Sanin Ginjo - Sake from the Shadows

0:19Welcome to Sake Deep Dive, the sake podcast for the beyond beginner. I am your host, Jim Ryan, coming at you as always from Toasty Yamaguchi Prefecture. Joined as always by my friend and co-host, Andrew Russell. How are you doing today, Andy? I'm good, although I suspect I'm in slightly toastier climes than you are, Jim. Yeah, yeah. Kyoto does have that reputation for excessive summer heat. I am right here on the sea, so I get nice cool breezes sometimes. So a little bit more relief, though I do tend to stay inside. I do have to say, though, that this hot summer day, there is a shadow laying over me.

1:10And that shadow is that I can't drink as much hot ginjo sake as I tend to, Andy. Wow, that's a multi-layered segue there, Jim

1:28Our listeners are probably getting fed up of these by now But as we're going to explain during the following episode That actually has different levels to it Like an onion Peeling away at that one Brilliant, Jim Right, so yes Today's topic is going to be fun for all kinds of linguistic reasons. What are we talking today about? Yeah, this is definitely one of our more obscure topics. But I think probably most of our listeners are at least going to have heard the term, although they maybe don't know the finer details. But we are talking about San In Ginjo. San In Ginjo, which is a bit of a mouthful.

2:14And I think Republogy is going to have to really start right there at the top because Sanyo, unless you're a real Japan geography nerd, you may not exactly know off the top of your head what Sanyo and its opposite Sanyo means. for a hint I happen to live on the Sanyo coast of Japan which is I guess what you'd call the it curves around a bit the west or the east or the southern coast over here on the side with the Seto Inland Sea which by process of elimination tells us that the Sanyin coast is on the opposite side yeah yeah i i loved learning this for the first time because i did this when i was studying kanji so it makes it makes perfect sense and i always felt a little bit sorry for for the people on the san inside when i learned the meaning of the kanji so the the san in region is specifically Totori and Shimane way up in the north on the Japan seaside but the broader definition does sometimes expand into your home turf Yamaguchi but it goes into Hyogo and even sometimes as far as northern Kyoto so that's the the borders I guess of the Sanin region it's a northern part but where I was from and like you said where you are now in the the Chugoku region this is very confusing for people that come to Japan and see why is there a bank of Japan a bank of China sorry everywhere it's not Chugoku as in the Japanese for China it's Chugoku as in the region has exactly the same kanji but smack bang in the middle of that you have the Chugoku mountain range it sits pretty much in the middle of the land mass and I guess in ancient times because the Sea of Japan side has this very bad weather they get a lot of rain and in the winter snow and a lot of high winds the the mountain range protects the southern part of of these prefectures And so for that reason, the sand part just means mountains and in over the other side means in the shadows of the mountains and the yo means in the sunshine.

4:58So these are the two very different climate zones of these two regions. One is way over in the shadows and one is in the sun. And you'll definitely see, probably more likely to encounter Sanyo when you travel around that region. There's the Sanyo Shinkansen and there's various other namings in local foodstuffs and things. But that's the region that we're talking about is the one that's over the other side of the mountains. in the shadows. Yeah, and it's fascinating to me how very different it is. People don't typically call like Hagi part of the Sanin. I would say that as you get closer to the Xiomani border, it is much more sort of culturally Sanin, but it's much less accessible by public transport over there.

5:54There's no direct train across at this part of Japan. You have to sort of either go around the tip or go up via Osaka and stuff. It's much less accessible. The stuff over there, much smaller cities, typically, where you do get cities, things are a little bit less industrial, not as many factories over there, which is actually kind of a good thing. It's just a very different vibe on that side. Oh, definitely. I mean, one thing you notice when you're specifically in, let's call it the Sanim proper in Shimani and Totori, is the lack of people. Totori is the least populated prefecture in Japan. And there's all these stories about why they have the very famous coffee outlet that they have in Totori.

6:52Not Starbucks. it's um it's got to do with sand sunaba sunaba kohi i think it's called but it's it's a kind of real kawaii story that there was no starbucks in totori and one day starbucks were surveying the people of total and they said we'd love a starbucks but they still hadn't built one so they ended up making their own brand and it's it's very it's branded very similar to starbucks but it's now one of the very famous attractions in Totori so yeah that should maybe give you an idea that it's a very underpopulated or very depopulated part of Japan and it does have a very different feel because of that at the same time that also makes it really nice it's a good place to visit I quite enjoy traveling on that side of the island my son and I take trips over there the the scenery is wild because of that climactic difference the really strong winds blowing off the sea of japan really big waves over there the the the rock formations are crazy uh the tides are really really there's an enormous differential because of of just the the way things work over there and uh So, yeah, it's actually kind of scary, the sea on the Saniyin side, because of those differences.

8:20The Seto is quite calm and placid. The Sea of Japan is not. So you get a very big difference culturally and in lots of different ways over there. what you also get is a very big difference in things like food culture, dining, the kinds of things that they eat. There's a lot of a big thing about the soy sauce on that side of the island is that it's much sweeter than on this side. And of course, that filters down into the uh the topic that we tend to talk so much about sake and uh here we are sain sake yeah sain sake or sain ginjo so what is sain ginjo and i suppose that's the obvious question to be asking for this podcast right now here is the thing is is So Sain Ginjo is a thing I've seen.

9:20Like I've seen it on a couple of blog articles. I've seen it on labels, I guess, a couple of times, particularly from a particular brand that people will probably be familiar with, Tenon. Now, here is, I guess, my question to you as a sake brewer, Andy. Can you describe Sain Ginjo in one sentence? maybe not one sentence what is Sanin Ginjo? okay so let's start with what it's not Sanin Ginjo is not a recognised term in any legal sense obviously Ginjo is but Sanin Ginjo is really more it's a specific set of techniques that one particular region has brought together and has put a label on it and those techniques really to get into them i mean this is going to be the the crux of the episode really it you need to get quite geeky it's proper brewing stuff so the the things that are very important to sani and ginjo are the type of koji so we've always we've talked many times on this podcast about the two, I guess, standard types of koji, which is sohaze and tsukihaze.

10:50Sanin ginjo is made by tsukihaze koji, and we'll get into what that is soon. In terms of how it tastes, low amino acids seem to be a very important aspect of this. And of course it's ginjo, so long, slow, cold fermentation. But where it differs or where the people that are proposing sanin ginjo is a separate classification is in the aroma aspect. So of course orthodox ginjo literally codified into the legal terms is ginjoka. This is these prominent aromatics. They very often get split into two broad categories which is the kind of green apple sometimes peach side of it. They call that kapuronke in Japanese.

11:48And then there's the other side of that, which is the more banana, more mellower aromas. They tend to come from the slightly older kylkai yeasts, whereas the appley ones, they come from the more modern association yeasts. But saiyin ginjo is not aiming for aromatics. It's aiming for flavour. That is the key thing. And you asked me as a brewer or just as a drinker, that has to be the one thing that separates it from, I guess, orthodox ginjo. The question is, does it make it unique enough or distinctive enough to deserve its own label? I guess the distinctions that they are talking about are quite specific in production.

12:49So as someone who is not a sake brewer, who does not really understand all of the intricacies of sake brewing, Let me just say it from what I've looked at. I've looked at several things and most of what I see seems to be describing things that I thought were common to Ginjo Sake Brewing, right? So low and slow brewing, focusing on that. You briefly mentioned the Tsukihaze Koji forms. So I don't know. Can you can you elucidate perhaps some of those specific distinctions in the sake brewing that makes what or that they seem to be claiming as sort of identifiers for San In Ginjo? okay so well first of all where are we getting our our information on this and we this is one of the rare episodes where there's actually really not a lot of information out there but there is one very thorough source which is a brewery who who are claiming to pioneer this really which is tenon in shimane i think a brewery we're both fans of as well they do some yeah do some fantastic sake and they really seem to be holding the torch for this sani and ginjo and they also claim to be a very integral part of the the development of this so they they have a very comprehensive blog on their website it even has notes that the brewers made now it's someone who's worked for specific ginjo brewer in my time in Hiroshima with Imada-san of course my first brewery as well in in Okayama they also they weren't specifically ginjo like Imada-san is but we also made ginjo sake so I have I do know the process I've done it for for years and I agree with you it's it's very difficult to see where the differences come in so from my take on that whole thing and i went i poured over the whole thing it actually takes quite a long time there's a lot of information it's in two parts the the first start off by talking about things that really are just standard ginjo practices so you have things like kyu sui gente this is very important for ginjo right absorption yeah control hydration yeah this is one of the the iconic images of sake brewing when you see the the master brewer standing there with the stopwatch gazing into the into the rice that's soaking to try and get the perfect absorption rate this is very important for stages later down the line specifically koji production and obviously they talk about the type of koji which is sukihaze.

15:52Sukihaze is sometimes referred to as ginjo koji so just as a recap this is this is really quite difficult to to explain but when you make koji there's two different schools of thought but a lot of the time brewers will mix them so again sohaze and sukihaze what's the difference so in japanese means like overall or I don't know. Yeah, you're the translator, Jim. But in terms of this, it means overall. What it's referring to is it's referring to the chul, the haze. This is this word that you always see come up in discussions about koji. This is basically the growth of the mold on or into the grain of rice.

16:41Now, if you see Sohazi, the Koji grows pretty much on the entire surface of the grain. That's Sohazi. Now, this tends to produce very high enzymatic activity, but it's a different kind of enzymatic activity that you get from Tsukihazi. Tsukihazi is different. Another word for it is actually speckled Koji. and you can see the difference that it doesn't actually consume the whole surface of the rice or close to that only parts of that and that is because the koji spores are burying into the grain not on the outside of the grain now this also produces very strong enzymatic activity but it's a slow release now slow release comes in handy when you're doing the low and slow fermentation it's actually one of the ways that you can do it because all these microorganisms, they build up a lot of heat.

17:43And so with this type of tsukihaze, the enzymatic activity is quite subdued, but it's also very strong. So what that does is it allows it to have a low and slow fermentation, which is what you need when you're making ginjo because it typically, the fermentation period will last about 30 to 35 days, which is a lot longer than other types of sake like futsushu or junmai or honjozo. And the reason they're doing obviously low and slow is you're trying to bring out aroma. So the rice, going back to the rice soaking and washing part, what you're trying to achieve with Kyusui Gente is you're trying to very carefully control the amount of moisture, but you're trying to concentrate it ultimately into the centre of the grain.

18:33because that's what you're trying to make with skehase. Koji spores look for moisture. And if the moisture is on the surface of the grain, then it just starts growing on the surface. But if the only moisture it can find is in the centre of the grain, then it burrows deep. And we won't get into it all tonight because we'll be here all night, but this is why they steam it in a certain way. Geico 9N, hard on the outside, soft on the inside. This is all related to Skihase and Ginjo brewing. So, so far, what have we got? We've got the fact that they're doing Kyusei Gente, which is related to Skihase, why they're doing Skihase, and why they're doing long, cold fermentation processes.

19:24And in Orthodox Ginjo, that would be for aroma, and also by keeping the yeast subdued and slow and sluggish and cold fermentation, it's not going to produce a lot of acidity, which is another way of saying, or one way of saying, amino acids. So that's basically covered everything that we talked about at the beginning of what Sani and Ginjo is, other than the fact that they're not aiming for a high aroma. So according to Tenon The timeline of this Is during the late 20th century When ginjo techniques are spreading all across Japan Then obviously this is a trend for This is the beginning, sorry, of the trend Of aromatic, sweet and fruity sake But brewers in Shimane Belonging to the Izumo Toji Guild Are they decided to resist this trend and develop something different.

20:26And this is what they're now calling Sanin Ginjo. Does that all make sense up until this point? It definitely makes sense. If I were to put it in my words, it sounds like an Ajigin made in the Sanin region. Now, are things like, say, yeast coming into play here? I mean, if I hear, typically when I think of ajigin versus hanagin or kagin, you know, the aroma, I immediately start thinking of the yeast. And, you know, I guess we haven't really got to that stage yet. But, you know, I do know that tenon likes to go for things like kimoto. and typically, you know, Kimoto people are really into Yanetsuki, Kobo, you know, the yeast that seems to be naturally occurring in the brewery.

21:29Does that play an impact or does that play a role in what they are trying to call Saiyenginjo? Well, interesting. This is the one point they don't talk about in that blog. So this is only me speculating. but yeah of course yeast comes into this this is a this is a discussion about whether asaki has aroma or not and we know that aroma comes primarily from yeast and how they do that is like how they achieve that is slightly different that's when you start involving koji and things there's that we're not going to get into this tonight because i think we may have even done that have we have we done a topic on yeast if we have we probably got into that but the way that you actually produce capron k the the apple aromas compared to the banana ish aromas from say like number sevens and to a certain extent number nines compared to things like 1801 and as philip parper calls them armor piercing yeasts the way you produce them is a different process so we're assuming in this case they do neither of these things and what they're actually doing is is handling the yeast in a different way that is going to make it this is the complicated part they're going to make it low in amino acids but still have presence or still be a flavorsome sake but they seem to talk about everything else other than how they're achieving this so we can only speculate that maybe that's the bit that they don't want people to know about but of course yeah if they're using kimoto and things i don't actually know if a lot of the sake are naturally fermented or whether they're using association yeast i've tried a few of them before certainly feels like it's more in the sort of number seven range that would kind of make sense for a brewer like that It's a nice strong fermenter, but it's still capable of doing at least some sort of ginjo brewing.

23:36But we don't know because it isn't in this blog. And as I said, there's no one else has really attempted to put any set of instructions on this as to what actually it means. And what I think you're alluding to there is how it actually differs from Aji Ginjo. because one thing is for certain, they're not the only people that make ginjo that don't prioritise aroma. We've talked about this before and we didn't even mention Tenon. This was something that is talked about in a book, a fantastic book I have called 300 Years of a Narasaki Brewery from the previous Kuramoto of Sawa no Tsuru. And he explains the difference between Aji Ginjo and Hana Ginjo, Hana being obviously flower Ginjo or aromatic Ginjo.

24:30And he says they're very much on the side of flavour Ginjo. So it's definitely not unique in that respect. And I guess that could be the key for if there is a major difference between this or whether or not Sani Ginjo is just Ginjo, doesn't treat Ginjo as an overly engineered fragrance showcase. it actually aims to have it as something that you would enjoy with food and what have you right yeah you know and i guess you know another thing that that i'm i'm i'm seeing here like we've got this rather particular process for making sake in the sanin region uh particularly focused in Shimane where Tenon is.

25:17I always associate two people with sake brewing in the Sani region and that is our friend and professor. It had to come up didn't it? Yeah you know so this guy you know we've talked about him before the so-called father of of Jumai Brewing. He worked in Shimane and that is, was it Ueda Sensei? Uehara. Uehara Sensei. Uehara Sensei. Yeah. He, he, he worked for the Shimane sort of, what do we call them? The technical brewing organization. He taught people in the area a lot about brewing. And so whenever I see something that has to do with particular, what do you call it, kodawari, obsession with brewing process in that region, I tend to look for his influence.

26:18And I do believe his influence is in this. Yes, you'd be right. It came up. And we should point out, by the way, Uehara Hiroshi, I think it was actually Totori who he was employed by. He's certainly from Totori Prefecture. He has done a lot of good work for the sake industry. This was a very influential person. But in terms of why, I guess, he kind of keeps coming up as a counterpoint for our own views. is he did have some very strong views on certain things and i'm not even sure some of the time i hear these things and i and i wonder actually how far from what he actually would have thought about things i wonder how how diluted it's got of things that he said and then these were maybe misinterpreted down the line and they they became this kind of this rally cry for Junmai-ists, there are obviously very famous slogans that surround Uehara Hiroshi.

27:26One of them is, Saki is Junmai, if it's warm, even better. But actually, in reading this, this blog from Tenon, there's some really interesting things in relation to this. So, but first and foremost, what has he got to do with Sanyin Ginjo and the honest thing is it doesn't seem like he has a lot to do with it directly it seems that he's influenced some of the people that were directly involved in it so according to this Tenon blog well there's there's three people Sakamoto Shun he did not work for Tenon but he was very prolific at another brewery in Shimani Prefecture and he was a member of the Izumo Guild.

28:16I think he worked in the same place for 40 years so this is a serious brewer but he had a friend who they're actually not too different in ages it seems that they're only slightly younger called Nagasaki Yoshihisa and he did work at Tenon and he learned from Sakamoto Sensei so these two combined are the two that decided to to not go down the aromatic ginjo route and to make something unique or to make something specific to Shimani, aii sanin ginjo but sakamoto being the the beginning of this ground zero he worked closely with uehara sensei so there there's your connection and the combined work of these three people that gets taken to to tenon obviously because nagasaki sensei goes around a few breweries i I mean, he worked at Fuji Shuzo in Takihara.

29:25That's a brand I'm sure our listeners will have heard of. And there's all, even to this day, there's quite a strong connection between Fuji Shuzo and Tenon. But from Tenon, it gets passed to the person who, the author of this blog, which is a man called Kojima Tatsuya, who's just been in the news quite recently because I believe he's stepping down from working at Tenon to start his own, I guess it's Doboroku they're trying to make something a bit closer to the sake from the Kojiki so going beyond the roots of Seishu into something completely different but in the blog he does mention this sake is Jumai even better if it's warmed and I'd never heard of this take on it before but according to him this goes back to another phrase which is the original meaning of ginjo and how these two things converge the original saying is ginmishite seizo suru this is sake made with scrutiny and he he says that when in the past the junmai of the uihara hiroshi era this is his his attempt to take the sake industry away from all the bad Sanzo Shu and Aruten of the past and make Junmai, what he is saying is that is really the modern equivalent of Ginjo today.

30:58So he specifically says Junmai Ginjo and Junmai Dai Ginjo. And what he means by that is they weren't necessarily trying to make Junmai specifically, they were just trying to go back to sake brood with scrutiny. So if you unpack that, this is a whole thing about ginjo and what it actually means this is a slight on the modern definition of ginjo that it's it's determined by polishing percentages and aroma whereas they're saying no there's more to it than this ginjo is sake made with scrutiny and that that's what they're aiming for in Saiyan Ginjo. He even says in the blog, wouldn't it be more accurate to say Saki is Jumai Ginjo even better if it's warm?

31:53I think that, I might have got that wrong, but I think that's what he concludes from the whole Uehara thing, is that actually they differ slightly and that it needs a little update to that very famous slogan. Well, yeah, I can see that being sort of the end period, particularly if you are focusing on flavor sake, right, on the ajigin, then that spirit, you know, drinking sake warm, making it with care certainly does seem to be sort of the end point is, you know, why stop at ginjo, or why stop at junmai if we're making junmai ginjo that is this little. And I assume that the idea here through all of this is still, you know, if we're making stuff with care, then we are focusing on the junmai.

32:50I do appreciate that, you know, Kojima Toji does mention that, hey, there's nothing wrong with Aruten. There's nothing wrong with Futsushu. There's a place for all of it. We should be ready to, we should be able to make sake. in however we want to make it, which, you know, that's definitely a sentiment that I can get behind. Yeah. Yeah, that's certainly something that, if the stories are true, Ui Hara Sensei would not have said. Certainly. Certainly.

33:26Generational differences, maybe. It is, I think, you know, the idea behind sort of labeling Saini Ginjo as a collective effort of raising the quality of sake brewed in this area, in an area that is distinct. The Saini area has its own everything. It is a different feel from the part of Japan where you and I live. I definitely think that that has merit and that has role whether whether or not the sake that is being made follows a particularly unique process or the result is is in and of itself particularly unique is i gotta say i still have my doubts yeah i i'm gonna say i i don't know what the difference is between ajiginjo and saiyanginjo and i i couldn't i couldn't find that by applying the same extensive research that we do to every episode of Saki Deep Dive I couldn't come up with the answer so maybe it's a secret maybe they don't want to know but the only area where where I can see a difference they're not actually citing this as a part of Sani Nginjo this is in a separate blog but it was also very fascinating was their their approach their specific approach to making koji because i think you probably saw the same thing they don't just talk about sukihase but this is now very focused on tenon they are actually talking about a specific kind of sukihase which they call it's sukihase no mikakoji this is something i think we probably should get into because this is very much been about tenon and they seem to be really the poster child for the Sanin Ginjo classification if we can call it that and it is something very specific to them you don't I know other breweries that do this but this seems to be something that they do for almost everything and it is quite different from making other koji and I remember speaking to I think it was Imada-san about this to to get an idea of how difficult it actually is to do.

35:51Yeah, I think this is probably quite an important topic as well. Right, so let's talk about that. The mika koji. So three-day koji used at a very specific part of the brewing process. What is different about it? What is different about mika koji? I've actually heard of yokka koji as well, used in making distilled spirits. Awamori in Okinawa and some shochu. So tell me what's up with the mikka koji. Well, again, I guess most people probably know koji typically takes about 40 to 50 hours. You've got the first stage, which they call the toko stage, where it's all just laid out on a table. and maybe you're going to do tanikoji.

36:43Maybe you do that on the table or maybe you actually do it, becoming more common to do it before you even go into the muro. And then there's the whole ondo kanri stage, the temperature control stage. And then you put it outside and you cool it down and it's ready for use. That normally takes about 48 hours. If only it was as simple as that explanation. But tenon, they take three days to do that. So that's quite a substantial difference. And to understand that, you need to look at their philosophy. So this second blog, they talk about their different approach to Koji. So of course, Koji is all about, the image we have is all about temperature control and thermometers and obviously very, very strict hygiene.

37:28but they say that they don't use that type of system anymore they don't use thermometers or anything what they're doing instead is sensory evaluations because and this is really a good point he makes the point that brewing has really gone down the route of focusing on the type of enzymes that come out of koji there's there's obviously there's different kinds of enzymes Some of them dissolve the rice, some of them create more sugars and that temperature control element is how you try and determine that different balance of the enzymes. But koji is also a massive contributor to flavour. So what they are saying is they focus on that element.

38:17So they focus on, it's a bit like a chef that's tasting the koji. this tasting they're cooking all the way through rather than just checking temperatures and things they're doing it by what it's going to actually add flavor wise and I guess that again is actually coming away from what you're doing with orthodox ginjo and for them that extra day of maturity when it really starts to get these sort of rich chestnut aromas and flavors that is what is achieved through 3D Koji. So I thought this was really interesting. I actually thought it was more interesting than the part on Sani and Koji and how they're making it because as I said it just seemed very much down the same lines as Aji Ginjo but the Mika Koji I'd never realized what was.

39:09They're approaching Koji for what it can do to actually affect the flavor of it and I guess those two combined that could be the missing piece if you will of how they're achieving this low in amino acid but also flavour driven type of ginjo sake because the koji is always important when you're talking about yeast it's important for feeding the yeasts for all the different purposes and all the different objectives but it is also a big contributor to taste or i think this has got to be a very important thing for this sanin ginjo thing and of course for for tenons brewing okay perhaps then you know maybe that's where it should maybe maybe instead of talking about all of this very careful uh ginjo brewing process stuff, the focus should really lay on that one element, the more matured, richer koji that they're using.

40:20Now, I did notice out on the blog that they use a different koji for the first half, the shubo up through the soy stage of dankake, which keen listeners will know from our last episode. Does that make a difference? I don't think so. We sort of talked about this before. So one of the practices that was considered standard is using Sohaze Koji for the moto, and then you start to transition to Tsukihaze for the actual moromi. now I thought that was kind of across the board I have worked with brewers who basically they didn't really have that big difference but they were making slight adjustments but not enough to say this is sohase for the moto but and this is sukihase but a lot of brewers are making these adjustments bear in mind that these are not binary that this is something there's a whole spectrum and there's going to be crossover between is that really sohase or is it really but it doesn't seem anything out of the ordinary for someone if the purpose of a moto is it was a few things you're you're really controlling or setting the foundations for the acidity you're you're obviously trying to bring up a healthy colony of yeast but you're also trying to increase sweetness as well that is one of the points in this the yeast is feeding off the the sugar so you want to get a big head of steam with with sweetness as well so so has it is really the tool to do that because the the type of enzyme the type of strong enzymes it really gets that mechanism going whereas towards the later stages you want to start to especially when you're doing low slow fermentation you don't want too much sugar conversion and rice being dissolved or you're going to get what what used to be called off flavors so you you start to to tone it down and you start to get to the the skehase style and again if you're doing long slow fermentation you don't want some really powerful thing that's that's really driving all these biological mechanisms that are going to start tiring out the yeast and things so So, yeah, I think what they say is they use Sohaze up until Soi and then Sukihaze from Naka and Tomei.

42:54Yeah, that's what that says. So, yeah, I'm going to say that's nothing too unique. But who knows? Maybe I'm wrong. Okay. Well, there we go. One of our more esoteric topics, something that remains perhaps less definitive than even I like to have things. But if you are, I guess, looking to experience sake that is, I guess, Shimane, Totori, Saniin, Ginjo, then this is the time that you've been waiting for. It's time for a recommendation. Andy, do you have a recommendation for people looking to dig into this very, very specific topic? I do. It's probably quite predictable, but I'm just going to go with the poster child, which is Tenon.

43:50Like I said, I've been a big fan of Tenon for years. I think the Saki is fantastic. It's very varied. But they did start a new series, I think maybe four years ago. This is kind of considered their absolute top spec. and what they say they're aiming for is omiki so sacred sake i mean this bear in mind this is the land of mythical creatures and the sake origin story shimane i feel like there's there's actually quite a lot of sake extremism up there if you want to call it that that it seems to be a hotbed of it and this is what they say they're aiming for and this is a mukyu tenon this is again from the name you just know these are all religious references to this kind of scripture.

44:36But it's a Jumai Daiginjo called sake, not just the standard kanji for sake, it's kanji for, I believe it's purification aroma, which is quite ironic because they're not really aiming for aroma. But it's kimoto, long-term fermentation, made with the poster boy rice for this, which is sakanishiki, which is the daihyo teki, the representative rice of Shimane. and it's very nice. It's exactly what we've been talking about through this. It's a kind of very low-aromatic, but very low-amino-acid, easy-drinking, dry ginjo. So, yeah, what better way to sum up Sanin ginjo? So that's my recommendation. Okay, well, for mine, I'm going a little bit up the Sanin coast to Totori, and this is not a sake that perhaps falls into or maybe even calls itself san in ginjo but I think if we're following the description that Andy just gave then it falls right under that thing.

45:45It is chiyomusubi goriki 60. It is a Jumai Ginjo using a rather representative Totori rice, Goriki. And yeah, absolutely. Flavor front, dry, clean, perfect, warmed up, which is always a plus in my book. It is definitely not a delicate Ginjo. So maybe if that's part of the equation, then maybe we're finally honing in on what makes Sainin Ginjo. So there you have it. Two great Ginjo sakes from the Sainin region. Bringing us once again to the end of a Sake Deep Dive. Thank you so much for listening. Remember that the Patreon is still out there. Patreon.com slash SakeDeepDive All the way in word And we are rolling up on our annual Sake Matsuri Which patrons do get access to I have been your host, Jim Ryan You can find me online at www.jimryan.com Andy, where can people find you?