"It's perfect for traditional liquor".Domestic barley demand for malt oil surges

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More and more people are looking for old-fashioned Sikhye and Gamju in the so-called grandmother wind.

Thanks to this, demand for domestic barley varieties developed exclusively for malt oil making sikhye has increased significantly.

Reporter Oh Jum-gon covered it.

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malt made by sprouting barley.

When making Sikhye, or Gamju, the first task is to soak this malt in water to extract enzymes.

[Moon Wan-ki / Korea's Sikhye Master No.1 : When dipping, lower the water temperature to 15 degrees Celsius and soak in water for 15 hours. That's why you sugarize the malt with that water.]

After soaking, rice is mixed and saccharified to complete sweet persimmon wine.

Moon Wan-ki, CEO of Sikhye Myung-in No. 1, who follows the traditional method to realize the taste of old grandmothers but is more concerned with the selection of barley, the raw material.

In this place, which values the old taste, it is a barley variety exclusively developed by the Korean Rural Development Administration. I mainly use Hyemi.

The outer barley hyemi for malt oil developed in 2006.

Demand for making sikhye is increasing rapidly these days in line with the purpose of development.

[Choi Hye-sun / Researcher of the National Institute of Food Sciences: Maltese oil made from Hyemi has excellent sugar-fired power. So you can feel the natural sweetness in abundance.]

As a result of consumer analysis, Sikhye made of Hyemi malt oil was evaluated as superior in refreshing and deep taste than conventional barley.

As demand increases, the number of farmers who grow hyemi is also increasing rapidly.

In Gunsan, Jeollabuk-do, where barley is cultivated a lot through contract cultivation with farms, the cultivation area has increased dramatically.

[Kim Sang-ki / Director of Gunsan Agricultural Technology Center: Although it was only about 20ha in 2022, it is expanding to 190ha this year, and the demand is expected to increase further as processors are pioneering overseas markets.]

The Rural Development Administration expects barley production exclusively for malt oil to increase 13 times next year compared to 2022.

I'm Ojeomgon of YTN.