NZ Made

[kiwistiller]

has anyone tried just floating an appropriate sized metal bowl containing maceration a boiler full of water? Reckon that might work for a water bath?

yeah could do. I was planning on building a little stove top unit anyway for making gin essence. I'm down in christchurch, how do you get people delivering fruit to your door in auckland central?!

[Rude Boy]

Someone I know knows a friend that needs to get them off their lawn out in the country somewhere. Stroke of luck. It seems every autumn there's always someone giving away bags of them to their crafty friends for jams and such. You wanna put the word out with your friends/neighbours.

[kiwistiller]

Just got offered a sack I might try and do a feijoa brandy. Was thinking of blending 4kg of feijoa, adding 2kg of white sugar and a bit of water, and boiling it for a while first to invert. You reckon that the sodium metabisulphate ruined it for you? I might skip it... I think i'll ferment on the pulp and then rack and leave to settle for a while before stilling, then hopefully the element won't be too much of an issue.

[Rude Boy]

I think the sodium meta' wasn't necessary anyhow, as boiling it should kill any bugs in the pulp.

[Rude Boy]

ok then, an update then on the feijoa buisness:

Of the two feijoa wine/washes that I mentioned earlier, the first one went vinegar on me, and so nominated itself to become feijoa schnapps instead of wine. I threw it in the kettle and ran it as a pot still. First run to strip - and man was the smell of sulfur strong off the distilate. Re-diluted and did the first spirit run, making cuts. Tasted and decided on one more refining run. Sulfur smell not noticeable in the middle cuts and now that I've just sniffed the feints bottle, no sulfur there either, thanks to the copper I guess. The final product still has PLENTY of feijoa character, and I notice that once the sugar is gone from the taste, I'm left with a concentrated fruity/woody essential oil type flavour. I have added a bit of sugar to try and re-balance the taste, but it seems like it needs something else (like some of my less fussy friends to drinks it please). After doing a little reading about aromatic bitters here and on Aunty Wiki, I wanna try using it as a starting point for a NZ style Bitters. Any ideas on other aromatic NZ ingreeds? Anyone know where to buy dried orange peel in these fair isles?

The second feijoa wash is nearly done, and doesn't taste infected, so this will be bottled as a bubbly wine me thinks... Nothing to distill these days, waiting on slow washes in this cooler weather.

[kiwistiller]

Mine went to vinegar as well, or something awful at least. ended up scrapping it, and throwing it through a reflux the neutral was nice though!!! My maceration worked great.

I think strong manuka could add something to a bitters. you could try the berries but I think it would be too late now to find any. guess you could use some toasted chips. I've also wondered about cracked beech seeds? the mice sure seem to love it...

several of the furn shoots round these parts are edible, would give a earthy, walnut type taste I think. same with bracken, I much on that sometimes when hiking. again, might be a summer thing.

I'd also be interested in dried orange peel. can't find it myself.

Thought of titoki berries? I heard they are a bit of a wonder food, full of anti oxidants or something, I think I remember reading that they were fermented and distilled back in the day as well.

Puha (sow thistle) is common as anything, practically a weed, The maori used to eat a lot of it. I think it would give a spicy, pungent kick to whatever base you make your bitters from. would want to go pretty easy though and not macerate it very long.

apparently, pikopiko (common shield fern fronds) are commercially available some places, but you'd have to look pretty hard I imagine.

I know there is an interesting honey made from Rewarewa (a type of protea) flowers, might be worth investigating the dried flowers. the fruit is pretty woody, not that tasty.

We really don't have much to eat here . except all those slow, stupid, flightless birds

Oh, and there is a plant I use to trick tourists in tramping huts. I tell them its called strawberry tree and get them to chew one of the mottled red leaves, and then watch the steam come out their ears. works best on those with no sense of humour. I think the real name might be pepper leaf or something? that would sure add a kick dried and macerated. good luck!

[kiwistiller]

While I have the attention of some kiwis... anyone found a good source of malt in nz? outside of home brew stores (Where it is bloody expensive!)

[Rude Boy]

I can still get Maltexo at the super market. It's in the fitness foods/energy bar section. I used to love eating that stuff when I was a kid. It's about $10.50 for a 1.5 Kg tin, so it works out about $5 cheaper than the malt in the brew store. Just make sure you don't get the Matexo Plus stuff, which has fish oil and other healthy type stuff in there. The normal Maltexo lists it's ingredients as malted barley, water and sodium. Don't know what the sodium is for, but I'm guessing it's not going to affect your wash the same way cod-liver oil would.
I looked up drying orange peel on the net too, you are right, it seems to be as straight forward as it gets. I need to find a juice squeezing place and get a whole bunch of spent peels.
Ever heard of Bitter Orange for sale here? Apparently it's important to get this stuff in your bitters, more than just for flavour: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Seville_orange

[kiwistiller]

I've asked around about bitter oranges, I wanted some for making gran marnier and such. everyone at the farmers markets and such just looked at me like I was talking in another language. I did a web search just now, and found this: http://www.lowrypeaks.com/orange-splash.aspx" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;" rel="nofollow .I have no idea if it is made with proper bitter oranges or if it is just a 'bitter' orange concoction. Seems to be the only thing made with bitter oranges in NZ though. I will however be driving through Culverden (where they are based) on Friday, so if you want to ring them up and ask, I could pick some up and send them to you I suppose?

[The Tippler]

Do the name tangerine ring a bell?

[kiwistiller]

It does indeed! I love tangerines (Citrus tangerina). However, they aren't bitter oranges (Citrus aurantium subsp bigarade IIRC)... They're normally sweeter than the usual oranges as well, so I'm not sure they'd be that good for bitters.

Are they are a good substitute?

Cheers,
KS

[The Tippler]

K'stiller, I gave the wrong one. I make a lot of cumquat liquer. (kumquat). Half fill a large jar with well spiked (with fork) cumquats. For each cup of nuetral one heaped teaspoon sugar (I use raw sugar) till jar filled. Lid on tight, turn top to bottom every few days. Month is good,three is better. Use spent cumquats sliced thinly to add a zesty lift to icecream and deserts. Tippler.

[olddog]

Hi Kiwistiller, Blackrock malt comes from NZ, available in most OZ brewshops, must be available in yours as it comes from NZ.

[kiwistiller]

K'stiller, I gave the wrong one. I make a lot of cumquat liquer. (kumquat). Half fill a large jar with well spiked (with fork) cumquats. For each cup of nuetral one heaped teaspoon sugar (I use raw sugar) till jar filled. Lid on tight, turn top to bottom every few days. Month is good,three is better. Use spent cumquats sliced thinly to add a zesty lift to icecream and deserts. Tippler.

that sounds really good... I might have to run off to the shed and make some neutral. No, I should find some kumquats first I guess

Hi Kiwistiller, Blackrock malt comes from NZ, available in most OZ brewshops, must be available in yours as it comes from NZ.

Cheers Olddog, I'll see if I can figure out where the factory is. Should be a fair bit cheaper there If i can talk them into selling me some. thanks for the tip.

[olddog]

Blackrock malt is made by Canterbury Brewery, 36 Asaph st, Christchuch NZ if that is near to you.

[kiwistiller]

Blackrock malt is made by Canterbury Brewery, 36 Asaph st, Christchuch NZ if that is near to you.

*hat tip*

I can get there in two turns, if you include my driveway

Cheers
KS

[kiwistiller]

Any kiwi's out there using a element controller? what did you use, where did you source parts etc?

I'm currently experimenting with aging on some manuka, red beech and mountain beech heartwood. I figure that the manuka (if I can get the toast / amounts right) will be delicious based on the flavors of the honey and manuka smoked fish etc. The red beech seems like it might be an interesting oak alternative, it is almost as dense as white oak. will report back in a month or so when the samples are done.

I'm going to age it on vodka (to get an idea of the taste of each on its own), rum (because... rum is delicious...) and DWWG (because I'm too much of a noob to make an all grain at the moment, and if I could I wouldn't waste it on experiments!)

Also, Rude Boy, how are the bitters coming along? I found a bush of what I call strawberry tree / pepper leaf while in the hills, took photos for you. I tried it again with bitters in mind and think it could be really useful. will post photos as soon as I can get photos off my camera, which is a little bit broken.

Cheers,
KS

[Rude Boy]

I'm chronically broke at the moment, so sourcing all the ingredients for my bitters will have to go on the back burner. I did find a good link on one of the threads here to a place that has reasonable looking prices and international shipping: http://botanical.com/.
They have pretty much everything if you have a credit card (I don't). I haven't checked to see if there are any bio-security issues with importing any of the stuff I want either... next $$ wind-fall and I'll be on to it.
Just made some whiskey from a coupla tins of malt extract and about 3kg cane sugar. I'm really pleased with the results. The sweetness of the malt really carried over and I blended plenty of heads into it as I liked the green apple notes they had although that was probably the wrong thing to do. Can't wait to get another malt wash going, this time with some of that Black Rock malt.

I been looking for a power controller for my still too. Due to the improvised design of my still, my column floods meaning I have to periodically turn the power off to let it drain. Riku mentioned on a thread here that a simmerstat-like power switch with a duty cycle of one second or less will work to provide smooth power attenuation. I've been scouring the internet for something like this, no success yet. Failing that I'm thinking of getting a more savvy friend to make me something like what Pintoshine uses. Would prefer to buy something cheap and purpose built tho....(sigh)

I heard kiwi fruit was going for about 17c per kilo a few weeks ago, on the topic of cheap seasonal produce here in NZ. Anyone making any kiwi fruit schnapps?

[kiwistiller]

Would prefer to buy something cheap and purpose built tho....(sigh)

Tell me about it. they don't seem to make anything cheap and purpose built in this country, except for stills, which are expensive and purpose built.

I've got an electrical engineer mate fiddling trying to make one for me. apparently we don't have cheap light dimmers here either. He's finding it cheaper to go from basic components.

[Rude Boy]

Haven't seen any dimmers that rate higher than 300W here, on eBay I've seen 1KW light dimmers - still not enough. Lemme know how much your outlay is if you get something made.

[kiwistiller]

This is the last report from my tame engineer:

Light Switch dimmers are very expensive!
They may be a couple of bucks in the US but here I've been quoted $35 and $47 as cheapest prices in Jay Car and Mitre Mega. K Mart doesn't have them - at least I couldn't find them there.
I will be building from scratch I think. The Triac itself (good for 15A) is $7.50 and the Diac is $2.50. Misc components will be no more than $5 hopefully excluding the heat sink - which may be a tad more expensive but the online site they gave for them looks pretty sweet, so may order a few from there. I love it how you can buy a plug head for like $50 (well maybe no that much) or cut the head off an extension cord for $5.
I will continue plotting.

looks like it should be a pretty cheap build, I'll get him to keep track of where he's getting stuff from.

[rabbit_]

Has he tried places like Mastertrade?

[kiwistiller]

dunno, I promised to let him 'sample' the booze with me and a couple of crays and I'm just leaving him to it aside from weekly emails telling him to hurry up . whats the point in a bribe, after all, if you have to do the work yourself? I will get him to keep his plans though, just in case he does a good job.

KS

[kiwistiller]

Rude boy, I have dug up the photos and the name of the plant I was talking about. it's called Horopito. here's some thats not completely... ripe? the leaves haven't gone as red as they go.

horopito

I reckon this would be a good component for bitters.

KS

[kiwistiller]

I was about to chuck this in the 'what did ya'll make today' thread, but thought it might be more appropriate here. as I said earlier, I've got a stash of some dried native heartwood. I turned some manuka to charcoal today, ground it up with a pestle and mortar, put in a triple coffee filter, and filtered through some oaked DWWG+malt. WOW its really good, I'm going to dislocate my shoulder trying to pat myself on the back soon

Next experiment is aging on toasted manuka / red beech. now I need a toaster oven...

KS

[Rude Boy]

If there's a Binn Inn anywhere near, the sell some pretty cheap malt extract - $5.50 per kilo. Just put 18kg Binn Inn malt in a wheelie bin with about 120L water and 500g bakers yeast. Looking forward to a big run real soon. Thanks for the horopito pic KS, I got a mate who does revegation landscaping who might be able to show me a few spots to grab some wild herbs. I read the list of ingreeds on that Harker's cold/cough tincture (tastes like an old fasioned bitters) and I think horopito is on it. Any luck with your power controller mate?

Cheers RB

[kiwistiller]

Gidday Rude boy, been a while

My mate has finished the controller, I'm going to be in welly in a week or two so I'm going to pick it up then. Its sort of moot now though, he pissed around so much that now I'm running an LPG keg and a 50mm VM / pot.

Looks like I'm going to have to move up your way next year for work, so maybe we'll have to have a tasting session good luck on the binn inn, thats where i've been getting my rye from. loving the ujsm corn + rye + barley right now. I had another crack at feijoa wine, the wine was awesome and then I distilled it, drunk, and it ended up being crap. rookie mistake that one

While I'm posting here, a couple of nz messages:
If anyone in christchurch needs kegs, pm me. I've found some places.
Where do you guys get your bottles from? I'm trying to get a bar tender to stash them for me at the moment but their performance has been less than satisfactory.

KS

[gbdsl0]

Hi guys regarding heating control check out my post http://homedistiller.org/forum/viewtopi ... =2&t=10989 re the Sutronic BFM240-13. It will control up to 3kw. If you purchase direct from UK it is half the price as the same product through distributors in Aus and NZ. Shipping is free. Approx $77.00 NZ. You can't build anything that does the job as well as this for the same price.

Regards

gbdsl0

[kiwistiller]

Cheers for the heads up mate... they must be losing money on that if shipping is free!

[gbdsl0]

Shipping from the UK doesn't cost that much. My sister lives over there and she regularly send presents for the kids and I am astounded at how little she pays. Postage to the UK from Aus is rougly 4 times the cost of postage from the UK.