Does anyone have a Makkoli recipe, or a link to one?

[Laripu]

Hi Laripu

Keep us posted on how you get

Also here are two good resource on sake, or similar rice wine

http://www.taylor-madeak.org/index.php

http://forum.northernbrewer.com/viewtopic.php?t=50409

Thanks!! I'll look at these later from home.

[Laripu]

Well, today I started my first makkoli (or makgeoli or makhuli). I'm just waiting for the rice and liquid to cool to 80°F, so I can pitch the "nuruk" i.e. yeast and amylase enzyme powder. I've taken photos of the various steps, so when it's all in bottles, i about 10 days, I'll post a link to the whole recipe with photos.

It's now four days into it. The intial gruel/nuruk mixture stank: apparently nuruk is a smelly thing, somethng I didn't know. After the first three days (of saccharification), fermentation has slowly started, as evidenced by small bubbles on the surface of the gruel. More importantly, the nuruk smell is nearly gone, and has been replaced by the makgeolli/alcohol smell with which I'm familiar. I'm glad I didn't chuck it all in the toilet! I'll bottle some time next week, as time permits.

OK. Back in school they taught me that when you're doing an experiment, you must be completely honest about all parts of it. So the following is in that spirit. Before the confession, though, I must say two things:

• I will drink it anyway
• It will be pasteurized first

And so... yesterday I was looking at the surface of the Makgeolli brew to see how the fermentation was progressing, and I saw something untoward. Among the bits of wheat seed coat and the odd rice kernel that had floated up to the surface, there was also something that looked a lot like a rice kernel. Something white, like a rice kernel, that was perhaps a millimeter in thickness, and 6 mm or less in length. Something with legs.

LEGS???? ..... is what I said, followed by some even more colourful language.

Well I fished out four of these little guys. They were not moving, and I suspect the alcohol killed them. I think there must have been eggs present in the nuruk, which is not made in a lab and really isn't sterile. (This link has a flow-chart for nuruk preparation.) I guess the eggs hatched in the nutritious rice gruel, and the larvae or maggots soon died from alcohol poisoning.

Tonight I will skim the top of the fermenting liquid and if I find any more I will try to photograph them. They looked to me like this, but of course there were only four and the longest was 6mm x 1mm. Straining before bottling should catch them all, and now I've decided to bottle in glass beer bottles and pasteurize in the stove: 170°F = 77°C for 30 minutes. That's overkill, but the maggots spooked me, dammit.

I would try to find an old Korean lady who had made this in her kitchen and ask her whether it's normal... but there's a language barrier, and I suspect that if she did understand me she'd just laugh and call me a wuss. Which I am.

[Laripu]

There will eventually (soon) be photos of the hardware and discussion of technique, but for now I can say the the Makgeolli experiment was a total dismal failure.

I did not bother to bottle. I tasted a bit of the Makgeolli prior to that, and it was sour. Makgeolli is normally a bit sour, but this was clearly too sour, almost vinegary. I guess the maggots should have let me guess that in advance. So it all went down the drain, and clean-up was a bit disheartening.

Luckily, as bad as the Makgeolli turned, out the weekend was not all bad. I smoked a nice pork shoulder on the BBQ, and drank some nice homebrew. And my team won, so the weeekend wasn't a total loss.

[llannige]

Saddened to read about your latest brew L.
I'm sure you will bounce back.
Looking forward to your next adventure.

[Laripu]

Here are the promised pictures of the failed makgeolli experiment. Maybe someone will figure out how to fix it, and post the results of another attempt?









Starch conversion lasted 3 days, during which you have to stir this mess twice a day. The smell is pretty bad, but after three days it starts to smell alcoholic like makgeolli is supposed to smell.

[taylormadeak]

Here are the promised pictures of the failed makgeolli experiment. Maybe someone will figure out how to fix it, and post the results of another attempt?

I've never made any of the Korean style jiu, but I've been making sake (you guys already know about my sake...), beer, mead, and cider for going on 10 years now. I've had other people ask me about makgeolli before, however, and one friend even sent me a link to what he considers the best guide for making it:

http://answers.yahoo.com/question/index ... 032AAM9q5O

The above method can still be improved upon with modern homebrewing practices like sanitizing your equipment, using a closed fermenter, and controlling the fermentation temperature. I won't go into detail about that unless asked, however.

Here are a few adjustments to your method that you might consider for your next attempt:

• That bag of rice says "Enriched Long Grain Rice." There are a couple problems with that. Long grain rice isn't really suitable for making jiu of any style. It just doesn't readily convert to sugar, and when it does finally convert, it doesn't create very much sugar. Short grain rice is much better, though it is sometimes labeled as "pearl" or "medium grain" here in North America. Likewise, stay away from "enriched" rice. Enriched rice is dusted with vitamins and minerals like niacin and iron that make it a whole lot healthier to eat, but those same additions (especially iron!) are very bad for jiu. If enriched rice is all you can get, then make sure to rinse it very thoroughly before steaming.
• That brings me to my next bullet: if you steam your rice instead of simmering or boiling it, you'll find that it becomes a whole lot easier to handle. It also doesn't dilute your jiu quite as much because you're adding only about a third as much water in that rice, and the water addition you do need can be added as cold water to cool the rice down to pitching temperature. That makes it a lot more sanitary in the end because you don't have gallons of hot water and starch sitting around catching bugs for 8 to 12 hours before you can inoculate it with nuruk and yeast.
• Use some wine yeast (or sake yeast if you can get it) in addition to the nuruk. I know that common Korean wisdom says that nuruk contains yeast, but it's really just a cake of malted barley and wheat. Any yeast it contains is going to be wild yeast, and if you rely upon it alone your chances for a successful batch of homebrew diminish.
• A plastic bucket with tight fitting lid and airlock would make a much better primary fermenter than a kitchen pot.

I'll be around if you guys want to have further discussion on this subject.

[Laripu]

Here are a few adjustments to your method that you might consider for your next attempt:

• That bag of rice says "Enriched Long Grain Rice." There are a couple problems with that. Long grain rice isn't really suitable for making jiu of any style. It just doesn't readily convert to sugar, and when it does finally convert, it doesn't create very much sugar. Short grain rice is much better, though it is sometimes labeled as "pearl" or "medium grain" here in North America. Likewise, stay away from "enriched" rice. Enriched rice is dusted with vitamins and minerals like niacin and iron that make it a whole lot healthier to eat, but those same additions (especially iron!) are very bad for jiu. If enriched rice is all you can get, then make sure to rinse it very thoroughly before steaming.
• That brings me to my next bullet: if you steam your rice instead of simmering or boiling it, you'll find that it becomes a whole lot easier to handle. It also doesn't dilute your jiu quite as much because you're adding only about a third as much water in that rice, and the water addition you do need can be added as cold water to cool the rice down to pitching temperature. That makes it a lot more sanitary in the end because you don't have gallons of hot water and starch sitting around catching bugs for 8 to 12 hours before you can inoculate it with nuruk and yeast.
• Use some wine yeast (or sake yeast if you can get it) in addition to the nuruk. I know that common Korean wisdom says that nuruk contains yeast, but it's really just a cake of malted barley and wheat. Any yeast it contains is going to be wild yeast, and if you rely upon it alone your chances for a successful batch of homebrew diminish.
• A plastic bucket with tight fitting lid and airlock would make a much better primary fermenter than a kitchen pot.

I'll be around if you guys want to have further discussion on this subject.

Thanks for the tips. It looks like, despite the fact that I've been successfully brewing for 18 years, I've made every kind of newbie error in my first makgeolli. So much so that I'm rather embarrassed.

You're absolutely right about using an appropriate primary instead of a pot. the only reason I didn't do it is that I was worried about contaminating my plastic bucket, currently only used as a bottling bucket. And the result is that I contaminated my makgeolli. Not smart.

I did think Nuruk had some yeast; I guess I should have made a yeast starter as well. Wild yeast is not good, and I guess the nuruk is contaminated with that. Also with housefly eggs. (They had to come from there, because I haven't seen a housefly in Tampa in years.) Years ago I told some winemaker friends of mine to forget about making wine with the wild yeast that came on the grape skins; and to kill those off and use proper wine yeast instead. I should have listend to my own advice, in retrospect.

About steaming the rice: wasn't what I did the equivalent to that? I had a small quantlty of water in the smaller pot containing the rice, and the boiling took place in the larger pot. In the smaller pot, the water was soon absorbed.

Your point about the type of rice is also well taken. While I did rinse it well, I suppose I should use the right kind of rice for the proper result.

Maybe I'll try again one day, after the memory of the failure diminishes somewhat. In the meantime I've made a very nice all-grain Sticke Alt-beer, and I'll be bottling a strong ale tomorrow. At least my beer never fails.

[taylormadeak]

About steaming the rice: wasn't what I did the equivalent to that? I had a small quantlty of water in the smaller pot containing the rice, and the boiling took place in the larger pot. In the smaller pot, the water was soon absorbed.

Your process looked like you were just cooking the rice to me, but re-reading it just leaves me confused. Steaming always means suspending a basket or other slotted or holed container of whatever you want to cook over boiling water. In the case of rice, no additional water is added to the vessel that contains the rice while it is cooking (not to be confused with the vessel that is boiling the water, to which you should add water as often as necessary).

No matter how you cook the rice you're going to gelatinize starches, the real difference is the texture of the rice once it has been cooked. If you boil or simmer the rice with an equal or greater amount of water, you are forcing up to 100% of the grain's weight in water into the kernels. This results in nice soft, fluffy, and sticky white rice that is pleasant to eat, but tends to clump very badly and blend together when handled (not to mention the dilution of your jiu that extra water means). Rinsing and soaking the rice for an hour or two only allows the grain to absorb up to about 33% of its own weight in water. When heated with steam, this water will gelatinize the starches while adding very little additional water to the kernels; resulting in rice that is firm, rubbery, translucent yellowish rice that still has some tendency to stick to itself, but isn't anywhere near as tenaciously sticky as simmered rice and won't blend together while you're trying to break up the clumps and mix the rice into your liquor. Being able to quickly cool your hot rice simply by adding your chilled water requirement to it is a nice added bonus.

So, what method did you use? Hell if I know, because there aren't any cooked rice pictures in your post. But you can think back on what your cooked rice looked like and answer the question yourself.

This is what my steamed rice usually looks like:


Click for the full-size image.

Also with housefly eggs. (They had to come from there, because I haven't seen a housefly in Tampa in years.)

...Yuck. All I can say about that is try a different brand of nuruk next time.

[coatesg]

I'd like to say that, second only to MartialAnt's IrnBru TC thread , this is a highly interesting thread! Hoping you give this another shot - and hope it goes better!

[Laripu]

I'd like to say that, second only to MartialAnt's IrnBru TC thread , this is a highly interesting thread! Hoping you give this another shot - and hope it goes better!

I aim to entertain!

Seriously, I will try it again one day, when the trauma wears off.

[NWC]

So, did you drink it as promised??
It will be yummy - complete with uncooked rice and housefly larvee, I imagine a sort of oatbran texture with extra legs.
We need to see pics of this event or your credibility will be ruined forever !!

I'll do you a deal;
I've got some dodgy ginger wine - stuff not fit for human consumption, or even as a base for a whisky mac. Even in a fancy bottle it looks toxic - you know the sort of stuff.
You drink yours, I'll drink mine -- deal?

[Laripu]

So, did you drink it as promised??
It will be yummy - complete with uncooked rice and housefly larvee, I imagine a sort of oatbran texture with extra legs.
We need to see pics of this event or your credibility will be ruined forever !!

I'll do you a deal;
I've got some dodgy ginger wine - stuff not fit for human consumption, or even as a base for a whisky mac. Even in a fancy bottle it looks toxic - you know the sort of stuff.
You drink yours, I'll drink mine -- deal?

I did taste the makgeolli. It was too sour, not what makgeolli should taste like. So it went down the drain, I'm sorry to say. The texture was thick, but not like oat bran, since it was sieved through a cheesecloth. it was a little thinner than Milk of Magnesia. Perhaps Milk of Amnesia?

No deal on the exchange, I'm afraid. If you lived down the street from me, I'd consider it, but shipping costs would be prohibitive. You're probably in the UK? I'm in Tampa, Florida... definitely not walking distance!

[taylormadeak]

ROFL! Laripu, he wasn't offering to exchange with you, man. Re-read that line and you'll see why I'm laughing. =)

[Laripu]

ROFL! Laripu, he wasn't offering to exchange with you, man. Re-read that line and you'll see why I'm laughing. =)

I guess the thing I've been using for a brain inverted the 'yours' and 'mine'.... I got it now.
Well, then in that case, it won't work anyway. Mine's all down the drain!

[NWC]

Hey - I'll just drink mine anyway then