Bottom of the barrel sauce (Torii sauce)

Bottom of the barrel sauce (Torii sauce)

When Worcestershire sauce is aged in a wooden barrel for over a month, the solids from the vegetables and spices slowly settle to the bottom of the barrel. The resulting sauce is full of flavor and is rich and spicy. It has a unique flavor. Sauce lovers should definitely give it a try.

Capacity: 200ml

Ingredients: sugar (domestically produced), vegetables (onion, tomato, carrot, garlic, celery), brewed vinegar, salt, spices, lemon juice, kelp, bonito flakes

Shokunin Shoyu No. 3096

The flavors that have accumulated at the bottom of the wooden barrel are concentrated.

Torii Sauce's Worcestershire sauce is aged in a wooden barrel for over a month. During this process, the vegetable solids and spice grains slowly and naturally settle to the bottom of the barrel, and a rich sauce packed with umami accumulates at the bottom of the barrel. In the Kansai region, this is called "muddy sauce."

This sauce can only be made by a sauce manufacturer that uses a aging method. It is proof of aging, so to speak. It is not simply too spicy, but has a rich, spicy flavor that will have you hooked once you try it.

The sauce is made from vinegar and vegetables.

The ingredients of the sauce are surprisingly unknown. President Torii Daisuke explains, "Soy sauce adds saltiness and umami, and sauce adds sourness and umami." The source of sourness is vinegar, and the source of umami is vegetables. The sauce is made by adding spices to these ingredients.

Therefore, Worcestershire sauce is committed to using 100% domestic vegetables and home-grown vinegar. The vegetables are sourced from familiar producers and neighboring areas as much as possible.

The vinegar is also homemade

We have been brewing our own vinegar for over 30 years. We extract alcohol from sake lees from ginjo sake produced at a local brewery, then use the static fermentation method to grow acetic acid bacteria and turn it into vinegar over a period of two months.

Vinegar and spices have different optimum temperatures

Another feature is the use of spices such as cinnamon, nutmeg, and cloves that bring out the sweetness. Instead of powdering the spices and mixing them, they are placed in a straining bag in their original or coarsely ground form and then soaked in the sauce, allowing only the aroma to be dissolved into the sauce.

Depending on the type of spice, some can withstand heat, while others cannot, so the temperature and timing of adding them are important. By dividing the temperature range into two stages and allowing the heat-sensitive spices to cool before adding them, only the desired aroma is transferred to the sauce.

The idea is to put spices in a bag and let them steep, but Torii explained, "It might be easier to understand if you imagine tea brewed in a teapot and powdered tea. Tea brewed in a teapot doesn't have much impact, but it goes down smoothly. Powdered tea has a straightforward taste, but it still has a bitter aftertaste."