- Here, out in the middle of LA County,
we are able to take what we have,
the rice that we have, the water we have.
And we try to create the best sake possible.
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We measure exactly how much rice we're gonna use,
so that we can calculate, at every step,
how much moisture the rice is gonna gain.
Calrose is a founding variety found in California.
This particular rice is a 50% polished down.
Sake rice is polished usually between 50 to 70%.
Outer layer is where all the protein, fatty acid, bran is at
and you wanna get rid of all those materials
that you don't need,
and you wanna get to that center starch of the rice.
Japanese sake brewing is the only industry
that uses the method to polish down the rice.
Depending on how many percent it is polished,
it'll create different flavor profile.
In this piece of rice, you see a white core.
That's just starch, and in Japanese,
we call that shimpaku,
which is the heart of the rice.
And that pure starch is what brings out fruitiness in sake.
At this moment, we only focus on using one rice strain,
and that's because we want to create
this relationship with Calrose rice.
(water splashing)
So this is our tank full of filtered water.
We go through two filtrations
to get all the unwanted minerals out of there.
The water is very important in anything, really.
Beer, sake, and wine,
more than 80% of what you drink is water.
Californian rice grew in Californian water,
so I believe that making sake in Californian water
with Californian rice is the best combination.
I learned this technique from a very small
award-winning brewery called Inaba Brewery in Japan.
They still use hand-making techniques,
and I was really intrigued by old way of making sake
without too many machinery.
All that white stuff is bran and rice powder
that we don't want.
We don't wanna wash too much,
or we will lose nutrients that we actually need
to make healthy koji,
and for healthy yeast fermentation.
When you're hands on with your raw ingredient,
you get to feel it,
you get to have an intimate relationship with it.
If you rely too much on machines,
you stop learning about the rice.
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What's important about being a sake brewer
is understanding your rice,
and how it reacts with the water.
Depending on the temperature of the water,
the rice will absorb the water at a different speed.
I believe that as a sake brewer,
I have to learn the raw method first
before I start to rely on machine,
and that's how I grow as a brewer.
And once it's 15 minutes in the water,
I'll take it out and start draining.
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So this rice, we're making it for koji.
We're measuring the weight to make sure
that the moisture level is right where I want it,
and I'm spreading the rice evenly in the steamer.
Koji needs moisture to grow.
Perfect amount of moisture in the rice is very important
to make a good quality koji.
I'm looking at how shiny the rice looks.
If it's not shiny enough,
that means it's not enough moisture.
I'm gonna put this cover over it.
If the steam rises, it's catching all that water.
One hour each layer.
Rice has been steaming for one hour.
After steaming, I'm looking for
around 15% increase in weight.
So I do like to use all my senses while I'm making sake.
I try to taste the rice at each stage.
As I'm chewing, it's holding its shape,
so I know that the doneness is right.
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I give it a mix to help cool down.
I'm also trying to separate each piece of rice.
So making sake is something
you have to be present for in every stage.
You have to know the status of your rice in every stage.
Is it moist, is it too hot, is it too cool?
And now we got all 50 pounds of rice onto the cooling table.
I try to reach 33 degrees Celsius
when I'm inoculating with the spores.
It looks good.
Moisture level is just where I want it.
It's not too sticky.
I'm gonna measure a precise amount of koji spores
that I'm gonna use to sprinkle onto the steamed rice.
(pleasant music)
So the rice has been cooled
to the temperature that I want it.
Now we're gonna inoculate with koji spores.
These are very sensitive microorganisms.
You wanna be very careful
exactly how much is sprinkled onto the rice.
Those tiny, powdery looking seeds,
they are landing on each of the rice grains right now.
They're gonna start looking for moisture,
start to look for starch to feed on,
and then eventually turn that starch into sugar.
All alcohol needs sugar to produce alcohol.
In wine, that sugar comes from grapes.
In beer, it comes from germinated grains, such as barley.
Sake, rice is all starch, just like barley,
but instead of germinating rice,
we grow koji on the rice.
Koji is what has the most flavor in sake.
Koji likes to be at a certain temperature level.
This is so that the warmth is maintained inside,
and also keeping any bacteria out of the way.
At this point, it's gonna be moved into the koji room.
This is my koji room.
I'm gonna stick a temperature probe in.
And we're locking in all that moisture.
Koji is the most sensitive
and important process of making sake.
It's kind of like putting a baby to sleep.
After 22 hours, we start transferring the koji
into separate boxes.
If you just let it sit in this big mound,
it's just gonna overheat.
I will leave it in here like this
for another six to eight hours.
So this is koji at 45 hours
from when we inoculate it with.
How long we keep it in this room is very crucial
to the flavor profile that you are looking for.
You want the koji to penetrate inside the rice.
It'll depend on the sake brewer,
but for me, making koji is the most important process
as a sake brewer.
This will decide how your end product will taste.
After 45 to 48 hours, I will take it out of this room,
and cool it, so that it stops propagating.
If we keep, continue to let it grow,
it'll spore, turn green and yellow,
and you don't want that in sake.
You see, all these white things on the rice?
That's koji.
This koji was in production for 48 hours.
Now it's complete.
One of the most unique process in sake production
is what's called multiple parallel fermentation.
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Multiple parallel fermentation
means starch turning into sugar,
sugar being turned into alcohol.
This is all happening at the same time in the same tank.
(speaking foreign language) is when the least amount
of rice, water, and koji goes in.
We start with the water.
We put in the necessary minerals,
and this will create an environment
that is clean and safe
for the yeast to properly grow in.
And then the koji goes in.
So we're making a water full of sugar and enzymes.
After 30 minutes, steamed rice goes in.
This is a steamed rice for the hatsuzoe.
All the yeast that you need for the whole batch
goes in at the hatsuzoe.
We want the yeast to be stronger than anything else,
so that the yeast population grows and multiples,
and becomes active.
Second day, odori,
we don't make any addition to the tank.
We just give it a stir.
Second step which is called nakazoe,
and only rice, water, and koji goes in at the second step.
And then, the last step, tomezoe,
is the same thing.
And this will fill up the tank
to the level that you are aiming for.
All the rice, all the koji has been melted down
into this mash called moromi.
After the moromi
is finished fermenting,
we pour it into a bag.
With this method is called shizuku.
Shizuku means drip.
We're allowing the sake to drip out of these bags.
This is a process in Japan usually done by
at least two to three people.
I've went through a lot to figure out
how to do it by myself.
I fell in love with sake
when I had my first premium sake
called Junmai Dai Ginjo.
I was so surprised by how it tastes.
It's nothing like the stuff I'd been drinking.
I started with home-brewing beer.
At that time, I was working as a sake specialist.
I studied everything about alcohol industry.
I realized at that point that a lot of Americans
have a misconception of what sake is.
I took on a mission to clarify
this misconception that Americans have.
This is actually a really traditional way of pressing sake.
They only use this method for super premium sake in Japan.
We only collect the best part of the sake,
so it's laborious, time consuming,
but it is worth it.
We let it hang in the air for one to two days.
Any alcohol product, if it touches oxygen,
it'll start to degrade.
What we like to do is push CO2 in this.
CO2 gas is heavier than oxygen,
so it'll start to purge out that air.
So we're trying to rid of any oxygen in there
to keep it fresh inside.
Now we're gonna transfer that,
and we're gonna let it clear up again in this tank
for about two weeks.
When the sake is dripped out,
it still has what's called ori in the sake.
Ori is rice particles, and we let the sake naturally settle
using time and gravity.
I do like to keg all my sake after the secondary tank
until bottling to keep it as fresh as possible.
And as soon as it's all clarified and matured,
we get it into bottles.
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Me and my partner, we just always felt
something was missing in LA,
and that's a local sake brewery and tasting room.
So I kind of started to think
that maybe I can turn this into a profession,
and actually start the first sake brewery of LA.
So this machine does purge the bottle with CO2,
so it gets all the oxygen out.
Keep it fresh.
I put a lot of time, a lot of effort
to try to make a sake that tastes good.
I would often think, what am I doing?
Is this gonna actually really work?
Our sake is all namazake.
Namazake means fresh, unpasteurized sake.
I'm brewing almost every single day with no day off.
Two years ago, I would've never imagined
that I would be actually making sake.
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Because it is unpasteurized, it is a live product,
it will change over time,
just like an aged wine.
It'll just make some changes in the bottle.
I would say drink within the first month.
Mm, so you definitely first thing you notice
is that effervescence.
The best indicator of freshest namazake
will be the existence of a little effervescence in the sake.
Sometimes I will be here until one a.m..
You've worked all day, so you feel so tired.
But then, from the brewery,
you start to hear bubbles coming out,
and that's a sign that the yeast is doing its job.
So it's a beautiful sound.
Even though my body is tired, it makes me feel good
about what I'm doing, and I feel satisfied, you know?
I'm still at the point where everything is surreal.
I will never be proud of myself more than this.
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