Tenryu Beer Brewery

Do you know Tenryu Beer Brewery? It’s a brewery started in 2023 by Takuji Yamada of JACK Company, the firm behind the Hamamatsu izakaya chain "Hamamatsu Tanto."

That’s the key point. Usually people think about which dishes a beer will pair with after they make the beer, but Yamada did the opposite. He wanted a beer that would pair perfectly with the Hamamatsu gyoza and eel served at his own restaurants, so he started brewing it himself. He’s a sharp business leader who also operates locations in New York and Honolulu.

It’s short for "Abare Tenryu". The Tenryu River has long been famous as a wild, unruly river, and over about 170 years from the Edo to Meiji periods it caused more than 40 major floods. That fierce energy is packed into the beer’s name.

ABATEN LAGER is brewed with Czech hops, domestically produced malt, and water drawn directly from a tributary of the Tenryu River. Its concept is "richness, bitterness, and crispness," so it has a firm bitterness that stands up to the garlic and fat in Hamamatsu gyoza, while the lager’s crisp finish resets your palate.

The recipe was developed by Julian Mansell, an American brewer who graduated from liberal arts-oriented Lewis & Clark College, earned an MBA in Taiwan, and was once head brewer at August Beer in Japan. The day-to-day brewing is handled solo by Eiichiro Kawabe, who had worked at JACK Company since 2007 and was trained by Julian until he could run everything himself. He’s a brewer who switched over from the food and beverage world.

At its first public unveiling in October 2023, they served 1,000 cups at Ieyasu Rakuichi in Hamamatsu Castle Park, and now they also have a direct sales shop right in front of the south exit of Hamamatsu Station. It’s a small operation at 500 liters per batch, and the spent malt lees that would otherwise be discarded are donated to a local after-school day service for composting.