Novice strip and spirit run question…

[Usge]

I've made some really good tasting brandy from crap red wine. Ran it off in my alembic, took a wide cut, then put it on heavy toast oak cubes in a flower vase (with coffee filter on top) for about 3 weeks. That's all it took. Longer than 3 weeks starts to get woody. It actually had a good nose to it as well.

[Suburban Guy]

When running a pot still it is never a good idea to fixate on numbers... You get what you get regardless and relying on hard numbers for temperature, volume, or %ABV will just make you crazy...

Yes, tails have an ABV reading and they can start far higher than you might think... There is some great reading in the Reading Lounge which explains the various cuts for both pot stills and reflux columns...

I hear what you are saying with respects to the numbers. I’ll couple them, the numbers, with touch, taste and smell and keep moving along with my runs.

Indeed, I have read through it, the diagrams are great. Perhaps it is time for me to study the entire thread again.

SG

[Suburban Guy]

"I use any wine I don't want to drink, to distill for brandy, and if the brandy does not appeal I run it again for neutral."
Sure, that is how brandy is made; distilling wine. Traditionally in a pot still (I didn't notice your type of still) but you can use a reflux still with the packing taken out, in other words running it in 'pot still mode'. I just have a pot still but others can advise you better how to do it if yours is reflux.
Usually somewhat harsh white wine for the true brandy; but try it with whatever you have and if you don't like the result, use it to make more-or-less neutral spirit.

When I was first learning to distill I got several hundred bottles of sub-standard wine from my friend's winery and distilled it; the results were not all that good but would have been quite okay if I had understood more about making 'cuts' at that time!!!
And if you have not got a large quantity of (not-good-enough-to-drink) wine, you can throw it in with the feints from your last distillation.

I've made some really good tasting brandy from crap red wine. Ran it off in my alembic, took a wide cut, then put it on heavy toast oak cubes in a flower vase (with coffee filter on top) for about 3 weeks. That's all it took. Longer than 3 weeks starts to get woody. It actually had a good nose to it as well.

Very interesting guys, maybe I’ll give it a try. It would sure help me justify buying the Carlo Rossi jugs that I like so much.

SG

[Janina]

I found this quite excruciatingly hard to follow, especially after all the replies. Thanks for sharing your thoughts on these guys, I'm really planning to buy equipments to start a small winery. As much as I love ordering australian wine, I cannot call myself a real wine enthusiast if I don't have the slightest idea on how to make great concoctions.

[hanon]

I still didn't see a definitive answer about the spirit run volume. Let's say someone ran 15 L of a wash made from barley in a 20 L alembic pot still for a stripping run and collected 5 L of low wines. Is it fine to do a spirit run with 5 L of low wines in a 20 L still, would it work better/be advisable to add water so there is more volume for the spirit run, or should they collect multiple batches of low wines to get 10-15 L?

[googe]

More is better, your cuts will be easier, I'm sure no one wants to do small batches, drink that in one sitting, when you can do larger batches and have some to sit and improve. But, to answer your question, as long as its 40% or lower it wont matter.

[hanon]

Thanks. Most of the things I'm reading about distilling Scotch say the low wines from the stripping run are 25% tops, but from what you're saying I'm assuming it won't make a difference whether the low wines are 20% or 40% and that the cuts from the spirit run will be dependent on the total alcohol content of the low wines rather than the volume. I plan on collecting 150 ml cuts for heads, hearts, and tails as that amount should allow me to get a good reading with the hydrometer, so I think I could get a decent amount of them even with only 5 L of low wines. I'm really only shooting to get 750 ml of good whiskey out of such a run and assume I should get a fair amount of feints to go along with that.

[skow69]

Most of the things I'm reading about distilling Scotch say the low wines from the stripping run are 25% tops.

They might have been refering to this: Fusel oils and maybe some other stuff are hydrophobic. Diluting your charge to 27% or less scares them, and they go hide in the tails where they belong.

cuts from the spirit run will be dependent on the total alcohol content of the low wines rather than the volume.

Exactly. Ten gallons of 40% is the same amount of booze as 40 gallons of 10%. We're making ethanol.