막걸리 만드는 법(영어)
It is so wired that you always miss something even if you didn't really enjoy yourself usually when you were in your country. Makgeolli is one of the these things for me. I didn't mind to have it but I didn't particularly enjoy them.
Anyway, one day, my wife was really look forward to have it but I couldn't find good and real Korean way for making Makgeolli in English. So, I decided to open the pandora's box for all the people who was looking for these proper recipe. :D
Notice : You have to sanitize all the equipment and tools properly to get a fine result. Remind you that bacteria could cause improper result.
What you need : - 4 lb of Sweet Rice(Medium long grain rice or sushi rice or sticky rice are all ok)
- 1 lb of Nuruk (you can buy it from Hmart or close Korean Grocery Mart near you)
- 1 tbs yeast(any kind of yeast is ok)
- 8 Gallon container(for fermenter) & several big bowls
- Cheese cloth
1. Wash your rice until you get clear water. This is very important that you wash your rice very clean. You might have to wash it more than ten times.
* if you don't know how to wash the rice, here's the tip.
- pour the water and stir it with your hand several times. When water becomes milky, dump the water accordingly. Repeat this until you get the result.
2. After you finish washing rice, soak it in the water about two hours and strain it about 40 min before you steam it.
3. Add 3.5 L of water (1 USA gallon is 4L), 1 lb of Nuruk and 1 tbs of yeast to the another bowl and mix it up well. Set aside for later.
This stage is that we let them pre activation.
4. I use hot water to sanitize the fermenter (8 Gallon container) but you can use any kind of sanitizer that you are using for your wine or beer making.
5. Dry the fermenter well.
6. Now, we are making Godu-bob that will be a steamed rice. Godu-bob is the booster to shorten the fermenting time and we want it to be really dry rice. Before you steam it, place Cheese cloth on the bottom of steamer and put the rice. Wrap the cloth on of the rice, cover it up and steam it about 40 min.
7. If the rice is not cooked well, you can leave it a bit longer (half an hour more).
After it's well cooked, you can stir the rice well, and let it sit until the inside of the rice is cool.
Caution: If rice is too hot, it could kill yeast and be aware even out side of rice is fell cold, often inside of rice is still hot.
8. Once rice is cool and nice. You can put rice and contents of No.3 and mix them well using your hand.
9. Cover the fermenter with cheese cloth and place fermenter in warm room temperature between 18 C to 23 C for the best result. It will take seven days of fermenting time.
( I used paper towel because I couldn't find cheese cloth at that time and place strainer on top of the fermenter that secures the cover. if you have wine or beer making equipment, I would suggest you to use them for fermenting)
10. Everyday, at least once a day, you have to stir it well for helping fermenting.
Don't forget to sanitizing the spoon before use it.
If it is fermenting well, you can see Makgeolli is breathing like this! :D
11. One week later, when fermenting stage is done, now we have to filter them.
Add equal amount of water what we used (3.5L) to fermenter.
Place big bucket(or bowl that is able to hold 7 L(little less than 8 Gallon) of liquid) and filter the Makgeolli using cheese cloth by putting makgeolli to cheese cloth and squeezing them out.
I know it is a hard job but it need to be done and it will be worth it.
12. Now, all you need to do is bottling. Please don't forget, sanitize the bottles properly.
(In my case, I have saved several pop bottles and sanitized them with wine bottle sanitizer)
If you want, you can drink fresh Mageolli or you can add equal amount of seven up or fruit juice if you desire. In my suggestion though, it would taste a lot better if you put them in the fridge for a week for second fermenting.
Enljoy your Makgeolli!
