My infected Rum

[dukethebeagle120]

you are right der wo
i had a corn mash a while back that smelled to high hell of vinegar.
but i had 40 gallons of it.
i stripped 15 gallons and had good alcohol content
so i stripped the rest
in the end it was sweet and really great tasting corn likker.
so to say,just cause it smells bad,
don`t mean its no good.
that was one of my best corn likkers

[Shine0n]

Der wo, have you had any progress with this experiment?
I've read till my eyes were blurry about bret, lacto and some others I can't pronounce. Lol
Just wondering how yours is going? Good or bad?

[der wo]

Mash No. 2 & 3:

I decided to take the risk to not sterilize the dunder for mashing and to ferment open only covered with a cloth.
Each 25% (volume) blackstrap molasses + 40% water + 35% live dunder (already diluted 45% dunder + 55% water). Garden chalk, nutrients and fresh bakers yeast. Both buckets started off as usual. Fermentation was fast because of the hot temps here at the moment.
The fermentation is finished now since a few days. No visible infection up to now. I added now one cup of fresh infected dunder to each mash. Perhaps this helps. All in all, despite the hot temps, to infect grain seems much easier and faster than to infect Rum.

[Jes2xu]

I just see you have a new video, silly ideas about sanitizing fermenters...
Courageous of you to post here on enemy's ground. Don't forget to sanitize your hands after posting here.

HAHAH Fair enough dude.

"Enemy" or not this stuff is cool, and about as far away from what I know as you could get (I guess a bret beer would be my closest). So like I said pretty cool to be able to follow along for me.

Yeah for sure UNCLEAN! UNCLEAN
A fair portion of brewers that do any type of souring will have 2 separate set ups. Because apparently, even PBW and star san won't "make it safe". I dont go that far haha!

But really, even with this sort of fermenting it would be hard to argue that good cleaning and sanitizing would not yield more reliable results. Both for development and "production". I am in no way suggesting anyone should tho haha.


anyway . . . . what I really wanted to ask was do you think the higher temps would change a whole lot more than just the speed of fermentation? For example, do the higher temps seem to favor the baker's yeast more and allow them to compete more aggressively in regards to the other beasties (or vice versa)?

[der wo]

A fair portion of brewers that do any type of souring will have 2 separate set ups. Because apparently, even PBW and star san won't "make it safe". And hot temperature wouldn't help? We have always the possibility to pour our hot backset fresh from the still into the fermenter.

anyway . . . . what I really wanted to ask was do you think the higher temps would change a whole lot more than just the speed of fermentation? For example, do the higher temps seem to favor the baker's yeast more and allow them to compete more aggressively in regards to the other beasties (or vice versa)? No. Also at normal room temperature the bakers yeast would supress everything else very easily as long there are fermentable sugars. But after the main fermentation I think the hot temp helps the infection to grow and to produce fast the acids. Also the development of the dunder pit is faster I think.

[Jes2xu]

A fair portion of brewers that do any type of souring will have 2 separate set ups. Because apparently, even PBW and star san won't "make it safe". And hot temperature wouldn't help? We have always the possibility to pour our hot backset fresh from the still into the fermenter.

anyway . . . . what I really wanted to ask was do you think the higher temps would change a whole lot more than just the speed of fermentation? For example, do the higher temps seem to favor the baker's yeast more and allow them to compete more aggressively in regards to the other beasties (or vice versa)? No. Also at normal room temperature the bakers yeast would supress everything else very easily as long there are fermentable sugars. But after the main fermentation I think the hot temp helps the infection to grow and to produce fast the acids. Also the development of the dunder pit is faster I think.

Ah no that was me poking fun at other brewers. Meaning I dont subscribe to that. I have no problem fermenting with something funky, cleaning it out killing everything off then fermenting "clean" in it.

Cool thanks. Looking forward to being able to mess with this kind of thing.

[Vanmark]

Thought I'd drop in to relate my own progress.

My process:

A ferment of molasses, cane sugar and dunder straight from the still. Inoculated with live dunder three days into the fermentation, stripped and then diluted with live dunder to 28% for the spirit run. The fermentation is restarted after the stripping run using the existing yeast bed and a very small amount of new bakers yeast.

I did my fourth spirit run last week and each generation seems to be getting stronger in terms of flavour. I'm still a far cry from some of the crazy rums I have tried but I suspect a good part of that lost flavour has to be due to the more conservative cuts that I am making. Some of the crazy flavours I've tried so far start off nice but end with a distinct heads or tails twang.

One thing I've learned through this process is that the smell, taste, and look of the fermentation can sometimes be quite scary but end in a nice product. Via esterification of stinky carboxylic acids some horrible vomit smells end up quite fruiting after distilling. I would suggest it is never worth dumping a ferment. It may not produce what you expected but it may be all the more interesting for it.

[der wo]

A ferment of molasses, cane sugar and dunder straight from the still. Inoculated with live dunder three days into the fermentation, stripped and then diluted with live dunder to 28% for the spirit run. The fermentation is restarted after the stripping run using the existing yeast bed and a very small amount of new bakers yeast. The dunder started an alcohol fermentation without adding new sugar? Strange.

I did my fourth spirit run last week and each generation seems to be getting stronger in terms of flavour. I'm still a far cry from some of the crazy rums I have tried but I suspect a good part of that lost flavour has to be due to the more conservative cuts that I am making. Some of the crazy flavours I've tried so far start off nice but end with a distinct heads or tails twang. My advice for more taste is a flavorful wash (only molasses, no sugar) and flavorful low wines (not too low wash abv and a very long stripping run (per 10l wash 3.3l low wines)). And then a very conservative tails cut and perhaps rectification. This is my method for flavorful AND clean spirits. An infected dunder is something additional. It cannot replace something.

One thing I've learned through this process is that the smell, taste, and look of the fermentation can sometimes be quite scary but end in a nice product. Via esterification of stinky carboxylic acids some horrible vomit smells end up quite fruiting after distilling. Yes. And I remember incredible strong cheese smells of infected backset. I would suggest it is never worth dumping a ferment. It may not produce what you expected but it may be all the more interesting for it.

[Vanmark]

The dunder started an alcohol fermentation without adding new sugar? Strange.

No, to the yeast bed I add dunder from the still, water, sugar, molasses and then two to three days later some live dunder.

My advice for more taste is a flavorful wash (only molasses, no sugar) and flavorful low wines (not too low wash abv and a very long stripping run (per 10l wash 3.3l low wines)). And then a very conservative tails cut and perhaps rectification. This is my method for flavorful AND clean spirits. An infected dunder is something additional. It cannot replace something.

Interesting that you recommend a higher ABV wash. Could you go in to that further? Mine should be around 8.5% abv based on the change in S.G. From a 20L wash stripped to 10% I get 5L at 36%. 20L@8.5%=5L@36% (more or less). How are you getting such a yield of low wines from 10l?? Are you running past alcohol and distilling the water in the dunder? Are you up at 15 or 18% for your ferments??

[Vanmark]

Also, living in denmark, we probably have access to similar supplies. What are you using for your molasses? Through work I'm ordering fancy organic molasses and cane sugar which is quite expensive...

But I have found some animal feed molasses that is said to be from sugar cane and not beet root. I'll be looking to try that once this cycle is finished.

[Saltbush Bill]

I have found some animal feed molasses that is said to be from sugar cane and not beet root.

If you can get that, use it, and leave out the sugar, you will then get a much fuller flavor in my experience.

[Shine0n]

Fuller flavor Wow!!! With the recipe I use 2 gal feed moll and 16 lbs dark brown sugar (15 gallon wash) it's packed with flavor. I'll try an all molasses wash one day soon just to compare, I can't imagine too much more flavor though as it's already a bit pungent but buttery and molasses-e.
I couldn't afford fancy all the time here that's why I ended up using feed, feed moll here is at 43-46% sugar and I'm not sure exactly what % is fermentable?

My wash finished in 3 days and is now on day 7 so I'm hoping to get it ran so I can start my dunder pit, start a new wash and start filling my 55 gal drum in stages inviting an infection. There is lacto available due to all my AG ferments so I'm hoping for that to take ahold we'll see as I'm still learning about them.

Shine0n

[Shine0n]

Der wo, you mentioned the potatoes and I'm wondering if you washed it? Cut it into pieces or skinned it or just put a whole potato in the wash? I'm digging my spuds up tonight and I'm wondering, what if I added it 4 days after fermentation? Could it still have an impact or should I wait for the dunder and a new ferment?

[der wo]

Interesting that you recommend a higher ABV wash. Could you go in to that further? Mine should be around 8.5% abv based on the change in S.G. From a 20L wash stripped to 10% I get 5L at 36%. 20L@8.5%=5L@36% (more or less). How are you getting such a yield of low wines from 10l?? Are you running past alcohol and distilling the water in the dunder? Are you up at 15 or 18% for your ferments??

Not such high abv. But I don't see a reason to go under 10% when the goal is flavor. Many here aim for a 6% wash. Especially when they make grain spirits. This is something I don't understand. "Water is the best filter". Yes, and a 6% wash is the same like a 10% wash but with more water, so it will produce less flavor.

An enlightening experiment is:
Make a wash/mash/must for 5% alcohol. And make exactly the same again, but add refined sugar for 5% more. In theory the 5% version should have twice the flavor than the 10% version. But in practice the 10% version isn't such bad. Yes, it has less flavor, but not half.
What I want to say: A higher abv has a higher extraction of flavor. Good or bad depends on what you want to get at the end. The amount of water you use for mashing is a tool to influence the flavor strength.

When you have 100l 10%abv and you strip very long, something like 35l (yes, this is down to 0%abv), then you have 28%abv low wines. This gives you much space for dilution with infected dunder before the spirit run, without needing a third run. If you only have 7%abv, you will have to stop the stripping early and you will not be able to add much dunder, or you need three runs, what again reduces flavor.

[der wo]

Der wo, you mentioned the potatoes and I'm wondering if you washed it? Cut it into pieces or skinned it or just put a whole potato in the wash? I'm digging my spuds up tonight and I'm wondering, what if I added it 4 days after fermentation? Could it still have an impact or should I wait for the dunder and a new ferment?

I washed it a bit with cold water. I didn't peel it. I chopped it a bit.
It's never too late for an infection. But it needs time. If you want to strip it now, run it. You can always do something like dilute the low wines with infected dunder. When you read my infection threads, this is the most effective way anyway to get those flavors IMO.

[Shine0n]

On one of those links Odin stated the same thing, it's easier to control the dunder not the wash.
So that's my plan is to strip the first and try to infect the dunder and add to low wines.
Thanks for these threads,
Shine0n

[der wo]

On one of those links Odin stated the same thing, it's easier to control the dunder not the wash.
So that's my plan is to strip the first and try to infect the dunder and add to low wines.

And I experienced exactly the same like him: It's not only obviously safer to infect the dunder and add it to the low wines, but it's also way more effective. It causes much more esterification this way. My conclusion of my other two threads about infections was, that if I don't want to experiment but only produce a high ester spirit, I wouldn't mess with infecting the wash or mash, I would infect dunder and add it to the low wines.

My experience is that, when using fresh backset right of the still to start up a new generation, the backset does not add much to the taste. At least the true "sour mash" taste that sour mash whiskey has, is not obviously present in my results.My (current) conclusion is this: that the sour mash taste comes over mostly from bacterial activity. And I know many sour mash pro distillers add bacteria on the last day of their 3 day fermentation cycle.
But there may be another solution. If you want sour mash taste. Not long ago I wanted to do a finishing run, but my low wines ... weren't enough. Yet, I still had some 20 liters of hot backset from the last strip run, just finished, in the boiler. I added the 20 liters of low wines to the 20 liters of backs-set and did a potstill finishing run on that.
Result? All the sour mash taste you could look for. In fact it was too much!
So my conclusions are that sour mashing is great to create the right environment for the new fermentation cycle to start off (nutrients, ph, etc.), but that for the real sour mash taste, you need to leave some backset in the boiler. Or add some backset to the low wines prior to the finishing run. Not 50/50 as I did, but maybe 25/75. Or add bacteria, at some stage during the ferment, but my experience is that that's hard to control. Before you know it, you have a full scale infection and you can start all over again.

[Shine0n]

That's the exact route I'll take, I'm going to run this rum Friday and start the dunder process.

[Vanmark]

Der wo, you mentioned the potatoes and I'm wondering if you washed it? Cut it into pieces or skinned it or just put a whole potato in the wash? I'm digging my spuds up tonight and I'm wondering, what if I added it 4 days after fermentation? Could it still have an impact or should I wait for the dunder and a new ferment?

I'm pretty sure that the bacteria you are looking for is in the soil itself and not in the potato. I would toss it in dirty as can be.

If you're looking to kick start a dunder I have had success with cheese. Two of the key precursor acids for fruity esters are propanoic acid, which is produced by bacteria that create holes in cheese (swiss cheese) and butyric which is created as cheese is putrefying. I saw more action in my dunder bucket in the week after adding cheese than the month leading up and allowing it to do its own thing.

der wo, are you using feed molasses or regular store bought stuff? And are you clarifying before fermentation?

[der wo]

I use the potato, because I have read, that you can produce easy butyric acid with the clostridia of potatos. You can find many "recipes" with google "potato butyric acid experiment". For example simple chop it and drop it in a jar with water and wait. Or drill a hole in a potato, fill it with soil and then drop it in a jar with water. Perhaps a good idea would be to make a clostridia starter jar, let it grow without competitors a month and then add it to the pit.

I also used cheese for my infected peated malt whisky. Yes, take one with holes. Only cheese with holes has propionic bacterias.

I use blackstrap molasses:
http://www.ebay.de/itm/Melasse-10-Liter ... Sw44BYjexo" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;" rel="nofollow
"28-30% water - min. 45% sugar"
Simply solving in hot water and topping up with cold water.

[der wo]

Stripping wash No. 2 & 3. Comparing. Adding dunder to low wines. Comparing.


Although the washes didn't show any active infection, I decided to run them after 12 days, because I had a free day.

Smell test low wines:
---Low wines 1 (uninfected): More musty and of course less fruity than the infected ones.
---Low wines 2 (wash infected with yoghurt starter): Surprisingly here I got some typical rum-aroma flavor, like you can buy for bakery. I thought this would be related to propionic bacterias not lactic (yoghurt) bacterias. The fruitiness is very strong and very pleasant. If I would want to drink low wines, I would choose this one.
---Low wines 3 (wash infected with an old infected malt backset bucket and raw potato): The fruitiness is much darker and less sharp than No.2. Perhaps mild tropical fruits. But less fruity than No.2, what surprises me, because this infection looked much heavier.

I added then almost 3l dunder per 10l low wines. Belonging dunder, the yoghurt dunder to the yoghurt low wines and the potato dunder to the potato low wines. I hoped for a huge fruit flavor explosion like I got with my other two grain infection experiments, when I diluted low wines with backset. But unfortunately here the added dunder has still such a massive molasses flavor, that I am not able to identify the fruit flavors better than before adding the dunder.

I will do the spirit run soon.

[der wo]

How the dunder pits look at the moment:

yoghurt

potato and old backset bucket

I now diluted the fresh dunder from the stripping runs 1:1 with water and added it to the two dunder pits. This destroyed the pellicle. But I am sure it will grow again fast.
And I started a new dunder pit, No.3, infected with all kinds of soil I have at home and a raw potato. I will make three sugarheads with those three dunders.

[Shine0n]

Looks good der wo, keep up the " interesting work"

I'm still reading and researching, I did start my dunder pit Thursday, it has a quilted blanket on the to to keep the mice out but let fresh air in. I have some potatoes so I think I'll add 3 to jump start something.
would it be wise to keep the dirt on them as they were just dug from my garden? I will cut them into 1/4.

The temperature here is 90°f during the day and 70's at night so there is a 30°f difference between night and day.

[der wo]

I think adding soil is useful.
Also adding cheese is probably useful. But I see in another thread you write you want to make two different pits. This is for sure the most interesting way. It seems to me, that you get easily very different results, you can learn something and perhaps you get a complex mix this way. Would you toss everything in one bucket, perhaps one of the bacterias would dominate all others. But as long we have also molasses flavor, it's not so terrible bad, if the infection flavors are one dimensional. But it is also possible, that mixing is the best way, because all those bacterias have different jobs in nature and often benefit from the presence of other bacterias. Perhaps they work together, perhaps they work successively, I don't know. What I can say is, that at the end I never had a fail up to now.

I thought about looking at my infected dunders with a microscope. But I've read it's not simple with bacterias. You need a very good microscope and liquids to color the bacterias. And probably then you only see a very basic information, like if they are rod-shaped or bowl-shaped. And both clostridiae and lactobacillii are rod-shaped. Perhaps I would not be able to prove such basic things.

[Shine0n]

If the new wash is complete tomorrow I'll go ahead and run it and use cheese with the dunder. I'll use Swiss cheese as directed.
Also i have a 7.75 gal keg to use as a boiler for some of these experiments to keep costs down in case they don't turn out so well.
If I choose, only put 7 gallons in boiler and 7 in thumper in one experiment and same on the other using different dunder of course.
I heat with propane so low levels shouldn't be a factor.

[der wo]

I now diluted the fresh dunder from the stripping runs 1:1 with water and added it to the two dunder pits. This destroyed the pellicle. But I am sure it will grow again fast. After 24h both pits have a thick pellicle again.
And I started a new dunder pit, No.3, infected with all kinds of soil I have at home and a raw potato. After 24h there are a few pellicle spots. After 48h the layer is closed. Soil seems to be a very fast and easy way to start an infection.

[Shine0n]

Are there any drawbacks from using soil? I put the potatoes in with some dirt on them but not much! I have rich soil where I'm from, I'm not sure of ph but I need no fertilizer when I plant my garden.

[der wo]

Up to now no drawbacks. But it will need two months until I have low wines from it. I used one or two hands full of soil per 10l dunder.
I will have to decide, if I sterilize it before I add the sugar and the yeast. Probably I will try without sterilizing.

[johnnyv]

Stripping wash No. 2 & 3. Comparing. Adding dunder to low wines. Comparing.


Although the washes didn't show any active infection, I decided to run them after 12 days, because I had a free day.

Smell test low wines:
---Low wines 1 (uninfected): More musty and of course less fruity than the infected ones.
---Low wines 2 (wash infected with yoghurt starter): Surprisingly here I got some typical rum-aroma flavor, like you can buy for bakery. I thought this would be related to propionic bacterias not lactic (yoghurt) bacterias. The fruitiness is very strong and very pleasant. If I would want to drink low wines, I would choose this one.
---Low wines 3 (wash infected with an old infected malt backset bucket and raw potato): The fruitiness is much darker and less sharp than No.2. Perhaps mild tropical fruits. But less fruity than No.2, what surprises me, because this infection looked much heavier.

I added then almost 3l dunder per 10l low wines. Belonging dunder, the yoghurt dunder to the yoghurt low wines and the potato dunder to the potato low wines. I hoped for a huge fruit flavor explosion like I got with my other two grain infection experiments, when I diluted low wines with backset. But unfortunately here the added dunder has still such a massive molasses flavor, that I am not able to identify the fruit flavors better than before adding the dunder.

I will do the spirit run soon.

Seems anything that contains the yeast and molasses I find smells of marmite/vegemite ie sulfurol, after the spirit run a lot less so.

[Shine0n]

This is the pit with potatoes, I see yours has a white top and mine is red like your yogurt backset pit. I wonder why that is?
Anyway, it smell of fruits, not any one in particular but has lots of fruity esters and it seems to be doing fine.
No smell of vinegar, just fruit.
Once I run the next strip, I'll do the cheese (swiss) to start another pit and compare once completed.

Maybe a possible blend of pits to get the best of all later down the road.