INhonolulu Magazine Issue #14 - February 2014 | Page 12

METRO
Kampai to the
Sake Shop
Joseph Han
Photos by Chantelle Matsumura

S

ake has a reputation as your father’s
drink; something that’s only good with
Japanese food. At The Sake Shop, the
first retail sake store in Hawai‘i, this notion
is proved false by the knowledgeable staff
who can help customers to learn about the
drink and find what’s best to bring to dinner
or to present to someone special.
With over 150 different premium sake,
seasonal sake offered throughout the year
and a select line of shochu and umeshu,
The Sake Shop has grown every year since it
opened in 2010, despite being a small business with minimal funding and no budget
for marketing.
Even today we have people who come in
for the first time expressing their surprise
that we’ve been around for four years and
they’ve never heard of us … (but) our plans
for the future include possibly moving to a
bigger location and maybe opening a small
sake tasting bar to accompany our retail
store,” said Nadine Leong, co-owner with
husband Malcolm Leong.
In 2006, Nadine and Malcolm took a trip
to Japan with a large group. During a particular dinner in the Ginza district of Tokyo,
they were able to sample various bottles of
premium sake which inspired their passion
for the drink.
“Both with the food and on it’s own, all
of the sake that night was outstanding and
quite reasonable in price,” Nadine said. “We
even dodged the expected massive hangover the next day as we found out that most
people don’t experience a hangover after
drinking good sake. Good friends, good
food and good sake in Tokyo, Japan: Life
doesn’t get much better than that.”
According to Nadine, sake consumption in Japan has been down, but steadily
grows every year in the United States and
Europe—especially in Hawai‘i with its large
Japanese population. Despite this, many
Page 12

The Sake Shop
1461 S. King St.
Mon.–Sat.,
10am–8pm
Sun.,
10am–5pm
947-7253
sakeshophawaii.
com

people here still don’t know that much
about sake.
“One of the challenges in Hawai‘i
is that many of us still think of sake
as that ‘jet fuel’ tasting drink that our
fathers or grandfathers would drink
piping hot,” Nadine said. “Premium
sake that is smooth to drink and consumed chilled is still new to many
people here in Hawai‘i.”
Nadine explained that sake is commonly known as rice wine. Like beer,

sake is brewed, but unlike wine—
where fermented yeast eats the sugar
present in grapes to create alcohol—
there is no usable sugar in rice. In
sake’s fermentation process, by applying a mold called koji-kin to cooked
rice, this produces an enzyme that
converts starch to sugar before yeast
is added.
“The sake making process continues with the addition of yeast, more
rice and water,” Nadine said. “At the

end of the process, the unfermented
rice particles are filtered out leaving
a clear liquid for pasteurization and
then bottling. Sake has the distinction of being able to produce one of
the highest, if not the highest, alcohol
level of any brewed beverage—around
20 percent.”
When asked why those who don’t
usually drink sake should