So many articles have been written about shio-koji. You may have made it in your kitchen, and have been using it to cook up delicious meals. Shio-koji is a seasoning, which makes everything taste delicious and everyone happy. If you don’t know about it, or haven’t made or used it before, I will show you how to do. Two weeks ago I did Shio-koji workshop at MOFAD, Brooklyn. All attendees prepared their shio-koji from scratch. After 10 days of nursing them, by now, everyone is...
Read MoreFungi, Koji, Does Miracle – Condinued Story
Koji loves Koji-muro which provids them Tokyo summer-like weather – high temperature and heavy hujmidity. Sometimes you see in the sake production photos that sake makers who are working in the koji-muro is naked from the weist to the top. That’s the best to wear. Koji, which is fed on cooked rice, multiplies and produces enzyme such as amylayze. Amylayze, then, breaks down starch in the rice into glucose. This process generates much heat in the rice. If the...
Read MoreRelationship of Delicious Sake and Fungi
It is exciting that today there are so many quality, delicious sake available in America, like the one which I have recently blogged – Daishichi Sake. Many of these sake are made at small family run breweries in Japan. Some have been in their business at least for one hundred years, others, close to 400 years. Production of sake is far more complicated than the wine making. Like beer sake is made from rice. In order to allow the fermentation to occur starch in rice...
Read MoreKoji and Amazake
I am now researching about koji a lot. Koji is Aspergillus oryzae. It is a fungus and used in Japanese traditional food production such as shoyu, miso, mirin, rice vinegar and sake. The popular drink associated with koji is “amazake”. The direct translation is “sweet” “sake”, but it is not an alcohol drink. I have been always unhappy with store bought amazake at Japanese food store in USA since it was too sweet..could be artificially...
Read MoreJapanese Cooking Seminar at International Restaurant and Foodservice Show
Please join us at Japanese cooking seminars at International Restaurant and Foodservice Show on March 1st and 2nd. The details are https://www.jetro.org/index.php?option=com_events_jetro&task=view&content=detail&event_id=409&Itemid=200...
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