Jokes on me - infected ferment

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Texas Jim
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Jokes on me - infected ferment

Post by Texas Jim »

So I went to more effort than normal to raise the ph of my mash in prep for fermenting. Usually I mess with it during the ferment.

Seems that allowed an infection to take hold. I’m currently at the baby puke smelling stage.

I’ve done the sour corn starter experiment up in the stickied threads and know that the smell will eventually go away. Will the ferment recover at that point, or is it a done deal?

And how do you go about getting rid of 30 gallons of stinky swill?
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NZChris
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Re: Jokes on me - infected ferment

Post by NZChris »

There are two things you can do that are big mistakes. Running it before the vomit smell disappears and kicking the barrel over.

Look up butanoic acid ester.
Texas Jim
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Re: Jokes on me - infected ferment

Post by Texas Jim »

NZChris wrote:There are two things you can do that are big mistakes. Running it before the vomit smell disappears and kicking the barrel over.

Look up butanoic acid ester.
I found one thread on it. Looks like it’s not necessarily a bad thing? Now I just have to get the wife to accept the smell in the garage.
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NZChris
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Re: Jokes on me - infected ferment

Post by NZChris »

MDH
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Re: Jokes on me - infected ferment

Post by MDH »

IMO you can't ester your way out of a butyric acid mess. The thing about esterification is that at a certain point during aging, the speed of esterification tapers off as less free hydrogen ions are available to help it along and a certain aspect of unpleasant-pukiness will remain. In other words the amount of damage that can be repaired by aging plateaus after a certain severity of infection/quantity of offending acid produced.

It could also be he is smelling an excess of autolysis byproduct (normal with yeast) combined with excess diacetyl. Either way it's not something I'd invest any more time in as a serious spirit.

The best you could allow it to do is allow it to ferment dry, run it and treat the stripping product with a strong base like sodium hydroxide, distill it again and then proceed to turn it into a neutral or blending spirit.
The still is not a liar. Mash and ferment quality is 99.9% of your performance.
Texas Jim
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Re: Jokes on me - infected ferment

Post by Texas Jim »

Well, according to everyone, it'll either be the best thing or the worst thing ever. lol
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