Making Traditional rice Wine. Cheap, Fun, and Different

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trbig said:
Oh.... I was hoping you'd have a place online for it. The only place I can find it is sites that offer them in bulk directly from China.

I go through St. Louis on bike trips once or twice a year though... May have to keep this in mind. lol. Or... just stick with the yeast balls and beating up my coffee grinder. :D
Click to expand...
A mortar and pestle work very well. It doesn't take a ton of force for me to powder the yeast balls with the granite mortar and pestle I use to crush spices.


kosciel4 said:
I honestly did a gallon batch by filling a few pots with 1-1 cups of rice and water.
When the water was almost gone I put it all in a mesh straining bag and ran it under cold water until the water ran clear and the rice was between 70-80 degree.
Then introduced the yeast, stirred a little bit and airlocked my container.
Then I left it in a warm closet around 80 degrees and it was ready in less than 4 weeks.
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Interesting, did you soak the rice first?
 
When i used Chinese yeast balls for my current batch I crushed the balls in their (two ball) packet with a mallet and then soaked the packet in starsan. The idea was to sanitize everything except the packet contents. No sign of infection so far.
 
nhamilto40 said:
When i used Chinese yeast balls for my current batch I crushed the balls in their (two ball) packet with a mallet and then soaked the packet in starsan. The idea was to sanitize everything except the packet contents. No sign of infection so far.
Click to expand...
I've only had something other then the white mold that breaks down the rice in one batch. That batch was a re-use of the starch mass so I figured it was prone to infection.

I do not use commercial sanitizers, ever. Not in brewing or in making the rice wine. I clean everything very well with soap and water, then rinse with very hot tap water. None of my brew, other then the one batch of rice wine, has become infected.
 
I'm going crazy, last 4 batches have showed black mold after 3 days of fermenting. I clean and sanitize the 1 gal jars I ferment in, the spoon I use to mix and scoop the rice, the mortar and pestle I use to crush up the balls, the lids of the jars, freaking everything..... Anyone else having this problem? I never get infections in anything else I brew, and my first batch went great. some reason all my others are driving me bonkers
 
tuxnerd said:
I'm going crazy, last 4 batches have showed black mold after 3 days of fermenting. I clean and sanitize the 1 gal jars I ferment in, the spoon I use to mix and scoop the rice, the mortar and pestle I use to crush up the balls, the lids of the jars, freaking everything..... Anyone else having this problem? I never get infections in anything else I brew, and my first batch went great. some reason all my others are driving me bonkers
Click to expand...


Hard to say where you are going wrong but mold infection by day three indicates a large amount of contamination. Probable sources could be your self, your equipment, the yeast balls and air born spores landing on your rice while it is cooling. Remember that mold spores from any source float in the air all the time.
 
Yeah, its clearly a high level of contamination. Unless star-san has stopped working, I am positive my equipment and myself are sanitary when handling the rice. I immediately transfer the cooked rice to the jars, close them, and allow the rice to cool there, I am thinking the easiest solution is going to be switching over to something that is actually airtight and using an airlock. The only other thing I can think of is the yeast balls, I hope its not those though
 
tuxnerd said:
I'm going crazy, last 4 batches have showed black mold after 3 days of fermenting. I clean and sanitize the 1 gal jars I ferment in, the spoon I use to mix and scoop the rice, the mortar and pestle I use to crush up the balls, the lids of the jars, freaking everything..... Anyone else having this problem? I never get infections in anything else I brew, and my first batch went great. some reason all my others are driving me bonkers
Click to expand...


Have you let it go the 21 days and checked it? If you look here at this link...

http://www.sake-world.com/html/koji.html

... and look at the picture of the Koji mold. It isn't a white mold in this pic, it's ugly and dark. Is there possibly different types of the koji mold? Without the mold, you get no starch transformation for the yeast to eat. If you're getting a nice smelling odor from the ferment container, I'd let it go. If it smells like the local landfill on a hot summer day... ??? Didn't penacillin get started something like this? lol. Seriously, I'd let your nose decide for you, not your eyes. Just my 2 cents, if it's worth even that.
 
trbig said:
Have you let it go the 21 days and checked it? If you look here at this link...

http://www.sake-world.com/html/koji.html

... and look at the picture of the Koji mold. It isn't a white mold in this pic, it's ugly and dark. Is there possibly different types of the koji mold? Without the mold, you get no starch transformation for the yeast to eat. If you're getting a nice smelling odor from the ferment container, I'd let it go. If it smells like the local landfill on a hot summer day... ??? Didn't penacillin get started something like this? lol. Seriously, I'd let your nose decide for you, not your eyes. Just my 2 cents, if it's worth even that.
Click to expand...

actually the mold looks pretty similar to that. I let one go for a couple of weeks and it smelt okay, however I wasn't getting the level of liquidizing that I got in my batch that went fine, just for kicks I think I'll let these last 2 batches go for the full time and see what happens. Seeing this black mold just makes me nervous, haha.

Anyone seeing black growths that are coming out with okay rice wine?
 
I don't know where you keep yours, but seems I remember something about light possibly being a factor to the color of the mold? Are they in a spot that gets sunlight?
 
trbig said:
I don't know where you keep yours, but seems I remember something about light possibly being a factor to the color of the mold? Are they in a spot that gets sunlight?
Click to expand...

There might be something to this even if its an area with artificial light a lot of the time. Maybe try wrapping the whole thing in a blanket? The other thing I can think of is maybe the cheescloth? I have had some before that I didn't feel good about even after sanitizing so I autoclaved it.
 
There could be something to the light idea. My first batch the wife wasn't home for so the closet's light was off, she's been home during the last few batches and uses the closet.... it could be light
 
I am at about the 18 day mark and that sour smell is gone on my rice wine with home made dry yeast ball. I think te problem was that once the dried out dough block I think it got too hot and dried too quickly and killed the yeast. Once I mixed in some of the leftover lees/rice mush from my last Sake the new rice wine improved dramatically.

The mash is not separating yet but is mostly liquid rice slush. I think another 12 days and I will strain this out.
 
Well, day 3-4 here and I checked it. Its been sitting on the kitchen counter. Liquid is starting to form in the bottom of all 3 jars, and there is the start of a white fuzzy mold on top. Looking good so far!!
 
Chinese yeast balls (qū) can be various mixtures of molds and yeast but the most common is Aspergillus oryzae and yeast. Less common are Rhizopus oryzae and Monascus purpureus.

Here are some some links to help you id your mold.


Aspergillus oryzae (yellow japanese type)

Life cycle

DSC02691.jpg


and spored

about_ingredients_koji.jpg


Rhizopus oryzae

Growth

http://www.tempeh.info/science/rhizopus.php

magnified

rhizopus-oryzae-1.jpg


sporing stage

Rhizopus_oryzae_colony.jpg


magnified sporing

wb03002800126fbc.jpg


Monascus purpureus

Life cycle on rice

grown on rice

CIMG9019.JPG


spore stage on rice

CIMG9015.JPG
 
nhamilto40 said:
Chinese yeast balls (qū) can be various mixtures of molds and yeast but the most common is Aspergillus oryzae and yeast. Less common are Rhizopus oryzae and Monascus purpureus.
Click to expand...

That helps a lot, the pictures of Rhizopus oryzae looks exactly like the growths I have. I am curious to see how that will turn out now, I still would feel more comfortable if it was the koji mold, since my first batch was delicious... It says that Rhizopus is usually used for Tempeh, will it work for Sake?
 
saramc said:
You mentioned you boiled to stabilize, would you share your process with others please, as others may want someone to describe what/how you did yours. They look great!!!

To pistachio, you have to pasteurize this ferment to kill the yeast, because this version and traditional sake being super prone to lactobacillus infection, not to mention it is typically still fermenting even when you harvest at Day 30., but you can dose with k-meta to incorporate its antioxidant power since you may want to age some of this. Plus, sorbate will not prevent the formation of vinegar, that is not how sorbate works or what it does. Vinegar comes only from acetobacter aceti, and I purposely make vinegar 365/24/7 far, far away from my winemaking with leftover wine which has been pasteurized, dosed with k-meta and/or sorbate..the acetobacter chomps right through it.
I have eaten the black glutinous rice and would love to make a batch of black rice wine, it is supposed to be an awesome wine. I was jumping with joy when I saw the rice at asian365, but I held off on buying. Next order though....some to eat, some to forment, some to eat fermented!! Definitely take photos, keep us posted.
Click to expand...

Hm, so what makes the wine into vinegar exactly? I assumed it was fermentation. Everyone here seems to be refrigerating to stave off further fermentation so no vinegar is produced, or at least that is what i concluded from the first 5 or so pages of this thread.

How exactly would one go about pasteurizing the wine without boiling off alcohol?
 
So pumped. Have my yeast balls ordered. Roommate is searching for sushi rice, now I just have to find a 1 gallon jar...
 
tuxnerd said:
That helps a lot, the pictures of Rhizopus oryzae looks exactly like the growths I have. I am curious to see how that will turn out now, I still would feel more comfortable if it was the koji mold, since my first batch was delicious... It says that Rhizopus is usually used for Tempeh, will it work for Sake?
Click to expand...

Sake implies the Japanese version of rice wine. It uses selected types of Aspergillus cultured on rice to convert the gelatinized rice starch into glucose. "koji" is the Japanese term for their version of this mold.

The Chinese are more varied in their use of mold to produce alcohol from starch. Most of their rice wine was traditionally produced from cooked starch and "qū". The qū was a mixture of the locally popular molds and yeasts grown on dough blocks.

In modern times the qū has been refined to a pure mold(s) and yeast(s) culture. Aspergillusis the most common. Rhizopus and Monascus purpureus are used in the tropical parts of China.
 
pistachio said:
Hm, so what makes the wine into vinegar exactly? I assumed it was fermentation. Everyone here seems to be refrigerating to stave off further fermentation so no vinegar is produced, or at least that is what i concluded from the first 5 or so pages of this thread.
Click to expand...

Refrigeration will cold crash and the yeast MAY go dormant. Several have experienced continued slow ferment even in refrig. What makes vinegar is exposure to acetobacter.
 
nhamilto40 said:
Chinese yeast balls (qū) can be various mixtures of molds and yeast but the most common is Aspergillus oryzae and yeast. Less common are Rhizopus oryzae and Monascus purpureus.

Here are some some links to help you id your mold.


Aspergillus oryzae (yellow japanese type)

Life cycle

DSC02691.jpg


and spored

about_ingredients_koji.jpg


Rhizopus oryzae

Growth

http://www.tempeh.info/science/rhizopus.php

magnified

rhizopus-oryzae-1.jpg


sporing stage

Rhizopus_oryzae_colony.jpg


magnified sporing

wb03002800126fbc.jpg


Monascus purpureus

Life cycle on rice

grown on rice

CIMG9019.JPG


spore stage on rice

CIMG9015.JPG
Click to expand...

nhamilto40 said:
Sake implies the Japanese version of rice wine. It uses selected types of Aspergillus cultured on rice to convert the gelatinized rice starch into glucose. "koji" is the Japanese term for their version of this mold.

The Chinese are more varied in their use of mold to produce alcohol from starch. Most of their rice wine was traditionally produced from cooked starch and "qū". The qū was a mixture of the locally popular molds and yeasts grown on dough blocks.

In modern times the qū has been refined to a pure mold(s) and yeast(s) culture. Aspergillusis the most common. Rhizopus and Monascus purpureus are used in the tropical parts of China.
Click to expand...

I know we aren't making traditional sake here, we just have a fun, neat way of making rice wine. But it sounds like what you meant was that the Chinese use versions of mold which may include the stuff growing in my rice right now.... thats the "for dummies" version I got anyways
 
So I'm the guy who had the black mold and let it finish. And it had a lot of alcohol because me an experienced drinker had a martini glass full (it was in the front of the cabinet because of the wife....don't judge!) and it made me seriously buzzed! It came out milky not clear but it was really sweet. It didn't make much 1 750ml bottle from 3 cups of sweet rice. I scraped the mold off before I pressed the rice mash. I am totally doing this again! Thank you Sonofgrok!
 
So just thinkin because Im harvesting in a couple days, did 5 cups of dry rice so I should harvest a decent amount that I will split into a few diff bottles/flavors. I was thinking what if I took a pint or so and added corn sugar and let it continue to ferment....how strong would it get? I realize it would totally dry out of course but....any thoughts?
 
tuxnerd said:
I'm going crazy, last 4 batches have showed black mold after 3 days of fermenting. I clean and sanitize the 1 gal jars I ferment in, the spoon I use to mix and scoop the rice, the mortar and pestle I use to crush up the balls, the lids of the jars, freaking everything..... Anyone else having this problem? I never get infections in anything else I brew, and my first batch went great. some reason all my others are driving me bonkers
Click to expand...

trbig said:
I don't know where you keep yours, but seems I remember something about light possibly being a factor to the color of the mold? Are they in a spot that gets sunlight?
Click to expand...

sonofgrok said:
There might be something to this even if its an area with artificial light a lot of the time. Maybe try wrapping the whole thing in a blanket? The other thing I can think of is maybe the cheescloth? I have had some before that I didn't feel good about even after sanitizing so I autoclaved it.
Click to expand...

tuxnerd said:
There could be something to the light idea. My first batch the wife wasn't home for so the closet's light was off, she's been home during the last few batches and uses the closet.... it could be light
Click to expand...
When you are propagating mushrooms you let the mycelium grow into your growth medium. To do that you need to have very damp conditions. You keep as much light off the growth medium as possible to discourage the growth of algae. Spent grain from a brewery is a fairly common growth medium for mushrooms.

pistachio said:
Hm, so what makes the wine into vinegar exactly? I assumed it was fermentation. Everyone here seems to be refrigerating to stave off further fermentation so no vinegar is produced, or at least that is what i concluded from the first 5 or so pages of this thread.

How exactly would one go about pasteurizing the wine without boiling off alcohol?
Click to expand...
Acetobacter. It is already present in the yeast balls to some extent. It converts alcohol into acetic acid, aka vinegar. I believe that is what accounts for the tangy flavor in many of the rice wines. Making vinegar always starts with making alcohol for the acetobacter to eat.

With a normal dosage, potassium metabisulfite and/or potassium sorbate won't do anything to acetobacter. Those are typically found in wine conditioners. You can get chemicals to kill it, but it's probably easier to just cook the little buggers.

+1 On the cider stove-top pasteurization thread.
 
Whether or not it ferments out to dry or not depends on the yeast. If your rice wine is already in the high teens percentage -wise, and you add a bunch of sugar, your yeast strain will only raise the alcohol up until it becomes a toxic level for it. You could end up with a sickeningly sweet mess.

Also, the rice wine is only good for a few weeks, they say, so the week or two waiting to ferment that sugar out, if it still could, might leave you with a really high alcohol un-drinkable experiment.

BUT.. I also realize that there's a lot of people that can't leave well enough alone. lol. It's like the engineers' moto at work seems to be, "If it ain't broke, screw with it until it is!" :D
 
trbig said:
Whether or not it ferments out to dry or not depends on the yeast. If your rice wine is already in the high teens percentage -wise, and you add a bunch of sugar, your yeast strain will only raise the alcohol up until it becomes a toxic level for it. You could end up with a sickeningly sweet mess.

Also, the rice wine is only good for a few weeks, they say, so the week or two waiting to ferment that sugar out, if it still could, might leave you with a really high alcohol un-drinkable experiment.

BUT.. I also realize that there's a lot of people that can't leave well enough alone. lol. It's like the engineers' moto at work seems to be, "If it ain't broke, screw with it until it is!" :D
Click to expand...

You do make a great point about the tolerence level that what I like to call "Brewers Curiosity" did not account for. But I guess depending on how much I do harvest I may do it still, if I do I will report back with results.
 
sonofgrok said:
Or oxidation to acetic acid.
Click to expand...

Exposure to oxygen leads to oxidized wine which forms acetic acid and ethyl acetate yet there must be an acetic acid bacteria, like acetobacter or gluconobacter, present in the oxidizing wine in order to make the change to vinegar. see http://books.google.com/books?id=lU...a=X&ei=mvwmUZCxKoPOqwGR74GAAQ&ved=0CFYQ6AEwBQ

Even the FDA does not recognize acetic acid as vinegar. Vinegar is so much more than acetic acid. Acetic acid is described as vinegar-like.

Vinegar is made by two distinct biological processes, both the result of the action of harmless microorganisms (yeast and “Acetobacter”) that turn sugars (carbohydrates) into acetic acid. see http://www.versatilevinegar.org/faqs.html

Great 32 page download on volatile acids and acetic acid & ethyl acetate production here... http://www.google.com/url?sa=t&sour...C0WDPisGE_k_6jkRw&sig2=_rxGT4HCHWjGwMYD1VbM4Q

I ferment vinegar and there is a big difference in a turned bottle of wine versus vinegar production, at least to me.
 
saramc said:
Exposure to oxygen leads to oxidized wine which forms acetic acid and ethyl acetate yet there must be an acetic acid bacteria, like acetobacter or gluconobacter, present in the oxidizing wine in order to make the change to vinegar.

Even the FDA does not recognize acetic acid as vinegar. Vinegar is so much more than acetic acid. Acetic acid is described as vinegar-like.

I ferment vinegar and there is a big difference in a turned bottle of wine versus vinegar production, at least to me.
Click to expand...

Interesting. I actually did not know this. I always just kind of lumped them together.

I guess in the future when someone asks about their brew turning to vinegar we will need to ask for clarification :)
 
Got the rice and yeast balls yesterday and today I am home with my son due to schools being closed after an ice storm last night. Hmmmm, looks like a good opportunity to cook up about 12 cups for rice and start a batch.

Going to put the rice in a paint strainer back and ferment in a 2 gallon bucket with an airlock. Would like to ferment in glass but I don't have a container with a lid. I'm figureing 21-24 days and I should be good.
Lakedawgs
 
I have read through most of the thread and may have missed this. Couple of questions.

1) sonofgrok - you mention steaming the rice but you said you use a 'rice cooker'. Are traditional rice cookers steamers? I have borrowed a steamer but will buy one if we like this brew. I have included a link for a 'rice cooker'. Not trying to be picky, just wondering, obviously you are having good results.
http://www.amazon.com/dp/B000KEJQEC/?tag=skimlinks_replacement-20

2) has anyone experimented with slightly undercooked or overcooked rice to get better results?
THANKS
Lakedawgs
 
Last edited by a moderator:
You can steam your rice on stove-top very easily if you decide you don't want to buy one. Most people are having success with using less than a 1:1.5 ratio of rice to water. As far as under cooking or overcooking I can't speak to it.
 
By accident I have used undercooked rice in the past. When the starch does not properly gelatinize from the cooking process the saccharification enzymes will not convert that part to sugar. You end up with the cooked part of the rice falling apart and you have a lot of hard lumps of un-cooked rice. I don’t think this hurts or helps the flavor but it may impact the potential ABV because you will have less starch > sugar conversion.
 
lakedawgs said:
I have read through most of the thread and may have missed this. Couple of questions.

1) sonofgrok - you mention steaming the rice but you said you use a 'rice cooker'. Are traditional rice cookers steamers? I have borrowed a steamer but will buy one if we like this brew. I have included a link for a 'rice cooker'. Not trying to be picky, just wondering, obviously you are having good results.
http://www.amazon.com/dp/B000KEJQEC/?tag=skimlinks_replacement-20

2) has anyone experimented with slightly undercooked or overcooked rice to get better results?
THANKS
Lakedawgs
Click to expand...

Ours is similar to that link although a little more oldschool. A rice cooker is really kind of like a unichamber steamer/boiler. The most important bit is that it always makes excellent rice and its consistent. I can probably post a pic of one of my cookers when I get home.
 
Last edited by a moderator:
No need, I'm with you. The wife wants a steamer cooker as they are a bit more versatile. I like the dedicated rice cooker as they usually have a larger capacity, when in the same price range. We'll see who wins..........OK, I'll just have to do more batches.
 

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