Shirakawago is produced by Miwa Shuzo, founded in 1837 in Ogaki, Gifu Prefecture, and takes its name from the UNESCO World Heritage village of Shirakawago, where the Doburoku Festival has been held each autumn for centuries. The sake is a pure rice nigori brewed using a distinctive four-step process that adds sweetness in a final fourth stage beyond the traditional three, producing a thick, creamy texture and a sake meter value of around -25. Rather than sake rice, Miwa Shuzo uses food rice as raw material, believing that the rice's proteins and oils convert into amino acids and depth that make the sake, as they describe it, drinkable rice.
