What is the meaning of "qu" in liquor, and what are the qu?

Modernly, there are roughly five main categories of liquor quills, each used for a different kind of wine. They are:

Maizqu, mainly used in the brewing of yellow wine;

Smallquot, mainly used in the brewing of yellow wine and smallquot white wine;

Redquot, mainly used in the brewing of redquot wine (redquot wine is a variety of yellow wine);

Largequot, used in the brewing of distilled spirits. It is a collective term for liquor that uses large quartz as a saccharification fermentation agent, i.e., large quartz wine;

In detail:

The quartz commonly used in China's production of brewing is roughly divided into the following categories, namely, large quartz, small quartz, and gluten quartz. (which is commonly used is the large and small quart)

A, large quart

Large quart is wheat, barley and peas as raw materials, crushed and mixed with water and pressed into a brick-like quartz billet, in the artificial digging temperature, humidity, culture and become. The quatrain contains many kinds of microorganisms such as molds, yeasts, bacteria, etc. It is a kind of mixed (enzyme) preparation with many kinds of bacteria, and the kinds and quantity of microorganisms it contains are affected by the raw materials for quatrain making, the temperature of the quatrain making, and the environment. Since the big quartz contains a variety of microorganisms, a great variety of metabolites are formed in the process of winemaking fermentation, which make up a variety of flavor components. At present, most of the various famous and high-quality liquor in China are brewed using the traditional Daqu method.

In view of the large amount of quarts used in the production of liquor, the fermentation cycle is long, more food consumption, labor intensity, etc., so people are committed to the research of microorganisms of large quarts, to explore the process of quaking microbial growth and distribution of the law, looking for large quarts and the relationship between the flavor of the liquor, the trial production of pure varieties of large quarts and strengthened quarts and the application of mechanical quaking to reduce the labor intensity and improve the working conditions.

Two, the small song

Small song is also known as wine medicine, white medicine. White medicine, wine cake, etc., is made of rice flour or rice bran as raw materials, add a small amount of Chinese herbs or spicy polygonum, inoculated with the mother of the song, artificially controlled culture temperature. Because the particles are small, it is customary to call it Xiaoqu. Quill mainly contains root mold, trichoderma, yeast and other microorganisms. One of the root molds of the saccharification ability is very strong, and has a certain wine enzyme activity, it is often used as a small white wine and yellow wine saccharification fermentation agent, such as the production of small white wine with the Qionglai rice crackers, Guangdong wine cake are excellent varieties of yellow wine brewing with the varieties of smallquot. Due to the fact that the method of making small quarts has been passed down from generation to generation, the microorganisms in the small quarts have been screened repeatedly, so that the small quarts can maintain their excellent quality.

In the process of making small quarts, some Chinese herbs were often added in the past to promote the growth and reproduction of brewing microorganisms and to increase the flavor of the wine, but the research has been done in order to save costs and to prevent the blind use of Chinese herbs. At present, it has been reduced or even not added Chinese herbs, and made into a drug-free small song (drug-free bran song), also obtaining satisfactory results.

The white wine brewed with the little song has a mellow flavor, elegant aroma and unique style. Because of the rice raw material, ethyl lactate, ethyl acetate, β-phenylethanol, etc. formed in the process of alcohol generation are its main flavor substances, which determines the typical style of Xiaoqu Baijiu. Guilin Sanshua Wine, Guangxi Xiangshan Wine, Guangdong Changle Burning, etc. are all the top grade of Xiaoqu Baijiu, and Dongjiu is also partly brewed with Xiaoqu.

At the same time, people also often use small quartz to brew nutritious yellow wine or prepare Shaoxing wine with rice wine mother, as well as the production of sweet, semi-sweet sealing cylinder wine, Xiangxue wine, sinking cylinder wine and so on, relying on the role of saccharification type amylase contained in the root mold, can make the glucose content of the sweet type of yellow wine reaches more than 20%.

Three, the red song

Red song is a kind of special song of China's yellow wine brewing, which uses rice as raw material and is cultivated by inoculation of the mother of the song. It mainly contains microorganisms such as Aspergillus oryzae and yeast, and has the dual role of saccharification and fermentation. The wine brewed with red yeast is called red wine, which has the characteristics of bright color and mellow taste. Because of the secretion of red pigment (C23H24O5) and yellow pigment (C17H24O4) by Aspergillus erythropolis, it is also commonly used in curd, traditional Chinese medicine, food, etc. It also has a certain antimicrobial and antiseptic ability. One of them is Aspergillus erythropolis, Aspergillus niger and molds and yeast *** raw made of currant. The yellow-coated red currant is the currant made of Aspergillus erythropolis, Aspergillus flavus and yeast **** birth. They are resistant to temperature and acid, and have a stronger saccharification and fermentation power than red currant. It is commonly used to produce yellow wine in Zhejiang and Fujian areas.

Fourth, wheat qu

Wheat quartz is a more common quartz consumed in China's brewing industry, it is based on wheat as a raw material, crushing and water molding, after cultivation of a multi-bacteria composite saccharification fermentation agent. It mainly contains Aspergillus oryzae, Aspergillus flavus, Rhizopus oryzae, Trichoderma reesei and a small amount of yeast and bacteria, etc. It mainly plays the role of saccharification and aroma-enhancement in the brewing of yellow wine, which makes yellow wine with special aroma and mellow wine flavor. According to the different production methods of malt, it is also divided into treading, hanging, grass color, popping malt and pure seed raw malt, pure seed ripe malt, and so on. It is also used in the production of yellow wine.

V. Bran

Bran to bran as the main raw material, inoculated with mold to expand the culture and become, it is mainly used in the production of bran liquor, as a saccharification agent. The use of bran instead of large and small to produce white wine, is the liberation of the implementation of a new production method, its main advantage is the strong saccharification of bran, raw material starch utilization rate of up to 80% or more, there are significant results in grain saving, bran method of white wine fermentation cycle is short, the raw material for a wide range of easy to realize the mechanization of production. At present, the method has been gradually developed by the solid state method of production for the liquid method of production, and the role of liquid quartz or enzyme to replace the bran quartz.