The return of the sakura and the arrival of sakura beer are both annual events, but their timing doesn’t have to match.

Spring in Japan isn’t just the time for cherry blossoms, it’s also the time for cherry blossom sweets, as we see a flurry of sakura-flavored cakes, cookies, and other sweets that show up right about the time Japan’s most famous flowers are starting to open. Here’s the open secret, though: the cherry blossom treats we enjoy every year are usually made with last year’s sakura.

That’s because before cherry blossom petals are used as ingredients, they’re preserved in salt, and with the flowers famously blooming for only a week or two, there’s not enough time to harvest, salt, and use them in any significantly large scale. The upside to this is that while no amount of wishing will make the cherry blossoms bloom any sooner, we don’t actually have to wait until the sakura start to bloom before we can start enjoying sakura-flavored treats, and that goes not just for desserts but for beer too.

Staring in February, Kanagawa Prefecture’s Sankt Gallen brewery will be offering this year’s batch of its Sankt Gallen Sakura beer. While some beer makers simply slap some sakura iconography on their cans or bottles to celebrate sakura season, Sankt Gallen uses actual salt-preserved sakura petals and cherry blossom tree leaves in the brewing process. Though they’re rinsed to remove excess salt one day before brewing, they still impart a subtly sweet, salty, and floral sensation.

▼ The cherry blossoms, of the yaezakura variety, are harvested by hand in the town of Ina in Nagano Prefecture.

Cherry blossoms aren’t the only Japanese culinary element that goes into Sankt Gallen Sakura, either. Along with a mixture of barley and wheat malt (the latter used for a smoother flavor), the beer’s ingredients also include Rakufumai, a type of rice cultivated in the Kanagawa town of Ebina that’s not grown for eating, but for use in making sake.

▼ Rakufumai

The presence of Rakufumai gives Sankt Gallen’s sakura beer an extra dash of delicate sweetness, and with the brew not being quite as hoppy as the company’s regular strong-hops offerings, it makes for a refreshing choice as the weather starts to get warmer and open-air beers start to become a more viable option.

However, like we said earlier, there’s no need to wait for a warm spring afternoon to crack open a bottle, as Sankt Gallen Sakura (which has an alcohol content of 5 percent and an IBU of 17) goes on sale February 19, priced at 539 yen (US$3.50), and can be ordered through the Sankt Gallen online store here.

Source: PR Times via Japaaan, Sankt Gallen
Top image: Sankt Gallen
Insert images: PR Times
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