CHIKURIN Taoyaka

The keywords for this junmai daiginjoshu are grace and elegance, with its rice highly-polished to 35% of its original size. It has a prominent, powerful fragrance, a rounded flavour with a range of subtly different tones, and a smooth sweetness. As ever with Chikurin sake, huge importance has been attached to bringing the flavour of the rice to life and thereby allowing the drinker to fully appreciate it. The flavour and aroma complement each other perfectly, and the taste of ripe Muscat grapes lingers on briefly after drinking this sake.

CHIKURIN Fukamari

The restrained aroma of this sake brings to mind the scent of fragrant wood. This is a dry junmaishu which has a subtle, smooth sweetness buried deep within the layers of its taste. This sake gives the satisfying sensation to the mouth of brown, unpolished genmai rice. The more one drinks, the more the delicious flavour of the rice spreads over the tongue and lingers on the drinker's palate. This sake is best enjoyed warm as atsukan.

HOU HOU SHU

This is a new addition to the Marumoto brewery's repertoire, a delightfully unusual and memorable semi-sparkling junmaishu. It has been brewed using no additional ingredients beyond water and a delicious, slightly sweet sake rice. Fizzing when opened with natural carbon, this is a sake comparable to fine champagne, although rather than shaking it, the bottle should be gently upended before opening. Its taste will come as a very pleasant surprise to the drinker and is very light, with only 6% alcohol by volume.