How long before koji rice smells like anything, mine is at hour 30 and blank

Question

First attempt at rice koji. Soaked overnight, steamed 45 minutes, cooled to about 35C, inoculated with spores, wrapped in a cloth in a cooler with a warm water…

waterbath_wes · Accepted Answer

Patchy fur at hour 30 is roughly on schedule and the smell arrives late. My timeline: hours 0 to 18 nothing at all, 18 to 30 faint sweetness and the first white haze, 30 to 40 it starts generating its own heat and you must break the bed apart or it cooks itself, 40 to 48 the chestnut and mushroom smell shows up…

gongfu_greta · Answer

Patchiness at this stage usually means the rice was too wet or clumped. Steamed rice for koji should be firm enough that grains separate when you rub a handful between your palms. If it smears, the spores only colonise the surface of the lumps.

epoxy_puddle · Answer

Wrap the cloth loosely, not tightly. Koji needs oxygen and a tight bundle at 34C with a water bottle can get anaerobic and sour, which smells like bad cheese rather than nothing.

iris_tanaka · Answer

If at 48 hours it still smells of nothing and the fur has not knitted the grains into a cake, the spores were probably old or the rice was too hot when you inoculated. Above about 40C at inoculation kills them.

How long before koji rice smells like anything, mine is at hour 30 and blank Koji & Miso

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