Dusul Doga

How It Began

Kim Du-su and Lee Jae-hui, the couple who run Dusul Doga, met in Silicon Valley in the U.S. Both worked there as semiconductor engineers, and Kim worked for a semiconductor-related company for about five years. After marrying, the couple returned to Korea and in 2005 settled in Mungyeong, North Gyeongsang, where they had no prior ties. The place they finally made their home was Wonbuk-ri, Gaeun-eup, below Mt. Huiyangsan.

Rice was what led them to brew. Seeing fellow members of their organic farming community worried because their rice was not selling, they decided to try brewing liquor with the surplus rice, and that was the start of Dusul Doga. There was no family gayangju recipe handed down, and Kim began studying liquor on his own.

Kim began brewing in earnest in 2017. In 2018 he fitted out an empty building in Ajagae Market, Gaeun-eup, as a brewery and hung up the "Dusul Doga" sign. After two years of tasting and refining with the villagers, Huiyangsan Makgeolli was released in 2019. Later the brewery took over the space of a fried chicken shop in the market that had closed, expanding its brewing space (as of 2022).

The "Du" in the name is both du (斗), a large measure, as in mal-sul (drinking by the bucketful), and the "Du" of Du Kang (杜康), the Chinese god of liquor. Kim said with a laugh that the most important meaning of all is the "Du" of his own name, Kim Du-su. "Suldoga" means a house that makes liquor and sells it wholesale. Dusul Doga is a "husband-and-wife brewery" run jointly by Kim Du-su and Lee Jae-hui.

How the Liquor Is Made

The ingredients of Huiyangsan Makgeolli are simple: non-glutinous rice grown organically in Huiyangsan Village, Korean wheat nuruk and yeast. The ingredients registered on The Sool for Huiyangsan Makgeolli 15 are likewise just four, purified water, rice (domestic), nuruk (domestic) and yeast, and it is labeled as a sweetener-free product.

The method is iyangju: a base mash is brewed, then a second mash is added. According to production information reported by Pressian in 2022, fermentation finishes 3 days after the base mash and 15 days after the second mash. Huiyangsan 15 is aged for another 2–3 months after fermentation ends.

What sets Dusul Doga apart is that it blends its makgeolli. Even when brewed from the same ingredients at the same time, each fermentation tank has a slightly different aroma and flavor, so since its early days the brewery has kept its taste consistent by blending makgeolli from several tanks. Blending takes place at the final finishing (jeseong) stage after fermentation and aging, and the blend ratio is set after tasting each tank. Usually two tanks are blended, but sometimes three or more.

"Oh! Mija-ssi," made with omija, is produced by adding fresh omija juice at the finishing stage. A fruit makgeolli using omija, a Mungyeong specialty, as a secondary ingredient, it is sold only in spring and summer, and as of 2022 it was produced in limited quantities from April to September. It contains no sweeteners, and at 7.8% ABV it is lower than Huiyangsan Makgeolli.

Signature Liquors and Lineage

Dusul Doga's first liquor was "Huiyangsan Makgeolli 15." It went on to add "Huiyangsan Makgeolli 9" and "Oh! Mija-ssi," made with Mungyeong omija, bringing three takju to market. Kim said that because they made the makgeolli for themselves to drink, taste came first: "It's not 6% ABV, it's 9% and 15%." These were the strengths at which it tasted best, he explained.

Huiyangsan Makgeolli 15 is 15% ABV in a 500ml bottle. The Sool describes it as a light, clean makgeolli with faint sweetness and slight sourness, noting that it goes down smoothly despite being 15%. Huiyangsan Makgeolli 9 comes in a 750ml bottle (as of 2022).

Even the bottle label comes from within the village. The Huiyangsan Makgeolli label is the work of children's book author Jeon Mi-hwa, a neighbor in the same village and a member of the Huiyangsan community. Jeon is the children's author of books such as "Miyeong-i" and "Daedanhan Chamoessi" (The Amazing Melon Seed). Kim said he chose to pay the author part of the makgeolli sales as a royalty.