Sake Brewing Experiences - Become a Sake Brewer
A new side of sake brewery tourism are sake brewing experiences, which are offered by a couple of sake breweries across the country:
Obata Shuzo’s Gakkogura on Sado Island is a sustainable microbrewery that allows a small group of students to brew their own sake tank in the course of one week.
In the mountainous region of Nagano, the Kurabito Stay is a two-nights three-days sake making experience, which will let you stay in a renovated guest house directly on-premise.
Two sake breweries near Tokyo host small groups of sake enthusiasts in a compact one-night two-days sake making experience during the sake brewing season.
Increased interest in sake brewery tourism
Visiting one of the over 1000 sake breweries spread around Japan can allow you an unique view behind the scenes of the sake producers, but only sake brewing experiences enable you to begin to understand the sweat and meticulous preparation that goes into every single bottle of sake brewed.
In recent years sake tourism has really picked up along with the increasing popularity of Japan’s national drink in foreign markets abroad. Some regional sake breweries teamed up to collaboratively promote their sake breweries and surrounding areas as possible tourist destinations - like for example the Tochigi’s Prefectural Sake Brewery Association initiated with Sake Voyage.
Going beyond the standard sake brewery visit with sake tasting and (if you are lucky enough) with a tour of the brewery’s inside, a few sake breweries offer visitors unique sake experiences, where interested people can try out how to make their own sake and learn more about the sake making process side-by-side to the real-life sake brewers.
Gakkogura on Sado Island, Niigata
On Sado Island, the biggest island of Japan, Obata Shuzo renovated and repurposed an abandoned elementary school. Since 2014 sake has been brewed at the former Nishikawa Elementary School during the summer. Because of the warm temperatures in the summer, the main part of the microbrewery is located in a room-size refrigerator in order to guarantee temperatures that are needed for the sake fermentation.
The brewery is run on the four pillars of "sake brewing," "learning," "environment," and "exchange”, and is dedicated to sustainability aligned to the SDGs. At the Gakkogura (Japanese for “School Brewery”) sake is brewed with all Sado-grown rice. Further, as part of a joint project with the University of Tokyo, solar panels have been installed near the brewery, and theoretically, 100% of the energy used for sake brewing comes from natural renewable energy sources. The pillars “learning” and “exchange” are brought to life by annual themed talks between various stakeholders from academia among others.
The sake making experience on Sado Island is a one-week program in which the participants are able to run through almost all brewing steps from washing the polished rice to making the fermentation mash. Each group of a handful of participants makes a specific sake in a designated sake tank. The own-brew is then actually sold later under the Gakkogura label and is available for sale. As the number of seats is limited, an early application to the program is recommended.
In-between the program also allows enough time to discover and explore the beautiful island of Sado. The island is surprisingly wide and spacious, so having a car makes moving around a lot easier. Rental cars are available at the main port, which is connected to Niigata city.
Kurabito Stay in Nagano Prefecture
Another interesting offering that came to life just in 2020 is the Kurabito Stay in Saku, Nagano Prefecture. The Saku area of Nagano Prefecture is home to 13 sake breweries. The Kurabito Stay is based within the Kitsukura Shuzo with over 300 years of history.
Kurabito stands for brewery person or brewery worker. In the 2-nights 3-days sake making experience one can not only experience the sake brewing process hands-on but also be able to stay overnight at the brewery. The former “Hiroshiki”, a larger chamber where the sake brewers used to sleep over during the brewing season, was renovated and repurposed as the living quarters for the Kurabito guests, welcoming the guests with separate rooms and a common lounge.
During the 3 days, one can feel like the brewer for a couple of hours and help with different stages along the sake brewing process. Besides working side-by-side with a real kurabito, the experience includes sake tasting and joint breakfast sessions among others. The vicinity to the actual brewery allows one to join the early morning activities like rice steaming and moreover to immerse oneself in the whole brewery atmosphere.
The experiences are offered usually during the brewing season (fall to spring) 2-4 times per month on the weekends. Here the next experiences can be booked.
Sake Brewing Experiences near Tokyo
The Tokyo Sake Club, a group of fellow sake enthusiasts, also offered 1-night 2-days sake making experiences at two sake breweries nearby Tokyo. One is Takizawa Shuzo located in the Saitama Prefecture, north of Tokyo. The second brewery is Kidoizumi Shuzo, which is situated in the Chiba Prefecture, right at the Pacific coast on the Chiba peninsula.
Due to its short time schedule, the 2-day program is fully packed with hands-on sake making steps like Koji-making or rice washing in a very condensed form. Compared to the other two sake brewing experiences, the Tokyo Sake Club hosted experiences are only offered in Japanese and a little bit more hectic in the real brewing environment.
All of the above-mentioned sake brewing experiences are a different and unique way of getting to know the sake brewing process and sense the actual work behind each delicious sake bottle we enjoy every day.
