Advice needed on Recycling Failed Recipes

Sugar, and all about sugar washes. Where the primary ingredient is sugar, and other things are just used as nutrients.

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C2H5O5
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Advice needed on Recycling Failed Recipes

Post by C2H5O5 »

Advice needed

I made some Limoncella and Orange Dreamsicle that is just plain nasty. I would like to recycle it. I will be using a pot still, then a reflux still going for a neutral.

It's very sweet and was wondering if,

1) I should add it to a ferment (worried about the alcohol killing the yeast)

2) Strip it with a wash (problems with sugar during strip?)

3) strip it with a spirit run (problems with sugar during spirit run?)

I'm leaning towards #2

??
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Re: Advice needed on Recycling Failed Recipes

Post by Opdog »

I screw up a lot.

I have never tried to redistill a failed maceration. If you do it, I think a heavily diluted strip would be the way to go. Go easy with the heat up and see what happens.


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Re: Advice needed on Recycling Failed Recipes

Post by The Baker »

C2H505 said, "I made some Limoncella and Orange Dreamsicle that is just plain nasty. I would like to recycle it. I will be using a pot still, then a reflux still going for a neutral.

It's very sweet and was wondering if,

1) I should add it to a ferment (worried about the alcohol killing the yeast)......

I will be doing something the same (pot still).
With the failed liqueurs I will add them to a ferment of something similar, with sufficient water so the alcohol content is below that of the ferment. Won't take much water.
And I have a large batch of marmalade that is terrible; I will add it a bit at a time to similar (mandarin?) ferments, broken down with some water and after the sugars in the ferment are pretty well munched up by the yeast. It will give the ferment a bit of a boost as it uses the sugars in the marmalade.

Geoff
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Bushman
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Re: Advice needed on Recycling Failed Recipes

Post by Bushman »

Don't add to the ferment until it is time to run, then just add to your next run same as you would with fients.
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NZChris
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Re: Advice needed on Recycling Failed Recipes

Post by NZChris »

Do calculations to work out the abv of the ferment plus recycling and make sure the ferment will easily go to completion. Add the recycling when the ferment is low on sugar but still active.
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skow69
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Re: Advice needed on Recycling Failed Recipes

Post by skow69 »

Trying to referment a finished liqueur might be just asking for heartache. If it works, that's great. But if it looks like trouble, stalls the ferment or something, I would be inclined to just give up and run it as as, whatever that may be at the time. This feels like one of those deals where I end up with a ton of time invested with little or no improvement. But then, I don't have much trouble with scorching sugar like some guys do, so YMMV.
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Re: Advice needed on Recycling Failed Recipes

Post by C2H5O5 »

Thanks for all the help, I'm gonna go with #2 and just divide the failed stuff into a few stripping runs through my pot still.
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NZChris
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Re: Advice needed on Recycling Failed Recipes

Post by NZChris »

C2H5O5 wrote:Thanks for all the help, I'm gonna go with #2 and just divide the failed stuff into a few stripping runs through my pot still.
Depending on the fault and how good your distilling skills are, sometimes that isn't a good idea. Some faults spoil everything you put them in. A couple of bottles of shit you don't like can become ten bottles of shit you don't like. If the fault is acidity because you didn't follow a good method you should be ok because the acid will get left in the boiler, but a flavor issue may carry over and spoil your next strip.
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Re: Advice needed on Recycling Failed Recipes

Post by shadylane »

Just a thought
I hate having to clean unwanted flavors out of a packed column
That's why I avoid redistilling flavored mistakes, such as Limoncella or Orange Dreamsicle
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Re: Advice needed on Recycling Failed Recipes

Post by Truckinbutch »

shadylane wrote:Just a thought
I hate having to clean unwanted flavors out of a packed column
That's why I avoid redistilling flavored mistakes, such as Limoncella or Orange Dreamsicle
A lot to be said for that wisdom .
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Re: Advice needed on Recycling Failed Recipes

Post by The Baker »

shadylane wrote:Just a thought
I hate having to clean unwanted flavors out of a packed column
That's why I avoid redistilling flavored mistakes, such as Limoncella or Orange Dreamsicle
But in the pot still....

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Re: Advice needed on Recycling Failed Recipes

Post by C2H5O5 »

The Baker wrote:
shadylane wrote:Just a thought
I hate having to clean unwanted flavors out of a packed column
That's why I avoid redistilling flavored mistakes, such as Limoncella or Orange Dreamsicle
But in the pot still....

Geoff

Correct, it will be stripped in a pot still then refluxed in my NS Offset with low wines.

The more I think about it, I don't see an issue with it, when I started out, I stripped a lot of my old liquors like peach schnapps...how the hell does someone accumulate so much peach schnapps :D ?
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C2H5O5
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Re: Advice needed on Recycling Failed Recipes

Post by C2H5O5 »

Truckinbutch wrote:
shadylane wrote:Just a thought
I hate having to clean unwanted flavors out of a packed column
That's why I avoid redistilling flavored mistakes, such as Limoncella or Orange Dreamsicle
A lot to be said for that wisdom .
Rub as hard as you want and you still can't polish a turd .
So your saying that it's not worth it to strip the alcohol from unwanted booze?
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kiwi Bruce
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Re: Advice needed on Recycling Failed Recipes

Post by kiwi Bruce »

C2H5O5 what sort of volume are you talking about?
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Bushman
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Re: Advice needed on Recycling Failed Recipes

Post by Bushman »

My experience when you add that small of amount to the next run you do not get the off flavors left in your packing.
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Re: Advice needed on Recycling Failed Recipes

Post by C2H5O5 »

kiwi Bruce wrote:C2H5O5 what sort of volume are you talking about?
3/4 gallon of each, I figured I would split it over three 12 gallon charges, so it would be about 1/2 gallon per 12 gallon charge (actually 11.5g to 1/2g)
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Re: Advice needed on Recycling Failed Recipes

Post by kiwi Bruce »

She'll be right...split it up and run her, Good call!
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