Banned in Its Homeland, This Cult Japanese Rum Is Close to-Inconceivable to Discover

At Journey Bar, among the finest locations to drink spirits in all of New York Metropolis, when proprietor Mike Vacheresse says there’s one thing new it is best to strive, clever drinkers pay attention and abide.

On a current go to, the spirit in query was an uncommon Japanese rum he’d simply fallen for. Vacheresse pulled a field from the shelf and eliminated an oddly formed, 1.8-liter shochu bottle with two colourful blue jays on the label.

This was Rurikakesu Rum.

Elevating a Glencairn to my face, I discovered it funky and fragrant on the nostril, a bit earthy with some minerality, and fairly fruity on the palate — viscous and oily, regardless of solely being 40 % ABV. Actually unimaginable stuff.

One of the best half? It was banned in America, Vacheresse instructed me, and he was fortunate to have this uncommon bottle. Later, I discovered that wasn’t really the case, however the purpose you’ll most definitely by no means see this rum in America is even stranger.

Nutrient-Wealthy

Rum has been produced in Japan for the reason that early twentieth century in subtropical areas like Ryukyu and Ogasawara islands. The truth is, Japan is fertile floor for sugar cane manufacturing, a lot of it in Okinawa, the place the crop first arrived by way of China within the seventeenth century.

North of Okinawa — which itself lies some 400 miles from mainland Japan — on the small archipelago that contains the Amami Islands, an uncommon sugar often called kokuto was developed by slowly cooking the sugar cane that was rising organically.

“It grew to be seen as a well being meals in Japan because it’s so nutrient-rich as a result of they pull off so little molasses [in processing it],” says Stephen Lyman, an American who now lives in Fukuoka, Japan, from which he exports distinctive Japanese spirits to America by way of Honkaku Spirits. “It’s very darkish, it’s wealthy, it’s grassy, it’s scrumptious.”

Most famously, nonetheless, the unrefined black sugar has been used for shochu manufacturing at small locations like Takaoka Brewing. The corporate was based in 1949 by Tokuhama Takaoka on Tokunoshima island. There, faraway from a lot of the remainder of Japan, an uncommon fashion of bull-fighting the place bull faces bull not matador can be very talked-about. Initially Takaoka brewed sake, distilled shochu, and used shochu mashing strategies to additionally make pickles and miso.

“What makes it so attention-grabbing flavor-wise is it’s virtually supplying you with an agricole expression. It’s not contemporary cane juice, however you’re nonetheless getting lots of the grassiness. Then, additionally, the treacle notes that you simply get from lots of agricole.”

A couple of many years in, the corporate’s subsequent president Hidenori Takaoka set his sights on rum. Although by no means beforehand distilled commercially in Japan, the spirit had a historical past within the nation.

“It was initially made privately in Ogasawara Islands and was consumed by the U.S. navy,” claims Hideyuki Takaoka, the corporate’s present distiller and fifth or sixth technology of the household to carry the position. The Ogasawara Islands, barely east of the Amami Islands, had been managed by the U.S. on the time.

In 1976, Hidenori Takaoka experimented with brewing utilizing sugar cane juice as uncooked materials. After years of trial and error, he established a brewing methodology utilizing kokuto sugar fermented with pure yeast cultivated from papaya. Using that approach to create the mash, by 1979 Takaoka had distilled and launched a gold rum, produced from powdered kokuto sugar and aged in oak barrels. He referred to as it Rurikakesu, and it quickly turned Takaoka’s high product, outselling even the corporate’s shochu.

Gasoline and Strawberries

A variety of rum is distilled from molasses, which is technically a waste product. Lyman does see a magnificence to that, in that distillers aren’t losing something within the sugar manufacturing course of. “However kokuto is a premium sugar supply,” he says. “It’s very costly rum as a result of the manufacturing is so restricted.”

Certainly, when a number of uncommon bottles of Rurikakesu made it onto on-line Japanese spirits retailer dekantā a number of years again, they bought for $140 earlier than transport. That’s greater than the standard value of 21-12 months-Previous Appleton Property. And in proof of its present rarity, there’s solely a single itemizing for Rurikakesu on world alcohol search engine wine-searcher.com on the time of this writing, at some liquor retailer in Oita, a mid-sized metropolis on the Japanese island of Kyushu.

Lyman first tasted Rurikakesu after discovering it in Fukuoka, at a kaku-uchi, a liquor retailer the place company should purchase alcohol after which drink it in a standing nook. He recollects bringing the bottle dwelling and the expertise that adopted.

“It is a super-tiny, family-run enterprise on this outlying island. It’s not even on the principle island in Amami [Amami Ōshima]. It’s one other island. So that they don’t have any want to suppose like a lawyer about something like this. When the federal government says no, for them it means no.”

“Gasoline and strawberries. That was my tasting notice,” he says, earlier than elaborating. “What makes it so attention-grabbing flavor-wise is it’s virtually supplying you with an agricole expression. It’s not contemporary cane juice, however you’re nonetheless getting lots of the grassiness. Then, additionally, the treacle notes that you simply get from lots of agricole.”

He instantly wished to promote it within the small liquor retailer he owns in Fukuoka and maybe attempt to discuss the household into permitting him to export it to America. On the latter query, the household shortly stated “no thanks” as they’d by no means labored with an exporter earlier than, and definitely not a international one.

A 12 months and a half after he’d first approached Takaoka Brewing, nonetheless, he bought a DM on Instagram from an American man who had simply married into the Takaoka household. With this familial and English language connection, Honkaku Spirits arrange an export deal inside 48 hours and commenced work on exporting to the U.S. market. Nevertheless, Lyman had solely gotten a number of bottles out to U.S. pals like Vacheresse at Journey Bar when abruptly the rum was banned.

The Ban

In April 2022, the tax workplace that regulates Japan’s liquor formulations introduced its plans to guard the geographical indication of kokuto shochu by proscribing its manufacturing to the Amami Islands, which at the moment rely 26 distilleries.

This likewise meant the federal government would now not enable every other aged spirits to be comprised of kokuto sugar. In different phrases, Rurikakesu — arguably the primary rum of Japan — can be no extra. (Nor would a number of the choose few different manufacturers, like Amagi, which Honkaku Spirits has additionally exported to the U.S. ) “If it had any shade to it in any respect, you possibly can now not name it a rum,” Lyman says.

“They’re such a small firm, if for some purpose they bought slapped by the tax workplace and misplaced their license or bought fined, it may finish the enterprise.”

He sat down with the Takaoka household for a two-hour brainstorm, however convincing them of any options was a battle. “It is a super-tiny, family-run enterprise on this outlying island. It’s not even on the principle island in Amami [Amami Ōshima]. It’s one other island,” Lyman explains. “So that they don’t have any want to suppose like a lawyer about something like this. When the federal government says no, for them it means no.”

Nonetheless, there have been a number of potential loopholes: Promoting non-shochu, barrel-aged kokuto spirits (labeled as nothing greater than “spirit”) was nonetheless authorized, however solely bottled at 27 % ABV or much less. As rum needs to be not less than 40 % ABV in America, this was a transparent no-go.

Technically, nothing within the new legal guidelines stated that it was unlawful to proceed producing aged Rurikakesu solely for export. Sadly, the overly cautious Takoaka household wasn’t thinking about that association, both.

Nonetheless, Rurikakesu has continued distilling kokuto rum, although it’s now solely bottled as a white rum, one thing that additionally stays authorized in Japan. “It simply doesn’t have the identical profile,” Lyman laments. “It’s simply that little little bit of time in a cask that offers it such an attention-grabbing character. That’s the rum I like.”

Maybe Lyman may import the white rum overseas in totes and age it overseas?

Sadly, Rurikakesu was skittish about any association that may run afoul of the federal government.

“They’re such a small firm, if for some purpose they bought slapped by the tax workplace and misplaced their license or bought fined, it may finish the enterprise,” Lyman says.

There may be one closing loophole, although: The regulation sunsets in 2027 and distillers can then begin making aged kokuto sugar rum once more.

Within the meantime, Lyman will hold pondering of potential options, and keen Rurikakesu followers will likely be ready.