Multi Grain Potato Vodka

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Re: Multi Grain Potato Vodka

Post by jedneck »

cranky wrote:Just my 2 cents but I think you need to ferment the mush as straight potatoes and use a steam stripper to distill.
I'll add 2 cents to that.
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Re: Multi Grain Potato Vodka

Post by Jimbo »

jedneck wrote:
cranky wrote:Just my 2 cents but I think you need to ferment the mush as straight potatoes and use a steam stripper to distill.
I'll add 2 cents to that.
...and 0.02 more. Shit man, that makes almost a nickle's worth. Now ya gotta do sweet tater all grain....er...all tater.
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Re: Multi Grain Potato Vodka

Post by jedneck »

http://www.culturesforhealth.com/sweet- ... fly-recipe" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;" rel="nofollow
Or plan B
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Re: Multi Grain Potato Vodka

Post by cranky »

Jimbo wrote:
jedneck wrote:
cranky wrote:Just my 2 cents but I think you need to ferment the mush as straight potatoes and use a steam stripper to distill.
I'll add 2 cents to that.
...and 0.02 more. Shit man, that makes almost a nickle's worth. Now ya gotta do sweet tater all grain....er...all tater.
I'm guessing you went to public school
2+2+2= 5
:moresarcasm:

I bet we could get it up to 2 bits worth if we try and maybe MCH will do it.
Now I need to add sweet potatoes to my list, actually it has been there for a long time.
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Re: Multi Grain Potato Vodka

Post by MichiganCornhusker »

WWHBD?

So it shall be, the Muse, along with Cranky, Jimbo, and Jed, has spoken.
Not sure how much water I will need to add to get this thin enough to ferment, but I will go for the All-Spud Sweet Potato Shine.
As I mentioned, I had been going back and forth on this already. But the whole time there was this whisper in my ear, a foreshadowing, a voice in the back of my mind encouraging be to do a straight tate.

It was HalfBaked. As one of the first to welcome me to the site, he is always a silent, all knowing, yet unknowing, mentor for me.
He is always a staunch proponent of the blend... brew up single grain (tuber) whiskeys and then blend as you like.
So cheers, HB, and thanks guys for helping me find my way.

Ive got almost 200# (fully) baked up, skinned, and ready to go. Will be pitching yeast tonight on their naked flesh. Will keep y'all posted.

Whether it was my sixth sense, or your 6 cents, sometimes ya just gotta grab life by the tates!
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Re: Multi Grain Potato Vodka

Post by Brutal »

MichiganCornhusker wrote:WWHBD?

So it shall be, the Muse, along with Cranky, Jimbo, and Jed, has spoken.
Not sure how much water I will need to add to get this thin enough to ferment, but I will go for the All-Spud Sweet Potato Shine.
As I mentioned, I had been going back and forth on this already. But the whole time there was this whisper in my ear, a foreshadowing, a voice in the back of my mind encouraging be to do a straight tate.

It was HalfBaked. As one of the first to welcome me to the site, he is always a silent, all knowing, yet unknowing, mentor for me.
He is always a staunch proponent of the blend... brew up single grain (tuber) whiskeys and then blend as you like.
So cheers, HB, and thanks guys for helping me find my way.

Ive got almost 200# (fully) baked up, skinned, and ready to go. Will be pitching yeast tonight on their naked flesh. Will keep y'all posted.

Whether it was my sixth sense, or your 6 cents, sometimes ya just gotta grab life by the tates!
Brutal approves of this message. I'm a little short at the moment.. I'll owe ya the 2 cents.
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Re: Multi Grain Potato Vodka

Post by MichiganCornhusker »

Watered down the mush. I've got 2 barrels fermenting, one came in at OG 1.033, the other at OG 1.029. Not too bad.
The thinner batch seems to be fermenting ok, bubbling and developing a cap.
The thicker batch has good yeast action, but it is all sitting on top of the mush. Maybe still too thick, I may need to thin it out further. Will see how today goes and decide later.
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Re: Multi Grain Potato Vodka

Post by Jimbo »

When I did the wheat flour ferment it was pretty thick. Viscosity like a 5W20. It fermented fine. Them yeasties arent bothered by a little soup to swim through.
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Re: Multi Grain Potato Vodka

Post by MichiganCornhusker »

Well I'm trying to keep my fingers out of it.
It does have a big orange cap, and I hear gas escaping, so I guess it's doing just fine on its own.
sweet cap.JPG
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Re: Multi Grain Potato Vodka

Post by firewater69 »

that looks good MCH! :thumbup: :thumbup:
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Re: Multi Grain Potato Vodka

Post by MichiganCornhusker »

Jimbo wrote:When I did the wheat flour ferment it was pretty thick. Viscosity like a 5W20. It fermented fine. Them yeasties arent bothered by a little soup to swim through.
Yep, I guess nature has her ways.
Checked in on the mashed taters today and found a quiet eerie orange volcanic moonscape.
active.JPG
Got a clean spoon and went digging.
I wanted to just pull aside some of the cap to see if there was activity below.
In the first barrel I had to dig about 6" down, in the other barrel I had do dig even further, about 10".
But, in each case discovered very liquid, foamy, active fermentation.

Apparently nature's way with a very thick mush is to attach a little CO2 to the solids, let them float up and out of suspension, creating a very fermentable, liquid environment for the yeast below.
I realize this is always the case with a cap, but never had one this thick and heavy!
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Re: Multi Grain Potato Vodka

Post by yakattack »

Good to know mch. Consider this added to the list. Now need to find cheap sweet potatos.

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Re: Multi Grain Potato Vodka

Post by MichiganCornhusker »

Great success!
I don't know how I keep forgetting how much work tater shine is.
With the barrels fermented out to about FG 1.006, I racked off the clear and filtered it getting 10 gallons from the 2 barrels.
That left 25 gallons of sweet potato beer slops left in the barrels. I don't think there would have been any way to strain what was left.

I started by running all of the slops with my steam stripper rig, filling the boiler with water and running 5 gallons of slop at a time in the thump keg.
Started coming off around 20% abv and I collected waaayyyy down, to maybe 5-10%. Went through a lot of propane, but I knew with a low OG and highish FG that I needed to collect everything I could.
From the 25 gallons of slop I collected around 4 gallons of low wines at around 10% average abv.

I charged my thumper with plain water and did a spirit run. I pulled 1 bottle of sweet tater shine from the hearts of this run at 90 proof.

Then I ran the 10 gallons of clear tater beer that I had racked off, filling the boiler with the beer, and starting with water in the thump.
Collected about 2 gallons of low wines. Then I combined these low wines with everything left over from the slop runs, and ran it all through the boiler/thumper again.
It started coming off at 140 proof, and I collected down till I saw oils on the jars and quit.

Pulled 2 more bottles of 90 proof from the hearts, then mixed up one more bottle from a mix of heads and tails.
My hearts cut was very conservative, so the heads & tails bottle is actually quite acceptable.

So, 4 fifths total from pure sweet potato goodness!
The first one, from the slops hearts, has the most tater flavor, so the steam stripper works great for bringing over flavors from sloppy mashes.

Coming off the still, this stuff smells a lot like yam juice, but the taste is much smoother, creamier. Still more fruity than white potatoes, but not nearly as crazy as the yams.

All in all, I'm super happy with how this turned out, and want to thank you guys for encouraging me to do the straight tate shine!!
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Re: Multi Grain Potato Vodka

Post by Kegg_jam »

Nice job.

Don't think I'd have the patients to see that through.
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Re: Multi Grain Potato Vodka

Post by cranky »

Good deal MCH :thumbup: I hope you bring some of that out to the PNW this summer :D
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Re: Multi Grain Potato Vodka

Post by Johnny6 »

Congratulations on getting all the way through it. I love reading your project threads. Always an inspiration.
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Re: Multi Grain Potato Vodka

Post by Jimbo »

MichiganCornhusker wrote:
All in all, I'm super happy with how this turned out, and want to thank you guys for encouraging me to do the straight tate shine!!
Congrats MCH! Im sure it's amazing. And now I have a selfish reason to refresh the standing invitation to you.... LOL This bottle of ginger hooch is still sittin here aging gracefully for ya too, along with whatever other distilled beverages interest ya in my stash brother.
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Re: Multi Grain Potato Vodka

Post by MichiganCornhusker »

Fermenting the remainder of my sweet potato pile, and it looks like this one, for better or worse, is gonna be a lacto tater run...
sweet lacto.JPG
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Re: Multi Grain Potato Vodka

Post by jedneck »

MichiganCornhusker wrote:Fermenting the remainder of my sweet potato pile, and it looks like this one, for better or worse, is gonna be a lacto tater run...
sweet lacto.JPG
Yummy funky taters. Can't wait to try more of your misguided creations.
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Re: Multi Grain Potato Vodka

Post by g4ogami »

Some advise please gents.
I've been making my vodka wash so far using 8kg of sugar in a 25L bucket with vodka yeast.

I'm keen on trying to make the wash with sweet potato.
Though as I'll be using less potato is there a formula or method to figure how much sugar I should use when using potatoes?
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Re: Multi Grain Potato Vodka

Post by skow69 »

You could prepare your sweet potatoes, however you plan to, put in water to, say, 20 litres, test the SG, and add sugar until you get to the % ABV you want. As indicated by the SG.
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Re: Multi Grain Potato Vodka

Post by g4ogami »

skow69 wrote:You could prepare your sweet potatoes, however you plan to, put in water to, say, 20 litres, test the SG, and add sugar until you get to the % ABV you want. As indicated by the SG.
Cheers :D skow69 i'm gonna try 1kg of sweet potato, 3.5kg of Molasses and 21L of water. Still trying to figure the amount of barley i'm gonna use. Looking at MCHs instructions i did not spot any clearing agent. Hands up i'm still an amateur so excuse my obvious questions :oops: . I still use turbo clear in all my ventures. So far so good though willing to try other options.
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Re: Multi Grain Potato Vodka

Post by LWTCS »

cranky wrote:Just my 2 cents but I think you need to ferment the mush as straight potatoes and use a steam stripper to distill.
Agree. Or can use a thumper. So the primary as the steam generator and the thumper for your beer. Agitator on the thumper would help I bet?
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Re: Multi Grain Potato Vodka

Post by MichiganCornhusker »

g4ogami wrote:Looking at MCHs instructions i did not spot any clearing agent.
I used only potatoes for all batches, no sugar, no clearing agents.

Based on my limited experience, I would say that the white potatoes produce a more subtle product and might not be as tasty with the addition of sugar.

The sweet potatoes have much more flavor, lots of fruity notes, and you might be able to get away with the addition of sugar with them. Sure would help with yield!

I stripped my early white potato ferments in a pot still with gas, had no trouble with scorching.
Later I stripped with my thumper setup, water in the boiler and tater glop in the thumper. It never really settled out, I don't know of anything that would help clear potato mush.

Good luck, g4ogami, let us know how it goes.
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Re: Multi Grain Potato Vodka

Post by g4ogami »

MichiganCornhusker wrote:
g4ogami wrote:Looking at MCHs instructions i did not spot any clearing agent.
I used only potatoes for all batches, no sugar, no clearing agents.

Based on my limited experience, I would say that the white potatoes produce a more subtle product and might not be as tasty with the addition of sugar.

The sweet potatoes have much more flavor, lots of fruity notes, and you might be able to get away with the addition of sugar with them. Sure would help with yield!

I stripped my early white potato ferments in a pot still with gas, had no trouble with scorching.
Later I stripped with my thumper setup, water in the boiler and tater glop in the thumper. It never really settled out, I don't know of anything that would help clear potato mush.

Good luck, g4ogami, let us know how it goes.

So here goes...

8kg Sweet Potatoes
5L NAF Molasses
2 x 25L buckets

started by peeling 2kg of sweet potatoes. Only to realise that shaved 250g off the 2Kg. After which i washed the lightly scrubbed the potatoes to rid them of dirt.
Then blitzed them down ready to boil https://photos.app.goo.gl/n5bmEbnsdm47Jc5g2
After boiling adding the HT enzyme to break down the starch into sugars. https://photos.app.goo.gl/lcExoudlFP6szWEH3
Prepare the bucket with 2L of Molasses and 3L of boiling water then adding the sweet potato soup https://photos.app.goo.gl/HlrpbJaBweMvyQtm1
Top with water to 25L let cool add carbon and distillers Vodka Yeast sit back and wait https://photos.app.goo.gl/EdDukQjW0K5Plzb32
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Re: Multi Grain Potato Vodka

Post by thecroweater »

And how was the yield MCH , how much produced what?
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Re: Multi Grain Potato Vodka

Post by g4ogami »

Ensigns log star date 95392.2

Suspecting time to rack off both barrels. The wash from barrel 1 smells very funky almost cheesy gravity is 1.014. I want to keep for longer but fear losing the lot due to the funk.

Barrel 2 on the other hand smells sweet like a westmalle dubbel. Measured the gravity and it's clocked in at 1.016. As I started these together I'm going to rack them off together.

Added clearing agent to both and shall siphon of in 24hrs wish me luck my father in law is visiting this week. He's been brewing his own for ages. Fingers crossed the spirit run shall be complete before he arrives so we can assess the initial quality.
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Re: Multi Grain Potato Vodka

Post by MichiganCornhusker »

Good luck, let us know how it goes.

I never put my white tater shine on oak, but I did my sweet potato and it turned out great.

Crow, I don't have any notes, but I want to say that I felt like I got a lot more from the sweet taters that I ever did from the whites. You just gotta make sure they're sweet potatoes, not yams. Yams give up even less than the white potatoes.
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Re: Multi Grain Potato Vodka

Post by g4ogami »

Bad news chaps. Made a rookie mistake in my method and did not add enough sugar to help the fermentation. chucked all 50L away time to start from scratch.
New receipe will either be 4kg Sweet potato & 5kg Molasses or 4kg Sweet potato & 5kg of white sugar.
To aid in removing potato from the wash i shall bag them in muslin sacks. Now i just need to figure out when to take the potatoes out of the wash.
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Re: Multi Grain Potato Vodka

Post by g4ogami »

Well update on Greg Sweet Potato V2. So chopped up 4kg of tatters boiled them up and added enzymes. In my 25L bucket i threw in 6kg of sugar and hot water stirred it until it becomes a syrup.
Once the tatters are ready i added it in the bucket. Adding in the yeast and letting her do her thang. I've now got to the spirit run phase and its coming out at 40%. will let you know how it tastes.
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