Hiokizakura
Tottori, Japan
CEO Masanori quietly welcomed us with smoking cigarette…. yes I would say he is THE Japanese artisan! Their Sake is really classic and smooth, way far from what the new fashionable sake makers aim at. It doesn’t mean their sake is old fashioned but shows what actual SAKE should be. More you drink, more you love it.
They are one of the first sake brewers to engage in rice cultivation. Unlike wine, sake makers usually do not get involved with rice farmers, but they believed that good rice was necessary to make good sake. They revived the “Gouriki”, which had died out over time, and worked with farmers to reduce the use of pesticides and put the farmers’ names on the back label of the bottles. “At the time, no one was concerned about the quality of sake rice or organic farming, so it took time to communicate my ideas to the farmers,” he says.
Their method of sake brewing is “kimoto”. This is the hardest and most labor intensive method used today, in which lactic acid bacteria in the air are taken in to produce lactic acid, thereby eradicating bacteria and natural yeast. The result is a supple and powerful sake that can be aged for two years. (usually sake cannot be aged well.) Their brand name “Hioki” means “the more time it spends, the better it tastes.” They only make large bottles, and they even believe that their sake tastes best when there is only 2 cm left in the bottle.
