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As a big fan of oriental cuisine, I decided on a bold gastronomic experiment and prepared the legendary Sake. My buddies grimaced skeptically, assuring me that I would get the usual rice mash, but curiosity won out. The main task was to find the right recipe.
Originally intended for members of the ruling dynasty, the drink, which has a history of 2000 years, simply did not befit to be spoiled by newfangled substitutes, so the preparation process was not easy.
I must admit right away that not everything worked out perfectly for me the first time, and here’s why …
The story was shared by my subscriber Roman.
What ingredients are needed
To prepare real rice vodka, it was necessary to use:
- a special kind of rice with large grains rich in starch, ordinary cereals from the supermarket will not work;
- highly purified water enriched with potassium, magnesium and phosphorus; but it should not contain iron and manganese;
- koji fungus;
- alcohol yeast;
- Activated carbon.
I also needed a fermentation tank, medical gauze and an electronic thermometer with a probe. At first glance, it seems that I did not incur any special expenses, but this is not so.
It turned out that neither artesian nor filtered water is suitable for cooking. Everything, except coal, I had to order in the online store and the purchases cost 180 US dollars.
Important: sake did not work out of ordinary rice and tap water, the products simply rotted, the money for the fungus and a month of time were wasted.
The cooking process
As I understand it, the essence of the cooking process is fermentation with the participation of mold, which is typical for cheese making, and not for the production of alcohol. Having become acquainted with the traditional method, I realized that I would not adhere to it.
So, in ancient China, rice was chewed with teeth and spit out into a cauldron, where the resulting mass was supposed to become moldy.
I decided to deviate somewhat from tradition and used a special koji mushroom that helps out modern distillers.
What I did:
- I polished the rice by hand, removing the husk, and diligently worked on these two days.
- I washed and soaked a kilogram of rice for several hours, after which I held it over the steam.
- I put the rice mass in a ceramic tub and added a moldy mushroom on top in the amount of one portion, which I kept at 62 ° C for two days on the stove, constantly checking the temperature with an electronic thermometer.
- Moldy rice was mixed with 25 g of yeast and a liter of water, after which it was left to ferment for a month in the same tub at a temperature of 10 ° C.
- On the 30th day, I filtered the mass through cheesecloth and discarded the sediment.
- I made a funnel out of paper, filling it with pharmaceutical activated charcoal tablets and passing a cloudy liquid through this filter.
- Pour it into a glass jar and close the lid tightly.
What will be the result
According to technology, the drink had to be pasteurized and kept for about six months in an airtight container so that mold and bacteria would disappear, but I decided not to bother.
The drink is original. It is impossible to describe its taste in a way that everyone understands, since I have never tried anything even remotely resembling rice vodka before.
The liquid is absolutely transparent, without sediment and suspensions, tastes more like wine than strong alcohol. This, by the way, is not surprising, since the measurements of the alcoholometer showed only 15 revolutions.
How to serve and with what
Of course, having spent a month making Sake, I couldn’t taste it randomly. He specially acquired an elegant porcelain set of a jug with hieroglyphs and two miniature glasses for one sip, turned on ethnic music, lit incense, cut pickled ginger and red fish and took the first sip.
At first I was disappointed, as there was practically no fortress, and the taste turned out to be too specific, vaguely reminiscent of mushrooms.
Rice vodka should be served in porcelain or thick glass. It is important to drink it in small sips. Sake is usually drunk with sliced red fish, lean meats and fruits. Summarizing my experience, I want to say that it turned out worthy, but expensive.
If you have any ideas on how to reduce the cost of a product without sacrificing quality, I would be grateful for advice.