How Sake Is Made: From Rice to Glass
Sake has been brewed in Japan for over a thousand years, and the process is unlike anything else in the world of fermented beverages. Understanding how sake is made gives you a deeper appreciation for what's in your glass — and why premium sake commands the respect it does.
Here's a step-by-step look at the journey from rice field to your table.
Step 1: Rice Selection & Polishing
It all begins with the rice. Premium sake uses special sake rice varieties — larger-grained than table rice, with a starchy core called the shinpaku. Before anything else, the outer layers of each grain are milled away in a process called seimaibuai (rice polishing).
For a Junmai Daiginjo like our Laugh with SAKE Junmai Daiginjo 35 Zuiun, the rice is polished down to just 35% of its original size — meaning 65% of each grain is discarded. This is extraordinarily labour-intensive and is one reason why premium sake is priced as it is.
Step 2: Washing, Soaking & Steaming
The polished rice is carefully washed to remove any remaining bran, then soaked in water for a precise amount of time — sometimes just minutes, depending on the grade. It's then steamed (not boiled) to prepare it for fermentation.
Step 3: Koji Making
This is the most critical and magical step in sake brewing. A portion of the steamed rice is moved to a warm, humid room where a mould called Aspergillus oryzae — known as koji — is cultivated on the grains over 40–50 hours.
Koji produces enzymes that break down the rice starches into fermentable sugars. Without koji, there would be no sake. The toji (master brewer) tends to the koji with extraordinary care — temperature, humidity, and timing are everything.
Step 4: Starter Mash (Shubo)
A small batch called the shubo (or moto) is prepared by combining koji rice, steamed rice, water, and yeast. This starter mash cultivates a large, healthy population of yeast that will drive the main fermentation.
Step 5: Main Fermentation (Moromi)
The starter mash is gradually combined with more steamed rice, koji, and water in three stages over four days — a technique called sandan jikomi. This careful addition prevents the yeast from being overwhelmed and allows fermentation to develop slowly and evenly.
What makes sake unique is that the koji continues converting starches to sugars at the same time as the yeast converts those sugars to alcohol. This simultaneous process — called multiple parallel fermentation — is found nowhere else in the world of beverages.
Fermentation takes 25–35 days for premium sake, at carefully controlled low temperatures. The lower the temperature, the more delicate and aromatic the resulting sake.
Step 6: Pressing
Once fermentation is complete, the sake is pressed to separate the liquid from the rice solids. For most premium sake, this is done gently to preserve delicate flavours. Nigori sake — like our Laugh with SAKE Namachozoshu Nigori Sake — is passed through a coarser mesh, leaving some rice sediment in the liquid for its characteristic cloudy appearance.
Step 7: Filtration, Pasteurisation & Maturation
Most sake is lightly filtered to remove any remaining solids and then pasteurised to stabilise it. Some sake — called namazake or namachozoshu — is unpasteurised, giving it a fresher, livelier character. Our Nigori is a namachozoshu, meaning it's pasteurised only once (rather than the usual twice) and cold-stored to preserve its freshness.
The sake then rests for several months before bottling, allowing the flavours to integrate and mellow.
The Result
What emerges from this meticulous process is one of the most complex and nuanced beverages in the world — clean, elegant, and deeply expressive of the brewer's craft. Every bottle of sake represents hundreds of hours of skilled work and centuries of accumulated knowledge.
Explore the Premium Pour range and taste the craft for yourself.