Sake rice Omachi 雄町 has been a favourite for longer than Yamada-Nishiki. It has also acquired a core group of fans in Japan, known as Omachists. The history of Omachi dates back more than 160 years. Jinzo Kishimoto, a farmer in Omachi town, Okayama Prefecture, was visiting Mt. Daisen in Tottori Prefecture, when he discovered some tall, magnificent and unusual ears of rice. With permission, he brought back two ears of rice, which are said to have been the start of cultivation. It is said to have had a larger Shinpaku, softer and more water-absorbent than most sake rice of the time, which spread to Okayama Prefecture and became the origin of today's Omachi rice.
Sake rice with large Shinpaku 心白 suited high milling, but the softness was a double-edged sword. If the milling ratio is too high, the rice will crack. Therefore, when rice milling technology was not as developed as it is today, it was of course difficult to mill rice at a high ratio, and even now, when milling technology has developed, the maximum milling ratio is around 40%. The high water absorbency is also suitable for making good Koji 麹, so sake made with Omachi often has a strong volume of umami, a sharp and powerful acidity, and a pleasantly persistent aftertaste. However, the best production areas are extremely limited, with 90% coming from Okayama, followed by Hiroshima, Kagawa and Fukuoka prefectures. So why is it that Omachi, which has a 160-year history of production, still mostly comes from its place of origin, Okayama Prefecture?
In fact, did you know that in the main reason is the difficulty of cultivation. Omachi is a slow-growing late variety of sake rice, growing to a height of about 115-160 cm, making it susceptible to collapse and disease. The second reason is that in the mid-20th century, the area planted to Sake rice was gradually reduced in order to secure rice for food. Thirdly, from the mid-1980s, the term 'Tanrei Karakuchi 端麗辛口' was coined and dry sake from Niigata with a clean, crisp flavour dominated the market for more than 20 years. Due to the characteristics of the rice itself and the historical background, production did not spread much in other prefectures. And this is probably the biggest reason. While Omachi production was so low in other prefectures, Okayama Prefecture, known as "Sunny Okayama", was extremely suitable for the production of Omachi, a difficult crop, as the three major rivers, Asahi, Yoshii and Takahashi, each have a basin area of more than 1500 km2 and are blessed with water essential for rice production and a mild climate. It is also important to note that within that Okayama Prefecture, the Bizen region in Okayama city in particular was the best rice-producing region in the Chugoku and Shikoku regions. In the Bizen region, rice cultivation flourished, particularly in the Kojima Bay reclamation area and the Asahi and Yoshii river basins, where there were many rice paddies, and most of the prefecture's 'Omachi' is still produced in this area.
It is now 160 years since the discovery of Omachi. Even though the mainstream of rice has been replaced by artificial hybrids, the native Omachi variety has been protected from breeding and hybridisation by artificial breeding to the present day. The wonderful character of Omachi's aroma must have attracted the predecessors of sake brewing, who knew the difficulties of growing Omachi, and considered it to be one of the things they could not afford to lose. This is not hard to imagine, as more than 60% of the artificially bred sake rice used today has the DNA of Omachi. For example, Yamada-Nishiki, the king of sake rice, is also descended from Omachi.
Did this help you to know a little more about Omachi? If you find a sake made from Omachi, please try it. Somm Cellars recommends the beautiful white Japanese paper label of the Kimoto Junmai Daiginjo Omachi, made with natural yeast by the Amabuki Shuzo brewery in Saga Prefecture. It is a wonderful sake that has different qualities whether drunk chilled or warmed
If you are interested, please feel free to contact me hiro@sommcellars.co.nz.
As soon as an alcohol licence is obtained, sales will begin.
Cheers,
Hiro
Points to note:
Not all sake made from Omachi is exactly as I have described, as there are many other variables in sake besides the rice, such as the condition of the Koji, the hardness of the brewing water, the blending, the temperature progress of the unrefined Sake, the milling ratio of the raw rice, the condition of the Shubo 酒母 and so on.
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