Getting Started
Choose by the Table: Food, Serving Style, and Occasion
An educational framework for comparing sake, shochu, liqueur and other distilled spirits through food structure, service variables and dining format.
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Getting Started
How to read labels and understand the basic categories of Japanese alcohol.
Getting Started
How to Read a Japanese Bottle Label Without Knowing Japanese
A practical guide to four fields that explain a Japanese bottle: category, ingredients when shown, alcohol content, and producer.
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Getting Started
Selecting Your First Bottle: A Thoughtful Guide for the Curious Mind
A beginner's guide to choosing Japanese sake, shochu and spirits — four simple ways to narrow the choice without memorizing technical terms.
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Getting Started
A Shochu by Nature, a Liqueur by Law
Asagiri, Kuma District, Kumamoto Prefecture. Founded in 1878, Tsutsumi Distillery introduced Gokujo Tsutsumi to the world, yet the label does not bear the word “shochu.” Under Japan’s Liquor Tax Law, this bottle is classified as a liqueur. And yet the base spirit is made from rice and rice koji. It is a traditional Kuma rice shochu distillate, aged for more than ten years in Oloroso sherry casks.
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