Epilogue

To Savour Two Hundred Years, Now — Between the Constant and the Changing

結章 — 二百年を、いま味わう・不易と流行のあいだ

From the Past, into the Present

In the prologue, we raised a single question — why Hekinan?

Carrying that question, we have traced this land. The alluvial plain and good water the Yahagi River brought. The sea surrounding it on three sides, and the cargo-ship road that led on to Edo. Mirin, which changed its form from a sweet wine into a seasoning. White soy sauce, which sets off an ingredient by adding no colour. A rare ecosystem of fermentation where all of miso, soy sauce, vinegar, mirin and sake gather. And the spirit, honouring the act of "waiting," that the tea which came with Zen nurtured over a thousand years.

All of this is a story of the past. But Hekinan is not a land that stays within the past. In this epilogue, carrying all we have traced, we wish to return once more to the "present." What is this land, holding a two-hundred-year history, now seeking to offer the world? In that, precisely, lies the close of this chronicle.

I. "The Constant" — The Choice Not to Change

To say in one word what runs through the breweries of Hekinan, it is the will "not to change."

The brewery that makes hon-mirin waits, over several years, for saccharification and maturation, with rice, rice kōji and shōchū alone. Where the law allows even mirin made up to five shō from one shō of rice to be called "hon-mirin," there are breweries that go on, deliberately, making only the dense and genuine. The white-soy brewery brews quietly within wooden vats, guarding against colouring through contact with the air. The Hatchō-miso brewery commits the years beyond two summers and two winters to wooden vats weighted with stacked stones.

All of these are choices that resist the logic of efficiency. Wooden vats take labour to manage and do not suit mass production. Long, low-temperature maturation demands time and cost. Pressing by hand asks many times the labour of a machine. And still the breweries do not change, because they know there is a taste that can be born no other way.

This is "the constant." However the age may change, there is what must not be changed. To guard, through to the end, the method, the bearing, the manner of giving time. The breweries of Hekinan have embodied this constancy for two hundred years.

II. "The Changing" — The Choice to Open to the World

But Hekinan is no land of nostalgia. The same breweries are now in the midst of a challenge newer than ever before.

The world, now, has its eye on Japan's fermentation. Since washoku was inscribed on UNESCO's Intangible Cultural Heritage, "Umami" has become a vocabulary common to the world, and for chefs abroad to use miso and soy sauce is by now a matter of course.¹ And among these, what the world's top chefs have come to watch in recent years is mirin. An expert who guides chefs from abroad tells of how chefs of the kind whose names appear in the Michelin guide, meeting genuine mirin, rejoice — "so this is real mirin."²

The figures, too, bear out the current. The export value of Japan's agricultural, forestry and fishery products and foods first exceeded one trillion yen in 2021, and reached one trillion five hundred billion yen in 2024.³ Soy sauce, too, has become a "world product," enjoyed in more than a hundred countries.⁴ Dark, light, tamari — and white soy sauce: that diverse line-up is highly valued by the world's cooks as something that widens the range of a dish.⁵

Hekinan's fermentation, too, is within this great current. Tamari soy sauce is exported to Europe and America, hon-mirin is found by first-rate chefs and pâtissiers abroad as "a liqueur of Japan," and white soy sauce is used across the bounds of Japanese, Western and Chinese cooking — as, two hundred years ago, the cargo ships carried Hekinan's fermentation to the vast market of Edo, so now Hekinan's fermentation journeys to the market of the world.

This is "the changing." To change and open — toward a new table, a new dish, a new country — in answer to the demand of the age.

III. The Constant and the Changing Are One

Here, Bashō's words, traced in the fifth chapter, take on a deep meaning once more.

"Knowing not the constant, the foundation can scarcely stand; knowing not the changing, the style is not made new" — without knowing what does not change, the foundation does not stand; without knowing what changes, no newness is born. And in Bashō, these two were not opposed, but at root one.

Look at the breweries of Hekinan, and one sees this principle living, just as it is.

The brewery is valued by the world because it does not change its method. Genuine mirin astonishes chefs abroad by the very density and depth that come of guarding through to the end the constancy of rice, kōji and time. Had it sought efficiency and changed its method, no bottle to astonish the world would have been born. That is — because it guarded the constant, the changing was born. Because it did not change, it could open anew to the world.

The reverse is also true. By meeting the new market of the world (the changing), the brewery comes to know afresh the worth of what it has guarded (the constant). A chef from abroad's single word — "so this is the real thing" — lights back the meaning of what has been carried on for two hundred years. The changing makes the worth of the constant be discovered anew.

The constant and the changing are not separate things. In Hekinan, these two are the two faces of one work. Not to change, and to open. To guard, and to journey. In living these two at once lies the present brilliance of the land called Hekinan.

IV. The Journey, from Here

We have now gained our answer to the prologue's question — why Hekinan?

Geography, the sea, sake, kōji, and a thousand-year spiritual culture overlapped in this land. Upon that necessity, Hekinan's fermentation was born, grew, and now seeks to open to the world. What Hekinan has brewed is not seasonings alone — mirin and white soy sauce. It was a way of life itself: to trust time, and, while guarding the unchanging, to open toward the new.

This chronicle lays down its brush here. But the story of Hekinan is not one that ends within letters.

The sweet, deep scent that fills the air when the brewery door is opened. The cool touch when one lays a hand on the grain of a wooden vat. The astonishment when a drop, pressed by a method unchanged for two hundred years, is placed on the tongue. The weight of the words when a brewer speaks quietly of "waiting." The stillness of passing through the roji into the tea room and setting the heart in order over a single bowl of tea. These are not things to be read. They are things that can be savoured only by placing oneself in that place.

To savour two hundred years, now. That is granted only by visiting this land and touching its time through all five senses. Hekinan's constant-and-changing waits, beyond the page, quietly, for you to come.

The journey begins from here.

Notes & Sources

This is the epilogue of the Chronicle of Hekinan (white paper). The facts stated rest on the sources cited. Figures such as export values rest on secondary materials citing Ministry of Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries data. The reading of "the constant and the changing" given in this chapter is the author's reflection, based on Bashō's poetic principle referred to in the fifth chapter. Throughout this chronicle, the advertising of particular companies or products is avoided, and the account is given as the fermentation culture of the land called Hekinan. The accounts of each chapter will be reinforced continuously, hereafter, by primary sources (municipal histories, brewing-history research, etc.).

⟨Chronicle of Hekinan — Full Structure⟩

Prologue. Why Hekinan? — Why the Land Chose Brewing
Chapter One. The Sea Road — Ōhama Port and the Cargo Ships That Linked Edo
Chapter Two. The Invention Called Mirin — From Sweet Wine to Seasoning
Chapter Three. The Invention of White — Why White Soy Sauce Was Born in Hekinan
Chapter Four. The Land Where Brewing Gathers — An Ecosystem of Fermentation
Chapter Five. The Land That Brews Time — Fermentation and the Spiritual Culture of Japan
Epilogue. To Savour Two Hundred Years, Now — Between the Constant and the Changing

This chronicle is placed beneath Hosomichi's upper white paper "The Japanese Spiritual Worldview," and is the first of the regional chronicles of culture, standing alongside those of other Mikawa regions such as Nishio matcha and Okazaki miso.

"Let Us Convey 'Fermented Foods,' the Charm of Japanese Cuisine," Japan Wonder Guide (on the sharp rise, since washoku's inscription on UNESCO's Intangible Cultural Heritage, of people worldwide who understand "Umami," and on chefs abroad using miso and soy sauce becoming a matter of course). https://japanwonderguide.com/about-fermented-food/ ↩
"'Japan's Fermented Foods' Draw Great Attention Worldwide!," apollostation Drive Discovery PRESS (as remarked by Mr. Ogura, an expert who attends to chefs from abroad, that mirin has in recent years drawn the attention of the world's chefs, and that top chefs listed in the Michelin guide marvel at genuine mirin). https://www.tfm.co.jp/discovery/index.php?catid=4076&itemid=198134 ↩
"Japan's Seasonings Are Popular Worldwide! Success Stories of Overseas Expansion," provej (on the export value of agricultural, forestry and fishery products and foods, based on Ministry of Agriculture, Forestry and Fisheries data, first exceeding one trillion yen in 2021 and reaching 1.5 trillion yen in 2024). https://www.provej.jp/column/na/japanese-sauces/ ↩
"Kikkoman Soy Sauce, Spreading Across the World," Kikkoman (on soy sauce being enjoyed in more than a hundred countries, and spreading through fusion with local food cultures). https://www.kikkoman.co.jp/enjoys/soysaucemuseum/global.html ↩
"Soy Sauce Going Abroad: How It Is Used in the World's Cooking, and Its Charm" (on the diverse line-up of dark, light, white and tamari soy sauce being valued by the world's cooks as widening the range of a dish, and on Japanese soy sauce being chosen for its traditional method and quality). https://shoyu.mikawa.farm/soy-sauce-global-use/ ↩