Colors Ash
⏳ Drinking Window
Typically best enjoyed within 1 to 3 years of release, though its structure allows for short-term cellaring under pristine conditions.
🍽️ Food & Wine Pairings
Grilled yakitori, roasted duck breast, aged hard cheeses
✨ Technical Specifications
Part of Aramasa's celebrated 'Colors' series, 'Ash' (known in Japanese as Niryu) is a tribute to agricultural heritage and the revival of lost traditions. This exceptional sake is brewed using Shinriki ('Divine Power'), an ancient heirloom sake rice variety that was once highly popular in western Japan during the Meiji era but eventually faded into obscurity due to its challenging cultivation. Aramasa has painstakingly revived this grain to express its unique, rustic, and deeply complex character. True to the brewery's uncompromising philosophy, Ash is crafted using the traditional Kimoto starter method, fermented in wooden cedar casks (kioke), and driven by the historic Kyokai No. 6 yeast. The result is a sake of singular personality, marrying vibrant, wine-like acidity with a rich, savory umami core and a delicate, earthy complexity derived from the wood.
🍾 About the Producer
Established in 1852 by Uhei Sato in Akita Prefecture, Aramasa Shuzo stands as one of Japan's most revolutionary and revered artisanal producers. The brewery earned historic distinction in 1930 when its in-house culture was isolated as Kyokai No. 6, the oldest surviving yeast strain in active distribution. Under eighth-generation kuramoto Yusuke Sato, who took over in the late 2000s, Aramasa embarked on an uncompromising renaissance. Sato committed strictly to pure Junmai brewing, utilizing exclusively local Akita-grown rice cultivated without chemical pesticides, including over 30 hectares farmed in the Uyashinai district. Reviving traditional Edo-period techniques, all fermentations rely purely on indigenous lactic bacteria via the kimoto method and take place entirely in wooden cedar vats (kioke). Fermented using only pristine soft local mountain water and Kyokai No. 6, Aramasa's sakes—such as the iconic unpasteurized No. 6 series, the terroir-driven Colors collection, and the experimental Private Lab bottlings like Amaneko—are globally benchmarked for their electrifying acidity, pristine structural tension, and vinous elegance.
🍇 Grapes
Shinriki sake rice
🍷 ABV
13%