Quality Grade: Junmai Daiginjo

Seimaibuai: 50% (50% of rice grain polished away)

Rice: Yamada Nishiki

Yeast: #9

Nihonshu-do:3

Alcohol: 15.6%

Acidity: 1.2

Brewery Name: Takasago Shuzo

Brewery Founded: 1899

Toji (master brewer): Tokujiro Sasaki

Brewery President: Shun Kohiyama

Also available in 300ml bottles.

Spice, minerality, and banana skin dominate the aroma profile of this shizuku- pressed sake. Medium-bodied with a clean impact, the flavors run the gamut of a well-crafted Junmai-Daiginjo- melons, herbs, vanilla essence and concentrated mineral flavors that keep the sake focused well into its long, ethereal finish. Truly one of the ‘Rolls-Royces’ of sake.

Pair with:

• Caviar
• Seared foie gras
• Blue crab fritters
• Grilled kobe beef with bordelaise sauce

94 Points, Stephen Tanzers International Wine Cellar, August 2007

“Very pale yellow. Complex nose offers saline, herbal and spicy notes, with a minty coolness. Wonderfully subtle, complex and precise, with a distinctly ethereal quality, high-pitched minerality and superb lift. Finishes very dry and persistent, with lovely lift. This is made inside an igloo in Hokkaido, in Japan’s extreme north, where below-freezing temperature prevents unwanted bacteria from surviving, thus ensuring a very pure sake. The clear sake is separated from the fermenting rice lees by putting it into canvas bags and allowing the sake to drip out overnight (as opposed to pressing it).”