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How to Have a Lousy Summer
Drink happoshu:
More typical reactions included: "It's sort of out of focus" (Harrell on Tanrei); "It tastes like regular beer after 40 minutes" (Chujo on Tanrei); "Feels like I've just woken up and need to brush my teeth" (Chuwy on Reisei, a dai-san brewed from yellow-pea protein, 5 percent, ¥139); "It's like chewing paper. It's like they made beer but forgot to put the flavor in. If "Star Trek" made a machine that replicated beer but didn't quite get it right, it would taste like this" (Chuwy on Honnama, happoshu, 5.5 percent, ¥159). "Oooooh, that's not nice." (Kono on Style Free).
After a few rounds, the panel stopped commenting and switched to discussing why anyone would buy this crap.
I was reminded this article--and why I don't like happoshu-- after having a can of Tanrei foisted upon me at a party recently. As the article points out, happoshu and dai-san (third sector) "beer" came about in the 1990s as a way for brewers to skirt taxation. The brews have proven to be wildly popular, and their cheapness makes them all the more attractive during the current economic downturn. Who doesn't want to get drunk on the cheap? To that question, my reply is: Why would anyone buy this crap when you can have the real stuff instead? Regular Japanese beer is nothing to write home about, but it is at least drinkable. Moreover, why would you knowingly buy fake beer and then hope that it tastes like real beer? If your goal is to drink yourself silly, you're probably better off buying 4-liter jugs of Nikka Black or shochu.
Many of my Japanese friends drink happoshu because it's cheap, but every time I've had a can of the stuff I've wanted a chaser to get rid of the weird mouth feel and after taste. Why deprive yourself the pleasure of a good drink? Pinching pennies by drinking fake beer is only going to make you miserable.
If you really love beer, but lament the fact that microbrews are hard to find, take heart! The Great Japan Beer Festival is near and will be held on the following dates:
- June 6 & 7 at the Ebisu Garden Hall, Tokyo
- July 18, 19, and 20 at the Kyocera Dome Sky Hall, Osaka
- September 19, 20, and 21 at the Osanbashi Hall, Yokohama
I've gone the past few years and it's always a good time. There are over 100 microbrews to sample and they run the gamut. There's gimmicky:
Strange blue stuff:
And of course there's lots of good stuff:
Personally, nothing beats the heat like a cold wheat beer, and the Great Japan Beer Festival has plenty of them.
Tickets
Advanced tickets are ¥3800, and ¥4500 yen for same-day admission. Advanced tickets for the event in Tokyo cost ¥4300, and same-day admission is ¥4800. You can purchase tickets at most convenience stories or Ticket Pia outlets.
- Shawn's blog
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Comments
Happoshu tastes like beer that has been spilled onto a carpet, then has been wrung back into a glass. In fact, I think that's what it is!
I am a happy drunk, but if the only alcoholic drink on earth was happoshu, I'd be a perfectly happy teetotaller
After a few drinks I never fail to mention my theory of how Japanese society and economic policy are reflected by the nation's beer shelves. The sun is past the yardarm somewhere so I'll share it with all you.
In 1990 the bubble burst but everyone was still supposedly middle class and everyone drank Super Dry.
But a refusal to do anything about the bubble's aftermath caught with Japan resulting in years of stagnant economic growth and banks that teetered on the edge until massive bailouts. In the nation's supermarkets housewives started to buy their husbands happoshu. Things got worse before they got better and the worst off in society were reduced to drinking the 3rd generation beerish substance.
However, economic reforms turned things around for a lucky few and screwed the unlucky unwashed masses. Now all the major breweries have upmarket premium beers for those who can afford them, happoshu for the salarymen, and 3rd generation piss for the dispatch workers.
And for the Eikaiwa teachers?
For the Eikaiwa "teachers" (I use the term "teacher" advisedly) , it's a choice of either pooling their meagre resources together to purchase a plastic bottle of shochu, or the few days after payday, possibly cans of chu-hi.
Eikaiwa drones cannot afford happoshu made from peas, let alone real beer! Everyone knows that, Junken Master! I know of several Eikaiwa "teachers" now living in flophouses in the Osaka area, and a few very close to sleeping rough on the streets. These are grim times for salarymen, let alone your humble Eikaiwa indentured slave.
When I was in the supermarket recently, with a six pack of gold Yebisu in my basket, I witnessed one Eikaiwa veteran at the taste testing table, plastic cup in hand, gulping the cheapest of cheap Japanese wine one after the other. It was a distressing sight. That guy gave his all for G.Con, and this is what he has been reduced to. Times are tough.
Eikaiwa + Gaijin = Loser. End Of.
You know happoshu's dodgy not only in the foul taste, but in the shitty hangover you get the next day off forcing even just a few cans of the stuff down your neck.
The same goes for that dirt cheap 120-yen chu-hi as well. Like drinking paint stripper.
The Paint Stripper Ripper
The loser thorn strikes again. What is this his 50th handle that he has written under. Wanker is all he is.
Mr. Ripper, Yaright seems to think you are me, which I find most offensive.
Please clarify, and put my name back in the black, where it should be, along with G Comm Nova, which has weathered the greatest economic downturn since the Great Depression, has weathered the huge drop of in eikaiwa popularity due to that incredible economic crisis, has weathered the storm that enveloped the entire eikaiwa industry, following the startling truths revealed about Nova and common eikaiwa business practices, and has weathered the difficulties involved selling the tarnished and putrid Nova brand name AND....... is now reporting profits.
Perhaps now they can afford to get their US recruitment website back up, which has been down for a month, and get all staff members paid on time.
Oh, here is a bet for you – I bet you they soon post a loss, and blame it on SH. "We nursed along our essential service, and then got hit with SH". Can see it coming from a mile off.
They should have stayed with what they know - the fast food business - idiots!
THORN
"They should have stayed with what they know - the fast food business - idiots!"
That's exactly what they did - they picked up McNova!
LOL!!
The McRipper