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January 25, 2005
Inside Kyoya Brewery - The secrets behind the flavor!!
Okay everyone, do you know how shouchu is made? Even if you can hazard a guess that it involves distillation, how about all the other processes that have to be performed before distillation? I think there may be plenty of people out there who aren’t so sure about the finer points.
For instance, how is shouchu different to Japanese sake and wine? And how does “Honkaku Shouchu” (the real and original shouchu) manage to retain the flavor of the original ingredients? Once you know all the details about shouchu, we figure that you’ll enjoy it even more than just enjoying the taste as you knock it back. And so, with this in mind, we decided to cover an in-depth story on Kyoya Brewery in Miyazaki Prefecture’s Nichinan City, which is famous for its potato (imo) shouchu “Kanro”. In this article, we’ll show you the production processes, and reveal the answers to some of the simple grass roots questions that we hit Kyoya with.
This, incidentally, is the same Nichinan City as the one that features in the TV drama series “Wakaba”, which is currently airing on NHK. For those of you who are not familiar with the series, Wakaba is actually the name of the leading character, and the story is set in the family home of Wakaba’s mother, which is that of a long-established shouchu maker. You may or may not be surprised to learn that both the house and the brewery of Mr. Watanabe, the president of Kyoya, have been used as an influence to help make this drama authentic.
Anyway, let’s start exploring the route to making shouchu!
1. First we start by incubating the malt in a tank.
Malt is a must in the production of the alcohol in shouchu. Malt is added to the rice, and this then dissolves the starch in the rice leaving really sweet sugar.
We can then use yeast to convert this sugar into alcohol. This sequence of malted rice and yeast operations is known as parallel multiple fermentation.
The rice malt is produced using this tank. When the rice is put into the drum, the following sequence of operations is performed: the rice is washed > the rice is allowed to absorb water > steaming > malt is added and incubated. So via the introduction of moisture and moderate heating, the nutrients within the rice are extracted, and rice malt is produced at a dramatic rate inside the drum.
2. The malt obtained is cooled in a cooler, and the malted rice allowed to set overnight.
The photo on the left shows the cooler. If the steamed rice is left lumped together, then the surface will dry out and the temperature will drop, while the center will become hot and moist. To stop this occurring, the rice is spread out evenly. This helps the moisture in the rice to evaporate, and leads to more uniform malted rice production.
“When using yellow malt for the production of Japanese sake, the proliferation of bacteria in the ‘Moromi’ (unrefined sake) is prevented by maintaining it at low temperatures. The white malt and black malt used in shouchu on the other hand form large amounts of citric acid, and this keeps the pH of the Moromi low, thereby preventing bacteria formation. Because of this, fermentation can be performed without problems in relatively high temperature storerooms,” explains Mr. Watanabe, president of Kyoya.
I see!! This must be why shouchu production has blossomed in the warm Kyushu region.
3. Next, the water and the malt are transferred to a “Kame” (cask), and fermented for 5~6 days. Steamed potatoes are then added, and fermentation performed for a further 12 days.
The initial fermentation results in what we refer to as the “Ichiji Moromi” (primary refined sake), and the following fermentation results in the “Niji Moromi” (secondary refined sake). The type of shouchu obtained depends on what we add to the Ichiji Moromi. If we were to add rice, then we would end up with a rice (kome) shouchu, barley would give a barley (mugi) shouchu, and potatoes give a potato (imo) shouchu.
In general, it is popular to make sake in stainless steel tanks, the temperature of which is controlled from the outside. At Kyoya Brewery they prefer to use Kame. In the 800-liter small volume production method, there is no forced addition or removal of heat from the outside of the Kame, and the natural fermentation process is preserved.
It may in fact be easier to perform the process in large tanks with temperature control, and in that respect large tanks may be advantageous. Their use, however, may also lead to shouchus that are somewhat bland and identical. On the other hand, when Kame are used the process is sensitive to changes in the weather, and the conditions of each and every Kame must be monitored and adjusted on a daily basis. The care and attention involved in the job makes it something that is more akin to looking after a child.
In my free time, I often bake bread using natural yeast. This is somewhat different to pure cultured yeast, which is comparatively easy to use in cooking. In the case of natural yeast, fine differences in the finished bread occur depending on the weather, humidity, and the method of kneading used. The dedication required to make bread in this way is in many ways similar to that required for producing Moromi. In both cases, one can sense a warm satisfaction in the fact that the degree of care and attention paid in the making is reflected in the flavor and finesse of the finished product.
4. Finally, the Moromi that has completed the fermentation process is distilled
A large difference between Japanese sake and shouchu is whether the unrefined sake is filtered or distilled. In the case of Japanese sake, the unrefined sake is actually filtered, but in the case of shouchu it is heated until it boils, and the vapor formed is extracted and collected.
You all learnt how to make distilled water in Chemistry class at elementary school…right? Well, the principle here is just the same. Grade-A shouchu is made using continuous distillation equipment, which yields highly pure alcohol. The real shouchu (or Grade-B shouchu) made by Kyoya Brewery, on the other hand, is made by performing distillation only once using simple distillation equipment. Using this latter method it is possible to produce shouchu that retains the flavor of the original ingredients.
Boiling and distillation can be performed under normal pressure conditions (atmospheric distillation), or at temperatures that are lower than the normal boiling point by lowering the pressure (reduced pressure distillation), and the flavor changes depending on the conditions used.
Both reduced pressure distillation and atmospheric distillation can be performed using the same distillation equipment. It’s like having something that performs both the functions of a pressure cooker and a casserole dish. Pretty high-tech, right?
The picture on the right shows the boiling Moromi. You can actually hear it bubbling!
This is a boiler. Recent boilers tend to generate a great deal of heat but very little steam. However, at Kyoya they use conventional boilers that create a lot of steam.
「“Despite the fact that the thermal efficiency is low, we are continuing to use the traditional Cornish boilers, since we can obtain great shouchu with a breadth of flavor by steaming the potatoes and rice in saturated low pressure steam,” says Mr. Watanabe.
I guess it’s kind of like when you heat sweet potatoes in a microwave…I mean they may get cooked but they don’t have such a sweet taste. However, if you heat the same sweet potatoes in a steamer then they can be surprisingly sweet. Although in both cases we are “heating” the potatoes, large differences arise depending on the method used to heat them. The same can be said for bread, where after fermenting but before cooking we cover it in a mist of water. By doing so, we prevent the surface from drying out, thereby allowing the bread to rise fully. When it comes to Kyoya though, all I could do is feel admiration, since although we may refer to it as the simple process of “heating”, the staff of Kyoya are cutting no corners whatsoever.
The memorable thing for me this visit was the depth I discovered that lies behind potato (imo) shouchu. It’s not only distilling the ingredients, it is the sheer ingenuity in the steps preceding distillation. For example, even when using the same type of potato, the flavor obtained varies depending on whether you remove all the skin, half the skin, or do not remove the skin at all. Further differences can arise depending on whether white malt or black malt is used, and how much water is added. At the end of the day, the cumulative effect of all these factors can have you asking whether the final product is from the same potato or not.
Potatoes differ from rice and barley in that they spoil with storage. Only potatoes fresh from the field can be used to make shouchu, and so production is limited to a period from September to December. So even though there is a shouchu boom, it is not possible to just suddenly increase production. I found out that these shouchus are truly delicate, and a great deal of care is taken at each and every stage of production, especially in the case of the limited edition products. I was truly moved by the pride taken by the staff at Kyoya as they carefully make these delicate shouchus.
At Kyoya, they have also mixed the locally produced “Hebesu”, a lime-like citrus fruit, with barley (mugi) shouchu to make a liqueur. They have other interesting products too, such as shouchu made using dates. Kyoya stands as a brewery and distillery that is really trying to think outside the box and do something new, while preserving the conventional Kame production techniques. I hope that they continue to make great tasting shouchu with this interesting fusion of tradition and innovation.
Posted Admin : January 25, 2005 06:12 PM
