TAKAMINE WHISKEY

T A K A M I N E

WRITTEN BY GABE TOTH

W H I S K E Y

Takamine Whiskey is adding a coda to the revolution in bourbon that never was, or perhaps opening a whole new chapter in the way that whiskey production is imagined.

Produced using 100 percent pearled barley — no malt, no exogenous enzymes — the Japanese spirit relies on koji to convert starch to fermentable sugars and is named for the researcher who nearly jump-started the use of koji in American bourbon production more than 100 years ago. Jokichi Takamine was already a successful

Japanese chemist and researcher when, in the 1890s, he was awarded the first biological patent in the United States for the production of the diastatic enzyme while conducting research for the U.S. Whiskey

Trust in Peoria, Illinois.

Takamine had developed a method to convert starch for bourbon production — traditionally reliant on malted barley for its enzymes — faster, more efficiently, with higher yield, and amazing flavor, according to Chris Pellegrini of Honkaku Spirits, which imports

Takamine whiskey. The secret was koji (Aspergillus oryzae), a fungus that produces a wide variety of enzymes and is used in the production of sake, soy sauce, and miso.

When combined with the reach of the Trust, a large proportion of bourbon production in the country was poised to be made using koji.

However, Pellegrini said, the part of the facility where Takamine was doing his research mysteriously burnt down, and when the fire department arrived in response to the fire, they found the water shut off.

“It was going to essentially put the maltsters out of business if he was successful. It was going to change bourbon entirely,” he said. “It was this point in American history where something was so close to flipping. The bourbon we drink today could have been made with koji. Koji whiskey could have been an American thing.”

By the time Takamine had recreated his research, Pellegrini said, the Trust had been broken apart by the state as part of the broader trust-busting era. “They had actually started producing whiskey, they had barrels and barrels of it,” he said. “Nobody knows what happened to it, they probably blended it into other products or something.” It was a rare failure for a quietly humble man who made multiple fortunes on his research, including isolating a diastase enzyme for fertilizer and isolating the hormone adrenaline. “This is one of his failed experiments, and we felt, let’s try and run it back a little bit,” Pelligrini said. “It could have been so consequential.” That’s why, when he and his partner at Honkaku came across the barreled whiskey stashed away at Shinozaki Brewery and Distillery, they wanted to import it under the Takamine name.

The Takamine family has the name in a trust, but they were convinced to grant Honkaku commercial rights to the name, the first time the family had done so.

Koji is generally used in parallel fermentation, where the Aspergillus is converting starch to fermentable sugar while, simultaneously, yeast is taking up the sugar and fermenting it into ethanol and CO2. Production of the whiskey involves no boil, no mash tun, and a very clean fermentation, Pellegrini said. The distillery relies on pearled barley, which has been polished to remove the husk and bran, leaving behind only the starchy endosperm. The use of koji results in a “remarkably high” ABV after fermentation, which is conducted in stainless vats and requires regular stirring to release heat.

Once fermentation is completed, the mash is pot-distilled twice and barreled at a low ABV, in the mid-40 percent range, because of a unique approach the distillery relies on. “They use water to push the whiskey around the distillery, so it just naturally, slowly gets diluted little by little,” Pellegrini said. Because of the low barrel entry proof, the finished spirit is bottled at 40 percent ABV.

Shinozaki relies on 90 percent oak sourced from Missouri and coopered at the Ariake Sangyo Cooperage in Miyazaki Prefecture, as well as 10 percent used bourbon. While Pellegrino said the vast majority of sake is made with yellow koji, which tends to accentuate the fruity and floral notes that yeast are producing, it’s not used as frequently in Japanese distilleries, which are predominantly located in the subtropical southern end of the country.

For example, in Kagoshima Prefecture, on Kyushu island south of Fukuoka Prefecture where Shinozaki is located, Pellegrini said there are more than 110 active distilleries in one of seven prefectures on the island, a physical space smaller than Connecticut.

“There’s a lot of distillation done down south, where it gets super juicy hot in the summer. The further south you go, the less sake is made and the more distilling you find,” he said.

A large portion of shochu and all awamori are produced in that part of the country, relying on white and black koji — which both create high levels of acidity — to create stable conditions even in a difficult environment. “You can pretty much have an open fermentation out in the jungle, and nothing is going to survive if it drops in there. Koji and yeast, up to a point, are impervious (to the high levels of acidity),” he said.

The native microflora are also essential to the proper flavor profile for these longstanding Japanese distilleries, he said. These distilleries have built up decades of those populations settling in and reaching an equilibrium with one another and the local conditions.

“You clean the wall, you clean the roof, you’re going to change the drink. It’s a very sacrosanct, historic endeavor,” Pelligrini said. “I’ve heard of rickety old distilleries, one more typhoon and the thing is going to collapse, but you’ve got decades of flora. If you replace that roof, you’re starting from zero. You’ve lost the lineage of your drink. I’ve heard of a distillery building around the building to protect it. They just built a shell around it to keep the elements at bay.” At Shinozaki, there are trees that are growing in the distillery, extending through the roof. “They just couldn’t cut the trees down. They’re these huge, beautiful trees, but they’re in the damn distillery,” he said. The distillery has “an excellent barrel program” and likes putting up a variety of fun projects, including shochu, which by law has a limit on how much time it can spend in the barrel. “They cling to tradition, but they’re always looking for something fun. It’s been a fun learning experience for all involved,” Pelligrini said. While Takamine is the flagship product for Honkaku Spirits, their goal is to introduce a variety of koji-based products to an American audience. Pelligrini worked in beer and brewing before falling down the rabbit hole of shochu and awamori, traditional Japanese distilled spirits that rely on koji to convert a variety of starchy media. Prior to founding Honkaku, he was a university professor and had been designated an ambassador for shochu and awamori by the Japanese government. His partner, Stephen Lyman, wrote the book The Complete Guide to Japanese Drinks and is, likewise, a category ambassador for the government of Japan. As they build a portfolio of spirits from Japan, he said, they felt that koji whiskey was a great starting point. “Our sympathies lie with koji,” Pellegrini said. “We want to spread the story of koji as much as possible, and Takamine right now is the biggest part of that story, just because it’s so easy to communicate. Everybody gets whiskey, everybody understands that, and when they hear about, ‘This is a koji whiskey,’ and they hear about Dr. Takamine’s story, then we’re off and running.”

“Our sympathies lie with koji. We want to spread the story of koji as much as possible, and Takamine right now is the biggest part of that story, just because it’s so easy to communicate.”

— CHRIS PELLEGRINI, Honkaku Spirits

Unfortunately, there are labeling issues on both sides of the Pacific. In Japan, Takamine can’t be called “Japanese whiskey” because of recently passed regulations on the industry that require malt. Meanwhile, in the United States, the TTB prohibited them from calling it “koji whiskey,” allowing instead for “koji-fermented Takamine whiskey” on the label.

In addition to Shinozaki, other members of the industry have been barrel aging interesting stuff for many many years, he said, including a small limited-release shochu made with roasted barley. Most of the portfolio Honkaku (which means “authentic” in Japanese) offers is shochu.

“A long time ago we started having these conversations with our friends in the industry, small distilleries we had been working with. We go and help them when they’re short-handed at the distillery,” Pelligrini said. “We talk all around the world about their drinks, and finally these opportunities came along.”

Part of their enthusiasm for koji-based products comes from what Pelligrini describes as a depth of flavor that the fungal addition provides. It’s more satisfying at a certain level, whereas, he said, “When I’m drinking a Scotch, I often feel like the middle is lacking.”

He believes it’s the savoriness that the koji adds to a product giving it an extra layer that’s often missing and creating a more full flavor profile. Koji is known to produce a variety of proteases that are relied on to break down the proteins in soy and other media, creating products like soy sauce and miso that are heavily reliant on the sensation provided by glutamate, known as savoriness or umami.

“It’s hard to articulate, I think, especially for American consumers, whose concept of savory really just comes from meat. People like meat because it’s satisfying, but tomatoes have umami, and a lot of different types of cheese are just chock full of umami,” Pelligrini said. “When you get an appreciation for that, I think you can recognize it in a lot of drinks. Once you can put your finger on it, it makes everything else in the drink easier to understand. It’s not salt, but it has that same sort of enhancing quality to it.”

As their flagship product is concerned, a little extra age also helped. The product they had selected in 2019 was eight years old, and that’s how Takamine is labeled. However, COVID-related delays left the spirit aging in the barrel for another year and a half before it was packaged and put on a boat. When the sales team in New York finally opened samples of the finished product, “they were beside themselves,” Pelligrini said. “They were screaming about it, ‘This is a grand slam.’ It had just turned that corner. What we had decided on was very very good, but now it’s one level better.”

Visit www.honkakuspirits.com for more information.