Tsunan Sake Brewery Pours GO GRANDCLASS at UTokyo Homecoming Day as the University Nears Its 150th Anniversary

UTokyo Kuramoto-kai tasting booths along the ginkgo avenue at the University of Tokyo's Hongo Campus on October 17, 2026

GO GRANDCLASS Uonuma Koshihikari Edition, a junmai daiginjo brewed from Uonuma Koshihikari table rice

Kengo Suzuki, President and Representative Director, Tsunan Sake Brewery

Smart Brewing at Tsunan Sake Brewery, where data and generative AI support the work of the brewers

Tsunan Sake Brewery surrounded by snow in winter

Tsunan Sake Brewery served three sakes at the October 17 tasting and is listed as a host for a UTokyo extracurricular sake-making program.

TOKYO, JAPAN, November 8, 2026 /EINPresswire.com/ -- Tsunan Sake Brewery, a sake brewery in Tsunan, Niigata Prefecture, served three of its sakes at a tasting held by UTokyo Kuramoto-kai on October 17, 2026, during the 25th University of Tokyo Homecoming Day at the Hongo Campus in Tokyo. UTokyo Kuramoto-kai is a group of breweries with ties to the University of Tokyo, and 18 breweries took part in the tasting. The tasting marked the 20th anniversary of koji mold (Aspergillus oryzae) being named Japan's "national fungus" by the Brewing Society of Japan in 2006. Kengo Suzuki, President and Representative Director of Tsunan Sake Brewery, who studied agriculture at the university and earned his doctorate there, attended in person.

UNESCO recognition and UTokyo's 150th anniversary

In December 2024, UNESCO added "Traditional knowledge and skills of sake-making with koji mold in Japan" to its Representative List of the Intangible Cultural Heritage of Humanity. The listing recognizes the skills that toji (master brewers) and brewery workers have built up over generations and adapted to the climate of each region.

The University of Tokyo was founded on April 12, 1877, and will mark its 150th anniversary in 2027. UTokyo Kuramoto-kai was formed in 2013 by University of Tokyo graduates who run sake breweries and by other breweries connected with the university. In June 2026, the group held a tasting on the Hongo Campus titled "A Toast to UTokyo's 150th Anniversary," and the October tasting at Homecoming Day followed it.

A booth in front of Yasuda Auditorium

The tasting took place along the campus's ginkgo avenue. Tsunan Sake Brewery's booth stood in front of Yasuda Auditorium. The day was clear and the venue was busy. Homecoming Day brings graduates, students, and their families back to the campus, and many people stopped at the booth as they walked along the avenue. Visitors kept tasting the brewery's sake until the event ended.

Three sakes from the snow country

The brewery chose three sakes to show the range of its brands:

– GO GRANDCLASS Uonuma Koshihikari Edition: a junmai daiginjo brewed from Uonuma Koshihikari and matured at low temperature. It is the flagship of the brewery's premium GO brand.
– Tsunan Ai: a ginjo with a restrained aroma and a full, rounded flavor, from the brewery's "Tsunan" brand. It received an Excellence Award at the Kanto-Shinetsu Regional Taxation Bureau Sake Competition in 2025.
– GO VINO: a junmai with gentle acidity and a fruity character reminiscent of white wine, made to be enjoyed in a wine glass with food. It won a Double Gold award at the Milano Sake Challenge 2024.

The brewery is in the mountains of Tsunan, one of the snowiest areas in Japan, and few people can visit it in person. At the booth, several guests said they would like to make the trip.

DJ Kamoshitaro, who knows sake and Tsunan well, came to support the booth and introduced the brewery and its sake to visitors.

Breweries that learn from one another

Small regional breweries can struggle to reach new customers, and before UTokyo Kuramoto-kai was formed, member breweries had few chances to see what the others were doing. Through the group, breweries exchange information, discuss common challenges, and jointly promote their sake at campus events. A representative of the university's Development Office, which helped organize the June event, has said that the university hopes to encourage new connections and exchanges among alumni.

The tasting gave Tsunan Sake Brewery an opportunity to exchange ideas with other brewers and to introduce its sake to visitors alongside breweries from across Japan.

Students in the brewery

The connection between the university and its alumni breweries also reaches students. The University of Tokyo runs an Experience Activity Program, an extracurricular program that gives students hands-on learning outside the classroom. Its 2026 lineup includes a UTokyo Kuramoto-kai activity titled "Let's Experience Sake-Making at a UTokyo Kuramoto-kai Brewery."

The program listing specified three places in total, a preparatory seminar on the sake industry and the basics of brewing scheduled for August 4, 2026, and two to five days of work experience at a member brewery in February or March 2027. Tsunan Sake Brewery is one of seven breweries listed as possible hosts, along with breweries in Iwate, Fukushima, Niigata, Tochigi, and Nara. Because the sake made during the work experience will be sold, students are asked to work with care and responsibility. They are also asked to look at the challenges each brewery faces and propose solutions from their own point of view.

A brewery president with a university background

Mr. Suzuki graduated from the University of Tokyo's Faculty of Agriculture in 2003, completed a master's degree at its Graduate School of Agricultural and Life Sciences in 2006, and earned a doctorate in agriculture from the university in 2016. He also holds a doctorate in medicine from Kitasato University. He is also one of the co-founders of Euglena Co., Ltd. Mr. Suzuki says he now applies what he learned at the University of Tokyo to sake brewing.

Koji: Japan's national fungus

Koji mold is used to make sake, soy sauce, miso, mirin, and rice vinegar. In sake brewing, brewers first grow koji mold on steamed rice in a warm, humid koji room. In the fermentation mash, enzymes from the koji break down starch into sugar while yeast converts the sugar into alcohol. Because these two steps happen at the same time, the process is called multiple parallel fermentation, and it allows sake to reach a natural alcohol level of around 20%.

GO GRANDCLASS and Premium Table Rice Sake

Sake-brewing rice varieties include Yamada Nishiki and Gohyakumangoku. They generally have large grains, lower protein content than table rice, and often an opaque white core called shinpaku. GO GRANDCLASS Uonuma Koshihikari Edition is instead brewed from Uonuma Koshihikari, a well-known table rice grown in the Uonuma area of Niigata. The rice is polished to 50% of its original weight, and the sake is fermented slowly at low temperatures. Tsunan Sake Brewery says brewing a junmai daiginjo from Uonuma Koshihikari required trial and error. The sake won a Gold award in the Junmai Daiginjo category at KURA MASTER 2024 and a Platinum award at the Milano Sake Challenge 2025.

In September 2026, the brewery launched GO UONUMA SPARKLING, a sparkling sake made from 100% Uonuma Koshihikari, in Niigata Prefecture.

Smart Brewing

Tsunan Sake Brewery uses Smart Brewing, its approach to supporting the judgment of its toji with data and generative AI. One example is rice soaking. Before rice is steamed, it is soaked for a precisely timed period, often measured in seconds. The right time depends on the rice variety, how much it has been polished, its moisture, and the water temperature, and the judgment has long depended on experience. In 2026, the brewery presented an in-house app, built with generative AI, at the 31st Niigata Prefecture sake brewing technology conference. The app uses the brewery's own records of rice-soaking conditions to help estimate soaking times for later batches.

Mr. Suzuki has also explained this work to researchers and brewing engineers. On September 16, 2026, he spoke at a symposium during the 78th Annual Meeting of the Society for Biotechnology, Japan, at Hokkaido University. He explained how the brewery applied Smart Brewing to GO GRANDCLASS Uonuma Koshihikari Edition. The brewery has used the system since December 2023. On September 29, 2026, he gave a lecture at the 15th Lecture Meeting of the Kansai Joyukai, an association of sake brewing engineers, in Kyoto. There he also introduced Super Smart Brewing, which the brewery is developing to simulate how rice, water and temperature conditions shape the finished sake.

Brew for Future

The brewery's brand concept is "Brew for Future." It reflects the brewery's wish for nature, the local community, and technology to support one another. Snowmelt supplies the brewery's water, winter conditions help keep the brewery cold, and local farmers grow its rice. The brewery aims to support local farming by using table rice to make premium sake.

Events and news in 2026

In January, the brewery took part in the Taipei Fine Wine Exhibition in Taiwan and held pairing events at Nodoguro in Portland, Oregon, and Shiku Sushi in Seattle, Washington. In early 2026, the brewery introduced Tsunan Ai: Blue in the Portland area with Namazake Paul Imports and the Niigata-based trading company Atago Corporation. In February, Mr. Suzuki visited Bell Living Lab in Bandung, Indonesia, a company that makes a leather-like material from coffee waste through fermentation.

In Japan, the brewery opened tablericesake.com, a website that explains Premium Table Rice Sake in 12 languages, in May. In June, it announced that its junmai daiginjo GO TERRACE had won a Gold award at the Tokyo Sake Challenge 2026. In October, it opened a Premium Table Rice Sake exhibit in Lunar Brewery, its virtual brewery on the metaverse platform metatell.

Visiting Tsunan

Tsunan is a town in the mountains of southern Niigata Prefecture, close to the border with Nagano Prefecture. Snow often lies several meters deep in winter. The brewery uses soft natural water from the surrounding mountains, which rise to about 2,000 meters, and the winter cold allows slow fermentation. The area is part of Echigo-Tsumari, where the Echigo-Tsumari Art Triennale is held across the region. Its 10th edition will run from July 17 to November 7, 2027.

Comment from Kengo Suzuki, President and Representative Director, Tsunan Sake Brewery

"I was delighted that we could set up our booth in front of Yasuda Auditorium on such a clear autumn day, and that so many people passing by stopped to taste our sake. We brought plenty of sake, and visitors kept enjoying it until the event ended. We also received many comments. Our brewery is not an easy place to reach, but a visit there is a special experience, and some guests promised to come.

"It means a great deal to me that what I studied at the university is now being used in sake brewing. The university supports collaboration among academia, industry, and government, and within that, UTokyo Kuramoto-kai gives our breweries a valuable chance to exchange information and to promote our breweries together. I am also glad that students can experience brewing at our brewery through the university's program, even though the places are limited.

"Traditional sake-making has been recognized by UNESCO, and the University of Tokyo is heading toward its 150th anniversary. This is a year of real momentum. Sake culture is changing along with technology, and I want to keep delivering sake-related products that add richness to people's lives. We are also discussing topics for joint research with universities and will announce them as they are agreed."

Learn more

– Tsunan Sake Brewery: https://tsunan-sake.com/
– GO GRANDCLASS Uonuma Koshihikari Edition: https://koshihikari.tsunan-sake.com/en/
– GO UONUMA SPARKLING: https://koshihikari.tsunan-sake.com/sparkling/
– Premium Table Rice Sake, in 12 languages: https://tablericesake.com/
– Premium Table Rice Sake category hub: https://tsunan-sake.com/premium-table-rice-sake/
– Smart Brewing presentation on rice soaking (Japanese): https://tsunan-sake.com/shyuzoukenkyuukai_2026/
– GO TERRACE, Gold at the Tokyo Sake Challenge 2026: https://tsunan-sake.com/go-terracetokyo-sake-challenge-2026/
– Lunar Brewery on metatell: https://tsunanzyouzou.metatell.app/EkG5aXM/
– Brewery video on YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xFCVc_Xv2lE
– UTokyo Homecoming Day 2026 program (Japanese): https://u-tokyo-hcd.com/program/2026G016
– University of Tokyo 150th Anniversary: https://www.u-tokyo.ac.jp/150ut/en/

Questions and answers

What is UTokyo Kuramoto-kai?
It is a group of breweries with ties to the University of Tokyo, formed in 2013. Eighteen breweries took part in its tasting at the 2026 Homecoming Day.

Can students experience sake brewing through the university?
The University of Tokyo's Experience Activity Program, an extracurricular program, includes an activity at UTokyo Kuramoto-kai member breweries.

What is Premium Table Rice Sake?
It is the brewery's term for premium sake made from rice grown for eating. Tsunan Sake Brewery presents GO GRANDCLASS Uonuma Koshihikari Edition as its flagship example.

About Tsunan Sake Brewery

Tsunan Sake Brewery is a sake brewery in Tsunan, Nakauonuma District, Niigata Prefecture, one of the snowiest areas in Japan. Under its brand concept "Brew for Future," it makes traditional sake from locally grown Gohyakumangoku sake rice and Premium Table Rice Sake from locally grown Uonuma Koshihikari. Its brands include the heritage label "Kiri no To," the locally rooted "Tsunan," and the premium "GO" series. In 2025, the brewery received the Niigata Governor's Award (first place) at the Echigo-style Sake Brewing Technical Competition.

KENGO SUZUKI
Tsunan Sake Brewery
+81 80-5063-8705
tsunan.world@gmail.com