Developments

One of the reasons Tim and I started this blog is because there really isn't a lot of variety in the online world of homebrew sake. If memory serves me... and a mildly hungover one at that today... I can only remember finding one or two actual recipes for making sake in the home. And those are constantly recycled, reprinted, hotlinked, with very little clarification about the process and what can be expected.

My first attempt at making kome-koji was a little weird. The recipes don't give a lot of detail about what to expect, how damp of an environment the keep the rice, how to break up the rice, what happens if the rice starts to turn soupy (as was the case with mine), etc. There just wasn't that much good information available. So mine started out a little weird. The koji started to break down the rice and make it look a bit soupy. There wasn't that much water in the container I was using so stirring up the rice as it turned into a liquid was kinda strange. It continued to develop the cheese like smell that is referenced everywhere, but the texture really began to change in an unexpected way. I simply never got those little white hair on the rice kernels. I would guess that the koji started to break down the rice instead of simply growing on it. It could have been due to the temperature of the room I kept it in. My current theory is that I kept the rice too damp. There will be another batch started tomorrow night so I'll let you guys know how it goes. I'll also do a better job of posting images.

This is the current batch on day 3 in the morning. It has begun to settle a bit and has started to develop a mild alcohol smell.