Sakura season marks the annual blooming of the cherry blossom and serves as an analogy for the passing of brutal winters into balmy spring. Hanami is the centuries-old practice of drinking sake beneath the petals, begun by the Imperial Court more than a thousand years ago, but which now sees all sections of society throng parks after work to drink and socialise.
Sadly in , even though Japan is inching its way out of lockdown, celebrations have been cancelled, and anyone attempting a flower-viewing party read: drinking party in Yoyogi Park will be swiftly ushered on by uniformed guards. In the UK, however, the lifting of stay-at-home orders coincides with our own, admittedly more subtle blossom season. Which makes right now the perfect time to get into sakura's essential accompaniment: sake.
Japan's signature drink has been brewed for around as long as hanami celebrations have existed, with historians dating its invention to the Nara period , although booze of various forms has been drunk on the island from at least the third century.
Really it's the wrong name: the Japanese character for 'sake' just means 'alcohol', "but at some point it got bastardised," says Marie Cheong-Thong , an effervescent sake obsessive who sits on the board for the British Sake Association and judges at the International Wine and Spirits Competition. Still, 'sake' will get you what you want both here, and in the bars of Tokyo. The drink is crafted from four ingredients — rice, water, yeast, and the fungus koji-kin more on which later — and although it falls in a similar ABV range to wine, it's brewed more like beer.
As such, making sake isn't as easy as sticking rice in water with yeast and waiting for time to do its stuff. First, you need to get at the starches that are stored at the heart of each grain of rice. Enter koji-kin , whose centrality in everything from soy sauce to miso makes it a key element in Japan's national identity. This feeds the yeast, kickstarting fermentation and steering the sake in particular flavour directions.
For decades, the mythos surrounding sake made getting hold of the stuff outside Japan very tricky indeed. In the Eighties, the only bottles available in Britain were overpriced and had likely been sat on a shelf for months or years, which meant the liquid inside — which should always be drunk as fresh as possible — was oxidised and tasteless long before it hit your glass.
However, as Japanese cuisine has boomed in the west over the last two decades, sake's fortunes rose, and it's now possible to get hold of great examples without needing a contact in Ginza. Ironically, sake's growth in the west has come as sales have dropped back east. Since , the number of producers has dropped from around 5, to nearer 1,, with taxation and changing tastes driving many historic breweries out of business.
The thinning out has, however, had the unexpected benefit of improving production standards, and slowly sake's popularity is rebounding as more premium examples appear, in which history meets modern brewing techniques. Now, rather than needing to be drunk within weeks of being bottled, sakes can stay good for months or even years, which makes it easier to access domestically and export abroad. Which is good news for those of us on the other side of the world who love its unique taste.
That flavour is dictated by each brewery's toji — the sake master. Pin Share Email. Buy on Drizly Buy on Instacart. Buy on Tippsysake. Buy on Bassins. Buy on Drizly Buy on Minibar Delivery. Buy on Drizly Buy on Tippsysake. Buy on Drizly Buy on Wine. Buy on Truesake.
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Let us know tippsysake! Louie Anne Batac-Nguyen. Prev Post. The higher the rice ratio, the more premium the wine. There are two main categories that all sake varieties are divided up between — Ordinary Sake and Special Designation Sake. Ordinary Sake is where most types of sake fall, as there are only eight different types of the Special Designation stuff. The main styles of sake within these two categories to note are Daiginjo, Ginjo, Honjozo and, like we previously mentioned, Junmai. This is a junmai style sake with a dry taste and relatively mellow flavors alongside pleasant aromas.
The flavors are earthy grapefruit combined with a balanced herbal profile that pairs well with nearly everything from fish to meats and oils as well. This is one of the oldest sake labels with over years of experience and 14 generations of brewing under their belt.
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