uncle jesse's simple sour mash method

[dropping_planets]

thanks dndrhead... I always take starting and final gravities... my ujsm run's dry, the final gravity is 1.000 every time so the difference is almost 3% abv...

in that case i'm fermenting the same amount of alcohol faster in more water...than stripping the same amount of low wines... everything happen's in much less time...

seems like i can take a scoop of the cream colored top layer of yeast... discard the rest of the yeast and turb...use that space for more water/wash... and keep going forward from there with the lees starting to pile back up..... thnx

[GrandPa]

Hello everyone. Good to see this place is still alive and kickin.
I just put on a 40 gal batch of UJSM. 2 days ago. I did one thing different, I soaked the cracked corn for 24 hrs before adding the sugar and pitching the yeast.
I made a mistake in my sugar measure though, I'm 10 lb lite.
Tomorrow will be 3 days and it's still working hard.
Would I be wrong to dissolve 10lb of sugar and add it now or should I just let it finished and run it.

[Dnderhead]

yes you can. Id mix up as a syrup and add. adding sugar in steps is some times a good idea.(easier on yeast)

[GrandPa]

Many thanks, I was thinking I could just wanted to be sure.

[Mitch]

Dumb question, BUT:

I started with a 32 gallon can and put about 30 lbs cracked corn and equal sugar. I've done about 7 generations but very little to no corn ever floats to the top for me to discard so I add a little corn and some more sugar. Lately I've only been getting about 11 gallons or so of mash and only about 4 gallons of 20-30 ABV low wines.
Is this right so far or am I way off on something? Should I just dig the corn out or dump all of it and start over, new yeast and a little backset for the sour mash part?

[trthskr4]

The spent corn will just be a lighter color (Whitish) layer on top of pretty yellow corn. It doesn't necessarily float to the top. When you rack off the liquid scoop off the top bit and go down til you hit really yellow corn again and add back as much as you take out. Keep it going, don't dump it out. Check your ph and adjust as necessary.

[Mitch]

How come you don't want to dump out the yellow? Does that just mean it still has fermentable sugar/starch/flavor/booze factor? It's been there about 6 months think it's still got some juice left?

[Wormy]

I've done some stripping runs on the UJSM recipe in my Brewhaus PS2 pot still. I collected down to 25% on each run. Now I have about 4 galons of low wines that look to be about 48% abv. and Im ready to do a spirit run. My question is, do I need to add water to my low wines in a spirit run or do I just run them as they are now? Ive done some searching and Im having trouble getting a abv.% to do the spirit run. What do all of you do? Thanks for all your insight and knowledge!

[rad14701]

I've done some stripping runs on the UJSM recipe in my Brewhaus PS2 pot still. I collected down to 25% on each run. Now I have about 4 galons of low wines that look to be about 48% abv. and Im ready to do a spirit run. My question is, do I need to add water to my low wines in a spirit run or do I just run them as they are now? Ive done some searching and Im having trouble getting a abv.% to do the spirit run. What do all of you do? Thanks for all your insight and knowledge!

Most folks cut the low wines down to the 40% range before doing a spirit run... There is plenty of information about this subject on the parent site, as well as calculators...

[MOUSE]

Hi I'm the latest noob.
At the moment I am twiddling my thumbs and reading this site until postman pat delivers my ss stockpot.
I have decided to try this recipe first but I am a bit puzzled about the quantities.

The ingredients are listed :-

"For a 5 gallon mash: (20l)
5 gallons soft, filtered water.
7 lbs (3.2kg) cracked corn. 6-8 pieces/kernel is the proper crack. If using bird feed, make sure it is perishable, or in other words is free of preservatives.
7 lbs (3.2kg) of granulated sugar.
1 tbsp yeast (distillers yeast if available.)"

But listed again :-

"So, for 40l wash. Recipe goes like this.

7kg cracked feed corn,
7kg raw or white sugar (I like raw)
Dissolve sugar in hot water, then add enough cold water to make 40 l total."

Are the ingredients for 20l or 40l

[Dnderhead]

7 KG in 20L = 20.6% pretty high
7 KG in 40 L =10.3% much better, this is what Id go with.

[MOUSE]

Aaarrggghhhh !

lbs,Kg,",mm these different units are doing my head in.
Just noticed one was listing Kg and another lbs.

I'll just go and stand in a corner and keep quiet.

[rafterjmc]

Just finished my first ferment of UJSM today plan on running this evening. I'm new and have done 5 runs of sweet horse feed mash that turned out good and all the friends said was the smoothest shine they have had but had a strange flavor to me. Sort of reminded me of burnt wire but no one else mentioned it. So I thought I'd give UJSM a try. So far the beer is much better than the sweet feed. That taste I mentioned was in the sweet feed beer as well as the product. Can't wait to taste a bit of this first run. Think I'll pull a pint of hearts from this first run to sip. I've read and read and read and wanted to post the plan so some skilled members could comment.
My still seems to run from 70% down on slow first runs and I haven't done any strip then spirit runs. Will do the first run slow to get that pint then add all back to second gen. After first gen the rest will be striped at a small stream down to 20% and put aside for a 12 gal spirit run later. When run at this speed the still starts at 64% so if I go to 20% Ishould have low wines at around 40% correct? On spirit run will collect at 3 drops per sec in pints quarts pints order air and taste for cuts. In a post on this thread someone wrote that more heads cut in makes a sweeter wiskey and more tails for a sharper wiskey. is this correct. I had planed to keep mostly hearts from this batch.
Might have got carried away with this after reading thread for third time. I did two 20 gal barrels with 25 pounds corn 21 pounds sugar and 15 gal water. Plan to use 4 gal back set for each gen. All I've read said this process puts out a lot of product. If I do 5 or 6 gens about how much product should I expect?

[trthskr4]

If you were stripping then doing a spirit run I'd say about 4-5 gallons per strip on 25 gallon ferments. You can figure about a 10% wash so 10% of 25 gallons would be 2.5 gallons of 100%. You're probably gonna average 50% so about 5 gallons. If you could save up for say 3 gens of strips and run all 3 at once, diluted to about 40%, you'd get about 3 gallons probably of hearts at about 75% just guestimating and depending on cuts.

[BritishBartender]

Hi Guys,

Just starting a batch today, my question is would the first distilate from the first ferment make a decent whisky or should I add it back into the still with the second sourmash ferment as UJ recomends.

Thanks,
BB

[trthskr4]

You can try it but the best thing is to save it up and either add it back to the still once the next run gets ready. Don't add back into the fermenter or the alcohol will kill the yeast. You can save up each run and just run the next one seperately as well and then after you get 5 or 6 or more gallons of low wines you can put them all together for a spirit run. I prefer to add the first strip to the second run then add the larger run to the next and so on.

[BritishBartender]

If that's the case I shouldn't have to do any cuts?? Just run the first one hard and fast and add it to the second distill??

BB

[trthskr4]

yep, it's called a stripping run. I prefer to do a fores cut on every run though but you can wait til the spirit run and do one big one.

[blind drunk]

trthskr4 said -
I prefer to add the first strip to the second run then add the larger run to the next and so on.

Hey trthskr4, I've read this before - do you add the first strip run to the second strip run or to the spirit run? If not, then you're essentially doing a spirit run of the first strip while doing the strip one of the second? And so on. Eventually you're doing a third run on the first strip ... etc. Does this give you a bigger middle each time? Is this correct? Thanks, BD.

[blanikdog]

I think that what truth is saying is to collect all the stripping runs - minus the fores - and when you have a batch of low wines to suit your fermenter, dilute to 40abv and then do a spirit run. That's what I usually do or alternatively you can add the low wines to each stripping run if you wish and finally do a spirit run with all the low wines. It sorta means that the each consecquitive run has a second distillation and if you do say, six stripping rune the first one has had six distillations, the next five, four and so on. Either works, but I don't know which is the most efficient. I'll leave that answer to somebody wiser/braver than I.

blanik

[Barney Fife]

and when you have a batch of low wines to suit your fermenter

You mean to suit your boiler, right? I hope

I save up a bunch, and dilute to 20-25% for the spirit run.

[BritishBartender]

Does everyone here run a stripping run or just do it in one pass as UJ says??

BB

[trthskr4]

Doing strip then spirit runs on everything is not always desirable or fitting.


What I do is this: I strip the first wash, use the backset to start the next, then when that one gets ready to run I put the first strip into the boiler with the second wash. What this essentially does is when you finally get to the 3rd or 4th generation you have one batch that has been tripple distilled, one that's been double distilled and one that has just been stripped. Then I do a spirit run cause usually that puts me at around 5 or 6 gallons. You end up with less alcohol overall but it's much better to me than doing all strips and one spirit run. It seems to kill the "sugar bite" of the UJSM to me. Just my opinion, I'm very very picky with my whiskey.

[sleder]

i do not strip this wash .
i do add my faints back on every run though.
i find that i lose to much flavor and product stripping.
i run a 1.5 inch 4 foot bok with 1 scrubber.
the finished shine is necter for the gods.
to me this is the bomb.
sleder

[trthskr4]

See, Sleder is running his through a column still and in his case it isn't desirable to strip and then do spirit runs. Also if you lose too much flavor doing strip and spirit runs you can do the spirit run with another fresh wash or even some backset diluting the strips instead of water.

[dropping_planets]

i save up 5 or 6 strips... keep adding them to the same carboy as the fients from the previous spirit run.... into the same carboy i also toss in the 150 or 200 milliliters of wash from the test beaker that i check the FG in...

when the carboys are full of the low wines/wash/fients mix..... i do a spirit run....

i tried using more wash per strip but it was too much... it started to lower my entire abv% structure and confuse me....

this seems to work very well for me and give me a decent amount of drinkin' likker.... ..

[shawnboy101]

I have recently impressed a farmer with a batch of UJSM. He has given me permission to pick as much corn as I like for this year's cookin'. Has anyone attempted UJSM with fresh corn before it is dried? My assumption would be that more sugar should be available for fermentation and it should turn out great, but we all know about assumptions...
I realize the weight may be a little off due to the moisture content, so I plan to measure by volume as apposed to weight. If anyone has any insight or suggestions, they would be greatly appreciated.
Thanks in advance,
Shawnboy

[violentblue]

if he's gonna give you as much corn as you want, why not add a little malt to the mix and skip the sugar.

[shawnboy101]

I'm not sure that my skill level is up to that challenge yet, but I'm getting a little braver each day.

[trthskr4]

Bravery usually comes with free feedstock.