A Japanese sake maker marked the grand opening of its brewery in upstate New York with hopes of catering to local taste buds through its renowned Dassai brand.

Asahi Shuzo Co. in Iwakuni, Yamaguchi Prefecture, launched “junmai daiginjo,” a bottle of the highest quality of sake, at the new Dassai Blue Sake Brewery under the Dassai Blue line.

It was the first time for Asahi Shuzo to open a brewery outside of Japan.

“This represents the first real step,” said Kazuhiro Sakurai, CEO of Asahi Shuzo. “We will now work on encouraging consumers the world over to embrace the taste of Japanese sake. It’s exciting.”

The sake maker is looking to boost its share of sales in the U.S. market and help cast off the alcoholic drink’s current image in the nation as a food garnish.

“Sake is only consumed in the United States as an accompaniment to Japanese food,” said Sakurai.

He visited the Yamaguchi prefectural government office on Sept. 15 to report the opening of Dassai Blue Sake Brewery to Yamaguchi Governor Tsugumasa Muraoka.

Muraoka praised the move, describing it as “really great that Japanese sake is so highly evaluated that they will be aggressively shipped all over the globe.”

A ceremony on Sept. 23 at Dassai Blue Sake Brewery heralded its introduction, with 450 officials from regional liquor shops and restaurants reportedly invited to try Dassai Blue.

The brewery is a two-hour drive from New York City. Covering an area totaling 62,400 square meters, the plant is outfitted with a rice mill and brewing equipment among other implements.

Its output comes to 1,260 kiloliters. Brewery tours and sampling sessions are available at the establishment, too.

Asahi Shuzo embarked on construction of the brewery in 2016. Completion was pushed back to March of this year due to the COVID-19 pandemic.

Yamada Nishiki grown in Japan is used for brewing, but Asahi Shuzo is moving to cultivate the short-grain rice at a farm in Arkansas for sake production at some point.

Locally pumped water is already being used for brewing.

A 720-milliliter bottle of Type 50, the first bottle from the Dassai Blue line, carries a price tag of $34.99 (5,200 yen). It is available at retail stores and restaurants.

Asahi Shuzo will be expanding its sales channel primarily in New York state for the time being. 

The name Dassai Blue is based on the Japanese proverb “though blue dye comes from the indigo plant, it is bluer than indigo,” meaning that students sometimes surpass their teachers.

WINNING OVER CUSTOMERS

Dassai Blue aims to go “beyond the original Japan-made Dassai” in quality.

The overseas brewery was set up in a quest to ramp up the consumption of Japanese sake in the alcoholic beverage market outside the country.

Data compiled by Japan’s National Tax Agency show rice wine exports to the United States are on the rise.

But sake bottles account for only 0.2 percent of the U.S. alcohol drink market in 2020, with beer, wine and whisky making up 60 percent.

“For the sake market to grow, we must cater to, and win over, wine and champagne lovers head-on, not just those who pair Japanese sake with Japanese cuisine,” Sakurai said.

To that end, Sakurai said the “alcohol content poses an unavoidable hurdle.”

According to Sakurai’s accounts, rice wine bottles from Japan typically have about 16 percent alcohol by volume, compared with around 13 percent for wine.

With this in mind, Dassai Blue has a lower alcohol content than typical sake.

“While tackling the challenge of lowering the alcohol content, we are pursuing better quality,” said Sakurai. “This is what we must overcome in cracking open the global market.”

Sakurai said Dassai could fine-tune its flavor as well.

“Flavors cannot be completed through marketing alone,” he said. “They gradually change via interactions with customers.”

Sakurai stated the taste of Dassai Blue “may go in a totally different direction from that of Japanese Dassai as a result.”

However, he admitted likewise that Dassai Blue can “end up being characterized by exactly the same flavor” as the Japan-brewed bottle.

“What we end up doing will only become clear over the mid- to long term,” said Sakurai.