Episode 06: It’s a kind of magic: how sake is made part 1
0:21
Greeting
Hey, everyone, welcome to episode number 6of Sugidama Podcast, the podcast about Japanese sake, the drink which looks so simple but requires so much skill and artistry to make. And today we will have a very exciting episode about how sake is made!
But before some great news!
Sugidama Podcast now has a sponsor, London Sake, an excellent online sake store. Really grateful to Andy who owns it and who decided to give my podcast a try.
"London Sake has one of the widest selections of premium and craft sake available online today. They deliver across the UK and Europe, and with over 100 sake from 25 breweries, there really is something for everyone. Using simple online tasting notes and sensible, affordable food pairings they help you find the perfect sake without any of the fuss. Listeners of the podcast can get a 10% discount by using the code: SUGIDAMA (all caps) during checkout. London Sake: making sake simple."
Another piece of great news is that I have finally got reviews for this podcast. Yay! Actually, they have been around for a while but I just didn't know about them. I just supposed that all the reviews should appear in my Apple Podcast account but it wasn’t that easy. Anyway, now I have found a way to keep a track of them.
So one review is from Araethorne from Singapore, who is @thesakecollective on Instagram. Pretty cool. I will not bother you with reading it in full as much as I wanted just a few bits from it:
“This podcast lays the groundwork for any sake beginner or enthusiast, and the content of this podcast series continues to grow more and more interesting. As a beginner or a growing enthusiast in the wonderful and ever-evolving world of sake, this podcast series will help you to understand your drink better… Hoping to see this podcast grow! Wonderful job Alex!”
Thanks a lot, Alex, thesakecollective!
Another review is from the UK by Gardenboy88 and it’s short but again very cool: “So informative and passionate about sake. Takes you from novice to expert”. Thank you very much. It’s so wonderful to receive recognition of your work.
So please, take a few minutes and leave a review on Apple Podcasts or any other platform that allows it. It’s really important for letting other people know about Sugidama Podcast.
How sake is made
3:26
Stages
Now let’s dive into such a fascinating topic as sake brewing. The thing about sake is that it’s a process-driven drink. As the opposite in a way to wine which is an ingredient-driven drink. More of the hard work in wine is spent on growing grapevines. It requires centuries of cultivation, proper location, proper soil etc. After the grapes are harvested the winemaking process is quite straightforward. I am not saying that it requires less skill than sake. The point I am trying to make is that without good grapes you will never get good wine.
Sake is different. Ingredients play an important role here and we will talk about in a minute, but even if you don't have the best ingredients, you still can make very good sake if you are a skilful brewer. It’s been mentioned in a lot of books and articles about sake and on this podcast as well, that 80% of wine quality come from the grapes and only 20% from the skill of the winemaker, while in sake – 80% of the quality come from the skill of the brewer and the rest from the ingredients.
I would divide the sake brewing process into one planning stage and 5 stages of sake brewing. The planning is basically about making a decision on what sake to brew, which affects a number of choices during the brewing process. After that, we have five brewing stages. The first stage is rice processing. The second stage is rice koji making. A very important step. Then the third stage: making a starter, we’ve talked about it in the episode about brewing methods. The fourth stage is actual brewing and the last fifth stage is post-production using the term from movie or music production.
5:38
Choices
OK, choices. Let’s look at the situation when a brewery wants to make a new sake from scratch. So they need to decide, what type of sake they would like to make. And here we have an interesting situation. We know that sake is made from rice and water with help of koji and yeast plus brewer’s alcohol if it’s non-junmai.
The water is usually given. The breweries historically were built near a source of good water. And good water means apart from being clean and in abundance, the water that contains potassium, phosphoric acid and magnesium but with low levels of iron and manganese. So normally, you can’t change the water. I mean you can use some techniques to make is softer and reduce the content of iron and manganese but still, it is what you’ve got.
You can look at Kanpai Sake Brewery in London for example. They have to use the local water, which is extremely hard by sake standards and they soften it but still to a certain degree. So the water commands the style of the sake they make. It’s dry and more acidic than normal Japanese sake.
Then we have rice. Here it can be two ways. Either the brewery decides what sake they want to make and choose the rice. For example for fruity and elegant junmai daiginjo, you would choose Yamada Nishiki rice, the king of sake rice as it’s often called. For refreshing and crisp sake Miyama Nishiki rice is great. Or if you want deep and rich taste you might choose Omachi, the first designated sake rice.
However, even here there are nuances. Let’s say, the brewery wants to brew fruity and elegant sake but with a twist, some deep undertones in the taste. So they might decide on Omachi rice or vice versa. The brewery would like to produce savoury junmai but with a whiff of elegance, So they could go for Yamada Nishiki.
However, the situation could be the opposite. The brewery might already have a source of its rice, so they need to decide what type of sake they would like to make from it given its characteristics. Again, the technique is more important than the ingredient itself. But still.
The same is about koji and especially yeast. You have to choose based on the style of sake you would like to make. Andy @originsake has a very good article about sake yeast varieties on his blog and you can see that they play a big role in the taste and aroma of sake.
Another thing is to decide what grade and type of sake to make and what brewing method to use. And as you might remember from the episode about kimoto, yamahai, sokujomoto and bodaimoto, they all influence the taste and feel of the sake. So let’s say, we decided what sake we want to make. So now is time to prepare the rice.
9:12
Preparation
And I am not going to talk about technical preparation. What I want to highlight here are rice polishing and further preparations. For example, we decided (OK I can see as “A brewery” now turned into “we”, but I guess it’s more fun this way), that we want to brew ginjo sake. So the rice has to be polished to 60% at least, polishing off 40% of the grains to remove more non-starch components of the grain.
Mind that historically, rice was polished either manually using mortar and pestle or by waterwheel mills, only to the 90% polishing ratio. I have already talked about the vertical polishing machines which appeared in the 1930s and vastly improved the quality of sake and allowed the emergence of high-grade sake. Bigger breweries have their own polishing machines, I saw them while in Japan. Smaller breweries might use either third-party polishers I think, or probably other breweries, which have spare capacity of their own polishing machines and don’t mind lending it. I know that most of the sake breweries outside Japan import polished rice from Japan or the US because for most of them it’s not economically viable to own a polishing machine.
But polishing is not all. After the rice is polished it has to cool down and it takes a few weeks. And you might say: “Wait a minute, that long?”. Think about it. We are talking about tonnes of rice being polished. Imagine rice grains in the middle of a bag that lies in the middle of the pile. That’s why it takes some time for the polished rice to cool down.
So the next step is washing. You need to get rid of rice particles and rice bran that remained after polishing. The process is simple. So now the last two preparatory steps which also the start of the brewing process.
First of all, the rice has to be soaked in order to get prepared for the next step which is steaming. The soaking process is quite simple but is very important. It’s the process where the toji, master brewer, often uses a stopwatch. Why is it so important?
First of all, the polished rice absorbs water much faster than the unpolished and it’s obvious as the protecting layer of the grain is removed. Secondly, the amount of water absorbed by the rice affects the results of the next steaming step. That’s why it’s crucial to achieve the optimal hydration of the rice and use a stopwatch, especially for high-grade sake. I have to say that sometimes the rice is left to soak overnight when the polishing ratio is low.
The last preparation step is as I have already said steaming. And this step is also very important as it will affect the fermentation process. The rice is specifically steamed and not boiled because it should be firm outside and soft inside. In sake brewing, it is called gaikonainan in Japanese, which is just a direct translation. While if you boil rice you will get the opposite result: soft outside and firm inside which is perfect for table rice.
Why soft inside? To make it easier for koji mould to penetrate the rice grain and start converting starch into sugar. When you take the steamed rice it feels firm sort of uncooked. But when you start kneading it with your fingers it becomes more elastic and soft. This is used by the toji to check if the rice is ready: making a sort of cake of the steamed rice to see if it’s elastic enough, soft enough etc. The technique is called hinerimochi.
In old days, the rice was steamed in deep large vats made of Japanese cedar wood, but nowadays they are usually made of steel. The steams comes from the bottom of the vat and goes through the rice. The vat is covered by some fabric material that is budging while the rice is steamed so it looks a bit like a mushroom.
After steaming, the rice is divided into two parts, 20% will be used for making rice koji and the rest for the main fermentation. Also, 5-6% of the steamed rice is used for the starter.
Here we are, the rice is polished, washed, soaked and streamed and ready for actual sake brewing!
Just to remind you guys, that Sugidama Podcast now has a sponsor, London Sake, an excellent online sake shop with a very good selection of over 100 sake from 25 breweries. They have excellent tasting notes and food pairing suggestions for each sake, which will help you to choose the perfect sake without any fuss. Listeners of the podcast can get a 10% discount by using the code: SUGIDAMA (all caps) during checkout. London Sake: making sake simple."
15:20
Making of Rice Koji
Sake brewers often refer to making rice koji as the most important step in brewing sake. There is an old saying which goes as: First the koji, second the moto (yeast starter), third, fermentation ranking the steps by their importance.
Very often rice koji is made by hand, while I guess large breweries might use special machines. If you watched any movie of video about making sake you probably remember the process when a brewery worker is walking along the tables with steamed rice with a special box sprinkling the koji spores which look like greenish dust on it.
So let’s just refresh from the previous episodes. To make alcohol, we need sugar and yeast. Yeast feeds on sugar breaking it into alcohol and CO2. Rice doesn’t have much sugar but a lot of starch. Starch is not very different from sugar chemically, just longer molecules, which are easier for a plant to store compared to sugar.
Koji, which is a domesticated mould used in fermentation in Asia for thousands of years, is used to break these long molecules into shorter ones, which is basically glucose. The process is called saccharification from the word “sacchar”, sugar. So as you see, it’s a very important part of sake brewing.
I have been a bit confused with the word koji because it often means slightly different things. I’ve already mentioned it before. So here I will use the word “koji” for koji spores (koji kin in Japanese) and rice koji for the rice infused with koji spores.
So rice koji is made in a special room. The room is hot (30-40 degrees Celsius) because koji like it, and well ventilated. So the steamed rice is carried in the koji room, which is by the way called koji-muro, put on the tables and let cool down.
Then koji spores are sprinkled on the rice. It could be done manually or using a special automatic device. The rice is mixed to break any lumps and to make sure koji is evenly spread through. Then it all is divided into smaller trays or boxes to have better control over the process. These trays are checked and rearranged every 2 hours or so for a period of 40-60 hours in total.
Basically, it’s a form of art in a way because so many things have to be controlled. The temperature is constantly checked as well as the process of saccharification generates heat itself, the humidity to make sure that unnecessary water is evaporated. Every brewery has its own method of making rice koji.
The way the koji grows on the rice is very important because it determines the taste, flavour profile and other characteristics of the future sake. And when we were talking about choices, there are two types of koji, each having a distinguished character and used for different types of sake.
19:08
Starter
We’ve talked about making a starter, which is called shubo or moto in the episode about brewing methods. Shubo literally means “mother of sake”, while moto just means yeast starter or mash. So we now know the basics and also that there are three main types of starter: bodaimoto, an ancient way of making it, kimoto, which was used between the Edo period and the beginning of the 20th century and also includes yamahai, and the modern method, sokujomoto, a fast fermentation.
As we have already talked about the differences in these four methods, I will focus on a few common points. If you haven’t listened to the episode about various brewing methods, it’s episode no. 4 called “From Kimoto to Sokujo and Back Again”.
OK, first of all, the starter is needed to increase the amount of yeast in the fermentation. So you grow a high concentration of it in the starter and then add it to the main fermentation. To do it, the brewery workers mix koji rice, which already has some sugar with water in a small vat and then add yeast. A small amount of lactic acid can be added as well or natural lactic acid bacteria can propagate themselves naturally. And lactic acid keeps away all unwanted bacteria and microorganisms from our starter.
Again as I have mentioned before, there is a method called spontaneous fermentation, when the brewer just waits for natural yeast which lives on the walls and the ceiling of the sake brewery to come down to the starter and begin to multiply. But this technique is very precarious and not used very much.
So for the modern sokujomoto method, it takes around two weeks for the starter to get ready. Kimoto method takes one week longer.
21:17
Recap
OK, we probably should stop here and continue next time to talk about the magical process, called sandan jikomi, the main fermentation and the post-production. Just a quick recap of the episode. The brewing process starts with the decision of what sake to make and the choice of ingredients. Then the main ingredient, rice, is polished to the desired level and left for 2-3 weeks to cool down.
After that the rice is washed, soaked and steamed. The brewing process starts with making rice koji when around 20-30% of the steamed rice is cooled down and infused with koji spores in a special koji room. The process of growing koji mould on the rice takes 40-60 hours. After that koji rice is mixed with water and pure yeast culture is added. Lactic acid can be also added depending on the brewing method. After 2-3 weeks the starter is ready for the main fermentation.
22:29
Sake of the episode
OK, it’s time for our exciting part, the sake of the episode. And I wonder if the listeners who listen to the podcast from the beginning have tried any sake I featured in the last 5 episodes? If you do, please let me know either through comments or social media or email.
Today I would like to talk about Narutotai Ginjo Nama Genshu. This sake is a double blessing for autumn. Not only it’s genshu, undiluted sake, it’s also namazake, unpasteurised sake. The combination provides a deeper, stronger and umami richer taste, which will perfectly complement any hearty autumn dish. The fact that it’s a ginjo style sake gives it a bit more refined taste and a slightly flowery aroma.
Unpasteurised sake generally does not have a very long shelf life and usually, you should drink as quickly as possible. That’s why Honke Matsuura Brewery, which has been around since 1804, came up with the innovative idea of a sealed aluminium can, which protects the freshness of Narutotai sake for much longer.
Narutotai Ginjo Nama Genshu is a bold but at the same time elegant sake. Behind its higher acidity and rich taste, you can detect plenty of nuances usually associated with ginjo style sake. Narutotai has a delicate sweet aroma with a lot of earthy notes and a tiny bit of fizziness of freshly made sake, which some people describe as a milky texture.
Try it with richer and heavier dishes like maki sushi with some rich sauce, grilled fish, miso aubergines, an autumn beef and vegetable stew, or even some mature and strong cheese. You won’t be disappointed!
And by the way, and I honestly did not plan it, Narutotai is available from our sponsor, London Sake and you can comp[are my tasting notes and pairing suggestions with theirs and decide which you think closer to your impression of the sake. And don’t forget that listeners of the podcast can get a 10% discount by using the code: SUGIDAMA (all caps) during checkout. London Sake: making sake simple."
25:19
Ending
That’s it for today. I will be back with more episodes. I am sure you are eager to know how sake is made. I will talk about the exciting topic of actual fermentation and post-production in the next episode. And after that we will have a few very interesting interviews with amazing people from the world of sake, so please stay tuned.
In the meantime, try some sake and let me know if you like it. Narutotai is available at our sponsor, London Sake as well as at other stores, both online and offline. Also look at my website, sugidama.co.uk. I am going to publish my recommendations for the 5 best sake for a rainy day or look at the tasting notes section. Please, send me an email or leave a comment about your experience.
Again if you like the episode and want more, hit the SUBSCRIBE button, please, please, please leave a review. Don’t wait, just do it now. It only takes a few minutes and means a lot to me! The podcast is gradually getting more listeners but it’s still not enough to bring the word about sake to the masses. So please share this podcast with your friends, with anyone who might ask you about sake, on your social media, Whatsapp chat anywhere.
Thanks a lot for listening!
Kampai!