Joy of Sake celebrates ‘fascinating’ Japanese brew

Chris Pearce calls sake “a little miracle in your glass.”

“For me the thing that’s endlessly fascinating about sake is how human skill and ingenuity can coax such an amazing panoply of flavors and aromas from two simple ingredients: rice and water,” Pearce said. “The work is mostly done by tiny microorganisms with the help of brewers who provide just the right conditions for them to thrive.”

Pearce is publisher of Hana Hou!, the magazine of Hawaiian Airlines. In local and international sake circles, however, he is known as one of the founders of The Joy of Sake, the largest sake-tasting event outside of Japan; the president of World Sake Imports, a sake distribution company; and a sake expert assessor, the only person in the United States and one of only 74 people in the world who’ve earned that title.

He has strong ties to Japan, where his family moved in 1958 when his father accepted a position at the American Embassy in Tokyo. Nine years old at the time, Pearce primarily lived in Japan over the next 20 years.

“Beginning in the 1960s, there was a movement for young people to get out of the cities and into the country,” he said. “I rode that wave down to Okinawa in the early 1970s and farmed rice.”

There he became a fan of awamori, an alcoholic beverage distilled from rice. When he moved to Hawaii in 1978, however, he couldn’t find awamori, so he started drinking Honolulu Sake Brewery’s Takara Masamune instead.

“A Japanese reporter introduced me to Takao Nihei, the toji (brewmaster) and the driving force behind Honolulu Sake Brewery until it closed in 1989,” Pearce said. “You can’t talk about sake in Hawaii, or even sake in the United States, without talking about Takao Nihei.”

In 1954 Nihei came to Hawaii from Tokyo to revive Honolulu Sake Brewery, which, founded in 1908, was struggling to make a comeback after World War II. A research technician, he solved technical problems that arose from brewing sake in a tropical climate. Impressed with the fortitude of Japanese immigrants who found hope and solace in a weekly glass of sake after working long, hard days in the sugar cane fields, he decided to stay in Hawaii.

“Nihei-san and I shared a reverence for rice and sake, and I think that’s why we had such a strong bond,” Pearce said. “I used to go to the brewery, drink sake with him and listen to his endlessly fascinating sake tales.”

Those conversations inspired Pearce to form Kokusai Sake Kai, the International Sake Association, with four other sake enthusiasts in 1987 (Nihei was the group’s adviser). Around 2000, according to Pearce, quality sakes started coming into the U.S. Articles with false or misleading information about sake began appearing, and “contests” with dubious judges and awards were launched.

“For those of us who had been participating in Kokusai Sake Kai events for 15 years and knew something about the criteria for evaluating sake, it seemed like a bad situation,” Pearce said. “We decided to establish a formal tasting based on procedures followed in Japan for a century.”

Thus was born the U.S. National Sake Appraisal, which brings 10 experts from Japan and the mainland to Honolulu each summer to blind-taste and judge hundreds of sakes. The Joy of Sake, the public tasting of those entries, honors Nihei, who died in 1994. This year the appraisal will take place Wednesday; on Friday some 1,500 sake aficionados are expected to sample a record 391 sakes from 167 breweries at the 15th annual Joy of Sake.

Ten entries are from five American breweries; the rest represent every sake-brewing region and style in Japan. Most are not sold in the U.S., and half are in the ultrapremium daiginjo category.

“Only at The Joy of Sake can people in Hawaii sample such an amazing array of sakes in peak condition,” Pearce said. “You never get bloated with sake, as you can with beer, and it doesn’t have the alcohol punch that spirits do. Sipping slowly, along with appetizers and a glass of water, you can enjoy sake for hours at a stretch.”

Twenty-one restaurants will serve dishes that showcase how well sake pairs with food. Think udon made with sour poi with tomato-coconut ponzu from Hale Ohuna, opening in Kaimuki soon, and smoked wild boar with poha berries and kabocha puree from Highway Inn, which has been drawing crowds to Waipahu since 1947.

Music, potters selling handmade sake cups and displays on sake making, tasting and the history of the Honolulu Sake Brewery will also contribute to what Pearce calls the finest sake celebration bar none.

“It’s a wonderful party,” he said. “Meet old friends and make new ones as you learn, have fun, delight your palate and discover the joy of sake.”

Cheryl Chee Tsutsumi is a Honolulu-based freelance writer whose travel features for the Honolulu Star-Advertiser have won several Society of American Travel Writers awards.