Tokyo, 23 December, /AJMEDIA/
Sake is one of my favorite drinks, not just because it’s delicious and helps silence the dogs constantly barking in my head but because it has such a vast and rich culture of brewing. Using only the key ingredients of water, rice, and mold, it is possible to create an impressive array of varieties through even the most subtle environmental differences such as humidity and temperature.
Now, Asahi Shuzo, the makers of the popular Dassai brand of sake, are going to push these environmental factors to the absolute limit and brew a batch of sake in space. There have been cases of ingredients like yeast being sent into space and back, but this will be the first time the brewing process will be done outside of Earth’s atmosphere.
Asahi Shuzo’s plan is to send the ingredients to the International Space Station in the latter half of 2025. Once there, the fermentation process will be carried out by astronauts in the ISS’s newly opened Japanese Experiment Module, also known as “Kibo” (“Hope”). Conditions such as the alcohol content will be monitored from Earth and extra care will need to be paid in zero-gravity conditions for the 15-day brewing period.