Over-soaking turns all efforts to froth.

After polishing, the pearl-like rice is transferred to the brewery, where it is washed and soaked. Although the purpose of soaking the rice is simply to allow it to absorb the desired amount of water, achieving just the right water content is easier said than done. The more the rice has been polished in the previous step, the faster it will soak up water. If highly polished rice is carelessly left to soak for too long, it will become too soft during steaming and cannot be used to produce fine sake. To avoid this, our brewers use stop watches to time the soaking down to the minute, and continually modify the design of the soaking equipment to achieve the best results.