Takatsugawa River Beer

Takatsugawa River Beer in Masuda is a brewery with an incredibly interesting story.

The Takatsugawa River is the only first-class river in Japan without a dam, and it has been selected many times as Japan's cleanest waterway. They brew beer with that water.

The representative, Eri Uwatoko, is from Fukuoka and studied law at Kyushu University before joining the Board of Audit as a former national civil servant. After working there for 15 years, she resigned and started the beer business out of a desire to create a place where senior citizens could work energetically. The spark came when she encountered Masuda through a regional relationship-building project in 2018.

The brewery is in a renovated old townhouse that used to be a traditional restaurant, more than 160 years old, in the temple-front district near the gate of Kakimoto Hitomaro Shrine. You can drink beer in a space that feels like stepping back into the Taisho and Showa eras.

And the beer itself is amazing. "Kuromoji Gyard," made with kuromoji, an aromatic wood that grows in the forests of Hikimi, is a Biere de Garde style beer from France and won the silver award at the International Beer Cup 2021. They also have around 15 labels that make the most of local ingredients from the Takatsugawa River basin, such as the "Masuda Muscat Ale," made with Shine Muscat grapes, and "Wa Weizen," with local soy sauce as a hidden accent.

There are others too, like "Mito Strawberry Saison" made with Mito strawberries, "Mamecha Black" made with mamecha tea, and "Yuzu Farmhouse" made with fully ripe yuzu... Every glass lets you taste Masuda's local character, and that's what makes it so great.