I've always liked making thing by my hands. It doesn't matter it is foods or things that I might use it for my life. Back in the day, when I didn't have internet, not sure how I made things. I vaguely remembered it was mostly from my life experiences. But I am living in the world of information now.
I am a big fan of Maangchi who is a cook on YouTube. She is a Korean who is living in NYC and I am one of her fan that follows her recipes and making foods at home time to time. She let me try many things that I've never made before. And her simple recipes and fun stories are borderless for many people in the world.
Her recipes are very much straight forward. It encourages people to make foods at home. But then there are some long term projects. I was blown away when she made soy sauce and Korean soy bean paste called Dwaen-jang. It took a year to complete and she made a 15 minutes long video. If there's some kind of awards then the video is deserving one or two.
One of her recipe caught my eyes and that is Korean Alcohol Mak-Geol-Li. It takes only 9 days to make and I was curious if I can do it. But the issue is not many place sells a crucial ingredient outside of Korea. But luckily my London shop has it. That is called "Nu-rook" which is starter culture. I grabbed one bag and some rice. Another issue for me to make this is I don't have food dehydrator. So I used oven. On her video, the machine was on 71'C to dry cooked rice. I tried to mimic the oven same way. But the issue is if the oven is not hot enough, then the fan is not going to be on. So that it is just a warm and humid oven. So I turned up the temperature to 150'C. And every 15 minutes I check the rice if it is well dried or burned. The key thing is not to be burned.
Everything went well. It is second day. The content is alive and keep making bubbles. The smell is sour. It is exactly Makgeolli taste but no alcohol in it yet. Hope it goes well and I can enjoy this with my friends.
Oven dried rice.
Starter culture with dry yeast.
Crushed and water is added.
I made sure it is not sealed tightly. The most important thing is the air should be able to travel through. So I folded kitchen towel and placed it on top of the jar. Then placed the lid on it without tightening it. If I have an Onggi(earthenware pot or Kimchi pot), it has millions of micro pores so that it can breathe through. But I don't have one. Glass jar would do the job.
4 hours later.
Through overnight.
It's alive. Bubbles are popping up.