Episode 165 Show Notes
Episode 165. If you hear the term “CEL-24” and the first thing you think of is prison, and not a sake yeast, I don’t think anyone would blame you. But today we’re here to spread the word on CEL-24 sake yeast and it’s role in bringing us some of the most fruit-driven sake aromas on the planet. Developed in Kochi prefecture in the 90’s, CEL-24 was a response to the market demands for more aromatic and fruity sake styles. And after tasting a CEL-24 sake for ourselves, we can say that the apple, pineapple and other fruit aromas are strong and powerful as promised. Yeast can have a big impact on a sake’s aromatics and CEL-24 yeast really shows this to be true. Join us as we explore the world of sake yeast and perhaps push the boundary of how fruity a sake can be! #SakeRevolution
Skip to: 00:19 Show Opening
Welcome to the show from John and Timothy
Skip to: 04:05 CEL-24 Sake Yeast
“Full mind, full body filled with Sanuki olive yeast”
https://sanuki-olive-yeast.jp/en
Facebook:
https://www.facebook.com/sanuki.sake/
Instagram:
https://www.instagram.com/sanukisake/
Youtube:
https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCKEzPPmZHQOOPu92QNy0Tjw
Twitter:
https://twitter.com/sanukisake
“Inspired by a unique idea born in the Sanuki region, we have successfully created the world’s first sake produced from olive yeast. We want those who find humor in novelty to experience the true pleasure of drinking sake with this surprising twist on the everyday. ”
Skip to: 13:08 Sake Tasting: Kameizumi Eternal Spring Junmai Ginjo Nama Genshu
Kameizumi Eternal Spring Junmai Ginjo Nama Genshu
Acidity: 1.6
Alcohol: 14.0%
Brand: Kameizumi (亀泉)
Brewery: Kameizumi Shuzo
Classification: Genshu, Junmai Ginjo, Nama
Importer/Distributor: Joto Sake
Prefecture: Kochi
Rice Type: Hattannishiki
Sake Name English: Eternal Spring
Seimaibuai: 50%
SMV: -17.0
Yeast: CEL-24
Skip to: 27:38 Show Closing
This is it! Join us next time for another episode of Sake Revolution!
Announcing Patreon
Now there is a new way to support Sake Revolution. Join us on Patreon! Patreon is an online platform that allows you to support your favorite creators by subscribing to a monthly membership. At Sake Revolution, we’re offering two tiers, each with its own perk. If you enjoy our sake podcast, if you are able, please consider supporting this labor of sake love! See below to learn about our Patreon support levels.
-
Sake Enthusiast
Have you ever wanted to sip along with us as we taste our sakes on the podcast? Now you can! As a Sake Enthusiast patron, you’ll get the inside track and know in advance which sakes we’ll be featuring on the show. This allows you to get them on hand and sip along with us while you listen.
-
Sake Otaku
As a Sake Otaku supporter of the pod, you’ll get access to all the Sake Enthusiast intel along with access to a monthly live zoom Sake Happy Hour taking place the first Weds of every month at 9pm ET (6pm PT). Visit with us live on zoom! Come with all your questions and suggestions and enjoy a relaxed and fun Happy Hour with with us as we all sip sake together!
Episode 165 Transcript
John Puma: 0:21
Hello everybody. And welcome to Sake Revolution. This is America’s first sake podcast, and I’m your host, John Puma from the Sake Notes. Also the administrator over at the internet sake discord and lead mod at Reddit’s rslash sake community.
Timothy Sullivan: 0:38
And I’m your host, Timothy Sullivan. I am a Sake Samurai. I’m a sake educator, as well as the founder of the Urban Sake website. And every week, John and I will be here tasting and chatting about all things sake and doing our best to make it Fun. And easy to understand. Hello, John.
John Puma: 0:55
Tim, that was a, that was a little bumpy or open than we’re used to. It feels like we haven’t done this in a while.
Timothy Sullivan: 1:02
Speak for yourself. a seasoned professional.
John Puma: 1:05
Well, yes, yes, yes. Yeah. No, we are, we are both seasoned professionals. Um, but I think that, uh, I think we’re going to take a brief moment here and address the small elephant in the room.
Timothy Sullivan: 1:14
no,
John Puma: 1:15
that is our.
Timothy Sullivan: 1:16
It’s, it’s, it’s a, it’s a tiny little puppy in the corner. Not an elephant.
John Puma: 1:21
the puppy in the corner, the puppy in the sake education corner, um,
Timothy Sullivan: 1:25
We’ve been away.
John Puma: 1:26
is that we haven’t done this in a while. We haven’t recorded a new episode in a little bit and it’s, you know, it’s, it’s nothing, I just want to say nothing bad has happened to Tim or I. We’re, we’re still doing our thing. We’re still. Uh, you know, we’re still living life and still, we’re happy and healthy, but, um, uh, our, our professional lives, our day jobs, so to speak, had some really large projects of late,
Timothy Sullivan: 1:49
Yes,
John Puma: 1:50
and it’s, it’s made, uh, doing the show a little bit more difficult than it had been, uh, in the past. Right, Tim?
Timothy Sullivan: 1:57
absolutely. Yeah. So I’ve been working on a big project out at Brooklyn Kura. We opened the Sake Studies Center and we’ve been developing programming and holding classes. And that’s been a whole big project, but very rewarding and very fun. And hopefully we’ll have some collabs with the Sake Studies Center soon. Uh, but you and I, John are back in the saddle, aren’t we?
John Puma: 2:22
We are. The saddle is the chair at my desk at my home. And, uh, and we’re here. I, I’m sitting, I’ve got my microphone, I’ve got my headphones. There’s a wine glass and a bottle of sake next to me. I am ready to get back into it.
Timothy Sullivan: 2:36
All right. Well, what could be more exciting and more thrilling for our listeners than talking about sake yeast?
John Puma: 2:44
So, so hang on, hang on a second. So we have so many series on this show. We’ve got series devoted to rice, drinking vessels, well, you know, everything under the sun. And we never really delved into yeast,
Timothy Sullivan: 3:00
we did have one episode on flower yeast, remember?
John Puma: 3:04
we did have. Yeah, yeah. But that wasn’t like, we weren’t starting a series. That was just a fun one off. Wasn’t it?
Timothy Sullivan: 3:10
it, was a
John Puma: 3:10
or was it stealthily? It was secret, the secret origin of our new series.
Timothy Sullivan: 3:18
My evil plan worked perfectly.
John Puma: 3:21
goodness, Timothy, what have you been doing?
Timothy Sullivan: 3:23
I tricked you into a new series without your approval.
John Puma: 3:27
So here we are with a new series about sake yeast, I guess, is that what that was officially is happening now?
Timothy Sullivan: 3:34
It’s official now. There are many varieties of sake yeast, and it may not be the sexiest topic on the surface, but we’re going to make it interesting, aren’t we? We’ll see.
John Puma: 3:45
I think, yes, it is not the sexiest topic on the surface, but one thing I do think is that it’s kind of important. I think it’s underrated. We always talk about how important rice is and regionality and, but the yeast is like kind of where a lot of the aroma and the flavor come from, isn’t it? Right. Yeah.
Timothy Sullivan: 4:05
Yes, yeast is incredibly important when it comes to the aroma of the sake. So maybe we should talk just really briefly about what yeast is and what it does for people who are just getting started understanding alcoholic fermentation, but yeast is one of the microorganisms that’s involved in making alcohol and it’s used in wine, beer, and sake. And what we do with the yeast, the yeast is put into the, uh, the the mash, and it eats sugar and then metabolizes it and gives off alcohol and CO2. And that is what I call the engine of fermentation. So it’s a microorganism that basically makes the alcohol as a byproduct of its metabolism.
John Puma: 4:49
Right. wouldn’t that be a fun superpower to have in your metabolism?
Timothy Sullivan: 4:54
Well, there’s, there’s all different kinds of sake yeast in Japan, and most of them are numbered. If they’re, if they’re, If they’re maintained by the, um, the Kyokai or the Brewers Association of Japan, they have a number, like there’s a yeast number seven, there’s a yeast number nine, there’s a yeast number 1801, and those can be purchased if you have a brewing license in Japan. And they all have different characteristics and brewers are just going to, you know, usually purchase the type of yeast that fits the style of sake they want to make. But today we’re going to talk about Something a little different.
John Puma: 5:32
Uh, second episode about on the yeast topic and we’re already doing weird stuff. I like it.
Timothy Sullivan: 5:36
Yes. this is connected to the Ginjo Boom. Have you, have you ever heard about the Ginjo
John Puma: 5:42
ginjo boom. That’s my rap name. That’s now that’s
Timothy Sullivan: 5:51
DJ Ginjo Boom. We are
John Puma: 5:52
that’s it. That’s my, that’s my DJ. That’s my DJ name. Ginjo boom.
Timothy Sullivan: 5:56
We are not cutting that out. All right. Okay. Mr. Boom.
John Puma: 6:02
Anyway,
Timothy Sullivan: 6:03
So you obviously got your rap name from the real Ginjo Boom, right?
John Puma: 6:09
obviously now, I mean, you know, I have a reputation for enjoying big, fun, aromatic sake and so yeah, ginjo.
Timothy Sullivan: 6:20
Well, in the late eighties and early nineties, there was a, there was an economic boom in Japan. Real estate prices were through the roof and there was lots of money being made. And there was a demand suddenly for more aromatic, more quote unquote, modern styles of sake. And What happened was that a lot of the larger breweries kind of had a stranglehold on the yeast that were used to make these more fragrant modern styles. And when we say ginjo styles, what are we talking about, John?
John Puma: 6:53
We’re talking big, fruity, the, the, the fruit bombs.
Timothy Sullivan: 6:57
Yes. Lots of pineapple, banana, and apple, right?
John Puma: 7:00
Ooh, Yes.
Timothy Sullivan: 7:02
Yes. And I know that’s very much as we say, your wheelhouse, as we’ve said
John Puma: 7:08
it is on brand for me is what it is.
Timothy Sullivan: 7:13
some of the other prefectures or areas were wanting to get in on this ginjo boom and produce these types of sakes and the yeast were not as readily available. So one of your favorite prefectures, John, Kochi, we’re going to talk about Kochi Prefecture.
John Puma: 7:33
Yeah.
Timothy Sullivan: 7:34
You’ve been there. I’ve been there.
John Puma: 7:36
Yes, We do. We do. But the thing is that Kochi is so known for. Kind of dry sake. They’ve got a rep, right? Is that, is that, is that a good way to put it? They have a reputation. They have a, you know, obviously there’s a, there’s, there’s exceptions to every rule, but kind of like when you think of Niigata, you’ve got that kind of like that light, classic sake. When you think of Kochi, you think of something really dry. It’s going to go with food.
Timothy Sullivan: 8:01
Yes. They do have a reputation for producing dry sake, but they also have a reputation now after, yeah, uh, for producing, uh, really fruity and juicy sake. And The Kochi Perfectural Industrial Technology Center just rolls off the tongue, but that institute was tasked with finding a fruit forward. yeast that they could use in the prefecture. And in 1993, they developed a type of yeast, two yeasts actually. One is called CEL 19 and one is called CEL 24. That’s the letters C E L. I know it sounds like something you’d find in a jail, but um, this is,
John Puma: 8:56
There’s only one L in this one, Tim.
Timothy Sullivan: 8:59
This is what they, um, they’ve, they decided to call the yeast strain. So we’re going to be talking in particular about CEL-24 today. So this was developed in Kochi by the scientists at the Prefectural Industrial Technology Center in the early nineties. And it had some characteristics that. really turned up the volume on what they wanted.
John Puma: 9:25
Yeah. Um, it’s almost like they were like, Oh, Dry sake, huh? We’ve got dry sake. I’ll show you dry. And then they went and made this extremely fruity, big, bold yeast, or rather, I’m sorry, this, this yeast that makes extremely big, bold flavors. It’s a, um, it’s kind of interesting. It almost feels like they were trying to, um, play against type in a way that they, you know, they’re like, well, we’ve got this style down. Let’s do this other thing. Um, and then, and then, and we’ve got it. But the early nineties is not that long ago. So this is a, uh, would you say it’s like a young yeast then? Does that, is that, you know?
Timothy Sullivan: 10:00
I think so. I mean, we, we talked
John Puma: 10:02
like 31 years. That’s not too bad.
Timothy Sullivan: 10:04
Yeah. When we talked about Masumi, we talked about yeast number seven in our Masumi episode, right? Yeah. And that was in the post war period, I think, that they discovered yeast number seven. So there, there is a characteristic that CEL-24 gives to the sake and we’re going to get a little scientific y right now, but this is called, have you ever heard of ethyl caproate?
John Puma: 10:30
Once or twice.
Timothy Sullivan: 10:32
Okay. This is like an aroma compound that is in the sake and it is One of the key aromas for ginjo or fruity style. This one is known particularly when you have a high ethyl caproate compounds in the sake. You get fruity aromas, sweet aromas, and especially apple like aromas. So it’s a, very concentrated appley, apple peel, apple aroma, and it’s The CEL-24 was, developed in such a way to have double the ethyl caproate of other sake yeasts.
John Puma: 11:15
So the go big or go home?
Timothy Sullivan: 11:17
Absolutely. You know, they turned the, uh, they turned the, they turned the speaker up to 11 with ethyl caproate. Yes. So.
John Puma: 11:29
Wow.
Timothy Sullivan: 11:31
Yeah, so they asked for, uh, I actually heard a story. I don’t know if this is true, but I heard a story that the scientist who developed CEL-24, um, Haruhiko Uehigashi, he worked at the, the Kochi Prefectural Center. I heard that. He actually is not the biggest fan of sake made with the yeast he discovered. It’s too fruity for him and it’s too juicy and over-the-top.
John Puma: 12:01
Hmm. Hey, you know,
Timothy Sullivan: 12:02
yeah.To
John Puma: 12:04
each their own. I don’t want to, I don’t want to tell the man what he’s allowed to like, but it’s a little ironic that he ended up not being a fan
Timothy Sullivan: 12:13
But he gave the people what they asked for, right?
John Puma: 12:17
that he did. You know, you want something big and fruity. We got that. We can, we can make this happen.
Timothy Sullivan: 12:23
All right, now there are a number of sakes. that use CEL-24 and we’re going to focus in on one in particular today, aren’t we?
John Puma: 12:33
We are. when I think of CEL-24 in the U. S., this is the one that comes to mind. and as you pointed out, we’re dealing with Kochi. So the sake is from
Timothy Sullivan: 12:41
Has to come from Kochi.
John Puma: 12:43
has to come. So no, wait, wait, wait. So no, they’re not distributing or they’re not sharing this yeast with any breweries outside of Kochi. That’s interesting. It’s not shocking, but it’s interesting.
Timothy Sullivan: 12:52
I think CEL-24 is a Kochi prefectural
John Puma: 12:55
Wow.
Timothy Sullivan: 12:58
Yeah.
John Puma: 12:59
kind of cool. I like that. Like the guy, you know, that they’re keeping it, they’re keeping it, keeping it close to the vest. Uh,
Timothy Sullivan: 13:08
Yeah. So let’s, let’s look at the sake. What brewery do we have here?
John Puma: 13:14
so, this is, Kamezumi Shuzo over in Kochi, Kochi, of course on. Shikoku Island down in Southern Japan. and this is their, Junmai, Ginjo, Nama, Genshu. So kitchen sink on there with all the names,
Timothy Sullivan: 13:32
That’s my line.
John Puma: 13:34
I know I’m stealing it. Um, CEL-24, the name they’re giving it here is Eternal Spring. I kind of like that. What do you think of Eternal Spring? It has a nice ring to it.
Timothy Sullivan: 13:46
That has to refer to the juicy, fruity, spring like characteristics of this. Like you can, you can tap into springtime any, anytime you want by drinking this
John Puma: 13:56
Yes. Now, can we take a moment here and talk about this label? Because it’s very interesting. It’s very unique.
Timothy Sullivan: 14:02
So I do have some intel on this label.
John Puma: 14:04
Ooh, okay.
Timothy Sullivan: 14:05
so for those of you listening, please check out SakeRevolution.Com to see a photo of the bottle and this label we’re about to talk about. But the label is designed in such a way where it’s just like handwritten the name of the sake, the stats, and there’s a little red stamp that says unpasteurized sake or Nama sake, and it looks like almost unfinished label. And according to the Joto website, the. Sake was so popular and in such demand when it came out that they didn’t have time to design a label. They just had their internal handwritten stats on the label for, you know, the internal use. And they just went with that for the commercial label because they didn’t have time to design and print. A label. So it looks very hand drawn, doesn’t it?
John Puma: 15:01
Yeah. Yeah. And, and I’ve seen other, I’ve seen other brands do similar, similar styles, but I think that in my mind, I think Kameizumi might be like kind of the first, um, or at least it’s, it’s the one that I think of. I love how it looks. So it just looks like somebody grabbed a marker and just wrote all the stats down on the front. Uh, it’s, it’s very interesting. It’s very, um, striking. however, uh, For people in the States, there’s one thing that we want to explain, though, that there is really no English on the front of this label, though. Uh, you do have to flip it around to the back to see, um, what you’re dealing with.
Timothy Sullivan: 15:33
but it’s a very striking
John Puma: 15:35
Oh, but you’re not yet. It’s very striking. You can see the one with all the stats on it out there is the only, uh, like Romaji, the only like, English lettering is the cell in CEL-24. So if you find the CEL-24, you have found it.
Timothy Sullivan: 15:51
Yes. Yes. Um, so it does look like a handwritten label and that’s the story that they had to rush it to market and didn’t have time to design a label. So they just went with their internal label. Internal label, which I thought was really cool.
John Puma: 16:06
That is amazing.
Timothy Sullivan: 16:08
Yeah. So what about the stats on this? We know what the yeast is. We know the yeast is CEL-24. Uh, what else do we got?
John Puma: 16:15
well, I’m glad we established that part. So, uh, the rice here is a Hattan-Nishiki and me. So, uh, Hattan-Nishiki we’ve talked about plenty of times and I think actually we spotlighted it. Once, um, it’s, it’s often associated with Hiroshima, which is very nearby. Uh, and I am unfamiliar personally with Matsuyama me. they have been, polished down to 50 percent of their original size.
Timothy Sullivan: 16:43
The only, the only intel I have on Matsuyama Mei is that it comes from Ehime Prefecture. Yes.
John Puma: 16:52
So they’re borrowing some, some outside rice.
Timothy Sullivan: 16:54
Other than that, I don’t know much, but I did read that the Matsuyama Mei rice that they use for this sake is from Ehime.
John Puma: 17:02
Excellent. Excellent. Thank you. the ABV on this is 14. So even though we said, uh, you know, it’s, oh, it’s a nama genshu and blah, blah, blah. Genshu does mean kind of your, your quote, unquote, your cask strength, your, your undiluted, uh, Um, doesn’t mean that it’s high in alcohol. It just means they didn’t add water to it. Uh, and so in this case, 14%, so that’s a touch low. And here’s where we have the fun, the nihonshu do, the sake meter value, that measure of dry to sweet, where you go low, you go sweet. And this is minus 17. This, we should have featured this on the extreme series.
Timothy Sullivan: 17:41
That’s not that
John Puma: 17:42
It’s not that I know it, but all we use for extreme was actually far more. Uh, and then the acidity is two, which is also high, uh, and, and may counterbalance that nihonshu do just a tad that sake meter value. one other bit that we don’t usually get this bit of information, but I like that they added it, the shubo method is a sokujo, So Like, like most sake, it’s Like 90, percent sake
Timothy Sullivan: 18:08
Yeah. That’s great. All right. we know this is a Namazake and a Genshu. So even though it’s lower alcohol, there’s, um, little to no water added for that. And this sake does have a reputation, don’t you think?
John Puma: 18:26
It does. It certainly does. Um, I think we should probably taste a little bit and I’ll talk about his reputation and compare it to what we’re experiencing.
Timothy Sullivan: 18:36
All right.
John Puma: 18:37
All
Timothy Sullivan: 18:37
I’m, I’m on board. Sold.
John Puma: 18:40
Sold. It’s sold to the man with the headphones on.
Timothy Sullivan: 18:44
All right, here we go. I can smell it already. I just opened the bottle and I can smell it. Oh my gosh.
John Puma: 18:58
a ginjo punch in the face is what this is.
Timothy Sullivan: 19:01
is, it’s a ginjo ka. Ginjo ka again means ginjo aroma. Ginjo ka, punch in the face. I think that, that is, uh, one
John Puma: 19:12
It’s just, it’s just a lot.
Timothy Sullivan: 19:13
Yeah.
John Puma: 19:15
Um, I mean, I, I like my, my ginjo aromas as much as the next guy, possibly more than the next guy, but this is intense. It’s all, it is so much,
Timothy Sullivan: 19:24
John and I both have this in the glass and we’re going to give it a smell. Bring it to the nose.
John Puma: 19:30
is
Timothy Sullivan: 19:30
right. It’s a very big aroma, first of all, very perfumed, lots of aroma pouring out of the glass. And what I smell is a lot of, fruity notes primarily. There’s, um, apple, there’s banana, Pineapple as well. I’m getting a lot of pineapple smell. Some strawberry as well. Very much a fruit salad on steroids. Turned up to 11. Juicy, juicy
John Puma: 20:02
Very, it smells like it’s going to be juicy. It’s one of those things. It’s just got that, yeah, that fruit salad up. Yeah, it’s just, it’s also a little jammy to me. Like it’s like it’s, it’s fruit salad and maybe a little pure little fruit puree. You know what I mean?
Timothy Sullivan: 20:15
Strawberry preserves.
John Puma: 20:16
Yeah, yeah, yeah. But it is, it is big and like it’s, it is, it’s a lot. Now we’ve,
Timothy Sullivan: 20:25
we talked about the ethyl caproate, which is that apple and fruity aroma. But there’s also another factor that is produced, and that is malic acid. And so
John Puma: 20:42
acid before.
Timothy Sullivan: 20:44
so we said the acidity was a 2. 0, um, which is just a touch on the, the high end of the scale for the average. Um, but we want to keep that when we taste this as well, we want to keep an eye out for the acidity on the palate and, um, see how those fruit flavors and acidity transfer to what we taste. So you ready to give it a taste?
John Puma: 21:07
Let’s do it.
Timothy Sullivan: 21:08
All right. Hmm. Okay. It tastes like a liquid fruit roll up to me.
John Puma: 21:16
Laughter That is a very astute observation, Tim. Laughter And now, I can’t think of anything else. Laughter Yeah, I think that’s it’s on the nose.
Timothy Sullivan: 21:30
Yeah,
John Puma: 21:31
Mm,
Timothy Sullivan: 21:33
yeah, it has a, that Jolly Rancher fruit roll up fruitiness. Intense, concentrated, jammy, rich. Um, there’s melon, again, pineapple, lots of pineapple for me. Um, some strawberry preserves. Some smuckers action going on with the palate.
John Puma: 21:56
action going on. I agree, um, but it’s It’s, it’s intense. And there’s also, there’s like, there’s, there’s, there’s some gas in here still. So you can feel that a little bit. The mouth feel is, is nice. The ni the mouth feel is, um, one of the more interesting things and I think it, it distracts nicely from the intensity of the fruit. I think that the, um, I think that without the mouthfeel, it might just be like, too much. that tiny bit of effervescence really goes a long way towards balancing it out.
Timothy Sullivan: 22:31
I will say it’s delicious. But it is, there’s a lot of sweetness here too, right? Yeah. It’s, it’s quite sweet and very coating on the palate and it’s just, it’s an intense sake
John Puma: 22:48
Yeah, this is not, to me at least, this is not a sake that I am going to be sipping and then, oh wow, where did the bottle go? Because it’s, you’re, you’re aware of how much of it you’re drinking. It’s a lot. Not that you’re drinking a lot of it, but the flavor is a lot. It’s very intense. It coats the mouth. It’s, it is in charge.
Timothy Sullivan: 23:10
Yeah. I never do this, but I’m going to make a wine comparison. Like I, I’m, I’m usually against this, but I’m going to break my own rule
John Puma: 23:18
Oh my goodness.
Timothy Sullivan: 23:20
has like, the weight and the body and the punch in the face of like a big tannic red wine. And if you compare that to like a light, clean sipping white wine for summer, that’s drier. And you know, it’s like that kind of a difference with the, the, the body, the aroma, the perfume, the weight is all just super intense and
John Puma: 23:47
I get exactly what you’re
Timothy Sullivan: 23:48
on top of that, it’s like, this is a rich, a rich, fruity sake. And this is going to be a big attract, attraction for some types of consumers. But I think other consumers who may be like clean, light, easy drinking, sipping sakes, this may be too bold, too rich.
John Puma: 24:09
This, this, yes, perhaps if you, you know, are a scientist who makes yeast and made this, you may be like, Hmm, not my thing. Yeah, no, this is definitely not for everybody. I don’t think any sake is necessarily for everybody. Um, but I think that this one is especially, it’s going to have its fans and they’re going to love it. and then it’s going to have people who, who thinks it, who think it’s, um, you know, Very tasty and fun to sip on. I think that I fit into that category and I think you’re going to find people who think it’s just, it’s just too much, you know? And I, and for me, like I’m, I’m, I’m in the enjoying it, having a good time. Um, category. I’m like, where, where do you fit in on that?
Timothy Sullivan: 24:51
love nama sake. I love unpasteurized sake. I love fruity sake, but I think that this type of nama sake is really best consumed super, super, super fresh to get the most enjoyment out of the, the ethyl caproate fruitiness that’s
John Puma: 25:10
hmm. I think I know exactly what you mean. Yeah.
Timothy Sullivan: 25:15
Um, but hey, Kochi Prefecture ordered some Super over the top fruity yeast and the Kochi Prefectural Industrial Technology Center, they delivered.
John Puma: 25:29
They definitely
Timothy Sullivan: 25:30
they ordered.
John Puma: 25:31
They did. They didn’t, you know, it’s be careful what you wish for, because uh, this is exactly what it is. One thing is I thought there were only like a handful of CEL-24 sake is cause I really had only seen a handful. And then when I was in Kochi, I found out that most of the breweries there have experimented with CEL-24 at some point or another. And then if you look around, you’ll find. Uh, you’ll find bottles that they’ve, uh, that they’ve done, and, and the, the vibe is a little different off of them, even though they’re still big and loud, you can’t, this is not a yeast that can be tamed by any stretch of the imagination, but you can bring it down a notch and, and control it a little bit, I think, I had one from Bijofu that I thought was a lot of fun. Um, that was a little bit, it was a little bit muted next to this. So it was a little bit more my speed, but it was still really sweet. Um, and, and it’s still, it’s still quite the, the fruit explosion. I’m going beyond fruit bomb, Tim. This is fruit explosion,
Timothy Sullivan: 26:29
Yes. one other, point about CEL-24 that I read is that it produces alcohol very slowly, so they cannot reach the higher alcohol levels with CEL-24.
John Puma: 26:45
so that’s why it’s 14%.
Timothy Sullivan: 26:47
It is very fruity, geared more towards lower alcohol sakes. Um, so that may be another reason why we’re, we’re clocking in here at 14 percent and it’s still a genshu or undiluted.
John Puma: 27:03
Very nice.
Timothy Sullivan: 27:04
Okay, John. Well, you know, for being away for a little bit, I think you know, it’s like riding a bike,
John Puma: 27:11
was about to say that too. It is like riding a bike and it’s, and honestly, it’s really good to be back. It’s so nice to be doing this with you again. I really
Timothy Sullivan: 27:21
Absolutely. I am so glad to be sharing this. Super fruity Puma Wheelhouse Sake with you today.
John Puma: 27:30
more than the wheelhouse. This is. The wheel, the house is full. No, it is delicious though.
Timothy Sullivan: 27:38
yeah, it is delicious. Uh, it was so great to taste with you, John. And, I’m, very happy to be back behind the microphone and, uh, so happy to, have all of our listeners tuning in again. Thank you so much for listening today. I want to send a special thank you to all of our patrons as well. If you’d like to learn more about supporting Sake Revolution podcasts, please visit Patreon.com/SakeRevolution to learn more.
John Puma: 28:08
And remember that every episode of Sake Revolution comes complete with show notes. Show notes have a transcript of everything we talked about. They have photos usually of the labels and photos of labels really important, especially when you’re dealing with a sake like this, which has a fun and unique label. So get over to the site and check that out. Uh, we’ve a link to our shop there where you can buy things like stickers and t shirts and, um, well, we’re not dealing with work projects. One of these days we’re going to add more stuff. That’s, that’s the plan. That’s on the, that’s, that’s on my 2024 roadmap. So Tim, on that note, please grab your glass. Remember to keep drinking sake and. Kampai!