Picked at full ripeness, vacuum-aged three years. The deeper of Sasaki-san's two profiles — a non-alcoholic pairing chefs reach for in place of a mature red.
In Japanese, yama means mountain and budou means grape — together, yama budou is, literally, the mountain grape. And that's what it is: a small, dark, intensely tart wild grape that grows in the cold mountains of northern Japan. It's one of only two grape varieties native to Japan. The fruit was used as a medicinal tonic seven centuries ago and almost disappeared as cultivated varieties displaced it. Today, a handful of farms in the cold northern mountains keep it alive.
Sasaki-san's family farm in Kuji, Iwate Prefecture, is one of them. His father planted the first vines in 1971 specifically to save the variety from extinction. No synthetic fertilizers, pesticides, or herbicides have touched the soil in over fifty years. The pomace from each pressing returns to the field as compost. Sasaki-san harvests only from vines fifteen years and older.
The Rich is picked in late October at full ripeness, after the leaves have fallen and the fruit's sugars have become more concentrated. This is the deeper of the two Dew profiles. Where The Fresh stays taut and acid-forward, The Rich rolls deep and round: lower astringency, a longer finish, and more weight on the palate. Closer in character to a mature red wine than to a typical non-alcoholic option.
After harvest, the whole fruit — skin, pulp, and juice together — is pressed and sealed into airtight vacuum tanks at low temperature. With no oxygen in the tank, fermentation never begins, and no alcohol develops. But over three years, the aging does its work. The wild tannin rounds out, the sharp acidity and raw edge soften, and the flavor becomes rounder, deeper, and more complex without losing the lift. No fermentation, no concentration, no dilution — the change comes from time alone. It's a non-alcoholic option — but not in the way that phrase usually suggests.
The Amethyst Dew series is served at Michelin-starred restaurants and fine dining establishments in Japan and abroad — typically poured in wine glasses, paired with red meat, game, or aged cheese where richness, weight and depth matter, or built into pan sauces, beurre rouge, and finishing reductions for heavier proteins.
Ayako, Umami Curator at The House of Umami, has spent time with Sasaki-san at the farm in Kuji. Visiting in autumn — the vines on steep terraces, the small crew working through the short harvest window, the fruit going straight from vine to press — she returned convinced this was a product the House of Umami needed to carry.
