Sake Victories – IWC Gold Medal Winning Sakes
It’s difficult to list all of the medal winning sakes from the IWC 2018 event in Yamagata Prefecture, but we wanted to highlight a few to help you purchase sakes that spoke to the judges in Japan.
The good news is that there are a lot of medal winning sakes already available in the US, and many more have since been ordered by American importers. That is one of the strengths of the IWC Sake Competition is that the winning selections are available to a vast of the public consumers.
We cannot possibly list every sake that medaled or was commended in Yamagata at the IWC, but herewith are a few selections that are easy for you to purchase and here also are a few breweries that made medal worthy products. This is only a partial list but it is worthy of your attention.
Team True Sake Recommends The Following IWC Medal Winning Sakes:
GOLD Medal 2018
Sparkling Sake
Ichinokura Suzune Wabi Sparkling
- Trophy Winner in 2016
Ginjo
Dewazakura Oka Ginjo "Cherry Bouquet"
- Will be the “Welcome Sake” at Sake Day 2018
- A very important brewery in the sake world
Junmai Daiginjo
Dassai 23 Junmai Daiginjo "Otter Festival"
- Recent flooding at their brewery may affect availability
- Owner Masao Aisawa will be at Sake Day 2018!
- Perennial Winner of Gold Medals – almost every year without failure
Junmai
Tengumai Yamahai Junmai "Dance of the Demon"
- Beau-Zone Layer last month
- See this month’s Top Ten list for food pairings with this sake
Honjozo
Ichinokura Mukansa Super-Dry Honjozo "Unclassified"
- Was the Welcome Sake at Sake Day 2015
We are contacting several of our importers to determine if they have several other Gold Medal winning sakes in their offerings so we can special order.