{"id":11343,"date":"2025-10-26T18:30:04","date_gmt":"2025-10-26T17:30:04","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.dutchwasabi.nl\/?p=11343"},"modified":"2026-03-02T15:15:29","modified_gmt":"2026-03-02T14:15:29","slug":"how-to-drink-sake-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.dutchwasabi.nl\/en\/hoe-drink-je-sake\/","title":{"rendered":"How to Drink Sake."},"content":{"rendered":"
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Although beer is the most consumed in Japan, and their whiskey is world-class, sake is the country's national drink. <\/span>This particular rice-based alcoholic beverage is best known as rice wine, but it is not; it is a separate category .<\/span><\/p>

Sake is a complicated drink, producing it is labor-intensive and time-consuming. It requires a lot of attention and, above all, love! The elaborate process results in many styles, each with unique flavor profiles, alcohol levels and sweetness. No two sake bottles are the same.<\/span><\/p>

Before diving into drinking and serving sake, you may want to know more about how sake is brewed. You can find this information here What is Sake. We also have another interesting piece on the history of Sake.<\/span><\/p>\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t

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Drinking and serving<\/h2>\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t
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Some sake comes in wine bottles, others in bottles that look like beer or liquor. Don't be fooled by the packaging. It often says little about the quality or how to use the sake. There are different ways to drink sake. Generally, this depends on the type of sake, the occasion and, of course, personal preference. Still, there are some handles.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t

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Tokkuri<\/h3>\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t
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A tokkuri is a bottle, typically very stylish and beautifully decorated, and it is ideal for bringing sake in gifts to your guests.<\/span><\/p>

In addition, the tokkuri also has another purpose, when hot sake is served, the tokkuri is heated in hot water, allowing you to heat it slowly and preserve the flavors.<\/span><\/p>\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t

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Masu<\/h3>\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t
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Vendors used to sell rice by volume using a wooden box as a standard size. This box is the masu and contains about 180 ml.<\/span><\/p>

This made the use of the masu as a drinking vessel commonplace, with the added advantage that you could also smell the wood aroma while drinking the sake. Now some sake is aged in wooden barrels, such as cedar, but generally sake is meant to be drunk as it is bottled. Nowadays the masu is mostly ornamental and is not used much.<\/span><\/p>\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t

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Ochoco<\/h3>\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t
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Small ceramic cups quickly became the norm for drinking sake; they do not emit odor or taste and are often beautiful and authentic.<\/span><\/p>\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t

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Wine glasses<\/h3>\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t
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Sake is increasingly served these days in the best restaurants around the world. Even in non-Japanese restaurants. Here sake is mostly served in wine glasses.\u00a0\u00a0<\/span><\/p>

It is no surprise that wine glasses, especially those for white wine, have become the norm in certain circles. Swirling a glass of sake releases the broad palette of subtle aromas, enhancing the complex flavor.<\/span><\/p>\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t

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Temperature<\/h2>\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t
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Sake producers create a wide variety of styles, some crystalline and some milky, some corky and some sweet.<\/span><\/p>

Traditionally, sake was always served hot in Japan, but in the past 30-40 years this has changed somewhat, with more and more sake being served at room temperature or chilled.<\/span><\/p>

This is due not only to changing traditions, but also to fundamental improvements in the production process. Many sake, especially the ginjo varieties that didn't really exist 40 years ago, now have a much more refined flavor and aroma, which can sometimes be lost when the sake is heated. Most sake used to be much rougher, fuller, sweeter and woodier, and therefore better suited to heating.<\/span><\/p>

While the only way to find the desired serving temperature for a particular sake is to experiment, we'll help you get started with three basic ways. These are\u00a0can<\/strong>\u00a0or heated sake,\u00a0hiya<\/strong>\u00a0which refers to chilled sake and thirdly sake that is on\u00a0room temperature<\/strong>\u00a0is served.<\/span><\/p>\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t

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Can-heated sake<\/h3>\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t
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Much of today's sake is still served warm, partly because heating can mask unpleasant aspects of the flavor and make it more palatable; something especially necessary with the cheapest futsushu (ordinary sake). Premium sake, on the other hand, with a more delicate character and subtle aroma, is generally not heated.<\/span><\/p>

However, junmaishu (pure rice sake) can be heated to about 45 degrees Celsius and junmai ginjo to about 40 degrees Celsius. The only other type of premium sake that can be heated is taruzake, which is sake that has been stored or aged in a cedar vessel.<\/span><\/p>\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t

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Hiya-cooled sake<\/h3>\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t
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Most premium sake such as ginjoshu, daiginjoshu, junmai daiginjoshu and unpasteurized namazake are best served chilled around 15 degrees Celsius. This is the temperature at which the subtle flavors and delicate aromas of these refined sakes are at their best. They can be chilled further, but over-chilling can blur the flavor and aroma, which can cause the complexity of flavor and aroma to be lost. Namazake, because it is unpasteurized, should be stored at room temperature and should never be heated or reheated. It can generally be served colder than other types of sake.<\/span><\/p>\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t

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Room temperature<\/h3>\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t
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This third option for serving sake is, in fact, one of the most versatile. It is recommended for all ginjoshu and daiginjoshu of the highest quality.<\/span><\/p>

For almost all of our sake, we have indicated the ideal temperature in the product specification. However, as you have read, sometimes it also comes down to personal taste. <\/span><\/p>

Enjoy!<\/span><\/p><\/article><\/div>\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t

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Hoewel bier het meest wordt gedronken in Japan, en hun whisky van wereldklasse is, is sake de nationale drank van<\/p>","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":11305,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[328],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-11343","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-info"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.dutchwasabi.nl\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11343","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.dutchwasabi.nl\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.dutchwasabi.nl\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.dutchwasabi.nl\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.dutchwasabi.nl\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=11343"}],"version-history":[{"count":16,"href":"https:\/\/www.dutchwasabi.nl\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11343\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":11422,"href":"https:\/\/www.dutchwasabi.nl\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11343\/revisions\/11422"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.dutchwasabi.nl\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/11305"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.dutchwasabi.nl\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=11343"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.dutchwasabi.nl\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=11343"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.dutchwasabi.nl\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=11343"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}