Sho Shin Sake
The Netherland’s first Sake Brewery
A shared passion led a couple of Dutch friends to start their own, independent sake brewery in Oosterbeek, The Netherlands – a village squeezed between forests and rivers, widely acclaimed for its outstanding landscape and natural springs.
Founders Arno and Reinout, joined by Bart, immersed themselves in the craftsmanship of sake brewing and are discovering the various facets of the process.
This Sake is their contribution to the taste and culture they are so passionate about.
2024 LIMITED RELEASE (1BY)
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SHO SHIN
‘In the beginner’s mind there are many possibilities, in the expert’s mind there are few.’
Shunryu Suzuki
OUR STORY
Our story starts with two high school friends who thought it would be easy to brew some sake during quiet Covid evenings. We share a special reverence for Japanese cuisine and culture, which sparked the idea to try and see if we could master the intricate technique of sake brewing without any prior brewing experience. Turns out it isn’t that easy….
However, our curiosity drove us into a self-taught process of trial and error experimentation. Studying scarcely available brewing literature, writing our own schedules and recipes while happily tasting all sake we could get our hands on. Our continuous exploration of the sake culture resulted in an apprenticeship in a family-owned sake brewery in the mountains of the Yamagata prefecture in Northern Japan.
Our fascination with sake and its wider Japanese culture proved contagious. Bart, a friend who happens to be a mechanical engineer, has joined our team as a technical specialist. His deep knowledge of designing food grade machinery allows for developing our own custom brewing equipment and step by step improving our brewery set-up. We have fun in continuously improving our own locally grounded take on the ancient Japanese tradition of sake brewing.
The brewery is located in a 19th century building in Oosterbeek, an historic artist’s colony well known for its outstanding natural landscape and natural springs. The geographic conditions that produce these springs are also the source of water that contains just the right amount of minerals, which is perfect to produce fine sake here!
To be able to produce the best sake, all other brewing ingredients are obtained from the Japanese craftsmen who learned their skills from age-old tradition and have the specific knowledge and facilities to produce high-quality polished sake rice, koji-kin and special sake yeasts. The process of procuring and exporting these products is a journey in itself which has led to valuable intercultural contacts and exchange of knowledge.
Follow us on our journey!
Sustainable brewing
Sake consumption in Europe is growing. By transporting the dry ingredients and adding the water locally, we minimize transportation cost to where the product will be consumed. The brewery is energy neutral and we adhere to a zero-waste mentality. Obviously, we only use natural ingredients and no additives.