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Sake tips, anyone?
So, after falling horribly behind on my brewing (I have shame... try not to rub it in too much!) I decided that I wanted to try something different, so I ordered a sake kit.
After reading the instructions, I am flabbergasted. The instructions contained therein are counter to most of the brewing rules I operate under, first and foremost being the deliberate the cultivation of MOLD on my grain (rice). (Really !?!?!?!) So, even though I've been away from the boards for a loooong time, here I am, crawling back, wondering if anyone has any tips, advice, or observations, specifically concerning the following:
1) Really? Mold?? Little white hairy growth is desireable? (I need some reassurance here!)
2) Is this mold going to take up residency in my fermenter? What's the likelihood it's airborne and might float to my grains?
3) Straining the finished stuff through cheesecloth.... even with sanitization procedures it seems to me that letting it sit at least 20 minutes in the open air is going to invite bacteria (or does the mold kill it? I can't get over the whole mold thing) even at an estimated 19% ABV?
4) Pasturizing process: Again, seems to me that this would a) evaporate the alcohol and b) open it up for bacterial invasion
5) Refer to question 1
sounds disqusting. i'll never be drinking Sake again. LOL.
Here's a link for making Sake. Never tried it.
http://www.taylor-madeak.org/index.php/ … lor-made-g
Here's some of what is said in the article:
Like beer, sake has only 4 ingredients:
•Water
•Rice
•Kome-koji
•Yeast
Notice the absence of malt there? You can’t malt rice for sake making the same way you malt barley, so the rice doesn’t contain any enzymes for converting starch to sugar like malted barley does. I’ll reiterate: rice won’t convert itself to sugar for the yeast to ferment. That’s where kome-koji (just koji for short) comes in.
Koji is rice that has had aspergillus oryzae (koji-kin) mold grown on it. This special mold has an interesting property: it secretes enzymes that convert starch to sugar. If you add it to a soupy mash of rice, water, and yeast, the result is fermentation. All that remains is technique.
DC
Well, first, I've never really liked sake.
Mold scares the bejesus out of me.
Had to stop brewing for a full year when I lived in a rental house, every batch was infected.
Dumped them all out.
Maybe, if you are unable to control this obsession, you could do it in a distant place from your true brewing.
Oh yeah, welcome back, missed ya.
Did you ever get that brew house operational?
Wow that's a really informative link. Thanks DC, I have also been thinking about producing some sake for myself. another project to think about. 
ID
Thanks guys... and thanks DC but I knew all that, 
Love you, man but I already did the net research. I'm looking for answers based on experience from people I trust.
I was thinking about when I could fit doing a batch into my brewing schedule and I have decided to do it sometime in the middle of summer. That's when I brew the least and my temp controlled ferm chamber will be kinda empty probably. After the sake is done I can drag the whole ferm chamber outside and give it a good deep bleach cleaning to get rid of any mold spores that got out of the bucket.
that is my answer but I have no experience on the matter and I don't know if I would trust me but that's my plan and I'm gonna stick to it..... maybe.
ID
Update: I'm not as worried about the mold infecting the rest of my stock since it needs an 85 degree humid climate which is NOT something that happens in my neck of the woods. I opted to do it out in the garage anyway since I am paranoid This time of year in the Northern Valley the temp hovers in the 40-50 degree range (which will be ideal for the fermentation process which wants cooler lager temps) but to grow the mold I set up a styrafoam cooler with a heating pad. I sprayed the cooler interior walls and lid with a bleach and water mixture which I did NOT rinse off just in case that mold decides to go airborne. I also opted for a smaller gallon batch.
Yesterday I steamed the rice and innoculated (infected!) it with mold. Stirred it at the 12 hour mark and again just a few minutes ago. This is the 24 hour mark and lo and behold, it smells like it's supposed to ("... a cheese like odor that, while not pleasant, is not offensive") I swear this is a nasty process, but I'm feeling a little better about it now that it's started and it's actually doing what it's supposed to be doing.
I feel dirty... I think I'll go brew up a batch of Chocolate Cream Stout.
Oh, and Brewski thanks for the welcome back, Kinda surprised me how pleased I was to see the familiar "faces" on the board. RE the brew house? I broke both heels, my work schedule changed (got a promotion and they took my car and gave me a lab) so I dont have my three day weekends anymore... hubby got deployed for 18 months and currently my nano-brewery is housing the lawn mower and assorted holiday decor, camping supplies and other shed stuff. Hubby's home now and has promised me we're going to work on my brewery this spring. Keep your fingers crossed for me
Great to hear from you again Jen, sucks about the brew house, but you'll get it back soon. Good luck on the Sake, yea that does sound NASTY, Ha ha. Although I hear you can make soy sauce, and it's very similar to making beer, at least that's what I hear. Not that they have anything in common, but the Asian decent.
Well... the good news is: The crud has fine white hairs growing on it (although I am not convinced that can really be categorized as good news) and it smells like toe-jam (ditto the above aside).
Bad news is that there are only a few patches of hairy mold... I apparently allowed the temp to get to high and the rice dried out. (Still trying to get my head wrapped around "it's BAD to let the mold die"). It is perhaps unfortunate that one of my personality traits is a wide stubborn streak. I WILL grow mold.
So, here we go, round two:
Turned the heating pad down, added a layer of cloth between it and the bowl of newly steamed and infested rice.... let's see if I can create a correctly hairy, stinky mess in the redesigned crud chamber.
I am sooo not drinking this (my husband is terrified because he knows who the house guinea pig is).
What a pain in the @ss this crap is to make!
So, how's the Chocolate Cream Stout doing?
LOL the Chocolate Cream is a specialty of mine.. it ALWAYS comes out good!
That damned saki on the other hand... I may have to give up. 3rd time's the charm?
Mind if I lean on you for that Chocolate Cream Stout recipe?
Sounds like something that would dispel the doldrums of a Missouri mid-winter.
Brewski -
Sure, I put it in your message box. Didn't want to clog up the board with non-related
Let me know if you have any questions
I know this post is fairly old, but it drew my attention by sending traffic to my web site today (thanks, deafcone!). I understand your concerns, Jen, and I'm probably not yet counted among the people you trust, but hopefully my experience can answer your questions and help you lay aside your qualms.
Jen wrote:
1) Really? Mold?? Little white hairy growth is desireable? (I need some reassurance here!)
What's wrong with mold? We use and eat mold in quite a number of products on a daily basis, ranging from humble cheeses to high-tech antibiotics. Koji mold itself has been used for hundreds of years in Japanese cuisine to make things like miso, soy sauce, pickles, and sake. The spores of this strain of aspergillus are not dangerous, and if treated with respect, the mold itself produces no toxins.
It's a fungus, harmless and sometimes useful, that's all. Think of it as growing your own button or shiitake mushrooms.
Jen wrote:
2) Is this mold going to take up residency in my fermenter? What's the likelihood it's airborne and might float to my grains?
Koji is highly aerobic and requires fairly high ambient temperatures and a good amount of water for its metabolism, so spores are never produced during sake fermentation. Read that again: koji does not reproduce during sake fermentation! This means that contamination of your brewing equipment is nothing to worry about. I also wouldn't worry about the spores contaminating your malt storage. Why? Because there are already mold spores of many different varieties present on the surface your malt grains! It's everywhere! They just never germinate and cause a problem because you keep your malt dry.
Jen wrote:
3) Straining the finished stuff through cheesecloth.... even with sanitization procedures it seems to me that letting it sit at least 20 minutes in the open air is going to invite bacteria (or does the mold kill it? I can't get over the whole mold thing) even at an estimated 19% ABV?
You're right, even with sane sanitation practices this process still opens your sake up for infection, particularly to lactobacillus infection, which will cause sake to turn sour very quickly. But then, after finishing that partially-open fermentation process with all the stirring and mixing and opening the fermenter...you're pretty much guaranteed to have a small population of spoilage bugs in there to begin with anyway (this is doubly true of the yamahai moto method I describe in my guide, which completely depends on the activity of those spoilage critters to lower the pH of the starter solution to begin with). That's why pasteurization is crucial to the sake brewing process. You can still make unpasteurized sake (this is called nama sake), but even with refrigeration it will only have a shelf life of about two weeks. Properly pasteurized and stored, sake has an almost indefinite shelf life and reaches its peak flavor maturity after six months.
Jen wrote:
4) Pasturizing process: Again, seems to me that this would a) evaporate the alcohol and b) open it up for bacterial invasion
Ethanol boils at 172ºF, while holding a solution at 140ºF for even a few minutes will render it a bacterial wasteland and denature whatever koji enzymes remain. Pasteurization won't cause your sake to lose any alcohol content at all.
Jen wrote:
5) Refer to question 1
Koji is important and interesting stuff! That humble mold produces proteases and amylases that are capable of catalyzing a radical transformation in many different kinds of foodstuffs, and it does it all without producing the mycotoxins and aflatoxins that other strains of aspergillus are infamous for! There's nothing to be afraid of here, Jen. Proceed with confidence.
Jen wrote:
I may have to give up. 3rd time's the charm?
If you're still having trouble with incubating your koji, I'd be happy to help you out by answering more questions.
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