Sake Brewery Tour: Takano Shuzo in Niigata, Japan
thing here and tie this around your back. Wow. Once again, watch this. Pull all the way to the bottom of the tank. Uh that’s kind of where everything will last. Sake that’s shot next to one of the tanks. And it’s not. Wow. Thank you. [Music] Hi everyone. Thanks for stopping by. Today we’re going on a tour of the Takano Sake Brewery in Nigata City, Japan. We’ll have a detailed tour of the brewery facilities, concluding with a lunch and sake tasting. I hope you enjoy it. Okay, let’s get going. At our next stop at Hano Shou, he’s going to be going more in depth into the actual process of creating sake. and you’re going to be going through the actual factory looking at all the equipment they’re using. Uh so this is just kind of the basics and we’re going to learn a little more in depth in our next tour. So if you have any questions at all uh and especially for uh the president of the company who will be giving us this tour, please feel free at any time to ask a question. Uh if you can ask in Japanese, that’s great. If you can’t speak Japanese that well, you can just ask me in English and I can translate that over to uh the president and he can answer that for you. So, let’s have a good time. Okay. Yes. All right. Let’s have a good time. Here we are. The Takano Sake Brewery, a gem nestled in the western part of Nigata City. Let’s head inside. something that just Before the tour begins, we’re welcomed in the meeting room by the president with a briefing on what makes Takano Brewery unique. Time to get suited up for the tour and then you’re going to just put on this little So, let’s start exploring the Takeno Sake Brewery where we can take a peek at the secrets of this ancient craft. So at this moment right now he only has this much here which is very little. Usually when it first comes in uh there’s just tons of rice here. This is the rice washing and steaming area. Here the rice is washed to remove excess starch, then steamed to the perfect texture, ensuring it’s ready to absorb the cooji mold in the next [Music] stage. If you would like, once again, please watch your step. It’s a little slippery. above the first floor where we just found nice washing machine. All right. So, that washed rice will come up through the pipe and it’s going to be putting that onto this conveyor belt here which comes over here and drops it in this machine. It’s going to go very slowly through this machine all the way over here. And this is going to take 1 hour in here and usually it’s around 100. All right. So, I was just saying they need to prepare the rice to a perfect temperature for the next. Next, we see the cooji room, a warm cedar line space where steamed rice is inoculated with cooji mold. This critical step initiates the fermentation process, converting rice starches into fermentable sugars. All right. So, the reason uh they increase the amount of yeast uh in these kind of small from the cooji room, we move to the fermentation tanks. Towering stainless steel vessels line the space, each containing a bubbling mixture of steamed rice, water, and yeast. This is where science and art converge as the master brewers monitor temperature and timing to create sake with depth and character. [Music] Be careful. Oh, be careful. Careful. Watch again. Watch yourself. Whoa. Whoa. Whoa. Whoa. I’m already tipsy. Get ready to roll up your sleeves. Here we were given the chance to try our hand at mixing the mash. A rare hands-on opportunity to stir the future sake as it fermentss. It’s fascinating to feel the texture and understand the labor behind this iconic drink. Just pull all the way to the bottom of the tank. Uh that’s kind of where everything will build up. And you want to just take and kind of with force, as you can see him, pull up on this mixture to kind of All right. So, this is called a yam. This is the machine that’s going to take uh what you were just stirring in that tank and it’s going to compress that and just leave you with the actual. All right. So, the freshly pressed sake that’s shot back to one of our tanks that’s going to sit for about another two or 3 months. They actually mature in a tank. Uh they don’t ship directly from Paris. That’s going to just sit for about two to three months. And then after that, that’ll be when the actual bottling process starts. The tour continues to the aging and storage room where sake is allowed to mature. This step allows the flavors to develop complexity and balance. And it’s not sun. If it’s sunny, then it’s All right. So, he was just saying that this uh storage house, this was built actually back in 1899. So, this is 126 years of history. All right. So, he said it’s cold. So, let’s go into another place. It’s probably cold. collapse. Wow. Rows of tanks showcase the patience and precision that define sake craftsmanship. Some of these tanks are almost hundred years old. All right. So, what he was just saying uh for everyone who’s back there is this is the oldest tank here. Uh this is from [Music] 1930. Thank you. All right. So, uh, these tanks that are to your left and right here are usually around the age of 1930s, 1940sish. [Music] Finally, we visited the bottling area where the sake is filtered, pasteurized, and bottled. But now, it’s time to head back to the meeting room for lunch and a sake tasting and food pairing experience. Today we are trying six different sakees. An umeu plum lure and a yuzu shoe lure. Yes. Number two, uh the alcohol percentage is higher in this compared to this first one as previously stated. And this is going to have a more kind of crisp dry flavor compared to this. [Music] Which do all of them? All of all. Well, that’s all. A nice ending to an interesting day. Thank you for joining me on this tour of the Takano Sake Brewery. I hope you enjoyed it. Don’t forget to like, comment, and subscribe. See you next time.
Join me on a tour of Takano Shuzo, a sake brewery in Niigata City, Japan. On the tour we hear about the process of sake brewing, from washing the rice to mixing the mash. Following the facility tour we have a tasting session featuring eight sakes from the brewery paired with a delightful lunch. I hope you enjoy it.
Takano Shuzo website: https://www.takano-shuzo.co.jp/
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