Sake News from Japan

GetNavi Web proposes a simple four-step process to choose sake with confidence at an izakaya… which true to sake form ends up being not so simple at all as they stray off into lots of detail. But let’s see how far it can take us, and what the Japanese media are...

Takashi Funakoshi from the Asahi Shimbun China office has a long report in With News on the newfound popularity of sake in China. [This post is part 2 of 2.] Of course, the current popularity of sake in China can’t be explained just by Japanese government policy. We...

Takashi Funakoshi from the Asahi Shimbun China office has a long report in With News on the newfound popularity of sake in China. [I'll post this in two parts.] If you ask people in China what part of Japanese culture they like, the first thing you’ll hear is ‘anime’....

The Iza site reports that a Shiga Research Association for the Promotion of the Fermentation Industry was established on 6 September 2019 to grow fermentation into a new basic industry capable of boosting the local economy. One of Shiga’s well-known regional...

The Yomiuri Shimbun reports on ten kuramoto (蔵元, brewery owners) in the famous Nada Gogō area who held a tasting event in the Kitano Kōbō no Machi area of Kobe on 7 September 2019, prior to launching their brand Nada Ki-ippon. Around 260 sake enthusiasts joined them...

Sanyo News Digital reports that the Miyashita Brewery in Okayama City launched a facial lotion on 2 September 2019, containing their junmai daiginjō Tenka no Shisei (天下至聖), which is made with locally developed Omachi rice milled to 20%. The brewery noticed that the...

The Kyoto Shinbun has a very brief report of a new product from Gekkeikan – a non-alcoholic, no-carbohydrate drink modelled on daiginjō sake. The Fushimi, Kyoto-based brewery release their new “Special Free” on 26 August 2019. It comes in a 245 ml bottle, with no...

Excite News report on a new drink from specialist sake shop Kurayoshi Yurakucho, who are taking the newly repopularised “drinkable intravenous nutrition drip” amazake and turning it into an amazake tapioca milk for the young and hip this summer. Amazake is renowned...

I’ve been going through some old news articles from December 2018, hence the recent article about heating sake, but here’s a more recent one on a more summery topic from Excite News – sake on the rocks. The first question, amusingly enough, is “Is sake on the rocks a...