So, How Did You Get Into Sake? Exploring Sake Brewery Origins

One reason sake culture is so fascinating is that when you learn a brewery’s history you also absorb a little about the history of the town in which it’s located, and often something about the social, financial or cultural currents of the time. Take for example, how breweries started. The most obvious reason was probably to fulfill the needs of the village; locals, quite understandably, wanted to drink sake.

But for some family businesses sake making was an add-on. At Tenzan Brewery in Saga Prefecture (makers of the much-loved brand Shichida) for example, the original family business, launched in 1861, was a water-powered mill. The family milled flour on the Gion River in the town of Ogi and also made widely coveted noodles. They did a little rice milling on the side, too. But when the local sake maker went out of business, the Shichida family found itself in possession of a sake brewery, equipment and all. By the early 1960s, sake was the family’s one and only business.

Yucho Brewery in Nara, popular for its Takacho bodaimoto and Kaze no Mori and Alpha brands, dates back to 1719. But even before, that, starting in the 15th or 16th centuries, the family was in the business of producing rapeseed, or canola oil, which was a prominent industry in the area. This former identity explains what the kanji character for oil (油 ）is doing in the name Yucho (油長).

One way owner-president Yoshihiko Yamamoto can estimate how far back the canola oil business may have been conducted is by counting the sake-brewing heads of family before him. Like many sake brewery owners, he assumed the hereditary name of the head of family when he took over the business. His sake-brewing name is Chobei, which he officially assumed last year as the 13th-generation heir. Yamamoto tells me that the father of the first Chobei died in 1685; calculating back from that, he’s come up with his estimate for the length of the rapeseed oil chapter of his family’s history. He also sent me an impressive photo of his very lengthy family tree.

At Kodama Brewery in Akita Prefecture (makers of the award-winning Taiheizan and Tenko brands) it was the local tax inspector who got the successful maker of soy sauce and miso to turn its hand to brewing sake. The business was founded in 1879, but didn’t get into sake brewing until 1913. Some time before that, the friendly local tax inspector suggested “Why not add sake as well?"

Since the Kodama family had the resources to take on a new product line, it took the inspector’s advice. Eiko Kodama, head of international sales and marketing for the brewery, speculates that the inspector suggested sake because “we were already quite successful in the shoyu (soy sauce) business and a good tax payer in the area.” Based on its track record, the tax inspector may have thought the family would succeed in the sake business, further enriching his agency. (The role of the National Tax Agency in Japanese sake is worth a whole separate story!)

Adding sake production to the family business “was meant to be and did turn out to be a big bonus for the tax agency for a long time,” says Kodama, who explains that tax on sake is collected at the national level through regional and local offices. Although tax on soy sauce is no longer levied at the national level, back in 1913 it was, so the brewery paid full taxes on both products. (Their soy sauce and miso is still sold under the Yamakyu brand).

I thought it was common for families to brew both sake and soy sauce, since my grandmother, who was born and raised in Chiba Prefecture, once mentioned that her family had a honke (本家、head house) and a bunke（分家, an extended family member group). These divisions were reflected in the business dealings of Japanese families as well. In my grandmother’s family, one brewed soy sauce and the other brewed sake.

But Kodama notes that while you might think that since sake, miso and soy sauce are all fermented products they require similar know-how, they are actually fairly different. Each uses different base substrate (whether grain such as rice or barley, or a legume like soy beans), koji fungus and yeast varieties. And sake production—the only one that requires the shubo, or yeast starter—also demands a much higher level of skill and craftsmanship and large quantities of pristine water. Water quality is less important in soy sauce due to the high levels of salt added. So not just any family soy sauce or miso operation can tack on sake making.

Because those koji fungus and yeast types are completely different, adds Kodama, the kura, or breweries, for each product must be placed far apart from each other, and great care taken to avoid cross-contamination. So lots of space is another must-have in order to create a multi-product fermentation business. The Kodama family had plenty of land as well as access to mountain, spring and well water sources. All it needed to develop was the know-how, which it acquired over time.

In many Japanese family businesses, as the honke and bunke grow into larger concerns they pull away from each other. In the Kodama family, the honke and bunke worked together as charter members of the business. But as bunke family members gradually migrated to the city, the honke was expected to continue operating the family business as its owner.

In Yamamoto’s family, the first Chobei was the chonan, or eldest son. While he ventured into uncharted territory and started the Yūchō sake brewery, the honke, or main family business of canola oil production, fell to his younger brother Sukesaburo.

It turns out it was a good idea to branch out into sake. The Yamamoto family’s oil business did not continue beyond Sukesaburo’s generation, while Yucho Brewery is thriving today, through technical innovation grounded in a reverence for Nara’s ancient sake techniques.

One other brewery that at one time produced sake and shoyu was Miyasaka Brewery (makers of the Masumi brand). Masumi representative Keith Norum explains that the family business began with sake but over time, the honke, led by current president Naotaka Miyasaka’s grandfather’s eldest brother—started miso and shoyu production, and the bunke continued on as the Nagano Miyasaka brewers of sake.

Please let me know of any other brewery origin stories that involve a change in product line, or an interesting honke and bunke saga, and we can continue to expand our knowledge of sake culture!

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