Azure is a super fresh, dry and modern Ginjo sake reminiscent of eating citrus, pear and green apple sorbet on the seashore. That sense of the sea coupled with its white wine style mean it's a wonderful match for crispy calamari doused in lemon juice, bonito or tuna cooked in a tataki style, seared oysters, tempura, Baja tacos or salsa verde. Chill it down and treat it as you might a Sancerre, a Chablis or a Muscadet; and serve in a white wine glass. This is London’s sake. The biggest market for Azure is our capital city. This may have a lot to do with its origins. The President of Tosatsuru Brewery’s daughter came to university in the UK. Here she met the love of her life. Her now-husband not only fell in love with her, but he became besotted with her father’s sake. But he had always found the traditional Japanese bottles baffling. So as an artist and a lover of gin, he set about redesigning the bottle and Azure was born. Sake has a strong regionality, much in the same way that wine does. Azure is made by the Tosatsuru Brewery in Kochi Prefecture on the island of Shikoku. It’s said that the people of this mountainous region are very shy, so they tend to gravitate towards sake that is smooth enough that you can sip plenty of it on the way to losing your inhibitions. As a result Asure goes down very easily. This crisp and aromatic spirit is handcrafted from Yamada Nishiki – considered the king of sake rice – that is polished to a ratio of 55%. But what makes it truly unique is the water used. When the local authorities discovered that pure deep sea water, which had been travelling along the bottom of the ocean for 2,000 years, was being pushed up towards the island of Shikoku about 35 years ago, they promptly began to tap it and offered it to three companies. The first was the cosmetic brand Shu Uemura, the second was a wakame seaweed farm, and last but not least the Tosatsuru Brewery, who use this high mineral content and crystal clear water to make Azure. It took this family business 10 years of experimenting to perfect it, but the results are spectacular. Although not salty, it has a real maritime feel to it and the finish is as delicate as a butterfly.
£5.83 per 100.00ml
