農家の味を追い求めて
ここに足を運んだ理由は、特Ａ地区の隣の加西市で山田錦を育てる農家の名古屋敦さんに会うためです。この名古屋さんは実に多才で、普段は大人しく優しい湯豆腐みたいな方でデザイナーをしていましたが、3 年前から家業の農業を継ぎました。農家という自分の将来を考えたときに、自分が育てたお米がどうなっていくのか、酒米が人の口に入るまでを知りたい、という思いから日本酒「SEN」を造りました。造ったといっても自分がお酒を製造するわけではなく、この思いに感銘を受け、同じ志を持つ蔵に依頼をしています。農家さんらしく「お米のうま味を感じて、食事に寄り添うお酒」がテーマで、今期で二造り目。茨城の蔵と地元加西市の蔵でそれぞれ、純米大吟醸と生酛造りの純米酒を造っています。将来的には加西市の若いメンバーでグループを作って、この田んぼで取れた山田錦、名古屋さんの作った山田錦、などというようにしていきたいとのことでした。兵庫県の田んぼの視察を終えた後に東京でSEN の新酒発表を行ないました。参加した日本酒好きの方々もさすがにこの新しくまだ日本酒市場に出回っていないお酒は知りません。しかし「まさか山田錦の農家さんに会えて話ができると思わなかった」と、名古屋さんの話に耳を傾けて、普段の日本酒の会とまた違ったアプローチに興味津々でした。昨今は農家さんの高齢化などで廃業が増え、田んぼが減少しているといいます。しかし、農家さんの顔が見れたり、表に出てくれば、これから彼のような農家さんのアプローチは増えるのではないかと思っています。
Pursuing the taste of the farmer's sake
The purpose of my visit was to meet Atsushi Nagoya, a farmer producing Yamadanishiki in the Kasai City next to the special A region. Nagoya is a very talented gentle man. He was working as a designer and then took over the family business three years ago. When considering his future as a farmer, he realized that he wanted to know the whole cycle of rice that he produced including how the resulting sake was consumed. So he started to produce a new sake and named it "SEN." Strictly speaking, he is not producing SEN himself. He is outsourcing the production of SEN to two sake breweries which have the same way of thinking about the sake production as himself. Their target is a sake with the sweet delightful taste of Yamadanishiki that harmonizes with foods. The current season is their second one. One brewery in the Ibaraki Prefecture is producing SEN of the Daiginjou type (from rice only, the kernels of which are ground off by more than fifty percents).
The other brewery in the Kasai City is producing SEN of the "Kimotozukuri" type (from rice only, using a special type of rice malt). Nagoya is planning to start up a group of young farmers in the Kasai City to promote Yamadanishiki produced in the area.
After returning from the abovementioned visit, I organized a party in Tokyo to introduce the newly brewed SEN to sake lovers. Many people came to the party, but even they did not know this newcomer to the sake market. But they were excited to have an opportunity to talk with a farmer who produces Yamadanishiki. They appreciated this rather uncommon style of sake party very much. Recently many farms are closed because farmers became too old to work and many young people do not want to work on farms. So the area of rice fields is decreasing. But I am hoping that approaches like that of Nagoya will activate the rice and sake industries by increasing the communication between producers and consumers.
