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Kiuchi Shuzou Ltd |
The Kiuchi Brewery was established in 1823 by Kiuchi Gihei, the headman of Kounosu ("Nest") village as a producer of sake. His family was collecting rice from farmers as land taxes for the Mito Tokugawa family. He began his brewery with the idea of using the remaining rice stocks in the warehouse. At this time in Japan a new political movement began to reform the Tokugawa regime. Fujita Toko, one of the movement's activists, advocated an ideology to build a new organizational government with a reverence of the emperor, and his thought led to the Meiji Restoration.
Kikusakari Sake
Fujita was a close friend of Kiuchi, who named one of his sakes KIKUSAKARI as a respect to the emperor. KIKU (chrysanthemum) is a crest of the imperial household, and SAKARI means 'property'.
Mikio Kiuchi inherited the brewery legacy in 1950. It was the time when the sake industry flourished as the rapid growth of Japan's economy after the World War II. Although many sake breweries started mass producing low quality sake due to increased demand, Kiuchi Brewery maintained their policy of pursuing the best quality of sake with the optimum ingredients and craftsmanship.
Hitachino Nest Beer
In autumn 1996, Kiuchi started their beer brewing business and named the brand Hitachino Nest Beer with the unique owl character logo.
Over the years, Kiuchi Brewery has gained Japan and worldwide attention by winning awards at numerous world beer competitions.
Shochu
Kiuchi built a distillation facility in March, 2003 to aid with recycling & reduction of waste. Beginning with the production of Shochu Kiuchi, distilled liquor made from sakekasu (sake lees) which is the by-product of sake brewing.
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| Picture: Kiuchi Brewery characters |
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