Joined: 15 Jun 2004 Posts: 46182 Location: Los Skandolous, California Country:
Posted: Tue Oct 18, 2005 7:37 am Post subject:
ahochaude wrote:
Pic of my Awamori bottle.
got f*cked up on that ish when i was visiting japan with my friend...but then he got more messed up than i did because it gave him the courage to think we would make it back to our hotel on the last train of the evening which we didn't... we got booted one stop before at Hiro-o in Tokyo...thank God the cab ride was short b/c those suckers are expensive.
so what's this mixutre of ichiko and what? tea? what kind of tea? oolong? and in what proportions...do tell
Joined: 13 Oct 2004 Posts: 8550 Location: California Country:
Posted: Tue Oct 18, 2005 7:39 am Post subject:
Tu_triky wrote:
so what's this mixutre of ichiko and what? tea? what kind of tea? oolong? and in what proportions...do tell
oshiete kudasai.
It was oolong tea and Iichiko. In what proportions? I couldn't tell you, but the drink was excellent. It doesn't hammer you to the point you could be drinking piss and say it was good.
Joined: 15 Jun 2004 Posts: 46182 Location: Los Skandolous, California Country:
Posted: Tue Oct 18, 2005 7:42 am Post subject:
dochira wrote:
It was oolong tea and Iichiko. In what proportions? I couldn't tell you, but the drink was excellent. It doesn't hammer you to the point you could be drinking piss and say it was good.
thx man...next time i go to mitsuwa i'll pick up a bottle and some tea and drown myself in the spirit of experimentation.
Joined: 13 Oct 2004 Posts: 8550 Location: California Country:
Posted: Tue Oct 18, 2005 7:44 am Post subject:
Tu_triky wrote:
thx man...next time i go to mitsuwa i'll pick up a bottle and some tea and drown myself in the spirit of experimentation.
Sounds good. There are drinks that give you that "strong alcohol" face....this one is not one of them. If I had to describe it, it's like a stronger oolong tea (the strength from the Iichiko).
Joined: 15 Jun 2004 Posts: 46182 Location: Los Skandolous, California Country:
Posted: Tue Oct 18, 2005 7:48 am Post subject:
dochira wrote:
Sounds good. There are drinks that give you that "strong alcohol" face....this one is not one of them. If I had to describe it, it's like a stronger oolong tea (the strength from the Iichiko).
well as you say...the dilution of the alcohol lessens the effect of the alcohol in that it's not as concentrated at the time of absorption...moreover, some studies suggest there are compounds present in tea that actually slow the body's absorption of alcohol so you don't reach higher levels of toxicity as rapidly as you might without tea.
A Yamagata brewery puts cedar-flavored taruzake back on top
Comparisons between sake and wine are easy to make—too�@easy sometimes, as I have discussed in this column before. While there are a good number of similarities that, once realized, can make sake very approachable to those that know wine, there is a limit to them and, in fact, there are many ways in which the two ambrosias are almost opposite.
One oft-compared point is the use of wood during fermentation and aging. These days, however, for the vast majority of sake there is little to discuss as it is brewed in ceramic-lined stainless steel tanks. As such, woodiness is not part of the flavor profile of most sake; when it is, it doesn�ft come directly from wood itself.
Yet hope still exists for fans of heavily oaked chardonnay and it comes in the form of taruzake. While taruzake too is fermented in metal tanks, this nostalgic brew has been stored in small casks made of sugi (cryptomeria; essentially Japanese cedar) for a spell before being shipped. The deliberate objective in doing this is to pull into the flavors and aromas a fairly strong if usually pleasant presence of cedar-like wood.
Taruzake is commonly enjoyed at New Year, often in the small wooden boxes called masu (also made of sugi), with a pinch of salt in one corner to taste between sips, but it can, with a bit of hunting, be found all year round. Just be aware of what you are getting in to when you purchase one.
The truth is that until about 50 or 60 years ago all sake was taruzake. While enamel-lined tanks first came into use in 1923 and slowly grew in acceptance (finally replacing most wood circa 1950), glass bottles were much slower to catch on. Sake was still put into the wooden taru at the brewery and shipped to the wholesaler, who sold it to consumers straight from the taru into their own personal take-home bottles. Even then, however, sake brewed in wooden tanks was not all that woody because the tanks were first aged and aired out, often serving an apprenticeship as water containers for several years. (A handful of brewers have revived wooden tanks, albeit for but one or two batches a year.)
The catch with today�fs deliberate taruzake is that, since the whole point is to convey �gwoodiness,�h essentially that is all you can taste and smell. Any hint of fruit, flowers, herbs or rice is pretty much overwhelmed. This in and of itself can be enjoyable, especially at festival time, but taruzake generally does not fall into the range of premium sake since all subtlety is cloaked. Rarely does one see something like a taruzake ginjoshu or, heaven forbid, daiginjo—the two top grades of sake.
Even just five decades ago sake was significantly different than it is now, being much fuller, richer and sweeter. It was the kind of brew that stood up to storage and shipping in taru. Today�fs ginjo simply did not exist back then and is a much more delicate animal, which is why it wimps out to wood so easily.
There is, however, one notable exception: Taruhei Brewery in Yamagata. Two of its brands, Taruhei and Sumiyoshi, are all taruzake at every grade, from honjozo to daiginjo. Sumiyoshi is the drier of the two and Taruhei the richer, but both sport a nice amber color and genteel wooden touch that is far from overpowering; rather, it supports and melds in with the other flavor and aroma components. Both are nice at room temperature, but also gently warmed—�etis the season, after all.
Taruhei�fs secret is aging the sake in the taru for a relatively short time. Its marketing material says �ga certain period of time,�h but having visited the brewery I know it�fs a scant one week. (Don�ft tell anyone you read it here.) This keeps the imparted woodiness down to a level that Taruhei�fs brewers feel contributes significantly to their sake. From the taste of things, they seem to be right.
Sumiyoshi and Taruhei are both well distributed and can be purchased at major department stores, including Mitsukoshi, Tobu and Seibu in Ikebukuro, and Seibu and Tokyu in Shibuya. John Gauntner will hold a sake seminar at Takara in Yurakucho on Saturday, Nov 12
Joined: 01 Aug 2005 Posts: 171 Location: Michigan Country:
Posted: Fri Oct 21, 2005 9:21 am Post subject:
Hm....favorite drink...let see...I have to say Bubble Tea..the lychee flavor one...delicious!!...I love Topica and that little white thing...it soo gooddddd
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