# Replacing sake with vodka



## ordo (Mar 19, 2009)

I heard that you can replace cooking sake with diluted vodka and may be a pinch of sugar. Any experience, advice or alternatives? Sake is getting expensive and difficult to find here.


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## phatch (Mar 29, 2002)

I'd go with a mirin next, then chinese rice spirt/wine if I could. And for the chinese wine, dry sherry is often substituted so give that a shot too. 

Vodka has next to no flavor so all you're really adding with that is the alcohol, and a lot more of it than would come along with the sake or any of the other choices.


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## cheflayne (Aug 21, 2004)

Depends on the recipe and what the role of the sake is and whether leftover wine is an issue and what you want to drink as a result, but offhand I would suggest dry vermouth or a dry grassy type sauvignon blanc, muscadet, or extra brut champagne.


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## ordo (Mar 19, 2009)

I'm looking for a low acidity alcohol. Wines and Champagne have high acidity (from pH 3 to pH 4) and lower alcohol than sake. Sake range goes from pH 0.7 to pH 1.2. I see now that vodka is also much more acidic than sake.

We have some cooking Chinese wines tho, but of lousy quality. I may post some picks of the rice wines we can actually get.

I have also access to this wine:



And this Californian sake:



And this Korean sake:



Anyone worth?


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## petemccracken (Sep 18, 2008)

Clarification please: are you looking for low acidity (pH greater than, say 4.0) or low pH (pH around 1 or high acidity), the lower the pH, the higher the acidity.


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## ordo (Mar 19, 2009)

PeteMcCracken said:


> Clarification please: are you looking for low acidity (pH greater than, say 4.0) or low pH (pH around 1 or high acidity), the lower the pH, the higher the acidity.


You're right sir. I mixed up unities. 0.7 to 1.2 is the Sando acidity, not the pH.

Sake's pH should be about 7 to 8.2, much more alkaline than wine and similar.


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