Episode 5: Welcome to Cellar F | Japanese Wines

These ten French oak casks of around 3300 litres each were ordered in the late 2010s. The smaller barrels we keep in our underground cellar have a much greater impact on wines as the surface area of the barrel is in contact with a much smaller volume of liquid. Such large casks as these, which hold 15 times more wine than regular-sized barrels, have a softer impact on wines and can be used for up to 30 years! That’s 20 years longer than our regular-sized barrels. We make our Aiakane Merlot/Muscat Bailey A blend, our Moegi Chardonnay/Koshu blend and other blends from the wines aged in these casks. It is interesting to note that the concave ends of these casks offset the pressure from the large volume of wine pushing outward. These casks have two large valves. The one on the front of the cask is for transferring wine, while the one at the bottom is for clearing out the sediment. The sediment is eventually spread on our vineyards.