REGION: Miyazaki

Kuroki Hoten has been distilling fine shochu since 1885. They take great pride in growing all the ingredients themselves on their own organic farm and turning the byproducts of distillation into fertilizer to reduce waste and create a renewable cycle.

Owned and run by the Kuroki family of legendary Kuroki Honten Distillery, the Osuzuyama Distillery was started in 1998 to specialize in traditional craft shochu and distinctive, shochu-based gin, using only the finest ingredients grown by the family on their own farms.

The Watanabe family see themselves more as farmers than as distillers, spending most of the year cultivating sweet potatoes using organic methods and local traditions. After harvest they ferment using wild yeasts native to the distillery, distill using a custom hybrid still and store without heavy filtration. The result is full bodied shochu with compelling and haunting flavors pulled from the Miyazaki soil.