Ginger is in this bottle, not just on its nose, so this doubles it rather than introducing it.
Barley shochu and grapefruit is the Kyushu sour after the lemon one. Bitter, bright and forgiving. Ruby or white both work; white is drier. The grapefruit sour is a real bar order in Japan, not a novelty.
One part shochu to three or four parts of the long mixer, over plenty of ice, then the accent on top. If it tastes thin, go two to three next time.
What it tastes like
A genshu distilled once under reduced pressure, where a fifth of the mash is Miyazaki ginger, with barley for body and rice koji starting it. Refreshing rather than hot: crisp and dry, with a tinge of sweetness off the grain and a little citrus behind the ginger. Soda shows it off best.
ginger
dry
crisp
citrus
barley
spice
Sweet
1/5
Body
3/5
Aroma
4/5
Fruit
1/5
Floral
not described
Grain
3/5
Earth
1/5
Umami
not described
Read from the words above rather than measured. Where it says not described, none of the sources behind this page mention it, which is not the same as it not being there.
Base
rice koji (30%) first, then barley (50%), then ginger (20%)
Koji
white koji (Kawachi L-type)
Distillation
single distillation under reduced pressure
ABV
38%
What to mix with it
This bottle is made with ginger, not merely reminiscent of it. A mixer meets the ginger first and the grain second, so read these as answers to the ginger rather than to the barley or the rice. Tap a family to narrow it down. Every suggestion carries its reasoning, so if the reasoning does not convince you, ignore the suggestion.
A longer wedge is a family we'd reach for sooner with this bottle, worked out from its flavours rather than tasted. It isn't a score, or a comparison with other bottles.
Juice and peel are two different tools. Fresh juice, never bottled, is the whole basis of the lemon sour and the quickest way to put acid into a distilled base. The peel expressed over the top gives the oil and no acid at all, which is what a sweet or roasted bottle usually wants instead.
Lemon sharpens a crisp bottle further
The lemon sour is the drink most izakaya sell more of than anything else on the list
The bottle already smells of citrus, and this puts more of it in the glass.
Jack Rudy's Extra Bitter, made with real cinchona bark, or Small Hand Foods'. Half a teaspoon and soda, set to the bottle in front of you rather than to a tonic maker's idea of a spirit.
You set the quinine and the sugar separately, so a dry bottle can have the bitterness without the sweetness
You set the sugar yourself, which makes it the easiest way to a bitter highball that's genuinely dry
The bottle already smells of citrus, and this puts more of it in the glass.
Barrow's Intense, made in Brooklyn, or Domaine de Canton, which is the easier one to find. Ginger and sugar arrive together either way, and both work hot as well as cold. Being spirits themselves they add alcohol along with the volume, which a juice or a syrup does not.
Ginger is in this bottle, not just on its nose, so this doubles it rather than introducing it.
It joins the pepper already in the glass rather than arguing with it
Small Hand Foods', or sugar, water and gum arabic from the baking aisle at home. Worth knowing that most Japanese gum syrup on a shelf today has no arabic gum in it at all.
It puts the body back without adding more sugar, which is the other way to fix it
The sweetener for a bottle you do not actually want to sweeten
Hot water in the glass first, spirit poured on top so it mixes itself. Around 40C in the glass is the sweet spot. This is not the only way, it is one way.
Heat carries spice aromatics up out of the glass; cold leaves them sitting in it
Oita's citrus, softer than sudachi. Bartenders in Oita mix it with the local barley shochu and soda.
Kabosu and barley shochu are both Oita's, and kabosu gets squeezed into drinks there; the gentler acid suits a mugi wherever it was distilled
The bottle already smells of citrus, and this puts more of it in the glass.
Harder to find outside Japan than most of this list. Worth ordering or a trip to a Japanese grocery, and where something easier works as well, that comes first.
A small green citrus from Tokushima, sharper and more herbal than lime. Sold frozen or as juice in Japanese markets.
Sharper and greener than the lemon a barley sour usually gets, which is what makes it worth the trip from Tokushima
The bottle already smells of citrus, and this puts more of it in the glass.
Harder to find outside Japan than most of this list. Worth ordering or a trip to a Japanese grocery, and where something easier works as well, that comes first.
A pinch of ground sansho over the top, or a few peppercorns steeped. Numbing, citrusy, green.
Sansho is citrus peel and pepper in one seed
Sansho and yuzu turn up together in Japanese seasoning
Harder to find outside Japan than most of this list. Worth ordering or a trip to a Japanese grocery, and where something easier works as well, that comes first.
The Korean-style yuzu preserve sold in jars. A spoon in hot water with shochu, or shaken cold.
Yuzu peel, sweetened, on a citrus bottle
Yuzu tea and barley shochu in hot water is a winter izakaya drink
Harder to find outside Japan than most of this list. Worth ordering or a trip to a Japanese grocery, and where something easier works as well, that comes first.
Hoppy Beverage Co. has made it in Tokyo since 1948; at 0.8 percent it is legally a soft drink, and it is hard to find outside Japan. Chill the bottle, the shochu and the mug and no ice is needed.
Carbonation carries aroma up out of the glass, so a highball shows an aromatic bottle off rather than diluting the point of it.
Cold-pressed juice or thin slices. Green apple is already in the aroma of a lot of rice shochu, so this amplifies what is there rather than adding something new.
The Japanese Bitters, five 100ml expressions, sold at Astor Wines in New York. Angostura at nearly 45 percent is a small spike in a 25 percent drink in a way these are not.
Tokushima yuzu at 27 percent, which is the shochu's own strength, so a dropper moves flavour and not proof
Hana Makgeolli is brewed in Greenpoint, Brooklyn; Makku sells a canned one. Strength varies widely across the category, from around 6 percent in a can to the mid teens for an unfiltered takju, so read the label before deciding how much to pour.
Its lactic tang keeps a crisp bottle from going flat as the ice melts
Cocchi Americano: moscato steeped with cinchona bark, gentian and bitter orange. The bark is the point of it, and it carries a quinine bitterness no citrus will give you.
Quinine and gentian give a measured bitterness where an amaro would take the glass over
Bitter orange: sour and aromatic rather than sweet, the citrus that goes into ponzu. Bottled juice is sold for cooking and works straight in a glass. Use the peel too, it carries most of the smell.
The bottle already smells of citrus, and this puts more of it in the glass.
Harder to find outside Japan than most of this list. Worth ordering or a trip to a Japanese grocery, and where something easier works as well, that comes first.
A Miyazaki citrus eaten with the white pith left on, which is sweet rather than bitter. Gentler and more floral than lemon, so it flavours a drink without taking it over.
The bottle already smells of citrus, and this puts more of it in the glass.
Harder to find outside Japan than most of this list. Worth ordering or a trip to a Japanese grocery, and where something easier works as well, that comes first.
Torn leaves steeped briefly. Perfumed citrus without juice.
The bottle already smells of citrus, and this puts more of it in the glass.
Harder to find outside Japan than most of this list. Worth ordering or a trip to a Japanese grocery, and where something easier works as well, that comes first.
Sweet, low-acid Japanese mandarin. Juice it or drop segments in a glass. It needs a squeeze of something sharper alongside.
The bottle already smells of citrus, and this puts more of it in the glass.
Harder to find outside Japan than most of this list. Worth ordering or a trip to a Japanese grocery, and where something easier works as well, that comes first.
Okinawa's own citrus, picked green and sharp, more bitter than lime and more floral than sudachi. Squeezed over awamori and soda it is what the islands actually drink.
The bottle already smells of citrus, and this puts more of it in the glass.
Harder to find outside Japan than most of this list. Worth ordering or a trip to a Japanese grocery, and where something easier works as well, that comes first.
Young sansho leaves, clapped between the palms and floated. Hard to find outside Japanese markets in spring, worth the hunt.
Kinome tastes of citrus peel and pepper at once
Harder to find outside Japan than most of this list. Worth ordering or a trip to a Japanese grocery, and where something easier works as well, that comes first.
The Japanese citrus that tastes like grapefruit, mandarin and lemon at once, with a floral peel. A little zest or juice goes a long way.
Doubles the citrus already in the glass
Harder to find outside Japan than most of this list. Worth ordering or a trip to a Japanese grocery, and where something easier works as well, that comes first.
The Kyushu condiment, in a tube in any Japanese grocer: fermented yuzu peel, green chili and salt. A quarter teaspoon stirred into an oyuwari, which is the serve Asahi publishes.
Fermented peel gives citrus without the acid a fresh yuzu would add
Harder to find outside Japan than most of this list. Worth ordering or a trip to a Japanese grocery, and where something easier works as well, that comes first.
Ways to serve it
With soda
On the rocks
Straight
The bases with no family of their own: sake lees, chestnut, corn. There are no style rules on this page, which is deliberate. What each bottle is described as tasting of is doing the whole job, so the suggestions come from that rather than from anything the category is supposed to want.
Cocktails other people made
We haven't found a cocktail written for this exact bottle. These were written for other bottles, so each one says which, and what changes if you pour this instead.
