After landing in Tokyo, I had kakiage soba (soba with fried seafood – crab and shrimp) and a draft beer. The perfect end to that long flight. After a 3 hour layover in Tokyo, I boarded a plane to Fukuoka, arriving at 9:45pm local time. A quick subway ride to the city center brought me to my hotel where I met my good friend, Mai Kumagami, who now lives in nearby Nagasaki. We headed straight to Bar Rev, which I’d visited last summer and somehow have remained the foursquare mayor thanks to a seemingly complete lack of Fourquare in Fukuoka (since changed).
Bar Rev’s owner, Yamaguchi-san, was ready with 4 rare imo shochus from Kagoshima – his home prefecture. The first was his favorite, Senshu, a genatsu shiro koji imo shochu, which lacked the aromas and flavors I crave, but was a nice light way to start the evening. He followed with 3 gems. All were joatsu and kuro koji, but one, Ten Shochu, sent that koji (and yeast) to space prior to use. Only the Japanese would think of this, yet it’s completely reasonable when you are in Japan and drinking the shochu with locals. And it’s a legit imojochu, much to my skeptical surprise.
The last two shochu were remarkable. One, Nishio, for having all of the characteristics you’d expect from an imo shochu and the other, RyuSui, for having the best name in the history of shochu – drunk dragon. It also had an amazing label (that’s it up top). As my batteries ran low Yamaguchi-san gave us the bottle of Nishio to finish at the hotel where Mai-san and I caught up on life until the Nishio was gone and I finally drifted to sleep.
The real adventure begins tomorrow.
Kampai!
Awesome label on the bottle. What was it woven from?
It’s washi, a traditional form of Japanese paper. Obviously that kura takes it’s products very seriously.