How Domaine Tetta Brought Okayama Wine To The World

In the lushly forested northwest of Okayama Prefecture lies the small town of Tetta. Venturing deep into the mountains of this picturesque part of Japan, you will come across a chic building on a hillside which houses modern art pieces and a café-restaurant that overlooks undulating vineyards and opens to the fresh highland breeze. What may at first glance appear to be a stylish gallery is in fact the home of winery Domaine Tetta.

Work on regenerating what in the past had been a grape plantation commenced in 2009. It was not until 2017 that the award-winning winery released its first vintage, one that was entirely produced and bottled on site. Follow us now on a journey to this attractive winery hidden away in a country Okayama town, but certainly not lacking in attention from wine enthusiasts.

Breathing new life into the land

Tetta, now incorporated into the city of Niimi, was formerly known as one of many areas in Japan that was engaged in the production of leaf tobacco. With the successful development of the large, sweet, and seedless New Pione grape in the 1980s, Tetta became just one of several districts in Okayama that took to their cultivation. However, like other rural areas of Japan, recent depopulation and aging has seen the town faced with the increasing problem of abandoned agricultural land.

“Honestly speaking, I was quite perturbed to see that what had been a scenic vineyard become this tangled mass of thickets,” Domaine Tetta owner Ryuta Takahashi begins. It was this thought that prompted him in 2009 to take on the management of the neglected vineyard as a side project to his main job in the construction industry. Takahashi explains that when he looked across the property through the eyes of someone experienced in reading the land (his primary work is in the mining of limestone), he saw a treasure trove of possibilities appear in his mind.

A global rarity: Tetta’s calcareous soil

“Around here, when you dig the land up, the limestone comes tumbling out — the soil is very calcareous (full of limestone). This is a rare characteristic worldwide and something that this place shares with famous wine producing regions in France such as Champagne and Chablis. We are also on a plateau about 400 to 600m above sea level and there is a large shift between daytime and nighttime temperatures, making for prime grape-growing conditions. While grapes grown in Tetta have to now been destined for the table, the environment up here is particularly suited for winemaking. You could search all of Japan and I doubt you’d find a location as ideal as this.”

Creating excellent wine the driving principle

Takahashi saw the potential for the property to find a second life as a winery. “But, I thought that I wanted to do more than just make good wines here,” he remarks.

“In order to start what I hoped would be a movement out here in the back hills of country Okayama, the first thing was to ferment interest and get people wanting to visit Tetta. That would in turn create employment opportunities for locals and if the they could share some meaningful time with those who come here, I envisaged the winery leading a revival of the town. Of course, the first challenge was to make excellent wine, but I thought that I also wanted to create a more comprehensive plan as to how visitors could experience the charm of this part of the world and the wines made here.”

After some thought, Takahashi arrived at the idea of creating a domaine: an estate that not only makes wine from its own vines, but also bottles and sells it at the winery. An image soon emerged in his mind: that of people gathering to directly come into contact with the land and the ideas behind the creation of the winery, where they could enjoy pairing the wine with local delicacies — one where they could experience the characteristic terroir of the land reflected in its wines.

With this in mind, Takahashi mustered the help of friends familiar with grape cultivation and winemaking and called in the skills of Masamichi Katayama, a world-renowned interior designer born in Okayama and founder/principal of the firm Wonderwall Inc.

“The idea was for a place where people could come together to enjoy the pleasures of wine. I thought that for that to happen, the design of the structure had to be pleasing to the eye and that concept was relayed to Mr. Katayama. I basically left everything that was not directly connected to the making of the wine itself up to him. The winery building took around four years from start to finish, but he is a strong supporter of what we do to this day.”

On an empty hillside, a stylish concrete structure housing the winery emerged. Its wide windows that open on both sides of the building frame the beautiful views of Tetta like a picture postcard; from the first floor café/restaurant and shop area, filled with the gentle mountain breezes passing through it, visitors can look down on the fermentation caskets on the level below.

Wine, naturally

Starting with the cultivation of table grapes and regenerating the vineyard to create an ideal winemaking environment, Takahashi’s efforts paid off in 2016 with the production of the winery’s first vintage. It was one that fully revealed a wild character, reflecting the characteristics of the soil.

“We use wild yeast for the fermentation process and there are absolutely no sugars or acids added. Antioxidants are kept down to the bare minimum. We’ve aimed at wine that brings out the distinct characteristics of Tetta’s grapes, so it undergoes a very coarse filtration process.”

Rather than avoiding additives, Domaine Tetta takes a ‘paring away’ approach. This has given rise to wines that possess a deep flavor, reflecting the minerals and structure the calcareous soil lends to the grapes. Despite an untamed expression, they feature a light body, are easy to drink, and are broad with a complex depth of flavor.

Wines with generous umami flavors — the perfect pairing with Japanese dishes

Wine that encapsulates Tetta’s terroir makes for a perfect accompaniment to dishes that feature ingredients from Okayama. The café restaurant on the first floor of Domaine Tetta offers the opportunity to savor local cuisine paired with the perfect wine.

“I think that food that is cultivated in the same climate really suits the wine. My personal favorite paring is the kinpira gobo (chopped burdock root cooked in sugar and soy sauce) with one of our whites. Oh, and sansai (wild mountain vegetables) tempura goes really well with the chardonnay! Our wines are rich in umami and you could also say they have the feint nuance of dashi (soup stock that builds the base of many Japanese dishes). That is perhaps another reason why the wines blend so well with the ‘umami culture’ that is incorporated in Japanese cuisine.

There’s no right or wrong in marriage...

Pairing wine and food is a tradition in French gastronomy that goes back centuries, one that has been developed through a long process of trial and error, Takahashi explains.

“In a country with a food culture where a bottle of wine always sits on the table to be enjoyed with a meal, people no doubt tried various combinations of wine and food over the ages. The result of that were wonderful pairings being discovered and the fostering of the rich food culture we see today in France. What I would like to see is the same thing happen in Japan, where wines can be freely mixed with various dishes without any preconceived ideas. I believe that one of the beauties of wine is that you can enjoy it in imaginative ways without being constrained by the thought that it is something that only goes with western cuisine.”

The evolution of Japanese wine culture

In the past, Japanese wines were uniformly poorly regarded. However, through the spirit of hard work and with inquiring minds, winemakers here are finally garnering global recognition, with several Japanese wines taking out prizes at international wine competitions in recent years.

“We started making wines in 2009, just before the Japanese-made wine boom began. At the time, there were not many domaines in Japan with their own wines and doing everything from scratch. However, with the appeal of Japanese wine now gaining attention, there is a burgeoning younger generation of winemakers now on the scene. In fact, we get many coming to us looking for training opportunities.”

“These new creators want to make wine entirely by themselves, from the growing of the grapes through the whole process. I feel that there are more and more unique winemakers with a strong sense of commitment emerging in the field. Our younger staff members will often enthusiastically come up to me with one of the grapes from the vineyard, saying ‘We’ve got a good grape here!’ When I see them developing their interest and their skills in winemaking, I’m convinced that the Japanese wine scene has a very bright future ahead.”