kenleewrites in 日本

When visitors ask me what shochu is, I usually tell them it’s Japanese whiskey. There are a few different tastes when it comes to shochu. The taste depends on the ingredient used in distillation. The common ones are sweet potatoes, brown (black) sugar, barley and rice. You can easily tell where a particular shochu was made just from the ingredient used in distilling it.

I usually drink imo-shochu produced with sweet potatoes. Historically, imo-shochu was exclusively produced in Kagoshima and Miyazaki, in Kyushu. Kagoshima is also regarded as the birth place of Japanese shochu as we know it today. The process to distill shochu apparently originated in Persia way back in the 16th century. It made its way east until it landed in Kagoshima. As you can probably guess, the other varieties of shochu were historically produced in neighboring prefectures.

So, how does one actually drink shochu?

From left to right -
- On the rocks.
- Neat at room temperature.
- Heated up to body temperature.

I think double circles are preferred to just a single circle. ^^.

When you go out drinking with your Japanese buddies, they might dilute it with water, hot water, oolong tea, fruit juice etc. I usually just have it on the rocks.