Why the sake here is what it is
Alcohol in the United States moves through three tiers. A producer sells to a distributor, the distributor sells to a retailer, and only the retailer sells to you. Nobody is allowed to skip a step. The system dates to the end of Prohibition and it was built to stop producers controlling the shops that sold their product.
What that means on a Washington shelf is that a brewery in Yamagata cannot put a case on a plane to a shop in Georgetown. Someone in the middle tier has to have decided, already, that the bottle will move. For a city this size that decision usually lands on the safe middle of the category, which is why the shelf is four bottles wide and three of them are the same thing at different sizes. The full argument is in why the sake in D.C. is the way it is.
What a group changes
A case is the number that changes the answer. It is enough volume for a brewery to ship and for a retailer to place, and a hundred people ordering together reach it without anybody having to buy twelve bottles. Kasumi Club is an informal buying group rather than a licensed retailer, so orders are placed through a licensed retailer with money collected from members in advance.
That does not fix everything. It does not get a bottle here that no importer carries in the United States at all, and it does not make unpasteurized sake survive a supply chain built for shelf-stable product.
What we have actually tasted in D.C.
Six bottles, one tasting, all poured blind in Glover Park on June 12, 2026. Every score and every confirmed specification is on the score sheet, and it downloads as a CSV.
Momokawa Pearl
SakéOne · Forest Grove, Oregon
4.0 out of 5Okunomatsu Tokubetsu Junmai
Okunomatsu Sake Brewery · Nihonmatsu, Fukushima
3.67 out of 5Hananomai Katana, Extra Dry
Hananomai Brewing Co. · Shizuoka
3.6 out of 5Murai Family Tanrei Junmai
Momokawa Brewing Co. · Oirase, Aomori
3.5 out of 5Kurosawa Junmai Kimoto
Kurosawa Sake Brewery · Yachiho, Nagano
2.0 out of 5Hatsumago
Tohoku Meijo · Sakata, Yamagata
Learning sake, from here
Everything in the journal, free and with sources named.
Why sake has no mashing step, and what the mould is doing instead
Beer mashes, wine never has to, and sake does something neither does. A fungus growing on a fifth of the rice turns starch into sugar i
Learning sakeSake rice is not table rice, and two of our six bottles were table rice
Four varieties cover most of what you will drink, and a starchy white core is the reason they exist. Three quarters of the rice that be
Learning sakeServing temperature, and why the same bottle tastes like two different drinks
Six bottles went into bags in June and all six were poured cold. Two of them came with instructions from the people who make and import
Learning sakeHow to read a sake label
Four things sit on almost every bottle. Find them and you can walk into a shop with no staff who know sake and still come out with some
How the trade worksWhy the sake in D.C. is the way it is
The interesting sake goes to New York and Los Angeles. The reason is a law from 1933 and a distributor's spreadsheet, and a hundred peo
How the club worksHow a blind tasting works, and how to score one
Labels go in a bag before anybody arrives. Here is the shape of the night and the four things you are scoring, so a first tasting is no
The ones we hear most
Where can I buy sake in Washington, D.C.?
Through a licensed retailer, because alcohol in the United States moves through three tiers and only a retailer can sell to you. Kasumi Club is an informal buying group and not a licensed retailer, so its group orders are placed through one.
Why is the sake selection in D.C. so limited?
Because a brewery cannot ship directly to a shop. Someone in the distributor tier has to decide in advance that a bottle will move, and for a city this size that decision usually lands on the safe middle of the category.
Is there a sake club in Washington, D.C.?
Yes. Kasumi Club has run since April 2026 and has about a hundred members. Bottles are poured blind in Glover Park and scored out of 5 by the members present. Joining is free.
What sake is worth buying in D.C.?
Kasumi Club publishes a blind score out of 5 for every bottle it has poured, with the brewery, the rice and the polishing ratio, on its score sheet. The highest so far is Momokawa Pearl at 4.2, which is brewed in Oregon rather than Japan.
Can a group order sake directly from a brewery?
No. Group orders still go through a licensed retailer. What a group changes is volume: a case is the smallest unit a brewery will ship and a retailer will place.
Send us a bottle and about twenty people will tell you the truth.
Kasumi Club pours everything blind. Breweries and importers use us to test the D.C. market, and every bottle we pour gets a page with its score, whether it wins or not.
How it works for breweries