Making Traditional rice Wine. Cheap, Fun, and Different

This looks over the top easy. Subscribed. When it is warm again here I will start a few batches.

 

Is it time for the "How much rice wine have you made" thread?

 

I vote yes on that! And is this a sticky yet??

 

That's an idea. I'll have to pick up one of those bags. I was going to anyway for a BIAB anyway.

Thinking about it, I may have added the crushed rice yeast balls when the rice was to warm. The batches that have been the most successful for me have been ones that have been made with leftover rice that was stone cold when I mixed everything up.

That's an interesting idea. Maybe a poll with a ratio of dry rice to liquid yield?

Hmm, it is distinctly different from any other kind of wine. It probably should be a sticky, or the wonderful info in this thread might get buried.

 

That would probably be the best way for newcomers to gauge thier projected yields.

 

Just harvested mine, it is amazing how much is produced. My rice all but turned into wine. I squeezed out the rice through a paint strainer bag, and then filtered it through a paint strainer bag in a funnel a couple times. I got nearly 2 quarts of wine from a little over a half gallon of cooked rice (5 cups) Honesty I don't see why you'd want to clarify this. It looks cool, and the solids add mouthfeel. Time to see what it can do

 

Looks delicious!!!! Ugh eager to harvest mine!

 

Yeeeeah I couldn't drink all that. I felt my head start to cave in somewhere halfway through that glass.

 

How is it with no sweetening?

 

Sweet! Actually just about perfectly balanced with the tartness. I can see why people like this.

 

Wow. Yours ended up looking almost like rice milk!

 

I think it's probably from using this super gooey sweet rice. It turned out much better than expected, it was pretty much a big pile of mush when I started it.

 

I know this has been addressed before but couldnt find it in the chain of responses. My batch is two weeks old today and sometime over the last few days developed black "mold" on the top. It was nice and fuzzy white when i checked it Sunday and the bottom of the container is starting to turn milky, it was pretty clear Sunday . I assume this is still safe to harvest but maybe not squeeze the rice ball? It smells sweet and I am not sure if i should let it go another week or try it now? I can send pictures this evenign if that would help .

Thanks in advance!

 

I'm so frustrated right now, I found a nice glass jar, rice, cheese cloth but no yeast balls. Why is this frustrating? Because I live in one of the most densely asian populated cites in North America! I went to 3 different asian groceries and two big supermarkets and everyone I asked looked at me like I had a third eye on my forehead. No one had ever heard about them, and I got cross eyed looking.

Well I just had to vent as SHMBO just rolled her eyes when I told her that I wanted to embark on yet another new hobby involving making alcohol lol.

 

The responses were black mold = not good but run with it and see what you get anyway!

 

A lot of people all seem to know it as something else. You may ask for dry yeast balls, yeast for fermented rice, or maybe even others. At worst, people have linked online sources for purchasing in this thread.

 

Ok sounds like maybe it got too hot then i think I will try again in a room I can keep @ 72

Thanks for the response I will let it run its course and see what happens for grins

 

I kept a pint if this in a jar with a regular screw cap and ring today while I was at work. It was highly carbonated by the time I got home. This stuff definitely needs to he pasteurized. I drank some, it was a lot like a dry sake champagne.

 

I went to the local asian market. I asked the lady behind the counter if they carry yeast balls. She looked at me as if I were speaking some unfamiliar dialect. So I explained it is used to ferment rice into wine. Suddenly her eyes lit up and she declared "You need yeas baus"she laughed as she realized what she had just said was what I originally asked for. She repeated "ah yeas baus"

 

The ones I bought were labeled rice cakes. It is probably not something that is often translated to English. Print a picture with the Chinese characters and bring it with you next time. I am sure one of the stores will have it.

 

I just read all the posts and I don't have any questions.

That is all .....

 

Here is a pic worst case scenario vinegar !

 

Same picture sorry stupid phone posted same pic twice

 

BP, where do you live?

 

A couple questions...

The only store I could find that had the yeast balls were these...














As you can see, there's some added ingredients. Garlic? *Shudder*. lol. Anyone else ran into this? I may have to order some online if this rice wine thing is to my liking. These were @ $1.50 for 4. I see they should be cheaper, but this should get me started to see if I like it.

Also.. the red yeast rice. The oriental store didn't have any, but the local Health Food store says they carry it. I plan on getting some just pulverizing it and the yeast balls in a coffee grinder. My first batch I have soaking is going to be 12 cups dry rice. I used 6 cups sweet glutinous rice and 6 cups of the jasmine rice. Rinsed it... but now how much red yeast rice to add to the mix?

I plan on using 12 yeast balls. (1 per cup of rice) And what's the deal with this red yeast rice? Does it have the proper yeast/molds like the Kobi that you could use just the yeast rice alone instead of the yeast balls? If I were to use a couple cups of the red yeast rice, do you add the additional water to allow for that soaking it up?

Last thing... The Jasmine rice says to use 3 1/2 cups water for 3 cups rice. The sweet rice doesn't say how much to use?? lol. The regular rice we cook around here is a 2/1 ratio.. one cup rice, two cups water. So how much water should I be using?

Sorry so many questions.

 

Also.. I don't have a steamer, so my plan is to cook on the stove, get it boiling and stir it constantly until most of the liquid is getting absorbed, then turning off the heat, covering it and letting it sit and steam that way for 10 or 15 minutes. Since I'm not exactly sure on the water/rice ratio, what if you put too much water, cooked it, and then just decant off the excess water before putting it in the fermenting bin? And yes.. I just plan on using a regular plastic ferment bucket I make my beers in with an air lock.

 

Not sure that I can answer all of that barrage of questions! You will most likely end up with rice wine out of this but I have no idea what it will taste like!!! Ginger? Interesting and maybe pleasant. Garlic? Woah... no clue how that is going to work!

Glycyrrhizae would be a fungus so that is most likely where the amylase activity is coming from.

I have never done the red yeast thing so can't answer that.

I would try to avoid cooking the rice with TOO much water. tons of water in the ferment does make you more susceptible to bad infections. There is a thai variation called sato which is fermented with standing water but it is easily infected.

 

Yeah, I didn't mean like double the amount of water or anything, but what's the ratio for your rice/water?

And since I'm going into a sterilized fermenting bin with an air lock, I'm not too worried about infection.. unless it's introduced from the yeast balls or red rice.

 

As a general rule of thumb when cooking any rice I use 1/1 ratio and thats what I did for my current batch of jasmine rice. I also stuck it in one of my 2 gallon ferment buckets (did 5 cups dry)

Edit: I did also soak for about 30 minutes

 

trbig, those look like they are intended for preparing some kind of a food product. If you can find those I would almost guarantee you will find the product we have all found. They seem to be very common. Interesting to see that fungal ingredient by name though.

 

Ok, so evidently glycyrrhizae is Chinese licorice.

 

BB, I had the same result from my thai jamine. I know for a fact i overcooked the rice at the beginning, making a mush blob.

BlackPriest, If you absolutely can't find the yeast balls, I can mail you some. the closest asian market i could find that carried them is a 4 hour drive from me, so i ended up buying 1kg from the site Saramc linked to. Even with the crazy long shelf life, i will never be able to use it all. I can send it to you if you cover shipping. the balls themselves were dirt cheap.
http://www.asiansupermarket365.com/Shanghai-Rice-Cakes-p/hshrcilj.htm

1. those yeast balls look like snacks. So far all of the successful rice balls have had ingredient lables of "rice, yeast" or just "rice". they don't look like they have "yeast" as an ingredient, and you are spending more per ball than if you overnighted them from a distributor. (maybe not, depending on where you live)

2. I would do a small test batch with just 1 ball and without your red yeast rice. you should know within the first week if it's got the critters you need.

3. you can steam rice with a spatter guard and a mixing bowl.
http://shesimmers.com/2012/08/how-to-cook-sticky-rice-the-easy-way-and-without-a-steamer.html

easy and cheap, and you won't have to worry about getting the 'perfect' water:rice ratio. you want to avoid boiling and draining the liquid because you'd be leeching valuable nutrients.

4. brew bucket is great. try not to open it too often

I'd like to extend you the same offer as BP.

 

next time I'll research first, recheck the thread for updates second, and post last...

 

Hey guys,

Thanks for your replies, I didn't expect such great offers and help so fast. I can't remember who said it but I think your right I am asking for something which isn't translated into english very often… maybe I just have to ask for rice wine ingredients. I live in Vancouver BC.

Wooda, thanks for the offer of shipping. I'm sure I'll be able to find some as the nick name for my city is Hongcouver based on how many folks from Hong kong live here. I'll try again today and maybe get some phonetics on what it is called in Chinese, that may help others in their search too.

So my journey begins, off on my quest for the balls of yeast!

 

My first attempt smells like nail polish remover after only one week.will this go away or did I screw up?

 

I don't think that sounds good. I'm a couple days past one week and mine has had a nice sweet rice and vanilla smell to it the whole time.

 

Definately doesnt sound good. What did you use and what were your procedures? What are you fermenting in?

 

Just wait it out the full 3 weeks. Mine had a definitely alcohol aroma at one week, there was plenty of other aromatics but definitely the booze.

 

Thanks for the feedback Ostomo and bottle bomber

 

I talked with the manager of the store.. one of the few people that actually spoke english. He said that these are what other people were using to make rice wine. They had another one next to it that was similar, but they said those were for making bread.

I went to the health food store and the red yeast rice is a no-go. What they had was pills of it in capsules. The lady said, "You could just break the caplets open and use them?" But the bottle of caplets was $34.. so I decided to pass on that. I guess I'll just try to use what I have and if it doesn't work, I'm out a whole $6 between the yeast balls and the rice.

I know I could read back through all of this and find it, but does someone have a link handy to the yeast balls they use that's a cheap enough source? Only thing I've found is from importfood.com. $4.50 for 10 of them, but didn't check shipping yet. I appreciate the offer to have some sent to me, but I'd like to find a good place to get a steady supply of them if this works out.