How To Drink Sake

Here's How:

1. Pour sake into a ceramic flask called tokkuri.
2. To warm the sake, soak the tokkuri in boiling water in a pan.
3. Pour sake into a small cup called o-choko from tokkuri to drink from it.
4. When you drink with others, it's a Japanese etiquette to pour sake into each other's cup. You should hold your cup up when someone is serving sake to you. Hold your cup with one hand and put the other hand under the cup.
5. Smell sake's aroma and have a sip before putting the cup back on the table.

Tips:

1. Regular sake, honjozo-shu, and shunmai-shu are warmed for drinking.
2. In general, ginjo-shu are chilled for drinking.
3. Chilled sake taste sweeter than warmed sake, so be careful not to over drink.
4. Any kind of namazake (sake which has not been pasteurized) shouldn't be warmed for drinking.
5. Usually, sake is warmed to a little bit above body temperature (40 - 45 degrees Celsius).

What You Need:

• Sake
• Ochoko (Sake Cups)
• Tokkuri (Ceramic Flasks)
• Small Pan