Ancient Korean rice wine is making waves in the Northwest. Meet the family behind its revival Ruby de Luna June 06, 2025 / 6:02 am

Many people enjoy sake, the Japanese rice wine. But now, a local brewing company is betting diners will soon make room for Korean rice wine.

Peter and Sophia Jung are the brother-sister team behind Rainbrew. At their Woodinville brewery on a late day in May, they take the lid off a vat of rice porridge made with three basic ingredients: rice, water, and nuruk, a fermentation starter.

The mixture has the consistency of wet oatmeal.

“This is only three days old,” Peter said. “But you can smell the kind of fruitiness a little bit.”

After 10 days of fermenting, the batch will be filtered. The end product is rice wine called makgeolli, a traditional brew

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