Beaujolais Nouveau still had a following in Japan when I lived there. The rest of the world had had enough, but the glory days hadn’t yet ended in Japan. I remember going to a British pub in Kyoto one December, shortly after the release of the latest Nouveau, and asking the Japanese bartender if they had a red wine other than Bo-joh-reh. Sorry, but no, was the answer. They did have Beaujolais, of course, but that was it. I declined and had a beer.
While Beaujolais Nouveau was worthy of a large sales
display in convenience stores like Lawson and 7-11, nobody ever mentioned to me
that I ought to give the Japanese grape Koshu a shot. It could be that I was
simply moving in the wrong circles, in which beer, plum wine and shochu
(a fearsome and, to me, mysterious spirit) were the kings. Then again, maybe it
just wasn’t very well-known.
Almost
a decade after leaving Japan, I finally decided to see what Koshu was like. I
did a modicum of research and learned that the grape is associated with
Yamanashi prefecture, the location of Mount Fuji, so it is unsurprisingly well-adapted
to volcanic soils. It’s also disease resistant, which is a real plus point. I spent
a year in Shizuoka prefecture, which shares Mount Fuji with Yamanashi, so I can
speak with authority on this matter. The rain in that part of Japan could be like
something out of The Old Testament and the humidity was intolerable in the summer.
Not ideal conditions for growing vines, in short.
It’s
not that easy to obtain Koshu in the U.K. They don’t even have one at Majestic
Wine, for goodness’ sake. The first bottle I sampled was a 2011 Koshu ‘Sol
Lucet’ from Yamanashi Wine Co., which I optimistically purchased online about fourteen
years after the vintage. It had a very dusty shoulder and cap, and a wonky
label on the front. Not promising. ‘The characteristic parts of this wine are
Japanese citrus notes’, I read on the back label. The flavour was in fact indescribable,
and the bottle probably should have been drunk a decade before I opened it.
Next
up was Château Mercian’s Koshu Gris de Gris 2022. I’m not generally
partial to orange wines, as I find it hard to get my head around the concept of
a tannic wine made from white grapes. More importantly, the flavours are often
just plain odd. If it doesn’t taste weird, I think there’s a strong chance that
an orange wine will taste of apples – baked, most likely, or something akin to
a carton of apple juice. Such was the case with this wine. It was pleasant, but
when the bottle was empty I was still scratching my head about the varietal
character of Koshu.
I
finally tracked down a bottle of Koshu which had undergone a standard steel
fermentation and was not past its best in the handsome cathedral city of
Lincoln. As I climbed an empty street appropriately called Steep Hill, I saw a
wine shop. I was shocked to see a bottle of Koshu in the window, as well as a
bottle of Springbank 10 Year Old Campbeltown whisky. This had to be a good
place.
I
went back the following morning and bought a bottle of Grace Wine’s Kayagatake
Koshu 2023. Alas, I found the wine underwhelming. I concurred with the
producer’s tasting note in so far as it had ‘lively acidity’, but it was a
rather neutral wine. I picked up a touch of green apple and my tasting partner
felt there was a chamomile note, but that was about it. Even more
disappointingly, the shop didn’t have any older Springbank whiskies.
Earlier
this year, I almost bought a ticket to London in order to attend a tasting
devoted to Koshu. In the end, the Scottish side of me won, and I went to
Campbeltown instead. I’m aware that I didn’t try very much, but if I ever go
back to Japan, I don’t envision myself seeking Koshu out. Give me a glass of
plum wine on the rocks instead.
