Sake brewery tour: Katayama Shuzo in Nikko, Tochigi

Sep. 18. 2022

by Kyoko Nagano

I just posted about Watanabesahei Shoten a day before but here, let me introduce about another wonderful sake brewery in Nikko, Tochigi prefecture – Katayama Shuzo located in walking distance from Watanabesahei Shoten.

Katayama Shuzo’s Kuramoto Toji Tomoyuki Katayama san is same age with Watanabesahei’s president Yasuhiro Watanabe san and they went to same school during youth days. (until junior high school – they went to different high schools and Universities)

Founded in 1879, Katayama Shuzo is led by Tomoyuki san who is the 7th generation, the style he learned is Shimotsuke Toji (one of the Toji guilds) and it is a very small sake brewery.

The characteristics of the sake is, undiluted Genshu sake.

The front of the store has a big sign saying Genshu 原酒 (undiluted sake) – Brandname Kashiwazakari

Koshiki – where the brewery steam rice in the old fashion “wagama" style

This is the sake pressing machine – very old fashioned “Saseshiki" – it takes more time to press out the sake compared with the Yabuta style – thanks for taking off the mask and pose in front of the Saseshiki!

You are welcome to drink and take back the delicious underground water – it is coming from 16 meters below. Very clean and delicious water from Nikko mountains

We had 3 different kinds of sake, left Muroka Namagenshu Sugao (Junmai), middle one is Junmai Ginjo Sugao (Muroka Namagemshu) and then the right one is Daiginjo Sugao, Muroka Namagenshu.

It was hard to pick one – they were all Muroka Namagenshu (undiluted, unfiltered, unpasteurized sake) but I bought the middle Junmai Ginjo Sugao and also their fantastic sake cake to take back home!

This sake cake won the cake competition award (how awesome is that)

Sorry I forgot to take the photo of what was inside since it was so yummy! I heard that it is served at Ritz Carlton Hotel in Nikko – so you know how good that is!

Thanks to Katayama-san and NearbyTokyo.com & sakevoyage.com for providing good information about Katayama Shuzo.

You might want to find more here: https://nearbytokyo.com/katayama-sake-brewery/

KATAYAMA SAKE BREWERY

From Sake Voyage link

Both Watanabesahei Shoten and Katayama Shuzo are walking distance from train stations depending on where you are coming from and if you ever travel to Nikko, be sure to drop by these wonderful breweries. I put google map of Watanabesahei in the previous post but here is the google map of Katayama Shuzo so you won’t get lost.

Have a nice sakeful day!

#sake brewery visit (22)