Visiting distilleries, I don’t have much experience, currently only been to Hokkaido’s Otokoyama Brewery and Kyoto’s Gekkeikan Okura Sake Museum (although this is a museum, not a brewery). The sake produced by this Hachinohe Shuzo Brewery mainly includes Mutsu Otokoyama and Mutsu Hassen. They used to not allow visits, but now they have started opening for tours to promote their sake… However, because it is a sake brewery, we still need to wear protective clothing to enter.
The signboard reads “Komai Shuzo Brewery”
Inside, you can see a sign for “Mutsu Otokoyama”.
I don’t understand what else is written on it.
Led by a young boss, we were taken on a tour and personally explained that this is the Aomori rice used to make the rice wine here.
However, not the entire rice is used for making the wine, only the more refined portion.
This portion accounts for 65%, which means that 35% of the rice is removed and used for other purposes, leaving only 65% for making rice wine.
Next, let’s take a look at the progress of the ongoing production.
Each barrel contains something different, representing varying degrees of achievement.
This bucket has been sitting for quite some time.
After fermentation, the rice grains are then filtered, resulting in a semi-finished product like this…
At this point, it already has a strong aroma of alcohol.
This is the process of making wine.
Finally, there were some rice wine tastings available on-site, including some that have not yet been released for sale in the market…
In addition, it was surprising to see a small shrine placed inside the factory.
Of course, this shrine is dedicated to the Japanese god of sake – Matsuo Okami.
It’s quite interesting…
Above is the process of visiting the Mutsu Hassen Sake Brewery~
Since I can only drink sake like Shawa, and can only taste it, I am not sure about how to appreciate sake and what kind of sake is delicious~
For more information on transportation, attractions, food, and accommodation in Aomori, please refer to the Tohoku page.
Reference: Hachinohe Shuzo Brewery Official Website
『Original Source：https://nicklee.tw/1169/』
