Yasumoto Sake Brewery Pressing House

Where the Mash Was Pressed

The Yasumoto Sake Brewery Pressing House (安本酒造上槽場, Yasumoto Shuzō Jōsōba) is a brewing building erected in 1918 at Yasumoto Sake Brewery in Yasuhara-cho, Fukui City, Fukui Prefecture, and was registered as a Registered Tangible Cultural Property on March 26, 2015. It was altered in 1927. Built in wood and earthen construction, mostly single-storey with a 2-storey part, it is roofed partly in metal sheet and partly in tile, with a building area of 197 square meters.

Jōsō is the stage at which the fully fermented mash, or moromi, is pressed to separate the sake from the lees. The Yasumoto Sake Brewery Pressing House gathers rooms for both the beginning and the end of the brewing process around that pressing floor.

Pressing Floor, Cold Store and Starter Room

According to the Agency for Cultural Affairs, the Yasumoto Sake Brewery Pressing House adjoins brewing storehouse 1 on its south side and consists of three parts: the pressing floor and workroom, a cold storage room, and the former starter room.

The pressing floor and workroom are a single-storey timber structure where the pressing and related work took place. Mash fermented in the tanks of brewing storehouse 1 moved south into this space to be pressed. A cold store for keeping the new sake at low temperature is built into the same structure.

What shows on the outside is the former starter room. The starter, called moto or Shubo, is the small batch in which yeast is cultivated to set the main fermentation going. The room used for it is a single-storey earthen storehouse with a Geya lean-to, and its walls are left in the intermediate coat of clay, before any final plaster. The Agency singles out their plain, rustic character.

A Working Face in Clay

The Yasumoto Sake Brewery Pressing House is registered as number 18-0129, for its contribution to the historic landscape.

The brewing storehouses around it are finished in white plaster and clapboard, while the walls of the old starter room still show the colour of the clay. The difference in finish reads as the difference between storehouses meant to be seen and a workroom meant for work.

Seeing the Pressing House

The Yasumoto Sake Brewery Pressing House stands inside the lot, south of brewing storehouse 1, and the Agency does not describe it as facing a road. Expect it to be difficult to see from outside.

The brewery offers no tours or tastings, and the pressing floor is not open. Please do not enter the grounds.