INTRO
In episode 64, Stephen takes the show on the road and interviews Chris Anderson-Tarver of Denver Distillery in Colorado.
CREDITS
Theme Song: Begin Anywhere by Tomoko Miyata (http://tomokomiyata.net/)
Mixing and Editing: Rich Pav (https://www.uncannyrobotpodcast.com/)
HOSTS
CHRISTOPHER PELLEGRINI Vermont born and bred, long-time Tokyo resident and author of The Shochu Handbook, Christopher learned about delicious fermentations as a beer brewer at Otter Creek (Middlebury, VT). He now spends most of his waking hours convincing strangers that shochu and awamori are unlike anything they’ve ever tried before.
STEPHEN LYMAN discovered Japan’s indigenous spirits at an izakaya in New York City. He was so enthralled that he now lives in Japan and works in a tiny craft shochu distillery every autumn. His first book, The Complete Guide to Japanese Drinks, was nominated for a 2020 James Beard Award.
Stephen and Christopher are fascinated by non-traditional shochu expressions.
If you have any comments or questions about this episode, please reach out to Stephen or Christopher via Twitter. We would love to hear from you.
SHOW NOTES
Denver Distillery
The Denver Distillery is Denver’s first micro distillery pub. Situated on the ground floor and basement level of a historic hotel, the distillery operates as a tap room of sorts much like a craft beer brewery might operate, but instead of beer you’re served their spirits or an array of cocktails.
Where the kitchen might be in a typical brew pub sits 3 stills. A pot, column, and a hybrid. Chris Anderson-Tarver is the head distiller now that his father has stepped into semi-retirement.
Chris has taken a craft beer approach to distilling, making batches of things that he’s curious about and tweaking his recipes regularly. Their whiskies, rums, gin, and vodka are all well received. And its the vodka that really kicks off the shochu journey.
They’re the only distillery (that we know of) in the US making a sweet potato vodka. Chris was fascinated by their stripping run for the vodka. The single pot distilled sweet potato distillate was fascinating. He wondered if he could make a product out of just that. That’s when he discovered shochu and realized he needed koji.
Kasutori Imo Shochu
The Denver Distillery is set up to make western style grain distillates so its not equipped for koji production. Chris’s research led him to the Colorado Sake Company, who were more than happy to let him use their spent lees, which still has active koji organisms. Necessity is the mother of invention.
Chris cooks his potatoes (not reaching a boil, but steam headed for a full day) and then mixes this with his lees to create a 2 week or so fermentation. These are open fermentations in the basement of the distillery, which has a nice even temperature year round.
The mash is then transferred to their copper pot still and distilled just once to between 45 and 50% ABV. A pretty early cut for a sweet potato shochu, but the lees do some unexpected things to this distillate so he wanted it play it safe.
The distillate is then rested for 3 months before bottling at 40% ABV. Chris found that his local customers found the “traditional” 25% distillate to be too watered down so he bottles at a higher proof.
Tasting Notes
Denver Distillery’s Imo Kasutori Shochu is not a traditional shochu in that we are not aware of a single other sweet potato shochu made with sake lees as the koji source. Chris also uses much more lees than what would typically be used as the koji rice portion of a sweet potato shochu mash bill. In batch 1 he used about 40% lees v. 60% sweet potato and in batch 2 he got it closer to 50:50. The lees really stand out in batch 2 so he is going to dial them back in batch 3, which should be made very soon.
Denver’s Shochu Scene
Denver has in some ways become the shochu capital of Japan. In addition to Denver Distillery, Ironton and Golden Moon both have shochu in their portfolio. Ironton made Colroado’s first shochu with lees from Colorado Sake Company while Golden Moon makes an unusual barley shochu – unusual in that its distilled in a column. But hey, whose complaining? Very glad to see distillers outside Japan paying attention to this historic category.
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