Matsuse sake brewery (Shiga, Japan)

Main room at the Matsuse sake brewery

Yuge, Ryūō (Shiga prefecture)
The Matsuse sake brewery is a small family brewery that is in the sake business since 1860. It is located north of Kyoto in the Shiga prefecture, in a rice-growing valley between two mountain ranges. The facility centered around the brewery room that was built in the early years of the Shōwa era (1930s') is located in the middle of rice paddies along with a cluster of houses typical of the modern Japanese rural habitat. Matsuse is among the few sake breweries that work with farmers who eschew chemicals and herbicide for their rice supply, and also develop the production of terroir sake, therefore it is no surprise that cult winemakers like Pierre Overnoy, Emmanuel Houillon and Hirotake Ooka (pictured on right) visited the brewery a year ago. The heart of the brewery has the vibes of a real place and apart from a few machines it is very traditional and relies on the expert work of diligent kurabitos (sake brewery workers). on the picture above you can see the vatroom on the street level (it holds 18 marge fermenters lined along the walls) as well as the stairs leading to the upper sory where there's a shrine on the left and the small room where the rice is cooled down and dried. To access each area you change shoes, here for example leaving the ones for the vatroom on the ground and putting one the ones waiting on the stairs.

The brewery which employs a dozen workers in the producing season moved along the years focusing on the sourcing of its rice and water, working with local farmers it convinced to farm organic (something more difficult to do with rice growing than vine growing) and digging wells deep enough to find pure water tables. Brewmaster Keizou Ishida (pictured on left) who began to work here 17 years ago as a simple kurabito has implemented extensive changes in the brewing and rice_handling processes along the years for an even better quality, reinstating age-old methods.

Rice fields around the brewery

Until a few decades ago, the Matsuse sake brewery would buy all its Yamada Nishiki rice from Joto, in Hyogo prefecture but the demand from so many breweries for this quality rice made it more and more difficult and expensive, so, while still buying from over there, they looked around to source their rice in the local Ryuo-cho valley, especially that farmers who were until then growing table rice only were now growing Kankyo Kodawari Mai, a rice with a quality considered higher than the famed Yamade from Joto. Shiga's regulation for the production of rice is heavily regulated in terms of environment protection and Mr Tadayuki Matsuse (pictured on left with head brewer Keizou Ishida) who is a 6th-generation sake brewery owner also found farmers in the valley that were ready to work fully organic, without pesticides and industrial fertilizers, something which is not easy as it is, like for organic vineyard farming time consuming and needs more labor, which is rare and costly in Japan, many of this small farms using only the family to work in the fields.

Much of the sake you drink nowadays is made from non-organic rice and the issue will become more important with consumers asking questions. Cultivating rice organic is not easy but the local Shiga government has set up since 10 years ago the strictest standards in part to protect Lake Biwa nearby (the largest freshwater lake in Japan, providing drinking water for about 15 million people in the Kansai region, Kyoto, Osaka & Kobe) , pushing rice farmers to use only natural fertilizers and the lowest amount of chemicals; to this day 65 % of the area surface follows these rules, putting Shiga ahead in the organic conversion among Japan's rice producing regions. The hard work of the Matsuse brewery toward quality came to light nationally through well-known sake critic and shop owner Koichi Hasegawa who operates several shops in the Tokyo area selling small sake producers.

By the way, speaking of the region of Shiga, this is also the cradle of Omi beef, the oldest among the three cow breeds in Japan behind the wagyu, which are known for the quality of their meat. People in the West are now familiar with the Kobe beef but few are aware of the Omi beef. Omi beef has a 400-year history here, you can learn more from this report (in English) made in one of the local cattle farms of Shiga.

Rice fermenters

Thanks to the welcome of Mr Matsuse and of chief brewer Keizou Ishida (whom I met in Paris and in my Loire hideout), I shared the life of the kurabitos for three days, sleeping on a tatami in their quarters and sharing their meals. Before me, a few years ago, cult Jura winemaker Jean-Marc Brignot (who now lives in Sado Island although he travels to France each year to make wine) and Alex of Vineyardgate (both pictured on right) also shared the life of the kurabitos in the brewery, another sign of the interest sparked by the unique terroir/natural approach at Matsuse Shuzo.

Sake making is a seasonal work, let's say from october to april, and the workers who don't live in a village nearby basically sleep in the brewery, which makes more sense as the workday begins at 6:30. The process of sake making bears some resemblance with winemaking but it's more complicated and involves more stages and processes. A strict respect of the timing, humidity conditions and hygiene contribute to the making of an excellent sake and in this regard the staff was very efficient and well trained. Like yopu do even in private homes in Japan, you leave your street shoes at the door and will take sandals on, changing once again for other sandals if you enter the koji room or walk up to the drying chamber.

And it was also interesting for me to see that at the moment of my visit an Australian winemaker was there too, Matt Froude of Municipal Wines (pictured here after having poured a bucket of steamed rice into a fermenter) had been beginning to work since a few weeks, intending to stay for this winter season. His aim in the future when back in Australia is to make unpasteurized sake (most sake you find on the market including from the top breweries is pasteurized).

Steamed rice for kimoto

The first thing I saw in the morning was when they took out a few buckets of steamed rice from the top of the steamer for kimoto which is an old way of preparing the yeast starter (more info on this page). The steamed rice will be flatened evenly on these large trays to cool down and will get later some koji mold. Keizou doesn't add cultivate yeast in his kimoto, no chemicals either, no lactic bacteria (it's done routinely in mainstream breweries).

Kimoto stirring

This is the traditional kimito stirring as it was invented in 17th-century Japan, the kurabitos here are kneading, stirring, beating the steamed rice which had a bit of koji and water added in shallow tub named Hangiri, this process is done in a choregraphed manner along a minuted amount of time, the goal being to cool the rice and stimulate the activity of the koji mold, which add depth to the sake taste. This process will be reapeated 3 times. The word for handling these tools is Yama-Oroshi, it is a typical scene in a high-quality family brewery and it needs a lot of strength from the workers. The steamed rice will then go into an intermediary-size vat for the starter. Head brewer Keizou Ishida (in red) also takes part to the task.

Of course most breweries use shortcuts to avoid this traditional kimoto stage, read these few sentences picked in a book on the issue (very interesting to learn about it because we found the same patterns in the winemaking techniques' changes along the 20th century, also in the name of faster process, quick product delivery & reduced costs) :

The yamahai method for making moto was developed during the Meiji era (1868-1912) as a labour-saving development of the kimoto method, for it was during the very early twentieth century that brewers realized that all the hard work was not absolutely necessary for getting all the koji enzymes to work on rice starch properly. An employee of the National Institute for Brewing Studies discovered that koji enzymes would work quite well without all that pounding, as long as a little more water was added, and the temperature of the mash was raised a little. In addition, there is an initial mixing of pure koji rice with hot water, which hastens rice saccharification before bulk steamed rice is added. The development of this new methodology signalled the end of yamaoroshi (if necessary), and the new technique was named yama-oroshi hai-shi, which literally means "yama-oroshi ceased", or "discontinuation of yama-oroshi". This mouthful was later shortened to yamahai. While the yamahai method was developed to shorten production time, it is slower than the modern method of making moto, and is now only used in specialty brews for the "earthy" flavours it produces. A couple years after the yamahai process was developed, it was found that, if lactic acid was added to the moto at the beginning, the whole process could be completed in around half the "normal" time. This was called the sokujo process and, today, most sake is made with sokujo moto (meaning "fast-developing"), although it took about a decade before the method became widely accepted. A pure yeast culture is used to seed sokujo mash. Yamanai moto takes around a month to develop, whilst sokujo moto can be ready in a couple of weeks. Flavour-wise, yamanai has a higher sweetness and acidity, with richer, deeper, more pronounced flavours than sokujo.
[extract from the book : Alcohol and its Role in the Evolution of Human Society -- Ian S. Hornsey]

Rice milling workshop

I visited the side building next to the main brewery buiding, that's where the rice is milled and polished for the different types of sake they make here, some of the rice being grown very close from the brewery (picture on left). As you may know it is necessary to polish or mill the rice to make sake, as getting rid of the outer layers will allow water to get inside and you will have a smoother fermentation and transformation of the starch into sugar then alcohol. When you read that a sake is made from 55 % polished rice, that means that 45 % of the outer layer of the grains have been milled away. This is done in these types of rooms with such a machine.

Matsuse, unlike most similar small-size breweries, has its own machine which allows it to work its way, for example taking whatever time it takes for the milling, the longer the better in order not to "burn" the rice grains with excessive heat. Doing it themselves allows for a more gentle handling and milling, but most small breweries can't afford and delegate this job to specialized companies and thay don't have a say on the way they do the polishing, which can translate in lower-quality sake at the end. the problem is that as all sake breweries begin to make sake in autumn, these milling companies have a lot demand at the same time and they are forced to rush, doing time-consuming "gentle" milling being out of question. The machine is computer controlled and they just have to set the time and speed. It will take 26 hours to get a 60 % milled rice (60 % remaing volume). 36 to 38 hours will be necessary for a 50 % polishing. A service company would do that in a much shorter time.

Yamada Nishiki rice

Keizou walks up a pallet of rice bags, grabs one to show me the rice, it is Yamada Nishiki rice (rated A+ "Tokujo" meaning upper quality of this rice), special for sake making of course, it comes from Hyōgo prefecture in Kansai, this is the best area for this yamada nishiki type of rice. At Matsuse they source the rice from 10 farmers who provide 820 % of the needs of the brewery. Each contracted farmer does the farming but they follow the requirements. Depending of where it grows, sandy or clayish soil, the yamade nishiki rice yields a different character in the end sake.

Before & after

Here you can see the difference in the rice grains before & after the polishing process. The rice on the left is the original version when delivered by the farmer, and the one on the right is after it gets rid of 45 % of its outer shell (we call it 65 % then), it looks really reduced to its core, the harder, less tender outer part is gone and the water will easily permeate the rice now.

Water well

Here Keizou shows me where they source the water for the sake brewery. Unlike for winemaking you need lots of water to have the rice ferment and become sake, and it is very important to have an optimum water quality as well as devoid of residues. Keizou says that in his opinion each water carries its terroir qualities. Here they pump at a depth of 124 meters (407 feet), Keizou says that this area has a lot of available water even at shallower depths but until 90 meters the different water tables contains iron which is not so good for sake. The water tables further deep are physically separated by a thick layer of earth and according to the lab analysis don't have this iron component.

Keizou who overlooked this issue had lots of water samples taken and checked (it was quite expensive) and when he found the right water profile at 124 meters he asked his boss who agreed for the move and the well was dug by a specialized company, this was about 7 years ago. This water is rather soft, with less minerals. Usually, soft water in Japan is found in the upper water tables, not at this depth. This water, whilst having few minerals have a structure and this is what gives their sake an ability to age. Here is a very informative page on the importance of water quality for sake.
I remember that when we visited the Kenbishi Shuzo a few years back, we were told that they had water trucked from 13 different wells, this shows the importance of the water for sake brewing.
Mr Matsuse the owner who lives with his family in his house next to the brewery grows his vegetable garden here next to the well of which he can use the water through the tap. I drank some of it to experience the feel of a deep water well and one that is used for sake.

Washing rice (video)

This is certainly the first stage in sake brewing, with the polished rice entering the brewery and getting in contact with water. The rice bags full of rice polished at the desired ratio are opened, and a given weight of rice will be poured in individual bags, which in turn will be abundantly hosed and washed, and then soaked in a tub full of water during a precisely measured time (around one minute if i'm right), then speedly taken out, left a minute so that the water drains out, then further drained from running water through some sort of a vacuum cleaner (again chronometered time), then the bag is weighed, then put in the steamer.

Carrying soaked rice

The stage of washing and soaking the rice is quite some sport, it is a well calculated excercise where you have to keep your eyes trained on the chronometers (which are positioned on the side of the drying machine). Here Mahiro grabs a bag of rice out of its water tub and will put it for a minute standing still so that the water can drip down. The operation aims to get the exact amount of water inside the rice grainsand not more, that's why the precise timing for the washing, the soaking, the dripping and the vacuum drying.
Mahiro is the son of a farmer nearby who provides part of the rice to the brewery. he works at the farm and in season also at the brewery, this way he sees the two sides of the trade.

Filling the steamer with the soaked rice

The steamer (koshiki)

This is obviously stage 2 when the washed/soaked rice had had the correct amount of water, it is put in the steamer which is covered with a cloth when full and will stay for about an hour in there, the steam going through the cloth at the top. The steaming is important because once the water has penetrated inside the rice grain, the steam will further soften it and finish the job of preparing the rice as a fermentation terrain, making the later stage of fermentation and transformation of the starch into sugar and then alcohol easier. The kurabitos organized the inside of the steamer with several layers of rice, each separated by a cloth, the upper layer being used for the kōji, the preparation with the mold ferments that is central to the brewing of sake.

Steamer tool

Speaking of the steamer, that is not a simple steamer and this tool here makes a big difference in the quality of the steam, which is central to the softening of the rice grain, and as a result, to the transformation of starch into sugar and alcohol. This machine here is unique, head brewer Keizou Ishide ordered it to a researcher who made this prototype. Usually breweries use a boiler generating steam, but this state-of-the art prototype made from german parts the two cylinders) can separate the steam from the water droplets, sending only steam into the rice. I understand that like for winemaking, details like that count and added to other details they make a great sake.

Head brewer Keizou ishida checking the steamed rice texture

Rushing the steamed rice for kōji

Then, when the correct amount of time has allowed the rice to soften like it's supposed to do, the steamer kurabitos take the cloth off the steamer and begin to shovel the hot steamed rice into buckets and rush them to large coooling/drying trays in the adjacent room. There, other kurabitos will spread the rice evenly and move it upside down from time to time before tying the cloths as bags and carrying them upstairs for further drying.

From the steamer to the koji room

Depending of the batch you're preparing, the rice goes different ways. Here after the steamer is opened and the head brewer tasted the rice, it is shovelled on the drying machine, then sprayed with koji mold while rolling on the conveyor belt and then rushed directly (after it fell into in cloth bags) into the koji room where it will be kept at a high temperature and humidity levels to allow the mold to prosper on the rice.

Unloading the steamed rice on the cooling/drying machine

The cooling/drying machine

When not going directly on the trays and the koji room, the steamed riche goes through this drying/cooling machine on a conveyor belt, after which it is put into cloth bags and eventually poured into a fermenter. in some occasions the steamed rice gets sprinkled with koji mold right on the conveyor belt which you can see above the machine.

Pouring bags of steamed rice in small vat

For this particular batch the rice gets into what i think is a starter vat, a smaller fermenter. The kurabitos use pieces of cloth as bags to carry the rice most of the time, it's a very gentle way to move it around I think, and I guess it's good also because it lets the air and humidity circulate. What you have to understand is that sake is made through multiple parralel fermentation, so you have several fermenters brewing alongside and ultimately this will be blended in the same large vat, but for a European more familiar with winemaking that may be confusing.

Breakfast

Every morning after a couple hours of work, there's the breakfast, of course a Japanese breakfast as generous as a lunch, great moment of the day with miso soup, fish, vegetables, steamed rice (not the same one than in the brewery of course). The kurabitos chat or watch the news on TV, relaxing interlude before getting back to work. I was appraised for my ability to sit on my knees which few westerners can stand, but after some time i also liked crossing my legs. Lunch is samely taken together in this same room, great meal too and very healthy, the only thing is that here in Japan people eat too quickly, they should take their time. After lunch people would go to their rooms for a 0-40 minute nat and go back to work afterthen.

The large table-tray of steamed rice

Here is the koji room where the mold will develop in the rice thanks to the right humidity and temperature. You have to wash your hands throughly before entering this room because any germ could interfere with the mold, and of course you will use only the sandals that are already inside. It's quite humid in there and when you wear glasses you have to wipe then a few times, I had to do the same with the camera lens before I could shoot any picture.

Rice being knead in the koji room

From time to time the rice is moved to the center in its large sheet and then spread over the whole surface again, here again, to help the mold get access to the whole rice and have the humidity and temperature of the room affect all the clumps of rice (the kneading also aims at breaking all the clods of rice that tends to stick together.

Rice being rolled under a blanket And there's a time the rice is also put together in one big mass and left alone for a while under a blanket, with a thermometer sensor in thec middle of the heap to monitor the temperature. Special openings in the wall with forced ventilation allow to have the temperature & humidity drop in the room in just little more than one minute when needed, the kurabitos closing the openings as soon as the atmosphere inside the room reaches the desired humidity and temp.

Inside the koji room

Filling boxes in the koji room

After the stage on this large table in the koji room the rice will be distributed in a dozen plastic boxes with temperature sensors in half of them for monitoring. Usually breweries use wood boxes or trays but at Matsuse they inovated with these boxes because their see-through ventilated walls allows a better exchange in terms of humidity and temperature.

Seeding the steamed rice with mold

Sprinkling the mold

The mold

Drying room

after the koji room the rice is brought upstairs in boxes in this room where it will dry in these two large tubs.

End of the drying stage

Tasting early sake

Here at one point Matt offered me to taste moromi (the main fermentation stage of sake) and shubo (the starter stage) both having a very different expression. I tasted what was to be later Nigori (unfiltered) sake which was not intended to be delicate. The second was so delicate, light, more aerial type of sake, loved it. Then I tasted the yeast starter (which will be added to the bigger tank) which was yet very different with much more acidity. Matt loves it, he says when you like wine this speaks to you, I agree, very expressive with lemon or citrus peel notes, and goes down with glory when swallowed. What you taste here is never bottled as such but Matt says that if one day he makes his own sake he'll try to make something like this, and he'll try to make unpasteurized sake as well. He says he tasted several unpasteurized sake in Australia from Sake Shop and loves that style of sake and unpasteurized sake isn't that expensive in australia, he remembers paying some 30 AUD for a 720ml bottle.

Keizou taking a sample of sake mash...

...and offering me to taste the sake at this stage.

Keizou says it's not mature yet, that's like when you taste from a tank of wine, when it's far from the finished wine it's pretty difficult for non-experts like me to feem much : the sake from this tank at this stage was very thick, very nigori style (the unfiltered, white sake that can be purchased in bottles, of which I'm not a fan). Unlike for wine tasting from a vat or a barrel, we don't put it back in the tank afterwards, they'll put it in an entry-level sake.

The press

Here is the Yabuta press which they use to press the rice at the end of the fermentation, I will not see the pressing, as the process was to begin after I left, but I could see the preparation which is an intricate operation involving lots of cloths and sheets. For certain types of sake they use the Shizuku method (there are three press methods in sake making) which is an older way with large cotton bags from which the sake drips.

Preparing the filter cloth plates

This press is of the Assakuki type, almost always done with a Yabuta, THE press maker here for sake (the machines don't change much along the years). it looks like a giant accordion composed of filters, vertical metal plates wrapped with clean cloth. You can see here how they put the cloth on each plate, quite a long operation given the number of plates.

Laundry

With so many cloths, sheets and bags used in sake making, you need a in-house laundry and they have a very professional one here at Matsuse, it's almost working all the time, washing and drying to keep all these cloths immaculate and germ free before re-use. Atsushi, who also takes part to all the other kurabito tasks, is in charge here. Another thing where water is important and it's a good thing that there's no shortage of water in this country.

Stirring the fermenters

Another regular scene in a sake brewery is when the kurabitos stirr the fermenters and mix around the rice, the water, whatever rice may have been added and eventually the ice cubes that help the temperature remain moderate. Making sake is blending repeatedly different batches already in their fermentation process and stirring is important to homogenize the mash. Also it's important to remind that with grape fermentation the grape skins tend to float at the surface (that's why we "punch the cap" in the fermenters) whilst with sake the rice sits at the bottom, so you have to bring it up during the stirring.

But where's the sake, you'll ask : This will be the subject of the next story, featuring the terroirs and the tasting of the different cuvées of sake...

Bubbling tank

Matsuse sake brewery Visit report at Matsuse by Jamie goode Yuge 475, Ryūō (Shiga prefecture)