Domaine Atsushi Suzuki Kuma Kids Blanc 2022 750ml

Domaine Atsushi Suzuki farms 5.6 hectares on a gentle east-facing slope in Yoichi, Hokkaido — 60 to 80 metres up, on weathered gravel, sand and clay over andesite bedrock. Atsushi Suzuki took the vineyard over from conventional growers and has moved it steadily toward organic farming: grass cover, no tillage, Bordeaux mixture as the main treatment, and the domaine's own wines made only from the parcels farmed without synthetic sprays. The cellar is a renovated early-Shōwa stone warehouse once used for apples; there is no pump and no destemmer, only a small basket press, barrels and resin tanks. Fermentation is with wild yeast, nothing is added but a minimal dose of sulfites at bottling, and the wines are never chaptalised or acidified. One of the quiet benchmarks of Yoichi's natural-wine generation, made in tiny quantities and hard to find even within Japan.

Kuma Kids Blanc is the domaine's white under its playful bear-cub label, drawn from the estate's Germanic white varieties — the Kerner and Müller-Thurgau that still make up much of the Yoichi planting. Wild-fermented and bottled dry with minimal sulfites, it is the domaine at its most direct: mineral, fresh and quietly serious under the cheerful name. 2022 is now settled and drinking well.

Vintage: 2022
Cuvée: Kuma Kids Blanc
Producer: Domaine Atsushi Suzuki
Region: Yoichi, Hokkaido, Japan
Grape: Estate white blend
ABV: 12.5%
Volume: 750ml