GIN Jinjin KUMAMOTO

Madame TAKATA:

"We've been making shochu for over 100 years and have never stopped challenging ourselves, while preserving traditions and meticulous techniques of Kuma Shochu's distillation methods.

Making it as natural as possible. This is the basis of our shochu production. For rice we use as raw material, we mainly use hinohikari produced in our local Hitoyoshi Kuma district, but we also use low-pesticide rice from plantations using ducks and Yamada-Nishiki rice that we grow ourselves.

In addition to high-quality groundwater, we also use crystal-clear water that gushes from rocks almost 1,000 metres above sea level.

All our shochu are made by hand, in traditional koji rooms, stone warehouses and clay vats that have been used for storage since company was founded. We are able to maintain limited production in which we specialize.

Clay vats are made from the region's stable soil and surrounding nature, as well as wind that blows from the mountains into the warehouse. This has enabled us to cultivate a distinctive shochu that can only be produced here.

In addition, we have preserved traditions and taken on new challenges, such as use of floral yeasts, and have been able to produce a distinctive shochu".