Happy Holidays from VAoJ!

Looking forward to drinking the psychedelic bottle of California Zinfandel with our traditional Christmas Eve dinner tonight. It's been a while since I have had wine, as my research has taken me in a different direction...

As always, here is the VAoJ bonus holiday present:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n9kfdEyV3RQ&t=23s

Happy Holidays!

Best Zoom Workshop Ever!

As a part of my ongoing tachinomiya project, I participated in a two-day Introductory Sake Professional workshop over the weekend. I have drunk a lot of sake over the last twenty years, but not in any educated way (probably quite the contrary...). But I learned so much from the experience. I hope to take further workshops and perhaps become a sake sommelier... In any event, I am gaining knowledge that should be useful for future tachinomiya/izakaya fieldwork.

The last part of the workshop was a sake tasting exercise. My new sake sensei sent all participants six small bottles of various kinds of sake and an ochoko. This is what it looked like when I opened the box.

And this is what it looked like after I removed the bubble wrap. I learned how to observe the color, aroma and taste of sake. And there was plenty left over to enjoy after the workshop. It was a great weekend of research.

The workshop was also a wonderful example of a globalization. The sensei is Italian and affiliated with a British sake institution and the students were from Britain, Australia and America. The only Japanese participant was my daughter/research assistant with her zoom bombs and extreme interest in smelling the different kinds of sake. Cheers! #jijisake

AJJ 2021 Presentation