Shin Tsuchid (720 ml)

When 6th-generation owner Yuji Tsuchida inherited the brewery, he deliberately reversed his father's ginjo-focused, high-polish direction — returning to Edo-period kimoto technique and minimally polished Asahi no Yume table rice at 90% seimaibuai, retaining far more of the grain than virtually any premium producer in Japan. The brewery sits at the southern foot of Mt. Hotaka in Kawaba Village, Gunma's mountainous northern highlands, drawing on natural spring water filtered over approximately 50 years underground — soft, mineral-laden, and ideally suited to slow kimoto fermentation. The entire range is produced via 100% kimoto method, relying on ambient lactic acid bacteria from the brewery air to inoculate the yeast starter naturally — a practice used by fewer than 1% of Japanese producers — with fermentation running roughly twice the duration of modern accelerated methods. No distilled alcohol, no manufactured lactic acid, no enzyme agents: three ingredients only — rice, water, and yellow koji. What makes Shin Tsuchida singular is the double transgression: edible table rice (not designated sake rice) polished to 90% seimaibuai, combined with full-range kimoto, a combination practiced at scale by virtually no other brewery. The result is deeply savoury, umami-laden, and built for the table rather than the tasting flight.