Recently, I have spoken to one of my listeners, who praised this podcast for its wonderful content. “But you know”, he said. “Sake is a completely new thing for me and I feel a bit overwhelmed with the amount of information you put in each episode. Why don’t you make them a bit easier to digest?” And he’s absolutely right. So I decided to do a series of episodes focusing on one particular topic, I have mentioned before. And this time it's junmai/honjozo.

Do you know what irisake was and how it was used in the Edo period? What about mirin? Can you drink it or only use it for cooking? Listen to the new episode of Sugidama Podcast featuring Kinu Yukawa, a Japanese food specialist, chef and cookery teacher to find out! Kampai!

The new episode of Sugidama Podcast is about rice, the essence of sake. What type of rice do exist, what is the difference between table and sake rice, key sake rice varieties and interesting facts. Download and enjoy! If you like the episode please leave a review in Apple Podcasts or share the episode with your friends. Kampai!

The importance of water is difficult to overestimate. It’s second only to the brewer’s skill and as important as good rice and koji. But honestly, given good water, a skilful toji can make excellent sake from even table rice. But I am not sure if even a genius of a toji can make a delicious sake from low-quality water.

What could be more disappointing than ordering something, waiting for it with excitement and then realising that it’s something you don’t like. It happens quite often unfortunately and buying and ordering sake is not an exception. So in this episode, I would like to give you a few tips on choosing sake and also talk about some parameters you will find on the bottle beside a milling ratio. And my tips of course are based on my own experience.