Homebrewing Sake Mindfully

The following is a beginner's recipe for making sake. There are other, more difficult recipes but this one will produce a nice, smooth, cloudy sake.

What You Need

• A Sieve


• A big, deep brewing pot w/a lid


• A primary fermenter (old glass wine jug. You know the ones...cheap stuff. I like to make my own. The instructions are simple. Purchase cheap jug o' wine. Drink jug o' wine. Save empty jug.)


• Some sort of airlock (you can buy one from whatever store near you that sells brewing supplies)
  

Ingredients

• A little more than 3 lbs of rice (I like Jasmine but any medium or short grain rice will do)


• A little less than 1 lb of Kome-Koji (Some call it Malt-Rice but in reality it is rice with mold growing on it). Some can make it themselves but I usually get the pre-made variety (kindly provided by a friend when she visited Denver) and available at most Asian markets.


• One teaspoon of citric acid (lemon juice) or 4 grams of hops (I have never tried with the hops)


• Almost one gallon of purified (chlorine-free) water


• 5 grams of yeast (wine/champagne yeast or brewers yeast)
  

Process

• Wash all equipment with sanitizer


• Wash rice (NOT with sanitizer) in water until water runs clear. Soak rice for 1-2 hours. Steam rice. When done, let rice cool to 80-90 degrees F.


• Dissolve citric acid in one gallon of water in your brewing pot.


• Add your Komi-Koji. Mix.


• Add steamed rice. Mix.
  
• Transfer to primary fermenter (wine jug). But in rubber stopper and valve (valve will let gasses escape).
  

I should mention that fermentation will be vigorous. I was unprepared for this on my first attempt. I placed even mixtures into mason jars and then sealed them. The resulting build up of gas caused several of the tops to bubble up and eventual pop in a glorious explosion of semi-fermented rice, fungi, yeast and abandoned practice. The resulting smell, while not really bad, was however...strong and pervasive.

Just like ultimate realization, fermentation needs to be allowed to release some pressure.

Imagine each grain of rice as containing a small Buddha. A whole brew pot full of small, identical, unrealized, oblong Buddhas. Each deserved to be treated with the same amount of reverence and respect. Without the fermentation process changing each of those starches to sugars and then those sugars to a fermentables and those fermentables to alcohol the realization of the rice would be unfulfilled and would spend their existence as a starchy side-dish. Thus, I like to think of the fermentation process as the process of each grain of rice realizing their innate Buddha-Nature. Only when the bubbles begin to rise and the rice begins to release that nature do we see the extent of the transformation. If too many fermentables the process stops; if too much yeast the result is murky; if contaminated then the result is ruined. But of main importance is time and balance.

Back to the recipe.

Once secured at room temperature and in a dark cabinet, you need to agitate the mixture daily. You could open your fermenter and stir it with a sanitized spoon but I would rather not take the chance at contamination. I usually just shake the fermenter enough to get the mixture inside to move around a bit. After two days, the rice-Buddhas forget about their individual natures and meld into a chunky white slurry. Small bubbles of Buddha-nature will peculate through the slurry and in approximately two weeks the fermentation will cease.

Strain the resulting slurry into a decanter or if you would like to preserve it for long-term storage you can pasteurize it by slowly heating the liquid in a saucepan for 5 minutes at about 130 degrees F. It will stay for up to 3-5 years bottled at this point if remained unopened. I usually put my whole bunch into one large bottle and then store it in a dark place for a month to age. (unpasteurized is by no means a bad sake. It will be cloudier, smoother and yeastier when unpasteurized and will need to be refridgerated.)

Just remember how many grains of rice realized their true nature through this process and respect their months of striving and diligence. I use my homebrew sake for toasting ancestors, offerings to the Three Treasure as well as offerings to the six directions. Feel free to do the same or something different.

Cheers,