Nick Bumgardner
Two days. That’s how long it took for cans of Koji Gold to fly off of shelves around Nashville.
“People really took to it,” says Byron Stithem, founder and brewmaster of Proper Sake Co. “Beer is more approachable than sake sometimes—especially from an information standpoint. We had to find a way to make more of it.”
The wildly successful launch from Nashville’s only sake distillery was unexpected for Stithem, who currently uses extra tank space at Fat Bottom Brewing to make the Japanese-style lager. But the progression from distilling sake to brewing beer was a natural one for the music-management-major-turned-fermentation-geek.
“I have always loved Japanese-style lagers. For me, one of the best things is going to an izakaya in Japan and getting a sake and a beer and just hanging out. The two go really well together. Especially with the addition of the koji, which ties those two flavor profiles together.”
Nick Bumgardner
Byron Stithem
Koji, a special fermentable that’s been used in Japanese cuisine for centuries, is at the heart of sake brewing. Not so much beer. But for his first brew, Stithem chose to weave it into his recipe, producing amino acids and enzymes that give the beer an unmistakable hit of umami—much like a naturally occurring MSG. The result: a dry, crisp hybrid between a Japanese-style lager and a German Helles with a bonafide funk factor.
Rather than dominating any particular flavor, the umami-factor in Koji Gold works to heighten the taste of food, making it easy to pair with just about any dish. That’s great news for the new spate of dumplings Proper Sake is doling out to hungry tipplers looking for a nosh with their brew at the Ewing Avenue tasting room.
To wit, Stithem has tapped Husk’s former chef de cuisine, Nate Leonard, to help him develop five different dumplings that complement the beer and sake at the distillery, including Japanese pork, “huevos con chorizo” (eggs and Spanish sausage), Gulf shrimp soaked in sake butter, a veggie variety and, in a nod to Music City, a hot chicken version.
An order, which includes about five dumplings, will set you back five bucks.
But Stithem isn’t stopping at dumplings. Or Koji Gold. He’s dabbling in other traditional styles of Japanese beer, with an eye on introducing Nashville to some historical recipes that haven’t been widely available to the market. Up first: a saison-style, barley koji in the vein of a Japanese farmhouse ale.
“There’s not a lot of diversity in Japanese beer styles until you start to look way back,” says Stithem.
“But recently, the Japanese government opened up the craft brew license for small-batch brewing, so you’re starting to see some different styles. We’re heading to Japan soon, and a big purpose of that trip is to start consorting with brewers and see what they’re doing that’s interesting right now—and maybe talk about a potential collaboration of sorts. That’s a big TBD.”
Tasting room hours are Fridays 4-9 p.m. and Saturdays 1-9 p.m. Proper Sake Co., 628 Ewing Ave.; propersake.co