Japanese Sake - a wine?

[thistledoo]

We want to bring some Sake aboard after our next Japanese port. Was wondering if Princess treats it as a wine or spirit? We want it included as our two free bottles, otherwise we'll get them to store it till we get back to Sydney.

 

Does anyone know?

[Lucky TGO]

We want to bring some Sake aboard after our next Japanese port. Was wondering if Princess treats it as a wine or spirit? We want it included as our two free bottles, otherwise we'll get them to store it till we get back to Sydney.

 

Does anyone know?

Google said it's Japanese Snake Wine. So I think it OK. So let them look it up if they say it's not. Good Luck!!

Tony

[IsanTom]

Yes Sake is a rice wine! In Thailand we have Lao Kao, also a rice wine!

[easyboy]

We want to bring some Sake aboard after our next Japanese port. Was wondering if Princess treats it as a wine or spirit? We want it included as our two free bottles, otherwise we'll get them to store it till we get back to Sydney.

 

Does anyone know?

Yes, it is a wine.

[IECalCruiser]

On some ships Princess it has been reported on CC that Princess set a limit of 15% alcohol content for wine and did not allow port to be brought on board. Many Sake's have a higher alcohol content than 16% and they might hold it until the end of the cruise or it might be discarded at embarkation. I would say to call Princess but I wouldn't rely on the answers.

 

 

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[thistledoo]

We'll try bringing some on and see what happens. We developed a liking for plum Sake on our previous land trips. The ones we liked best were in the most unclassy screw top jars!!

 

Will post what happens.

 

Thanks

Edited September 12, 2016 by thistledoo

[Brisbane41]

We want to bring some Sake aboard after our next Japanese port. Was wondering if Princess treats it as a wine or spirit? We want it included as our two free bottles, otherwise we'll get them to store it till we get back to Sydney.

 

Does anyone know?

 

I have just done a Japan cruise on the Diamond Princess and in all the ports security was not challenging anyone taking alcohol on board. I cannot speak for embarkation day, but for all the ports of call you could walk on board with a gift wrapped bottle of alcohol and they would not even bother looking at it. I guess they realised that people were taking them home as souvenirs.

[thistledoo]

I have just done a Japan cruise on the Diamond Princess and in all the ports security was not challenging anyone taking alcohol on board. I cannot speak for embarkation day, but for all the ports of call you could walk on board with a gift wrapped bottle of alcohol and they would not even bother looking at it. I guess they realised that people were taking them home as souvenirs.

 

Thanks. I must say the Japanese have made an art form out of gift wrapping.

[IECalCruiser]

I have just done a Japan cruise on the Diamond Princess and in all the ports security was not challenging anyone taking alcohol on board. I cannot speak for embarkation day, but for all the ports of call you could walk on board with a gift wrapped bottle of alcohol and they would not even bother looking at it. I guess they realised that people were taking them home as souvenirs.

Never having been to Japan on a cruise, it makes sense that they might be lenient with Sake. It is always good to have actual experience.

 

 

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[XBGuy]

I would be very surprised if you were not able to reboard from a Japanese port with a bottle of sake. I actually see no downside to trying it. The worst thing that could happen is they take it from you and store it for you until the night before disembarkation.

 

Now, the rest of this post won't help at all. I just want to show off.

 

In the early 1980s my wife decided to returrn to college. She had found that the local State University offered a major in Hotel-Restaurant Management. She thought that sounded pretty neat. So, she enrolled--part-time for a few years and full-time in the last year.

 

One of the classes she took was "Wines and Spirits." This was an optional class, and, yes, students over 21 did taste. She was, in fact, qualified for the tasting portion, but that isn't really the point of my post, here.

 

Being the wine buff that I am, she would completely review each class with me when we had dinner. I thought this was interesting--a categorization of alcoholic beverages.

 

• Wines are fermented grapes.
  
• Beers are fermented grains.
  
• Spirits are distilled fermented plant materials (grains, grapes, rhizomes, cacti, just about anything).
  

 

This categorization leads to an obvious question.

 

What is Sake?

 

Sake is fermented rice. Rice is a grain. Sake is a beer.

 

LIke I mentioned at the top. I think the OP is fine reboarding with a bottle of Sake purchased as a souvenir in a Japanese port.

[JimmyVWine]

 

• Wines are fermented grapes.
  
• Beers are fermented grains.
  
• Spirits are distilled fermented plant materials (grains, grapes, rhizomes, cacti, just about anything).
  

 

Close. Wines are fermented fruits. Pears and plums count just as much as grapes.

[XBGuy]

Close. Wines are fermented fruits. Pears and plums count just as much as grapes.

 

Jimmy, I know that you are very well-informed, and you express your thoughts very well. I enjoy reading your posts.

 

I thought, though, that non-distilled fermented fruits that are not grapes were defined as "Fruit Wines"--i.e., a completely separate category.

 

It may be an esoteric difference, but that seems to be the consensus on the wine-geek boards.

 

Now, I would also bet that If I carried a 750 ml bottle of Strawberry Wine (I assume there is such a thing. I know it appears in songs.) onto a Princess ship, they would be OK with it.

 

So, yes, you are, probably, more correct than I am.

 

:)

[JimmyVWine]

Jimmy, I know that you are very well-informed, and you express your thoughts very well. I enjoy reading your posts.

 

I thought, though, that non-distilled fermented fruits that are not grapes were defined as "Fruit Wines"--i.e., a completely separate category.

 

It may be an esoteric difference, but that seems to be the consensus on the wine-geek boards.

 

Now, I would also bet that If I carried a 750 ml bottle of Strawberry Wine (I assume there is such a thing. I know it appears in songs.) onto a Princess ship, they would be OK with it.

 

So, yes, you are, probably, more correct than I am.

 

:)

Blame the French. By law, they restrict the word "wine" to be limited to grapes. And the rest of the EU followed suit. This left the rest of the fermented products to be sub-grouped into "Fruit Wines", but at base level, "Elderberry Wine", "Plum Wine" and "Grape Wine" deserve no real distinction. There is nothing that really distinguishes a blueberry from a grape in terms of wine making, other than the fact that wine geeks decided to keep "serious wine" under its own umbrella.

 

However there is one basis for restricting the usage of the term "wine" to the beverage made from grapes, and that is due in large part from its etymology. Going back to the Greek and Hebrew words from which the word "wine" has evolved, those words were most closely associated with vines. And grapes grow on vines. Pears and Elderberries do not. And the reason for this is probably because wine made from grapes is an almost hands-off process and could be done by the simplest of farmers. Most other fruits have either insufficient sugars, or excess acidity, or insufficient natural yeast such that it is almost impossible to achieve proper fermentation without human intervention. External sugars must be added to achieve fermentation. Or acids need to be diluted to prevent fermentation from being killed off. Etc. So naturally, (pun intended), the vast majority of fermented fruit beverages made and consumed in the Ancient World came from Nature's Perfect Package, the grape. As a result, the words used to describe that beverage were almost always related to grapes, or vines, or clusters, and those words evolved into the oenological words we use today. (And that word itself has its origins in the word "oinos" from Greek, which is believed to come from "yayin" in Hebrew, and pertained to the pressed juice from grapes.)

 

But rest assured that the Ancients weren't intentionally setting up a classification system whereby grapes got placed on a higher pedestal. (Only the French do that). It is just that if 99% of the liquid being fermented was from grapes, there was no reason to delve into anything else. Bottom line. From the earliest days, the word "wine" was not meant to be exclusionary. It was merely descriptive. Today, it takes on an exclusionary tone.

 

And that, ladies and gentleman, is your wine lesson for today. Time to pull a cork and watch the Steelers start their march toward a 7th ring!

Edited September 12, 2016 by JimmyVWine

[XBGuy]

That is very interesting, Jimmy. Thank you for posting.

[IECalCruiser]

Not to beat a dead rice grain, but sake is more like a beer than a wine. With wine, the fermentation process converts the sugars to alcohol. With beer, the the brewing process first converts the starch to sugar in one step and then converts the sugar to alcohol in a second step. These conversions occur simultaneously when sake is being made. Now back to your regularly scheduled thread.

[Brisbane41]

Sake is nothing like beer at all. It does not look like it, does not taste anything like it and sake can be served both hot and cold.

 

In fact the Japanese do not even refer to it as wine or beer. There is no native Japanese word for wine or beer in their language and they borrow the English words adapted for their dialect (wain for wine and biiru for beer).

 

Try saying anything like that to a native Japanese and they would probably laugh at you. It is their unique alcoholic drink and it had nothing to do with wine or beer.

[Lucky TGO]

I don't care what they call it I just like to try it :D

Tony

[Thrak]

Sake is Sake. Period.

 

Yes, it is from grain. Not exactly a wine. However, it is definitely not beer. Beer is made from four ingredients. Period.

 

Barley

Water

Hops

Yeast

 

Yes, "beer" such as Budweiser (GAK!!!) and others made in the US can have up to 50 different additives. Did I say GAK???

 

I like beer. My wife likes beer. My wife used to think she hated beer until she tasted actual beer. It is true that we have enjoyed beer with additives (one actually had a bit of Earl Grey in it and was amazing) but nothing like American beer. We are from the US but find almost all "regular" American beer to be swill. American craft beers on the other hand can be wonderful. (They can also be horrid...:eek:)

 

Sake may be "like" beer in that it is made from grain but it is not actually beer. It is something of it's own... It may be politically incorrect but I find the Japanese to be "different" from other cultures. Why not let Sake be "different" as well. I don't know for sure but it may well be unique - just like the Japanese culture. Let it stand on it's own and be enjoyed for it's own unique qualities.