by Kumagai Jinya
Unless you’re a local, you probably wouldn’t just pack up and head off to Toyama Bay without special reason—it’s one of those places. But for a craft beer fan, Tanabata Beer Festa Toyama comes to mind, not to mention the breweries of the region. But the appeal of taking a beer pilgrimage to Toyama hardly ends there; rich seafood options, the Tateyama mountain range and hot springs galore all add to the area’s charm.
Almost out on the tip of the Noto Peninsula in Ishikawa prefecture’s Noto-cho lie a brewery and restaurant run by Nihonkai Club since 1998. The governing body is actually a social welfare foundation called Bushien in southern Ishikawa’s Hakusan City that runs facilities for physically and mentally challenged individuals, the elderly and children.
Right after they received their brewery license and were about to begin making beer, the director of the foundation dived into a tour of Europe. While trying all the various styles of beer there, he decided first that they had to do a pilsner and then thought, “Well, if we’re going to make that beer, we might as well go with the original Czech style.”
He then enlisted the help of a consulting company for the brewing process. A Czech national in the company figured that if they wanted to make Czech-style beer the only natural thing would be to introduce a brewery he knew employing a Czech. A senior classmate at his old school had been the second brewmaster while someone in that same class, a guy named Kotynek, took the reigns to become the third. This particular high school was located within Prague and was a technical school specializing in food and agriculture; Kotynek had originally studied the fundamentals of brewing there. After graduation he worked at the Bernard Brewery, known for its delicious dark lager, and through his friend’s introduction, eventually ended up at Nihonkai Club!
Their regular beers include a pilsner, weizen, dark lager and the “Okunoto Legend” beer. He also brews some seasonals and when I visited I got to enjoy a rather challenging style of beer: imperial brown ale.
The sea that the Nihonkai Club faces actually is the Nihonkai, but the brewpub is located in Toyama Bay where the waves are gentle and rather clear. Before you start feasting on food and beer, definitely gaze out at the sea from the top of a really, really long slide on the premises.
Unazuki Bakushukan (ale hall) opened even earlier, in April of 1997. It’s now located in Toyama’s Kurobe City, but when it was founded, it was actually a part of the town of Unazuki, which was later annexed. It’s an area whose main industries are agriculture and tourism driven by hot springs. But as the agricultural economy began to wane, the town and business development association decided that in order to rejuvenate the town and create jobs, they would build a brewery and restaurant to be run by the private sector.
Their regular beers on opening were a kölsch and alt, along with some seasonals added to the lineup: a weizen for spring, a pilsner for summer, dunkel for autumn, and bock for winter. A German brewer trained Unazuki in 1998 on their bock and it is particularly good. They began selling bottles in 2000 and now their flagship beers include the bock in addition to the kölsch and alt.
So what is Unazuki Beer’s distinct characteristic? Sure, they may use tap water, but this isn’t any ordinary tap water; it’s the good stuff from Kurobe. The beer’s crisp, refreshing taste is due in part to this particular water. They also have their own malting equipment, which is quite rare among craft breweries, and use locally raised barley for malt. And of course the barley is raised on water from Kurobe.
Incidentally, the bock (called Kamoshika) took gold at the recent International Beer Competition held in Tokyo. Of the 43 competition judges, 17 of them were from overseas; with Charlie Papazian perhaps best known among the mix of personalities, it was truly an international event. When brewer Morishita saw the “Good job!” written on his comment sheet, he felt as if he really had been recognized at the international level.
Even now, Johanna Bakushu in Toyama’s Nanto City makes beer while at the same time running a sheet metal operation for automobiles. Brewmaster Yamamoto Masaru and his father decided to get their happoshû (beer with additives) license and in 2001 began brewing.
It was tough for them for a while. When the young Yamamoto went to a local festival, for example, he would only sell three beers. “And even when we sold it, people would snap at us, ‘it’s terrible.’ While dealing with that disappointment, I realized that a festival is almost like a court hearing for a given product.” Guests just don’t see that the person selling the beer in front of them is the brewer, and they say what they think. He took their candid but instructive words to heart and went back to the drawing boards.
One of the conditions of obtaining a happoshu license, however, is that brewers must produce more than six kiloliters each year. He neither cleared the bar his first year or in 2002, so in 2003 the tax office (which regulates the licenses) dropped in to say, “If you can’t do it this year, why don’t you call it quits (read: we’re not going to renew your license).” Yamamoto mused, “I don’t want to make just any old beer, but a good session beer,” and came up with his Sakura, which uses peach, and the Kaede, which uses Cassis. The two beers quickly became popular at events he attended and that year he produced seven kiloliters of beer. And because of those lighter beers, his regular Hakama Ale and Mugiya Ale became better known, too.
In 2005, at the urging of some of his clients and fans, he entered the International Beer Competition and won three awards. Yamamoto was of course elated, but perhaps his clients and fans were even happier for him. He gained wider recognition and even locally people warmed up to his endeavors. Then, he launched the Tanabata Beer Festa Toyama mentioned earlier and has been pumping on all pistons ever since.
Ohya Brasserie, located in Toyama City, came late to the game, getting its license in 2007 and selling its new brews the next year. The lone but perfectly capable brewer Ohya Takashi launched his career in 1999 at Funakura Kogen Nojo. After joining the company, he trained for two weeks at Kyodo Shoji (what later became Coedo Beer) where the German brewmaster taught him and four other staff from Coedo the art of brewing, in particular brews that use vegetables and fruits.
Funakura Kogen Nojo opened its brewery in 2000. They launched the “Fusha no Oka Beer Kobo” brand, but decided to shut down their brewery in 2007. Just prior to that Ohya had traveled around much of Belgium for training.
On his return to Japan, Ohya decided to open his own brewery, obtaining his license on Christmas of that year. He decided to add “brasserie” to his own name for the name of the brewery because of his training experiences in Belgium. The brewery was located right in front of Toyama Station and its regular beers included the Ecchû Fuga (a pale ale) and Chocolat Noir, which uses cocoa.
In 2010, he relocated from that dual industrial-commercial area to his home in the city. His brewery is now located in a garage and detached buildings.
Ohya prides himself in making beers that are individualistic and doesn’t pay much attention to what other breweries are making. Some of the beers born of this philosophy include honey ales. Ohya describes the subtle differences in flavor, “How they taste in the end differs depending on the type of flower which eventually gave rise to the honey. Honey originating from yuzu is really spicy.”
Yamamoto and Ohya are the main breweries behind the Tanabata Feer Festa Toyama that’s held in July in the city and draws fans from as far and wide as Tokyo and the Kansai area. Yamamoto and the owner of a now defunct beer pub in Toyama organized the inaugural festival in 2008, inviting the three Toyama breweries as well as nine breweries from outside the prefecture.
Until right before the event, Yamamoto was really worried whether anyone would actually come. He devised a marketing ploy: some blue beer that he had the local newspaper cover for him. After the article ran, they were deluged with requests for pre-sale tickets and droves more than they expected showed up, making it a huge success. The festival has since seen an increase in guests, breweries, and serving volume, so much so that, much to Yamamoto’s delight and distress, they can’t possibly accommodate any expansion in the current space. In the span of five years, the amount of beer consumed has doubled. Yamamoto has been on the organizing committee most of the time and laughs, “I’m the kind that likes to jump head-first into something, but Ohya is more cool and collected; together I think we make a great partnership with mutual support.” This year they decided to move the closing time back from 9:30 to 8:30 so that guests might be encouraged to visit some other hangout in the city and thus stimulate the local economy more.
It’s unfortunate that the pub in Toyama mentioned above shut down, but recently there’s a new kid on the block in the town’s entertainment district called Takoku Shokusai Oeuf that serves and supports craft beer. Naturally, they have bottles and cans from local breweries like Johanna and Ohya Brasserie, but on the weekends, they expand to other draft beers from all around Japan. It’s gaining popularity and they usually cash about two kegs just among the locals.
Obviously the summer may seem like a great time of year to visit Toyama with its mountains, scenic shoreline and beautiful countryside. But the fish specialties are fantastic in winter and with more than a few decent breweries around, why wait until any particular season? The beer is reason enough to go any time!
This article was published in Japan Beer Times # () and is among the limited content available online. Order your copy through our online shop or download the digital version from the iTunes store to access the full contents of this issue.
