Tapping into the Potential of Kasu, a Sake Byproduct These Chefs Love

For Brooklyn chef Nico Russell, the road to a singular dish that defined the five-year run of his Michelin-star restaurant, Oxalis, started with a garbage bag stuffed with 20 pounds of sake kasu. His first impression of the bag’s contents: “Cheese. Cheese was a big thing. That was one of the biggest takeaways—Parmesan.”

Sake kasu is, of course, not cheese. It’s the spent grains of rice...