Why did you become one of the brewers, rather than serve another role, like in sales or management for example?

I wanted to understand the company better and realized I had to learn about brewing. Beer seemed like a good direction for that because, compared to sake, it has more ingredients. I thought beer suits me, too. I started about three years ago, learning from our brewmaster Tsuji as well as at the brewing school in Hiroshima.

What have been some of the challenges you’ve faced?

In the beginning my job was mostly physical labor. Our company is also a sake company and very conservative so my training reflected that; I watched, I learned. It was only in my second year that Tsuji really started entrusting me with some of the brewing. The boil is actually the hardest part for me because we use old boilers and have to do a lot by hand. The first day of fermentation also worries me, too.

Have you ever had to dump beer on your watch?

No beer since I’ve been here. We’ve certainly done it with sake, though.

What are some of the beers that you’ve had an influence in producing?

I’ve given a lot of input to recipes, like the Garnet Rouge, for example. It’s a wine-like beer. I wondered how we might create a red beer. I thought about shiso and other herbs but we eventually achieved it through kuromai (black rice)! The hop is Nelson Sauvignon, which adds to the aroma. There’s no fruit in it whatsoever.

I’ve also provided feedback after we’ve produced a beer, saying let’s brew it this way next time. I haven’t had the chance yet to devise an entire recipe. We don’t really produce so much beer and the risk is high. But I eventually want to make at least one beer on my own, from start to finish.

Since Konishi Shuzo is also a sake brewery, have you ever tried to use sake yeast in beer?

Our Komin Bakushu actually uses sake yeast. The beer is named after Kawamoto Komin, who was Commodore Perry’s interpreter. He was able to drink beer because of his role and made what is believed to be Japan’s first beer recipe. We actually still have a copy of that recipe. We studied it and wondered what yeast he was using at the time. We realized it was probably sake yeast so that’s what we did. He was from Hyogo, you know, so maybe he even used our yeast! (laughter) Anyway, city hall told us about this interesting history and asked if we could make the beer. We started in 2008 and make it still. It’s a rather difficult beer to brew. The yeast becomes very active and we have to be careful to achieve a good balance.

Konishi Shuzo was one of the first craft breweries, but isn’t even close to being one of the biggest. Was it affected by the early craft beer boom, which died out in the late 90s?

That didn’t really affect us because we focused on local restaurants. We knew we had to take responsibility for what we made and we took it seriously. And we were small from the beginning. Most places in those days were going with German styles, but we went with Belgian. We wanted small Belgian equipment, Belgian techniques and, without compromising too much, Belgian ingredients. We grew very slowly and participated in outside events very slowly. It was only recently that we entered competitions and festivals.

Will you continue brewing?

That’s my feeling. If I’m needed elsewhere in the company, I might have to switch to that side. But whether it’s the import section or our own brewery, I’ll probably stick with beer.

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.