the lid gets cranked down on moromi that has been poured to small canvas bags laid neatly inside the fune, will yield sake kasu that is more chunky, broken up, and formless.

Also, some sake is pressed with more pressure applied to the moromi than other sake. Sometimes the brewers want every last drop, at the expense of flavor, and other times sake is treated more gently, to maintain fine lines and subtle facets. The difference is quite noticeable in the sake. It is also apparent in the firmness of the kasu. In fact, a sake brewer will always inspect the kasu, since so much about how the fermentation proceeded is revealed in it. How the starch in the dissolved – or did not dissolve – is one piece of critical information a brewer can derive from the kasu.

Certainly sake kasu is easier to find in the winter, but these days, sake retailers in Japan and Japanese groceries the world-round carry kasu for consumers. In fact, brewers can barely keep it from flying out the door. Sake kasu has long been used in Japanese cuisine, and imparts a unique flavor and touch. It is commonly used in miso soup (often with salmon or pork as well), and is also outstanding as a marinade for grilled fish.

Not all sake kasu in the industry is used for cooking, by the way. Some is used as livestock feed, and some is actually recycled and distilled to make something called kasu-dori shochu, or shochu made from kasu.

Sake kasu is relatively rich in protein, with 100 grams having as much as 70 grams of beef, as well as being full of vitamins B1, B2 and B6. Also, the carbohydrate content too is fairly high. Not bad for the dregs of the sake brewing process.

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Sake Professional Course in Florida, August 17-19

Thanks to everyone’s support and the current popularity of sake, the Sake Professional Course in Las Vegas, June 1-3, is full. The next Sake Professional Course is scheduled for Miami Beach Florida, August 17-19, at the Shelborne Wyndham Grand Hotel, within which sits the South Beach Morimoto Restaurant. This is the first Sake Professional Course to be held in this part of the country and promises to be a particularly enjoyable running of the course.

More information is available here, and testimonials from graduates can be perused here as well. The three-day course wraps up with Sake Education Council supported testing for the Certified Sake Professional (CSP) certification. If you are interested in making a reservation, or if you have any questions not answered via the link above, by all means please feel free to contact me.

Following that, the next one is tentatively scheduled for the fall in the northeast part of the US. If you are interested, feel free to send me an email to that purport now; I will keep track of your interest!

Really?

In last month’s newsletter, we spoke of the middle part of the pressing, and its numerous names. In other words, when the rice solids that remain after fermentation are filtered away, via a press of one sort of another, the terms nakagumi, nakadare and nakadori all mean the same thing, and all refer to the middle part, which is what comes out after the rough first part but before the start of the tired final bits. In other words, the middle part is the best.

And there is no end to the list of vaguely defined and less than universally applied terminology in the sake world. It keeps things delicately balanced on that fine line of interesting and frustrating.

Another variation of sake worth knowing about is something called jikagumi, which can be loosely but understandably translated as “directly from the press.” As might be clear from that English rendering, jikagumi on a label means that the sake was bottled directly from the pressing apparatus.

While that pressing apparatus may have been a modern machine (good), a traditional fune box press (better) or just drip-pressed (best), the sake in that bottle went directly there. This differs from the norm in that most sake is first sent to a big tank where it all sits for a spell. Further sediment will settle, and the sake in that one tank is all thereby guaranteed to be uniform in taste and aroma.

Furthermore, almost all kura will then blend the tanks of a given product brewed in that year to make sure that each bottle tastes the same. But jikagumi will render each bottle just a little bit different, at least in theory, since (supposedly) it was not blended with any other bottle.

So, not only is jikagumi sake not blended with others, it also should be muroka (unfiltered, or at least, no charcoal or ceramic filtering), genshu (undiluted) and nama (unpasteurized). However, sake can be pasteurized in-bottle as well, so jikagumi can in fact be pasteurized by the time we get it.

Throw all that together and in a sake labelled jikagumi, we can count on having an unfiltered, undiluted sake that has not been blended with any other bottle or batch. This makes it appealing in that each bottle is unique in our time-space continuum, in our universe, and in our reality. Wow.

There are just a couple of problems with this: one, they are not allowed to legally do that, and two, practically speaking it is not very realistic.

However, as the term is not legally defined, there is some leeway in the interpretation, and at the end of the day the point is to give us something close to the above. Which is nice.

Legally, when a brewer makes a sake, they press it (filter out the rice solids), and then they must send the sake to one tank, and weigh it. Concurrently they weigh the kasu (lees), or the rice solids remaining from the pressing process. The weight of the sake and the weight of the kasu are recorded – and their sum must equal the weight of the moromi (fermenting mash). Once this has been done and officially recorded, the brewer can bottle the sake, but not before. The point is, of course, to make sure that no sake slips through the tax-cracks.

So from that point of view, jikagumi is not legal. However, thanks to the vagueness of things in Japan, some tax authorities may allow a brewer to bottle it directly, and count the number of bottles multiplied by the volume of each. It should be the same thing, right? Indeed. And surely that is how some places are handling it. Prolly.

Also, practically speaking, it is very labor intensive and a huge hassle to hold one bottle after another under a funnel gathering sake dripping from the press. We are talking like 2500 bottles for an average sized tank of premium sake, one after another. One. After. Another. Sure, the whole batch need not be done that way, and only a few bottles could be labelled as such. But still: it’s “hassle city.”

And in fact, when sake is pressed, it is first allowed to gather in a small holding tank called a kame, and as the kame is filled it is repeatedly pumped to a larger tank. So in truth, something called jikagumi would not even be allowed to gather in the kame. To not do this would call for changes and tweaks that would drastically affect the flow of things.

Yes, it can be done. But it has legal and practical limitations. But yes, it is being done, at least based on the fact that sake labelled jikagumi are out there.

However – and this is important – the term is not legally regulated. So in truth a brewery does not have to it by any set of rules at all. Just because jikagumi is written on the label does not legally mean that anything had to happen or not happen. Trust that no one is trying to fool us here, but rather that some leeway of execution exists.

But knowing what jikagumi is (sake bottled directly from the press), and also knowing what it should not be (legally or practically doable), we are left with what the term actually implies.

And that is this: a unique sake to which as little as possible has been done between brewing and bottling. Therein lies its goodness, and its appeal.
In truth, sticking to strict definitions will not serve us here. (They rarely do in the sake world, but I digress.) The spirit of things is what is important.

There was, a few years ago, a spate of jikagumi sake. I recall seeing lots of them during seasonal tastings, usually from smaller brewers with a willingness to experiment and create more appealing sake. But then, I noted that less and less of them were visible.

Upon inquiry, it was as I expected, and as readers might infer from the above. In other words, because the term was not likely to be exactly as it was suggesting, and because there were potential legalities involved, some of the brewers using the term began to steer clear of it, opting for instead other appealing marketing terms. So as quickly as it appeared, it is fading from lexicons a bit. Yes, there are jikagumi sake out there, and yes, they are potentially special and wonderful. But they will not likely constitute a trend with any momentum.

So a sake with jikagumi on the label might not really be so; but it will be as close to that as was legally and practically possible. Enjoy it for what it is.

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The next Sake Professional Course in which there are openings will be held in Miami Beach Florida, August 17~19. For more information and/or to make a reservation, please email me sakeguy@gol.com.

In any industry there are big players and little players. There are always huge companies that produce widgets – or sake – in volume, with stable quality and cost-efficiency. And there are also companies that produce much less and do everything on a smaller scale. This juxtaposition exists in the worlds of widgets, beer, wine and of course sake.

It is important to acknowledge that both scales of operation are good. They are all good companies, the big and the small. Or at least, if they are not good companies, it is not a function of their size. So it is important not to lean one way or the other, not to prejudice against either the big or the small, and to appreciate what both big and tiny sake companies contribute to the overall picture.

There is much to say about this situation, and I go out of my way to support brewers of all scales of operation. But let us save that long and interesting conversation for yet another day.

What is quite interesting to grasp, though, is just how big is big, and just how small is small? And how do the twain compare? The figures can be eye-opening.

To begin with, the sake industry is very polarized. There are just about 1200 kura (breweries) actively making sake these days. Or at least, 1200 that say they are making it. The truth might be more like 1000, but I digress. Let this be a part of the conversation we have set for yet another day.

Of those 1200, about only 15 combine to account for over half the sake made on the planet. Fifteen. Make. Half. And at the other end of the polarized spectrum, we have about 1000 breweries that combine – all one thousand of them – combine to comprise 25 percent of the market. Numerically expressed 0.8 percent of the kura pay 52 percent of the sake taxes. Conversely, 94% of the industry combines for 25 percent of the sake taxes. Dotted across the chasm between these two there are 200 or so kura of medium and stable size.

Look at those number again. Think about them. It’s a huge spread.

What is interesting is that the large companies have their own challenges and responsibilities as an enterprise, and problems-opportunities that only large companies can have. And the smaller companies, which often make barely enough to be sustainable and barely profitable, have their own sets of trials and tribulations to face – as well as challenges and opportunities. Neither one is inherently better than the other.

The difference in the size of the big and the small is astounding. For example, if one tours Hakutsuru in Nada, the biggest company in the industry, there is a raised hallway from which we can look down on four identical pressing machines that are more or less continuously cranking out just-completed sake.

There is a sign on the wall that runs through some rudimentary math, and tells us that if we were to drink two full glasses of sake a day, every day (hey, no problem here!) it would still take 220 years to finish what was pressed in the room below in a single day. And bear in mind this is but one of their several facilities (albeit the largest for sure).

Hovering clustered near the other end of the scale are about a thousand breweries that make in an entire brewing season about half of what the above-mentioned place makes in a single day. It’s whacked to say the least.

During the Japan-based winter running of the Sake Professional Course each year, I take the group of attendees to four kura. One is impossibly tiny, the brewers of Soku in Kyoto. They have five tanks, each of which will yield about 2000 bottles of sake at a pop. He will rotate through them and end up using each two to three times. He employs like five people, including his wife and his mom.

The next day we visit the largest brewer in the industry, the aforementioned Hakutsuru. In one of the two brewing buildings we visit, there are about sixty tanks, each of which can yield about 20,000 bottles – ten times the other place. They make four a day of these, and press four a day. That alone is 40 times the production of the other – from but one of their kura. And it’s delicious honjozo as well!

Each has different means, ends, and philosophies as well as different resources, infrastructures and goals. And I emphasize again: they are both great companies, and both companies make some great sake.

Many of us love to love the smaller kura because of their romantic appeal, and surely it is there. I’ll not deny that. We all love a good story, wherein a small kura has the flexibility to try new rice or yeast types, to make sake of which there is little and it’s hard to get, where little old ladies put on the labels by hand and where they can’t even spell the word machine, much less use any. Sure; that’s fun.

But there are just as many interesting, impressive and satisfying stories about the large brewers, and their sake can be great and always well priced. Bear in mind, companies like that can make exactly what they want, and with great consistency. And their contributions to the industry over the years have been indispensable to its progress.

So in the end, don’t let size be a factor. But at least be impressed with the difference in scales of operation in this highly skewed and polarized traditional industry

Naka in Japanese means middle. The character (shown at left) is one of the easiest to remember of the gazillion or so that there are to learn.

Shifting gears and going back to sake, most readers likely recall that sake ferments for typically 18 to 35 days, and after that has run its course, the moromi (mash) is a thick white liquid that is basically sake with a suspension of rice solids that did not or could not ferment. These need to be filtered away to yield clear or slightly amber sake.

Yes, in truth, this is a filtration. And filter is a perfectly valid term. But I prefer to use the term “pressed,” as this eliminates confusion (or at least I think it does) since there is another filtration performed with charcoal or a solid-state ceramic filter later in the process. Also, the term “pressing” is a closer translation of the original Japanese term “shibori” used in reference to the step of separating the sake from the suspended rice solids.

Terminology notwithstanding, this is usually done by machine. The moromi is pumped from the tank into a long accordion-like contraption, in between alternating mesh panels and inflatable baloon-like membranes. When the membranes are inflated, the moromi is forced through the mesh, and the sake goes through leaving the rice particles behind.

These machines do an awesome job, and are used for perhaps 99 percent of all sake made. But as hydraulics were not exactly in their heyday in the 1500s, this is not the traditional way that sake was pressed.

Traditionally and historically there were two ways, and both are still used today. One was to pour the moromi into cloth bags about a meter long and lay those bags inside of a big wooden box called a fune. The lid of the box, slightly smaller than the opening, was then cranked down into the box to squeeze the sake out and leave the rice solids neatly in the bags. Well, sorta neatly; cleanup is still a hassle. While less common, pressing using a fune is still done today for much premium sake, and doing so leads to slightly more elegant, refined and lively sake.

The other way is to pour the moromi into the same bags, but then tie them off, and just let the sake drip out, with no pressure at all applied. This method is called shizuku, which means drip, and, not surprisingly, sake pressed in this way is yet even more elegant, refined and lively.

However: in doing it either one of these two traditional ways, there are a myriad of complications and conditions. Most relevant to our discussion here, the stuff that drips out at the beginning is different from what drips out at the end, and that is different from what comes out in the middle. And there are terms for each of these; but the problem is that these terms are not legally defined or regulated, and there is some variation from brewer to brewer – more than there needs to be, truth be told.

However, the most useful point related to all of this is this: of all the sake that comes running out of the box or the bags, the middle one-third or so is considered the best. And it is often marketed as such. But here is the crux of the issue: the terms used to indicate this will vary a bit.

In particular, there are three terms that are used more or less interchangeably, but all include the character for naka- or middle. Naka-dori (“taken from the middle”), naka-gumi (“scooped from the middle”) and naka-dare (“dripped out of the middle”) all refer to the middle third of the pressing. So if naka is in there somewhere, you’re drinking the best part of the pressing. Just remember that and you’re golden.

By the way, the first third is called “ara-bashiri,” or “rough run,” and is usually rougher and brasher than the smoother middle part. But this term too is sometimes used outside of this context, and at least in one case is used to simply imply fresh youth and generally sake made in the early part of the brewing season (one such case is Masumi from Nagano).

And the last third is called “seme,” and in reality the last part of the pressing is often thin and worn out. It is often mixed in with cheaper sake. I used to confidently say that no brewer would ever write “seme” on the bottle and market it as such. But never put anything past the sake world: I know of at least two brewers that proudly write seme on the bottle, as if to confidently boast, “even are dregs are so damn good that you’re going to love it!”

Remember that this term is not legally regulated or defined, so who knows for sure just when it came out or how it was pressed.

These terms do not so much apply to sake pressed by machine, but more to sake pressed in the old, traditional methods using the fune (box) or shizuku (drip) methods. However, at the risk of beating a dead sake-horse, there is some variance and vagueness owing to the lack of an official definition.

And, not surprisingly, there is more. Let us save that for the next time. But just remember that naka-dori = naka-gumi = naka-dare, and that they all = good sake, and that = you taking your sake experience to a slightly higher level.

Such is The Middle Way of sake.

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The sake brewing season is drawing to a close. Except for the handful of large breweries that brew year-round in climate controlled factories, most kura will be finishing up their brewing sometime this month. Naturally, there will be ceremonies tied in to significant activities within the kura. One such activity and ceremony is known as koshiki taoshi.

The large vat used to steam the rice in sake brewing is called a koshiki. In traditional breweries, the koshiki is made of wood (cryptomeria, or Japanese Cedar) and sits on top of a large iron pot of water called a kama that tapers a bit at the top. (If you have ever had kama-meshi, rice, vegetables and meat steamed in a small iron single-serving pot, the kama for this is  very similar in shape.) Beneath the floor, this kama is heated (long ago by coal, wood or oil) to produce the steam for steaming the rice.When the final batch of rice for the season has been steamed – usually sometime in April – the koshiki is removed from on top of the kama and knocked over (taoshi) on to its side for a thorough cleaning. This is what “koshiki taoshi” refers to: knocking over the rice-steaing vat. In other words, the last of the year’s rice has finally been steamed.

But more takes place than simply knocking over the vat. It symbolizes the beginning of the end of a long season of brewing, and as such a party is in order. A big announcement is made. The kuramoto (brewery owner) and all of the kurabito (brewery workers) have a celebratory meal. Also, a bit of newly-made sake is offered to the gods in thanks for the blessings of the brewing season.

Note that just because the last batch of rice has been steamed does not mean there is no work left to be done. There are still several tanks fermenting away, and it can be as much as another month before these will be finished and pressed. Completely finishing the final batch of the year is referred to as kaizou. And after kaizou, there is naught to do but clean up and go home for the summer. But the koshiki-taoshi is indeed a light at the end of the tunnel.

Today, things have changed a bit. Rare is the wooden koshiki sitting upon the coal-fired kama. Infinitely more common is a stainless steel koshiki with steam pumped in by hoses from a natural gas fired boiler. Often these are equipped in such a way that they can be turned sideways to make it easier to scoop out the rice. Kinda makes knocking them over a bit anticlimactic.

Large brewers sometimes have “renzoku jomaiki” (continuous rice steamers), huge contraptions that steam rice and pump it out onto a conveyor belt on a continuous basis. Some even use rice liquefying machines in place of steamers. Some concessions to modern times must be made, even in this feudally traditional industry. But nonetheless, the significance of steaming the last of the season’s rice is huge, and a ceremony and small party are held to acknowledge the significance of the last steaming of the season.

Also, the breweries that brew year round often shut down in July or so for yearly thorough equipment maintenance. This is the time when such breweries will celebrate their koshiki-taoshi.

After a cold winter of long days of grueling labor, a glimmer of the quiet half of the year to come must certainly be welcomed.

Sake Professional Course – June 1 -3 – Las Vegas, Nevada

The next Sake Professional Course will take place Monday June 1 to Wednesday June 3, at the MGM Grand Hotel in Las Vegas, Nevada. It is, quite simply, the most thorough sake education available today. “No sake stone remains left unturned.” Learn more here .

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