SakeSwap

"SakeSwap" is an activity hosted by Andrew Yamaguchi. This is a monthly activity, which any resident of Japan can join. Those who want to participate the activity of a specific month must sign up for the activity by the end of the preceding month. A partner is selected among the participants for each participant, and they exchange their selected bottles between the selected partners. So, if you join the SakeSwap activity you can share the delight of your favorite sake with your partner, and you in turn may encounter new local sake. I think this is an interesting activity, and I have signed up for July's SakeSwap.

I have already exchanged addresses with my partner, selected one bottle of sake, and sent it out. I had decided to select sake from among Tokyo sake brands for my partner because I live in the western part of Tokyo, where many of Tokyo sake breweries are located, and I am familiar with Tokyo sake brands. However, it turned out that my partner, who is an American, also lived in Tokyo. I thought he might know some of Tokyo sake or be very familiar with Tokyo sake. So, I thought I should select something very rare.

Yesterday, I visited a nearby liquor shop, where I always find sake products that are usually difficult to find in other places. At this time, I happened to find two bottles of Sawanoi Ginjo Nakagumi BY2008: one was 1-sho bottle and the other, 4-go bottle. These bottles were only two bottles they had.


Actually, I had a chance to drink the BY2007 version of this sake in March. At that time, the impression of the sake was elegant, moderate, and well-balanced, and I liked it. At that time, I was not sure when I would stumble across this sake again since this sake is quite a rare product (one employee of Ozawa Syuzou, the brewery of this sake, once said that it was hard even for employees of the brewery to have a chance to drink this sake).

So, yesterday, I purchased these two bottles, the smaller bottle for my sake swap partner and the lager bottle for myself. I hope my partner will like this sake.

Later, I will taste this sake and report.