Making Traditional rice Wine. Cheap, Fun, and Different

[pdxal]

Or, don't open the lid for 5 weeks if you want rice wine that has truly finished fermenting and won't try to carbonate if stored in a sealed container...

 

[wc1376c]

From last night. Already producing goodness!

 

[MasterCrook]

Or, don't open the lid for 5 weeks if you want rice wine that has truly finished fermenting and won't try to carbonate if stored in a sealed container...

I think I need to let my next batch go for 5 weeks, 4 doesn't seem like enough

 

[jak1010]

I think I need to let my next batch go for 5 weeks, 4 doesn't seem like enough

For one reason or another, I've left batches in the jar for 4 months and it still turned out fine.

 

[Zibe]

Doing a hybrid one gallon batch - 2 cups rice, and then I boiled some hops (60 and 10 min additions) just in water and threw in one pound of flaked barley and boiled for five minutes. 2 rice balls.
Here it is mixed all together


And here it is after a week smells nice and sweet like regular rice batches but it does have a crazy clump of white mold on the top seems to be liquifying nicely





Sent from my iPhone using Home Brew

 

[MasterCrook]

Here is my latest rush batch. Trying to get in another harvest for Christmas

 

[z-bob]

The liquid is close to the top and the rice mass is floating on 1/2" of pale cloudy liquid. I opened the lid just to smell it; it smells sweet, "ricey" alcoholic, and faintly of vanilla. I put the lid back, and gave is a "slosh" to release CO2 and drive out any air I let it.

Does anybody punch the cap down, or just leave it alone and the very top doesn't liquefy much? (or maybe it does and just doesn't look like it)

I'm gonna start another jar this weekend. I have 3 or 4 of these empty Aldi candy jars, might as well fill them up.

I am also going to try fermenting a gallon of sweetened sour apple juice using a yeast ball. The juice is pretty tart, so a little lacto might do it some good.

 

[MasterCrook]

The liquid is close to the top and the rice mass is floating on 1/2" of pale cloudy liquid. I opened the lid just to smell it; it smells sweet, "ricey" alcoholic, and faintly of vanilla. I put the lid back, and gave is a "slosh" to release CO2 and drive out any air I let it.

Does anybody punch the cap down, or just leave it alone and the very top doesn't liquefy much? (or maybe it does and just doesn't look like it)

I'm gonna start another jar this weekend. I have 3 or 4 of these empty Aldi candy jars, might as well fill them up.

I am also going to try fermenting a gallon of sweetened sour apple juice using a yeast ball. The juice is pretty tart, so a little lacto might do it some good.

I just leave the cap. I do give the jars a few twists to stir up the rice though.

 

[jak1010]

I just leave the cap. I do give the jars a few twists to stir up the rice though.

Same here. Although, I do stir sometimes when it looks dried and crusty on top.

 

[z-bob]

Well, after two weeks the entire rice mass has collapsed. Liquid all the way to the top now. (I assume this is a very good thing) I'm going to let it keep doing its thing; and I just started another jar.

The yeast ball that I put in a gallon of apple juice doesn't seem very happy. It has sunk to the bottom and fallen apart, and there's no airlock activity yet. Maybe I should have made a starter for that...

 

[Nogud247]

Well, after two weeks the entire rice mass has collapsed. Liquid all the way to the top now. (I assume this is a very good thing) I'm going to let it keep doing its thing; and I just started another jar.

The yeast ball that I put in a gallon of apple juice doesn't seem very happy. It has sunk to the bottom and fallen apart, and there's no airlock activity yet. Maybe I should have made a starter for that...

You didn't even crush up the yeast ball? I wondered how that would effect it. IMO more surface area = more fermentation.

 

[z-bob]

You didn't even crush up the yeast ball? I wondered how that would effect it. IMO more surface area = more fermentation.

I did smoosh it up after it sat on the bottom overnight without dissolving. :smack: (I thought it would float, then disintegrate in a couple of hours when the yeast woke up and smelled all that sugar)

 

[Nogud247]

I did smoosh it up after it sat on the bottom overnight without dissolving. :smack: (I thought it would float, then disintegrate in a couple of hours when the yeast woke up and smelled all that sugar)

Well thank you for trying this so we can all know how it goes.

 

[z-bob]

No sign of life in the cider yet, even tho' I dosed it with a little yeast energizer last night and gave it a good shake. I'll probably have to repitch with a wine yeast.

I thought all yeasts would eat sucrose and dextrose, even if they couldn't handle the fructose, maltose, etc. Maybe this is too acid or something for whatever strain is in the yeast balls.

 

[troy2000]

The usual apologies if my question has already been covered; it's a long thread.

I'm wondering if cooking is a necessary part of the process. Has anyone tried just soaking sweet rice until it stops absorbing water, then pouring off the extra and adding crushed yeast balls?

add: I may have answered my own question. I just munched on a few grains of sweet rice, and they didn't taste the least bit sweet.

 

[jak1010]

The usual apologies if my question has already been covered; it's a long thread.

I'm wondering if cooking is a necessary part of the process. Has anyone tried just soaking sweet rice until it stops absorbing water, then pouring off the extra and adding crushed yeast balls?

add: I may have answered my own question. I just munched on a few grains of sweet rice, and they didn't taste the least bit sweet.

Tried and failed miserably. Something about the cooking process allows the mold to convert the starches into sugar for the yeast to eat. I don't have the scientific explanation but I did try it without success.

 

[troy2000]

Tried and failed miserably. Something about the cooking process allows the mold to convert the starches into sugar for the yeast to eat. I don't have the scientific explanation but I did try it without success.

Thanks for the feedback. I have two pounds of rice soaking, and it would be a shame to waste it.

 

[RachmaelBenApplebaum]

Tried and failed miserably. Something about the cooking process allows the mold to convert the starches into sugar for the yeast to eat. I don't have the scientific explanation but I did try it without success.

Rice needs to be heated to a certain temperature in order to gelatinize the starches, like in a cereal mash. The starch needs to be in a form available to enzymes to be converted into sugar, hence "flaked" adjuncts that don't need to be cooked prior to mashing in. You could probably do the soak and ferment method with Uncle Ben's, but I'm guessing it might be gross.

 

[Cheesy_Goodness]

Thanks for the feedback. I have two pounds of rice soaking, and it would be a shame to waste it.

Should still be ok to get rid of the water and cook as normal right?

 

[ChefRex]

Should still be ok to get rid of the water and cook as normal right?

A lot of people soak their rice first, I've done it both ways, just an extra step in my opinion.

 

[z-bob]

No sign of life in the cider yet, even tho' I dosed it with a little yeast energizer last night and gave it a good shake. I'll probably have to repitch with a wine yeast.

I thought all yeasts would eat sucrose and dextrose, even if they couldn't handle the fructose, maltose, etc. Maybe this is too acid or something for whatever strain is in the yeast balls.

I was gonna repitch last night, but didn't get around to it. This morning it has a nice krausen (sp?) on top. Not violent like the EC-1118 that I used last time, but it might get there before it's over. (I left a lot more headspace in the jug this time JIC)

No idea why the lag time was so long. But if this works, I like paying 35 cents for yeast instead of $2.

A lot of people soak their rice first, I've done it both ways, just an extra step in my opinion.

I started another jar of rice a couple of days ago; I soaked the rice (half Chinese sweet rice, half supermarket medium-grain rice) for about 5 minutes in warm water, then drained and rinsed it. Then cooked it (2 cups of dry rice, just over 2 cups of water) It seemed to work as well as soaking for an hour. The rice definitely soaked up some water during the soak -- the color or something changed -- but I don't know if it swelled. This is the way I'm going to keep doing it.

I never soak long-grain rice.

 

[Arrheinous]

To the OP's credit, the batch last year was awesome according to the Chinese grad students and professors in my department. Just following those instructions gave a very legit product.

To scale this up a bit: I used a whole 15# bag of sushi rice for the latest batch and have been fermenting/conditioning it in a broken keg. I used a 2qt starter of rice with 16 yeastballs crushed up to produce a slurry that I could pour over all that rice to more evenly distribute the yeast to initiate fermentation. That much rice takes up about 3G of space in the keg. It's been going for two months now and I hope to package it soon for the office Xmas party in a few weeks. I've applied a lot of what I've learned about beer (starters, fermentation control, Starsan) since last year.

Filtration is going to be a beast. I want an unfiltered rice wine so I'm trying to build a bucket with a mesh to separate the wine from the 'lees'. Hopefully with the fermentation control at 75F and the starter most of the rice will be fermenting leaving less insolubles. I've also got a PVC rig to filter beer/wine through meshes or filters with CO2 pressure in 22oz batches.

Has anyone taken a shot at aging this stuff on oak? I'm considering bourbon barrel 'aging' a few bottles.

 

[wc1376c]

Has anyone taken a shot at aging this stuff on oak? I'm considering bourbon barrel 'aging' a few bottles.[/QUOTE]

I like what you did there, trying to better utilize my bubblers for bigger batches.
I have a gallon batch going right now, due in December. It it fermenting on Kraken soaked heavy oak cubes.

 

[Arrheinous]

Have you stolen any samples lately? I haven't had good results with rum-soaked oak in beer.

 

[wc1376c]

Have you stolen any samples lately? I haven't had good results with rum-soaked oak in beer.

No I refuse to touch mine until the four week mark. Thus the larger batches . However, I am going to start pulling them at three, because my last few have been on the dry side. I have to brew and bottle this weekend, so If I try I will let you know.

 

[MasterCrook]

To the OP's credit, the batch last year was awesome according to the Chinese grad students and professors in my department. Just following those instructions gave a very legit product.

To scale this up a bit: I used a whole 15# bag of sushi rice for the latest batch and have been fermenting/conditioning it in a broken keg. I used a 2qt starter of rice with 16 yeastballs crushed up to produce a slurry that I could pour over all that rice to more evenly distribute the yeast to initiate fermentation. That much rice takes up about 3G of space in the keg. It's been going for two months now and I hope to package it soon for the office Xmas party in a few weeks. I've applied a lot of what I've learned about beer (starters, fermentation control, Starsan) since last year.

Filtration is going to be a beast. I want an unfiltered rice wine so I'm trying to build a bucket with a mesh to separate the wine from the 'lees'. Hopefully with the fermentation control at 75F and the starter most of the rice will be fermenting leaving less insolubles. I've also got a PVC rig to filter beer/wine through meshes or filters with CO2 pressure in 22oz batches.

Has anyone taken a shot at aging this stuff on oak? I'm considering bourbon barrel 'aging' a few bottles.

Seems like a decent batch, do you have pictures?

 

[Arrheinous]

Seems like a decent batch, do you have pictures?

I'll put some pictures together when I get back from work.

With two months at 75F there's definitely some major fruitiness and not too many solids left over. After wringing out the remaining solids you get a smushed up rice ball about the size of a melon. A long way from the size of a 15# bag.

15# of rice, cooked like I normally cook it (1:2 rice/water ratio), gave out about three gallons of crude rice wine. I could get about 1.5G easy just with a siphon but the lower half was still caught up in the solids.

My plan is to let the remaining solids in the wine crash out, get the clarified wine, and then add back some of the solids to get the unfiltered look with just the right viscosity to it.

 

[Arrheinous]

This is the very last of my previous 3L batch which was something like 1 or 1.5 years in the bottle:

There's not much left and it does hold up over time even with all that headspace in 1L fliptop. The 'liquor' part of it will turn more yellow over time giving the mixing solids and liquor a more tan color over time.

Here's what I got from the 15# batch:

Kind of interesting to see the easy of getting the liquor from the solids with the first gallon versus the last. It has been sitting at ~55F in the basement for 36hrs so far.

To give a range of the solids you end up with:

I didn't chop the rice or anything but you'll get little bits, almost halves, of rice grains plus a fine particulate. This third bottle is where all the wringing out was dumped into.

Plan is to decant the liquor, sieve out the heavy particles with mesh screen, and add back a portion of the fine solids for body/sweetness. It might be enough to just use all of the first gallon plus the liquor from the 2nd and 3rd. So maybe 2G of final wine when all is said and done. 10 750mLs for something like $25.

The liquor is very fruity but slightly tart. My fermentation fridge has had a lot of sours in the past couple months - maybe there's some wildness going on but I'd attribute it to the better temperature control (continual 75F for two months) versus putting the quart jars over a heating vent in the old apartment during winter for the last batch.

If you're going to do a big batch like this I suggest using a keg. It's difficult to pour after siphoning what you can but the metal also helps disperse the heat faster. Really, I just wanted to ferment in this broken keg (stripped keg post). The other suggestion is to use a wider pot - if you have a taller pot the heat will build up in the rice at the bottom and scorch it. My first batch was called 'toasted rice wine' and it had a nice nuttiness to it. This time went a bit better but there was still some of that yellow, overly dry scabby rice at the bottom of the pot. You'll need a 6G pot to do 15# IIRC; my 4G pot took two runs to cook all the rice.

I pasteurized the last batch but somehow ended up with some very nasty gushers that took some time to vent from the flip-top. If that happens you can just pop the fliptop back on, wait for the foam to die, crack the fliptop again to vent until it also overflows, and repeat for a while. Didn't heat it hot or long enough or the temperature I measured wasn't representative of the whole batch. Do you need to pasteurize?

 

[MasterCrook]

This is the very last of my previous 3L batch which was something like 1 or 1.5 years in the bottle:

There's not much left and it does hold up over time even with all that headspace in 1L fliptop. The 'liquor' part of it will turn more yellow over time giving the mixing solids and liquor a more tan color over time.

Here's what I got from the 15# batch:

Kind of interesting to see the easy of getting the liquor from the solids with the first gallon versus the last. It has been sitting at ~55F in the basement for 36hrs so far.

To give a range of the solids you end up with:

I didn't chop the rice or anything but you'll get little bits, almost halves, of rice grains plus a fine particulate. This third bottle is where all the wringing out was dumped into.

Plan is to decant the liquor, sieve out the heavy particles with mesh screen, and add back a portion of the fine solids for body/sweetness. It might be enough to just use all of the first gallon plus the liquor from the 2nd and 3rd. So maybe 2G of final wine when all is said and done. 10 750mLs for something like $25.

The liquor is very fruity but slightly tart. My fermentation fridge has had a lot of sours in the past couple months - maybe there's some wildness going on but I'd attribute it to the better temperature control (continual 75F for two months) versus putting the quart jars over a heating vent in the old apartment during winter for the last batch.

If you're going to do a big batch like this I suggest using a keg. It's difficult to pour after siphoning what you can but the metal also helps disperse the heat faster. Really, I just wanted to ferment in this broken keg (stripped keg post). The other suggestion is to use a wider pot - if you have a taller pot the heat will build up in the rice at the bottom and scorch it. My first batch was called 'toasted rice wine' and it had a nice nuttiness to it. This time went a bit better but there was still some of that yellow, overly dry scabby rice at the bottom of the pot. You'll need a 6G pot to do 15# IIRC; my 4G pot took two runs to cook all the rice.

I pasteurized the last batch but somehow ended up with some very nasty gushers that took some time to vent from the flip-top. If that happens you can just pop the fliptop back on, wait for the foam to die, crack the fliptop again to vent until it also overflows, and repeat for a while. Didn't heat it hot or long enough or the temperature I measured wasn't representative of the whole batch. Do you need to pasteurize?

Nice pictures and write up! How come the third jug has so much sediment and I think you said rice grains too? How did you filter it? I am trying a 2G jar for the first time, I was a bit concerned about filtering it properly. So the jar I got has a tap at the bottom which I'll use to drain the free flowing liquid into a filter right above the bottle. I'll have to scoop the lees out into a filter bag after to squeeze for the rest. I usually get a really fine sediment at the bottom of the bottles after they've been pasteurized and settled for a month. The longer you let the bottles settle after pasteurization, the more the sediment compacts into the bottom. I have a few bottles from the summer, which have settled for.a few months and are crystal clear with hard sediment compacted at the bottom.

 

[Arrheinous]

The third jug was mostly from dumping the keg into a small pot and then pouring that into the jug via a big funnel. That was more like decanting than filtration and a lot of big particles got in there because I didn't want to sacrifice liquid that early. A mesh bag works but also retains a lot of liquid so it can be wrung out but it grinds up some of those large parts into finer ones.

My goal is an unfiltered rice wine intended to be shaken to mix the liquid and sediment before serving. There's a sushi place down the road that does sake flights (4 cold Ozeki samples) and the unfiltered is my favorite.