SOJU - Hail to The King!

Don't look into her eyes

Wow. What a drink. If you came to Korea and didn’t experience this national ‘rice-wine’ treasure, then, clearly, you didn’t actually go to Korea, did you. For anyone living here, Soju is part of daily life: whether you are in a restaurant, bar, in a park, outside a convenient store, up a mountain, at ANY time of day, you will likely see one of these distinctive green bottles, that help define the country’s gastronomic culture, being slowly emptied into some happy individual.

And recently, with the publication of Drinks International’s latest figures, Jinro’s brand of Soju has taken its place on the global piss-head scene, coming in at NUMBER 1 in a list of the most-drunk spirits in the world, beating the likes of globally famous drinks such as Smirnoff Vodka and Johnny Walkers Whiskey, by an absolute country mile. I was genuinely shocked by the figures I saw (first brought to my attention by the excellent KoreaBANG blog), so did a bit of amateur net-research into it all…

What’s really weird is that Soju is not remotely famous in other parts of the world, yet its popularity is huge, and localized. A staggering 552 million litres of Jinro Soju were sold last year alone (as well as a mere 215million litres by its lesser-rival Lotte), and 90 percent of all Soju is consumed within Korea itself. I’d never even heard of it before I came here.

Here are the stats according to Drinks International’s recent data

1 Jinro Jinro - Soju 61.38 million*

2 Smirnoff Diageo - Vodka 24.70 million

3 Lotte Liquor Lotte Liquor - Soju 23.90 million

4 Emperador Alliance Global Group - Brandy 20.10 million

5 Bacardi Bacardi - Rum 19.56 million

(*9 litre cases)

So if you add together all the Soju sales, it still eclipses the other brands’ sales combined! Madness.

So what’s the secret of Soju’s success? I could probably write a PhD thesis on the matter, but for your benefit (I know that, reading this, you’ll be gagging for a drink soon…), I’ll condense it down to three points.

PRICE

Don't-you-understand-the-meaning-of-NO-ju

My housemate, Dan, is an English Teacher at a University in Suwon, and he recently asked his students what their favourite drink was. No prizes for guessing that ‘SOJU!’ was their uniform answer. He asked them why and they said “it’s the cheapest way to get drunk”. No shit. A 375 ml bottle of Soju will cost less than (the equivalent of) 2 US dollars from a convenience store, and at just under 20% alcohol, one bottle to yourself will get you merry.

(I’m sorry to inform my readers in the UK that a bottle of Soju from a Korean restaurant in London might set you back close to ten quid! In Korea, such a price would surely lead to revolution within hours.)

HISTORY

Soju has been brewed in Korea since around the 1300s, and was, until the 20^th century, something of a cottage industry, with millions of Koreans making homebrewed Soju from locally produced rice, and flavouring it with different fruits such as cherries or plums, so that each batch could be totally different, depending on who made it and where. 

However, during the Japanese occupation (starting around 1910), Soju was viewed, rightly, by the Japanese as an important part of Korean indigenous culture. As part of a wider attempt to undermine Korea’s national identity, homebrewed production was all but eliminated, and there was an effort to encourage Koreans to drink other forms of alcohol such as Sake and beer.

In spite of this, Soju’s appeal endured long after the Japanese were kicked out in 1945, but sadly, the diversity of flavours, and the art of homebrewing Soju was lost forever. Very few Koreans, especially in the cities, have any clue how to make it anymore. Now, like so many things, production has been consolidated by a few very large corporations, especially the aforementioned chart-toppers Jinro and Lotte.

However, as a nod to the old days, you will often see Koreans shaking a bottle of Soju and tapping the bottom of a bottle (usually with their elbow) before pouring it. This used to be an essential way of stirring up the sediment at the bottom of the old home-brewed stuff. Now, with it being mass-produced to strict guidelines in large factories, this technique is completely unnecessary, but still, if you want to ‘act native’, do the shakey-tappy thing in front of a Korean, for instant kudos.

CULTURE

Koreans are social drinkers, and they like to eat while they drink. Soju fits this drinking culture of Korea perfectly. 

First of all, unless you really are a Class A alcoholic, you wouldn’t drink a bottle of Soju alone. It is intended to be shared, and there is a whole lot of etiquette surrounding the way it should be poured (you should never pour your own, you should always refill empty classes, being just two elements of the rather arcane ‘rules’).

Also, it’s not like a glass of ale or a vintage wine. I mean, it doesn’t exactly taste great. Part of the fun is knocking back a few shots with your friends. Before you know it, you’ll be sucked in by thinking “well, it’s not a REAL spirit like Vodka, I can handle a few more of these babies”. Oblivion ensues… Such is the insidious ‘charm’ of the stuff.

Also, Koreans like to stretch out the drinking process by eating Anjou (drinking snacks) while they drink. This could be anything from fried chicken to a pajeon (a kind of Korean pancake), some Ojingo (dried squid) or one of a thousand other dishes they serve, to make the Soju more palatable.

The idea of an English-style pub makes little sense to Koreans. Why would anyone want to just drink beer for hours on end? The idea of making yourself feel full and bloated, with only crisps to eat, just doesn’t add up to a Korean soju-lover. And as much as I love and miss pubs back home, there is a lot to be said for the way Koreans do it, and Soju is a key part of all that.

Hangover? What hangover? Get to work!

Let’s forget, for a moment: the nasty hangovers the stuff can give you (hey – they have hangover-cure drinks for that here!), its lack of a real flavour (have a bit of squid mate), or the way it obliterates the memory so adeptly that you can forget you’ve drank four bottles already and so demand another bottle (come on - that’s a clever drink). 

Rather, let’s appreciate the positives of a drink which is cheap, fun and sociable, and has enabled Korea to be a nation of admirably keen drinkers. Perhaps that’s why the average Korean man can drink 90 bottles of Soju a year, and why Soju is officially Number One - the King of Spirits.

Anyway, that’s your lot, I’ve got to go to the shop for some, er… milk.