Rice Wine
is widely used in Chinese Cooking
Different dialects
in the Chinese Community
brew their Rice Wine
unique to their individual groups
Rice Wines
are called by different names in their own dialects
Cantonese call theirs 'Wong-Zhou'
Hock Kien, 'Mi-Jiu'
Mandarin, 'Huang-Jiu'
Foochow have their own signature variant of
'Ang-Jiu' or 'Oint-U'
which is RED in colour!
Basically
all rice wine, whether yellow or red are the same
and
made by the same method
except with some additions of ingredients
My late mother-in-law took pride in her 'Oint-U'
which is sweet and 'strong'
To the older generations
certain 'pantang' needs to be observed
while making the rice wine
but
my late mother in law just told us to keep our mouth shut while making!
Using her basic method
I have come out with this easy and no fuss method
which I gladly share with you
First of all
There are 2 important rules:
1) to keep all utensils clean and thoroughly dry
2) to make sure the rice is cooked through and cooled overnight.
When completely cooled,
the ingredients are ready to be mixed together.
The glutinous rice already mixed with
blended red yeast
and
ground wine biscuits
ready to be put into the glass bottle
Done!
Now wait for 26 days for it to mature.
Foochow Red Rice Wine
1 kg glutinous rice
100g red yeast
1 sweet wine biscuit
1 hot wine biscuit
Utensils
a glass bottle big enough for the ingredients, sun dried thoroughly
a piece of cloth to cover the mouth of the bottle
a string to secure the cloth
muslin cloth to strain the wine during harvesting
Method:
1. cook rice in rice cooker, add same amount of water as you would cook rice
2. scoop out fully cooked rice to cool overnight
3. blend red rice yeast
4. put wine biscuits in plastic bag & mash with a glass bottle
5. mix red yeast powder & wine biscuits with rice, in batches
6. put the well mixed batch into the bottle, pressing to the bottom of the bottle
7. continue until all the rice is finished
8. cover the mouth of the bottle with a piece of cloth, secure it with a string
9. cover the bottle loosely with the plastic cover
10. leave in a cool place for 26-30 days
To Harvest:
1) Make sure the top does not have any BLACK mold (poisonous!)
Pour away all if you find any black spots!
and start again...... making sure you soak the bottle, cleaned & sun it well
Cause: contamination during the process!
2) some white mold is OK, just scoop up the white spots & discard
11. This top layer is kept as 'chow' or residue
12. strain the rest of the mixture through a muslin cloth
13. keep the wine (liquid) in a bottle. Do not fill to the brim but 2" below
to allow further fermentation
14.keep the residue in a jar & sprinkle some salt on top & store in fridge
Notes:
1. 100ml bottled water or (water boiled & cooled overnight) may be used to clean utensils
off the glutinous rice & yeast, and can be added to the lot for fermentation.
2. rice wine will remain red if store in fridge
3. to get a clear bottle of wine, drain the clear wine to a new bottle after it has settled for
a few days.
4. cloudy ones at the bottom of the bottle can be kept for cooking mee sua or sea shells
5. you can collect 1 litre of wine from this recipe
