Asahikawa - Izakaya Yakitori Gin'neko
1 - 2 Our trip starts with our old friends in Asahikawa (it’s our 4th visit). A very small izakaya Gin’neko where you can eat some small skewers and drink good local nihonchu. As welcome as Asahikawa is cold in winter (minus 14C, -20C). The standard” local Otokoyama is very pleasant (the brewery is quite big but take care of their nihonshu and local distributors).
To start with an Otokoyama "Kita No Inaho" Tokubetsu Honjozo light and can be drink "jokan" (~45°C). A delicate and wraparound taste.Then Otokoyama "Kita No Inaho" Tokubetsu Junmai tasted cold. A good balanced, simple, delicate. Goes very well with chicken skewers.
Asahikawa - Sakagura Takasago - Kokushimuso
A small tasting at Takasago, range Kokushimuso. Sorry for the name of the nihonshu but in Asahikawa there are so few English speaking clients that Apart from the scheduled visit, neither the employees, nor the bottles, nor the website speak English...
1 - 2 - 3 1) Hojonzo Daiginjo a 35% semaibuei nihonshu, delicate, flavorful. The umami perceptible even if this nihonshu is lightly dry. Rice: 山田錦, semaibuei : 35％, SMV : +2, acidity : 1.2
The next two are only sold in the brewery. No name for this two, so that will be the “green” and the “blue”. Their particularity is that their are two Name nihonshu and brewed from Hokkaïdo rice.
2) The green one, from the Miyazaki rice (similar to the Yamaha Nishiki rice) grown in Hokkaïdo: very good balanced sweetness / umami / acidity. A delicate banana flavor. A very rich first olfactif flavor while leaving a memory of enveloping softness.
3) The blue, the same but brewed from Kitashizuku rice (grown also in Hokkaïdo and not far from Asahikawa). Same rich first olfactif flavor. We can feel the light pineapple flavor, more drier and more acidic. Less plaisant at the first sip, but really very good and tasty with fat fishes (tasted with katsuo no taki, kind of tuna lightly burned), a real delight.
4 - 5 - 6 4) Kokushimuso Kakujo - Daiginjo Genshu : quite a lot body, local rice riz local relatively full-bodied, developed umami. Original and well-balanced.
5) Close to the previous one, but a little bit less harmonious, not bad at all though.
6) Kokushimuo Kitashizuku - Junmai Ginjo : pleasant but nothing more, especially after the previous one. Rice : kitashizuku, semaibuei : 55％, SMV : +2, acidity : 1,5
Kushiro - Sakagura Fukutsukasa
1 - 2 - 3 - 4 - 5 Small tasting of some of their sake. Light, clear but not so delicate. Maybe it was not the best selection among their production. A wider range of types of sake would have been more interesting. We bought the fourth, but nothing exceptional.
In the evening in an Izakaya (see below), we tasted some other nihonshu from their production. That experience made soften our first impression with a good surprise.
Kushiro - Izakaya Yakitori 串炉家(map)
Isakaya experience in Kushiro, southeast of Hokkaido. A little less cold than Asahikawa but still -12°C (10°F) felt -20°C (-4°F) in the evening! Fortunately, here too we can find welcoming Isakaya. Sometimes a little difficult to be accepted because they fear communication difficulties so we must insist a little with a few words in Japanese. But then, the atmosphere is really pleasant, warm and intimate at the same time. Small simple dishes meticulously cooked live from quality products. This isakaya was also the occasion for a good sake tasting. Sometimes isakayas have a limited choice of sake and not necessarily very elaborate. There, full of beautiful discoveries. The waitress, who does not speak English, took the initiative to choose for us after having managed to tell her that we wanted to try different sakés... Very good choices!
1 - 2 - 3 - 4 - 5 1) Fukutsukasa Shiboritate: light, harmonious, relatively fragrant. Perfect with gombo skewers and enoki mushrooms. Sake produced a few streets away from here (better impression than those tasted during the visit to the brewery in the afternoon, curious).
2) Kita no homare nigori: slightly acidic with a good balance that gives it a roundness and freshness that we wish to prolong endlessly. Produced a little further in Nemuro.
3) Houken (?) : slightly dry, very good on the fatty and salty taste of small skewers of bacon.
4) Denshu tokubetsu junmai "country squire" (Aomori) : Rice taste very present but different from those tasted so far, very interesting, well balanced with a good umami sensation. Very enveloping texture. Semaibuei 55%, SMV +3, acidity 1,5.
5) name? : good balance between flavours and body (between Fukutsukasa and Denshu n°4).