Osaka Wine Bar : Pinot Noir

The Lights of MinamiOsaka, Japan.
The wine-bars craze has come to the Japanese provinces and Osaka has a certain number of good wine bars. Osaka people are historically known as merchant people with a pronounced taste for good food. With a tradition of plentyful access to fresh fish (Osaka is a port) and to foreign imported delicacies, Osakans are the epicurian side of Japan. There's a cliché word to describe this passion of Osaka for good food : Kuidaore, litterally "eat oneself bankrupt"... The cliché goes on to say that Tokyo people ruin themselves on fine shoes and Kyoto people on expensive cloths. And what about about Louis Vuitton bags ?...
The place to go to experience this intense local dining culture is Minami (means South), and more precisely Shinsaibashi. In Osaka you have roughly two districts for the night and restaurant pleasures : Minami (South) and Kita (North). In short, the "serious", business-minded district is Kita, this is also where Umeda's high rises, important businesses and large train stations are located. Important businessmen or yakusas will rarely bring their guests to Minami (although for the latter we saw a couple of cars with blackened windows there which could hint that it is changing...) and artists or students will rarely choose Kita for their evening outings. There are also wine bars in Kita, but the price will be also much higher than in Minami.

Owner-Sommelier Masami UenoWe were told about this wine bar by our friend wine-consultant Akiyo who lives in between France and Japan and whose website (in Japanese) has prime information about the best French artisan vintners. There are many women in this wine story btw, showing the role they play in this new Japanese passion...
So we took the subway from Umeda (Mido-Suji line) and went out at Shinsaibashi station. The Nagahoribashi station of the Sakai-Suji line is closer but was less convenient from Umeda. In the station look for the exit to Sogo and Daimaru department stores (depato in Japanese), you need to take the street between these two stores and walk away from the station. the wine bar is quite a walk from there on this street [picture on top], after you pass an elementary school. It will be on the left upstairs (2F). The street is nice by itself, lively and with some sort of provincial quietness at the same time.Mieko Urisaka, Photographer in OsakaMieko is a Japanese photographer that B. knows from long time ago. We met her in the Pinot Noir wine bar. She was just back from a shooting for a magazine with models who came specially from Tokyo. She also loves wine and tells us her fond souvenirs with wines she had in Greece, in Santorin. The white wines there were gorgeous, made from vines that grow on arid volcanic soil and with violent winds year-around, sticking to the ground to hide from the nature's wrath. We discuss about my Torys bar visit and they draw a plan on my notebook to another "stando" bar in Kyoto, not a Suntory bar but yet, a survivor from the standing-bar era. We couldn't visit it but for those who want to dare a try, it is on Shinkyogoku street. Next time...Sipping Unfiltered Beer at the BarOwner Masami Ueno opened this bar 11 years ago. She travels every year to Burgundy and the name of her wine bar hints at a crush for Burgundy wines. She serves only French wines in her bar and the wine menu lists some 10 wines by the glass, among them Pernand-Vergelesses, Volnay, Chablis, and a Champagne (Champagne Delamotte).
After having been brought oshiboris (hot towels), we chose a glass of Pinot Auxerrois 2004 by Domaine Zusslin Valentin (Alscace), a wine with an onctuous mouth and honeyish aromas. Light sucrosity too. Sorry for the lack of price info, I'm still looking for what I was sure to have noted somewhere. The glass must have cost something like 1000 Yen (6,5 Euro) or a bit more.Jenifa (Jennifer)The wine bar interior decoration is basic with a long wooden counter and a large wooden table with high stools near the window overlooking the street. That where we sat to enjoy the view on the bar as people were coming in. Facing the bar, woodden crates full of bottles are stacked on the side, both for the pleasure of the wine-lover's eyes and because of lack of space.
The bar also serves a very good local Japanese draft beer, a Minoh beer. The Minoh brewery is located in Osaka and makes a wide range of specialty beers (click on each bottle on the Minoh page - there are even a couple of "Ganja High" beers that I'd like to try some day...). There is also a bar in Osaka which is operated by Minoh and where you can taste these beers. Mieko offered us to try it and it is an utmost savoury beer very close to the German Hefe WeissBier. The most well known of these Hefe Weissbiers is the Paulaner Hefe Weissbier of Munich and it is widely exported now. Like its German counterpart, this Japanese beer from Osaka is unfiltered and got zero additives, and has this peculiar savor and velvety mouthfeel : a feast that would makes us abandon wine...Osaka Station, Later in the Evening Pinot Noir Wine BarOsaka-Shi Chuo KuHigashi Shinsaibashi1-8-14 2FZip Code 542-0083Phone : 06-6253-1167Metro : ShinsaibashiStreet which runs between Sogo & Daimaru Dept. Stores