Greetings to all CSPs and ASPs,
We are well into the summer, at least for those of us in the northern hemisphere, and it is another hot one. Naturally this affects rice, and of course this can affect sake. I say “can” because last year was abominably bad too. But brewers were ready for it, and the managed to salvage the year quite well indeed. Surprisingly so. And not just in my opinion. You can read below about how this affected the quality of last year’s rice, and what we might expect if things stay hot this year too. That and a few more industry factoids and anecdotes round out this issue.
Rice is not the only thing affected by the hot summer. That creeping lethargy that stifles creativity and energy and makes me want to do nothing more than watch sumo with a glass or two of sake is back too. It’s called “natu-bate,” and as much as I love sake and sumo, I do need to get a couple things done!
Finally: if you are anywhere near New York City on August 2, please be sure to drop by the SEC event, see EVENTS.
Warm regards,
John Gauntner
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 FUTURE COURSES
Sake Professional Course Level II and Advanced Sake Professional Certification Testing
The “Level II” course and the subsequent ASP testing is scheduled for the week of February 13, 2012. As you likely know, the requirements are having successfully completed Level I. You do NOT have to have passed the CSP exam to take this course. However, to sit for the ASP exam you will need to take and pass the CSP exam, and an opportunity to do this will be provided to you at the beginning of the course.
Pricing and details are not yet 100% decided, but will likely be about \150,000, with travel and lodging separate but evening meals included. Feel free to indicate your intention to attend if you are so inclined, but a more official announcement will follow in the late summer.
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INDUSTRY NEWS
General State of the Industry
The below has been reproduced from my regular Sake World newsletter, just in case you do not subscribe to that.
March 11 Damage Assessment
A recent semi-final assessment of the damages incurred to the sake brewing industry as a result of the March 11 earthquake and tsunami was as below.
In the Tohoku and Kanto (the region encompassing Tokyo and the prefectures just north) regions, over 270 kura (breweries) sustained some damages. Of those, 15 had the kura or office or both completely destroyed. Nine people lost their lives, all in Iwate.
On top of that the effect from a drop in exports of not just sake but shochu and awamori as well have been significant. As such, the Japan Sake and Shochu Makers’ Association has asked the government for aid that includes reduced sake taxes and special financing to help the affected brewers rebuild and re-equip.
It is inspiring to note that in spite of the hardships behind and ahead, not one single brewer has decided to throw in the towel. Suisen of Iwate, hit by the tsunami on national tv, has found an old brewery that had ceased production several years ago and plans to start again almost immediately. The producer of Atagonomatsu and Hakurakusei, Niizawa Jouzouten, sits far inland but was heavily damaged from the earthquake, are following a similar plan and doing it with international assistance as well. See http://actionforjapan-uk.net/2011/06/19/947/ for more details on that.
Let us hope their inspiring actions lead to a successful recovery.
Statistics
Here are a few alcoholic beverage statistics from Japan. Naturally, we are only interested in those for sake, but a couple others are interesting to look at inasmuch as they add significance to the sake numbers.
For the fiscal year Heisei 22, (April 1, 2010 to March 31, 2011) Overall alcohol consumption in Japan was down a bit, 0.4%, but more significantly declined for the ninth year in a row. Shochu, or at least premium “honkaku” shouchu (basically a single raw material, made using koji, and singly distilled) was down 4.5%, but this once high-flying and very popular beverage has declined for the fourth year in a row. (Surely it is whiskey that is taking that share.) Seishu, however, was down but 2.2%.
More interestingly, if we look at only March of 2011 compared to March of 2010, overall consumption of alcohol was down 7.8%, shochu was down 2.1%, but get this: seishu was UP a WHOPPING 27%. That, folks, is significant. The “Drink Tohoku” push has worked, with all six prefectures in that region (see the map in the back of the SPC Manual – aren’t you glad I made that a test question now?) all were well above 100% of last year. Miyagi was up 64.7%, Iwate was up 38.6%, and Fukushima was up 22.2%. How they managed to actually ship all that in March is beyond me! By comparison, April’s numbers were down from March a bit, but still all in Tohoku were above those of April one year ago. But in May, they were back up to March levels again, and seemed to be leaning toward continued growth. Yesssss! In fact, for the first time in I dunno how long, the Tohoku region was up 21% in May, and seishu overall was up 2.7%. Congratulations, and may it continue for them.
I realize that statistics are limited in their meaning, and too many of them obfuscate reality, but at this time in sake’s evolution, I look at them more and more closely. Take from them what you will.
Government Help
While things are not totally settled, the government is considering three things. One is drastically reduced sake taxes for the affected brewers, another is special funding to use for rebuilding in the form of loans et al. And yet another is an extension of “Special Clause 78,” which gives tax breaks (30%) to smaller brewers.
While to some degree the existence of this Clause 78 is a source of contention between large brewers and small ones, there are those in the industry that say if Clause 78 is not extended, i.e. if it were abolished, we would lose half the existing breweries overnight. And, it is scheduled to be phased out! So what the industry is really doing is appealing to the government to extend it a bit more rather than stick to the phase-out schedule in place.
Whether these are actually implemented, and when, and how effective they are remains to be seen. Stay tuned to this SEC newsletter for more information on all this.
Rice and Hot Weather
You may have read that the very hot summers of late have been adversely affecting the quality of sake rice. Last year was record-breakingly abominable for Yamada Nishiki. Yet, the sake was not too bad at all. Naturally this is most apparent in contest sake, and even that was fine! That is not to say this year will be as well, though.
When it is too hot, the starch that develops in sake rice is not as soluble as it might be, and does not dissolve in the fermenting mash as well, leading to less full of a flavor. It also leads to more kasu, by the way. But less flavor, fullness, depth and richness is the main point of excessively hot and/or dry summers.
In preparing for Sake Professional Course New York 2011 taking place at the end of this month, I sought to get the latest rice stats, from the growing season that ended last fall. I searched and searched the Ministry of Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries (MAFF) site but could find it. So I emailed a contact that works there.
He basically said, “Dude, I have better things to do than this, but here…” and put me in touch with someone who gave me the link I needed, showing me all I need to know about all rice grown in Japan last year. But the main point I want to convey here is that the percentage of rice that got top-grade ranking after inspection was down about 20 percent compared to the last few years.
Now, in truth, the stats were a bit difficult to apply, for the following reasons. Likely, we all remember that rice is inspected and graded, and that most rice gets a 1st-grade, 2nd-grade or 3rd-grade (Itto, Nito, Santo) ranking based on things like size, shinpaku, percent of undeveloped grains and discolored grains. However, sake rice is grown so carefully that they added two grades on top of that, Tokujo (the highest) and Tokuto (next down), followed by the 1st-grade, 2nd-grade or 3rd-grade (Itto, Nito, Santo) rankings.
However, the statistics I just quoted spoke of only the drop in Itto rice, and included non-sake rice as well. But when looking at the amount of each variety of sake rice grown, and the percentage of that volume that was Tokujo or Tokuto, it was shockingly low. Disturbingly so.
For example, out of 19 thousand tons of Ye Olde Yamada Nishiki, only 1.0 tons were Tokujo! Only 13 were Tokuto. Many varieties had zero Tokujo or Tokuto: Tamazakae, Wataribune, Ginginga, and more. Even the venerable Omachi and Miyama Nishiki had zero Tokujo. And Gohyakumangoku had a whopping zero point one tons of Tokujo. (All three had some Tokuto, though.)
Also, just what is being grown has changed significantly too, with a few new rice types that have proven themselves (namely, Dewasansan, and Akita Sake Komachi) rising into the top ten.
Here is the list in terms of volume of the top ten for 2010:
Yamada Nishiki
Gohyakumangoku
Miyama Nishiki
Omachi
Hattan Nishiki
Dewasansan
Akita Sake Komachi
Hitogokochi
Hanafubuki
Ginpu
Ginginga (Iwate) at 11, Koshi Tanrei (Niigata) at 12th and Kura no Hana (Miyagi) at 13th are even more indicative of how up and coming rice types used for local-only sake are making their presence felt.
Of course, what happens this year remains to be seen, and I have not yet had the time to find out how the Tohoku triple disasters will affect what rice is grown in those areas, and how this summer will affect yields et al. Time will tell, and as I am personally very interested in all this, look for more information on this in the fall.
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EVENTS
| Sake Professional Course
New York City July 31 ~ August 2, 2011 "No sake stone remains left unturned."
Thanks to everyone, the Sake Professional Course for this summer is sold out, and in fact, there is a waiting list. In spite of all that is happening with Japan, and not happening with the economic recovery, sake remains popular.
Sake Education Council Gathering, August 2, 2011
New York City
On the evening of Tuesday, August 2, 2011 from 7:00 there will be an informal Sake Education Council gathering at soon-to-be-opened bar The Tippler, co-owned by SEC director Paul Tanguay, located at 425 W. 15th Street, between 9th and 10th Avenues. The number is 212-206-0000 The event will be a relatively informal gathering, with perhaps a word or two about the organization and its goals and direction. We hope that anyone remotely near New York City on that day can make it!
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CONTEST SAKE ANALYSIS Kikumasamune Wins Gold at Nationals
This
was also reported in the June Sake World Newsletter: Kikumasamune from
the Nada region of Hyogo is a company has long boycotted, or at least
chosen not to participate, in the New Sake Competition. They are one of
the most historically significant and stories brewing companies in the
history of the industry, and one of the largest brewers as well. This
year, after a decades-long hiatus, they submitted a sake - and won a
gold! Not surprisingly, it was a stable, simple, Nada-esque sake that
still managed enough ostentatious balance to do well.
I
repeat this here because I am surprised at the waves this had made. A
lot of people have been talking about their move back to the fold, or at
least overtly embracing the whole hoity-toity ginjo sake thing, rather
than the solid, stable and very good if not ostentatious sake they are
famous for.
It
also reminded me of something I learned when visiting Akita Konno, one
of five or so koji-mold producers in Japan. Our group on the Sake Tours
trip up there this past February. Man does not live on making
aspergillus oryzae alone, and they do countless other things too,
meaning research for and production of many other micro-organisms. These
include koji molds for non-sake products like shochu, miso, and shoyu
(soy sauce), yeast, and more. But the differences between all these are
manifest in the esters, acids, and other aromatic and flavor components
of a given sake. So these guys have all the toys to analyze those
elements.
So
what they do is take a brewer’s sake and for a measly 3000 yen per
measured compound they will tell you just how much your sake contains.
Brewers can then adjust things like temperature or yeast preparation or a
gazillion other things way over my head to try to get into the moving
target that is the sweetspot for winning gold medals in the nationals.
In
truth, I do not know how many brewers actually do this kind of thing,
or who really benefits from it. Maybe very few; maybe most just do their
best brewing. ‘Course, the analysis alone only takes you so far. You
still gotta brew it perfectly. But at the same time, how cool to know
you can do that! |
Finally,
If you are no longer involved with sake, God forbid, or for any other reason you prefer to not receive this email, then please let us know. We welcome feedback, ideas and contributions from all of the CSP/ASP community.
Until next month, please keep well, and enjoy your sake.
Sake Education Council |
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