Here's a picture of just the RYR. Those are the two package types my local Asian market had. The light in the picture is a little yellow. It's actually much closer to burgundy then any shade of brown.
Making Traditional rice Wine. Cheap, Fun, and Different
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Just ordered some on ebay from our local Jak1010. Next time I have some free time, I'll stalk the local Asian markets.
Red Cargo rice is a fancy rice much in the same way Basmati and Jasmine are fancier than normal long grain rice. You can certainly experiment with it but I'd point out people using plain long grain have not been overly happy from the results as a general rule based on this thread. It might behoove you to do a small side batch with it to see if you like the results before you waste all that rice and of course the time involved to make it. It near physically pains me to throw out a batch when I don't like the results but YMMV.
@Leadgolem,
The only reason I've been doing it in that manner was that I did a batch that I added fruit to the mix with a pectic enzyme. Since those can produce Methanol, I decided to go with another of the apple pasteurization examples (maybe even the same page) that kept things a bit lower but above the boil temp for Methanol for 18m. The nice burn you normally get with it was all but gone and it is my belief that the alcohol was way lower than even the lightest session beer because you could drink and drink and drink it without so much as a perceived effect. I can see the methanol being gone with that kind of involvement and maybe even some of the ethanol but I didn't expect anywhere near what I got. Like you said though, it probably takes far less than to kill everything so I try to shoot for fast with quick cooling.
Sidenote, I use two probes. One near the bottom and one near the top looped around a handle to make it easier to know if it needs stirred and just in case one fails. If you pasteurize pre-bottle I'd highly recommend this approach as I've had bigger batches be at a much higher temperature than the top liquid (which of course makes sense) and I'm generally too lazy to sit there and stir constantly.
@Leadgolem,
The only reason I've been doing it in that manner was that I did a batch that I added fruit to the mix with a pectic enzyme. Since those can produce Methanol, I decided to go with another of the apple pasteurization examples (maybe even the same page) that kept things a bit lower but above the boil temp for Methanol for 18m. The nice burn you normally get with it was all but gone and it is my belief that the alcohol was way lower than even the lightest session beer because you could drink and drink and drink it without so much as a perceived effect. I can see the methanol being gone with that kind of involvement and maybe even some of the ethanol but I didn't expect anywhere near what I got. Like you said though, it probably takes far less than to kill everything so I try to shoot for fast with quick cooling.
Sidenote, I use two probes. One near the bottom and one near the top looped around a handle to make it easier to know if it needs stirred and just in case one fails. If you pasteurize pre-bottle I'd highly recommend this approach as I've had bigger batches be at a much higher temperature than the top liquid (which of course makes sense) and I'm generally too lazy to sit there and stir constantly.
CreamyGoodness
Well-Known Member
If this small 3-cup batch of mine works out as I hope, I am kicking around the idea of buying a big ole bag of rice and a couple dozen yeast balls and using my big ole pickle crock to make several gallons.
Make sure you puncture the cap it forms to let the liquid hit it and transition more of it as some others have posted. If you don't you'll likely end up like my last batch with less than desirable harvests.
Sidenote, rice keeps nearly forever so long as you don't let it get wet. It doesn't even have to be airtight but rather with a tight enough seal to prevent bugs from getting in. I use $2 buckets and $1 lids from Walmart to great effect. And odd as it may sound, apparently in the case of short grain rice anyway, the older rice actually is said to have a nicer texture for eating than the newer harvest rice and is frequently more desirable for whatever reason from aficionados. That said, it never even occurred to me that there were rice aficionados before I started looking for more info on it.
Sidenote, rice keeps nearly forever so long as you don't let it get wet. It doesn't even have to be airtight but rather with a tight enough seal to prevent bugs from getting in. I use $2 buckets and $1 lids from Walmart to great effect. And odd as it may sound, apparently in the case of short grain rice anyway, the older rice actually is said to have a nicer texture for eating than the newer harvest rice and is frequently more desirable for whatever reason from aficionados. That said, it never even occurred to me that there were rice aficionados before I started looking for more info on it.
Johnnyhitch1
Well-Known Member
Ordered 10 yeast balls from jak1010's ebay listing for $7.50 and he sent me 15! ended up being around 50c a ball.
Great deal from this guy.
Hope to get my batch started tnite and will report back!
Great deal from this guy.
Hope to get my batch started tnite and will report back!
Pop a hole in the rice cap that begins to float on top of the liquid. I think it requires some gas exchange as well as exposure to the available sugar/starch for the yeast/mold to work its magic. Some have had large batches stagnate and not progress as well as the small batches because of the large cap.
I decided to try the rice wine sample I've got from beginning of April. All I can say is Wow! The alcohol aroma has dropped to almost nothing. The flavor has smoothed out. Still a very nice burn in the throat, even more then my 16% cider. The sweetness and tang remained the same. This was an inferior batch made with long grain rice. I noted it as having a strong "mushroomy" flavor and aroma when it was fresh. That has almost entirely disappeared. It still has a very slight mushroomy taste and aroma, though it mostly registers as just rice now.
It has separated, and I did not shake it up before sampling.
Shaking it up to put the solids back in suspension improved it further. It almost double the intensity of the rice aroma, and the sweetness. It had no other discernable effect on the flavor. I will try to leave some of this to try again in another month, but I doubt it will last that long...
EDIT: Interestingly, adding some simple syrup to sweeten it further resulted in the flavor taking on much more of a subtle "plum" flavor.
It has separated, and I did not shake it up before sampling.
Shaking it up to put the solids back in suspension improved it further. It almost double the intensity of the rice aroma, and the sweetness. It had no other discernable effect on the flavor. I will try to leave some of this to try again in another month, but I doubt it will last that long...
EDIT: Interestingly, adding some simple syrup to sweeten it further resulted in the flavor taking on much more of a subtle "plum" flavor.
WesleyS
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It definitely improves over time. I opened a bottle of my batch I flavored with pineapple coconut juice. It's been bottled, pasteurized, and refrigerated for at least a few weeks, if not over a month. I wish I would've wrote down the date. It's alot smoother and the flavor of the pineapple and coconut juice is starting to shine through more with the jasmine rice flavor coming through in the end. Tastes very, very good. I will probably wait another few weeks before I open another bottle from this batch.
Looks really good!
saramc
Well-Known Member
Are they flavored at all? What made the red one...so red? Have rice cooking now because my son and his friends ate the last batch. I left the house for a while, came home to the smell of fried rice. It was tasty, but this Mom was irked, so they poured me a glass from a bottle of peach port they picked out (which they really got into trouble for). They like the rice wine immensely and a few of them make it now, they said it is easier than 'all the crap you really have to do to make wine'. I will make wine/beer makers out of these 22-23 year old 'kids' yet.
No, no flavoring at all. These batches are both jasmine rice, 1:1 ratio with Chinese yeast balls. One batch had a few ounces of RYR added to it.
CreamyGoodness
Well-Known Member
Just checked on mine and its humming along nicely!! Only issue is that there is so mold on the top. Can I just remove this or is it screwed?
CreamyGoodness
Well-Known Member
Green mold. Like one would get on food that had been left out a few days.
CreamyGoodness said:
I had black or brownish mold on my very first batch that I suspect was from too much water 2/1 ratio and not letting cool enough as it hasn't happened again
All that being said it didn't grow much from when it formed initially and I harvested with removing the mold and consumed
It was good enough as I am now on my 12th gallon batch I believe
CooperBrew
Well-Known Member
Just bottled up my first batches a few moments ago. One was made with Sushi rice and one with Jasmine rice. The Sushi rice had a different aroma, a bit stronger smelling. I added raspberries to the Sushi Rice (pink color) and blueberries to the Jasmine (purplish). I have them in the fridge to chill, going to try them tonight. These were made in 1 gal jars, with 6 cups of rice and 2 yeast balls each. The bottles are 1 liter in size.
Great idea with the raspberry. I'd open them every few hours to release some pressure while it's getting cold. Although I haven't had any bad experiences, I do believe it came close judging by the amount of"pop" I got when opening a few.
saramc
Well-Known Member
Oh the raspberry/blueberry look great. Mulberries will be ripe when my batch is harvested!!
So I was in Atlanta today and came across the "Hong Kong Supermarket" and had to stop and see if they had yeast balls and RYR. They didn't have any RYR that I could see and none of the stock "boys" spoke English, so I couldn't ask them.
However, I did pick up some new types of yeast balls to try (as well as a big bag of the main ones I use.) Posting some pics with this. (note, these are actually PNG files, not sure why they're being renamed to JPG when I upload 'em...)
There are 14 individual packages in the big bag of "Hapy Panda" yeast balls. Got that for about $6.
However, I did pick up some new types of yeast balls to try (as well as a big bag of the main ones I use.) Posting some pics with this. (note, these are actually PNG files, not sure why they're being renamed to JPG when I upload 'em...)
There are 14 individual packages in the big bag of "Hapy Panda" yeast balls. Got that for about $6.
Ostomo517
Well-Known Member
Brewing right now Thai Jasmine/Thai Black batch, black must soak for 6 hrs so be forewarned!!! Look should be interesting in the final wine as the pic below is what the black did to the soak water. Its more the color of grape Koolaid
Not all browsers will display embedded .png files, so the HBT server turned them into .jpg files. It probably also resized them for you.So I was in Atlanta today and came across the "Hong Kong Supermarket" and had to stop and see if they had yeast balls and RYR. They didn't have any RYR that I could see and none of the stock "boys" spoke English, so I couldn't ask them.
However, I did pick up some new types of yeast balls to try (as well as a big bag of the main ones I use.) Posting some pics with this. (note, these are actually PNG files, not sure why they're being renamed to JPG when I upload 'em...)
There are 14 individual packages in the big bag of "Hapy Panda" yeast balls. Got that for about $6.
Hmm, I think I will try drying the leftover starch mass from my current batch of red rice wine in my food dehydrator. It should be interesting to try some of that in a small batch and see what it does. I'm fairly confident that will murder the amylase producing mold, but the yeast from the yeast balls and the monascus purpureus might survive it.Here's a link on how to make your own RYR. I suspect that if you grind up a couple tablespoons of RYR, and mix it with some cooked rice, then dry it in the oven after a week or so of fermenting, you'd have your own RYR supply.
An update on the RYR batch made with the leftover starch mass. It appears to be progressing normally. It is now just under two weeks old. I've got about 3 inches of damp mushy rice, followed by a very soupy mixture bellow that. I was checking on it to see if it had formed a starch cap that needed to be punctured. It hadn't. I believe I had that problem with the last batch because the rice was to densely packed in the container. It's got about 8 more days to go before I plan to harvest.
saramc
Well-Known Member
I was reading thru the associated links and found a 'how to make rice wine' link, http://www.ehow.com/how_2059791_make-rice-wine.html
which indiates that for every 4 cups dry glutinous rice you should use just 1/4 of a yeast ball. I guess I will try using 2.5gm of yeast ball per 4c dry rice and see what happens. Eventually.
...Sara
Nice! I am looking forward to the outcome of this batch. I will try to get one started in parallel this week.
So I was in Atlanta today and came across the "Hong Kong Supermarket" and had to stop and see if they had yeast balls and RYR. They didn't have any RYR that I could see and none of the stock "boys" spoke English, so I couldn't ask them.
However, I did pick up some new types of yeast balls to try (as well as a big bag of the main ones I use.) Posting some pics with this. (note, these are actually PNG files, not sure why they're being renamed to JPG when I upload 'em...)
There are 14 individual packages in the big bag of "Hapy Panda" yeast balls. Got that for about $6.
Those yeast balls look interesting. The ones in the small blue package are similar to the ones I picked up in a Vietnamese store locally. They worked great and tasted great. The large package is similar to what others have used on here frequently. The small package with red lettering are unique. I wonder how those differ, if at all, from the others. Do you plan to run an experiment with the 3 to get different tasting notes?
Well, sort of. I had planned on mixing/matching more or less at random. I have my first batch going and it's a mixture of RYR and some that look similar in packaging to the "Happy Panda" yeast balls (they're different in that they have a stag on the packaging instead of a panda bear.)
My first ever batch of rice wine has been going a week. It started out in a two-gallon container full of rice. It's now down to about 2" of head space, so something must be working. OTOH, I'm anxious, so I'm tempted to grind up some of the little blue ones and toss them in on top of what's already there, just to see if that would help it work faster/better.
The small packaging with the red writing says they are a product of Vietnam, and I think some other folks here have found some similar yeast balls.
saramc
Well-Known Member
Newsman....how many days in are you?
right about 7 days. Pretty sure I cooked the rice on the day before Memorial Day
It would be interesting if you did 3 batches, cooked exactly the same and see if there are any tasting notes.Well, sort of. I had planned on mixing/matching more or less at random. I have my first batch going and it's a mixture of RYR and some that look similar in packaging to the "Happy Panda" yeast balls (they're different in that they have a stag on the packaging instead of a panda bear.)
My first ever batch of rice wine has been going a week. It started out in a two-gallon container full of rice. It's now down to about 2" of head space, so something must be working. OTOH, I'm anxious, so I'm tempted to grind up some of the little blue ones and toss them in on top of what's already there, just to see if that would help it work faster/better.
The small packaging with the red writing says they are a product of Vietnam, and I think some other folks here have found some similar yeast balls.
CooperBrew
Well-Known Member
I tried a drink from both the Sushi rice and the Jasmine rice wines I made and flavored yesterday since they had a chance to chill a bit. I definitely prefer the taste of the Jasmine. It doesn't have as strong of a smell to it and seems a bit mellower. The Sushi rice has a more pungent odor to it that I don't find very pleasing.
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