Whisky Science Blog

[blind drunk]

http://www.whiskyscience.blogspot.com/" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;" rel="nofollow

[Samohon]

Great Read... Still to finish reading but none-the-less, a great find DB...

I have been reading quite a bit about the addition E150 Caramel:

Here are some other whisky distilleries that uses caramel, E150 to colour their whiskies:

• Auchentoshan
• Bowmore
• Bunnahabhain
• Cragganmore
• Dalwhinnie
• Glenfiddich
• Glengoyne
• Glenlivet
• Highland Park
• Isle Of Jura
• Lagavulin
• Oban
• Strathisla
• Talisker

Something else to experiment with: and so the hobby continues...

Thanks man... Great Find...

[LWTCS]

a great find DB...

U sippin all ready???

[blind drunk]

Hey Sam, I was curious about the colouring caramel; I expected it in rum but was surprised to see it used in Scotch, single malt, no less.

[Samohon]

a great find DB...

U sippin all ready???

Yep, the usual L.. UJSSM/Ginger ela.. er, sorry Ale...

I knew they used some colouring agent in some whiskies, but really expected it to be the blended variety and not single malts BD..

Wonder if E150 caramel is available for experimenting with..? I'll keep y'all posted...

[blind drunk]

Great for the whisky making members and the yeast heads -

http://whiskyscience.blogspot.com/2011/ ... vours.html" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;" rel="nofollow

[Prairiepiss]

Hey BD nice find. I didn't have time to read the whole article. But I will defiantly finish it. And he has a ton of blogs to read through. I will start in on them tonight after work.

I get the same page with both the first link and this last link. Were you trying to point out something different?

[Braz]

Wonder if E150 caramel is available for experimenting with..? I'll keep y'all posted...

Here you go. https://www.lorannoils.com/p-8469-liqui ... ramel.aspx" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;" rel="nofollow

I use it sometimes to color my brandy just to give it a richer, darker look. Doesn't take much - one or two drops per 750ml is plenty.

[Odin]

Caramel in Single Malts, yeah, quite a shock. I think Kiwistiller mentioned it before. With a wikipedia link somewhere. I used to colour my brandy & whiskey. Stopped doing that.

But if you want to try, why don't you make caramel yourselves? Pretty easy! Just heat sugar in a pan untill it liquifies, keep stirring until you get the desired colour.

Odin.

[Bushman]

Real nice find, does this mean I need to have a science degree? Just added it to my favorites as I think a blog in the future might have some additional info! I was also suprised a bit but understand the comment in the first paragraph where they are comparing beer fermentation with whiskey and they say that whiskey fermentation is usually not temperature controlled!

[mash rookie]

WOW. great link BD. A lot of heady stuff there. I love the flavor chart. There is so much to know about yeast. I have found I like bakers better for UJSSM than distillers yeast. Rd sugested once that I try an ale yeast for a different flavor.

I color my rum by adding just a little fancy molasses to my final blend. Not to a dark rum, It looks like light whiskey. Smoothes and sweetens it a little.

[Bushman]

BD the following is taken from one of the links at your site on Potstillin. I thought it was interesting that they reintroduce foreshots with the feints in the second run which I thought was not done!

The wash distillation is mixed with the foreshots and the feints from previous spirit distillations and distilled in the spirit still. The second distillation is a fractionated distillation; the most volatile compounds boil first and are called foreshots or heads, the second part is called the middle cut (spirit cut, heart), the third part is feints (tails) and the remaining liquid in the still is called spent lees.
The foreshots consist of the most volatile compounds, such as methanol, acetaldehyde (ethanal), some of the ethyl esters such as ethyl acetate and volatile sulphur compounds (see table of boiling points below). Along with them come some of the residues of the previous distillation, which are not high volatiles but soluble only in higher strenghts of alcohol, for example fatty acids and their esters. These compounds are therefore condensed into the still at the end of previous distillation and as the next distillation starts, they are made soluble again by the high alcohol strenght and swept up to the spirit safe along with the foreshots. The foreshots are either unpleasant in flavour or dangerous to health (or both) and therefore not included in the final spirit but returned to the next distillation. The long-chain fatty acids and other residues from the previous distillation tend to form a cloudy mixture when diluted to 80 sikes proof (45.7% abv).

[Prairiepiss]

Bushman I'm not understanding the why? It doesn't really explain why they would do it. Then it says they have unpleasant flavors? So why would you add them back in? Did I miss something?

[Bushman]

Bushman I'm not understanding the why? It doesn't really explain why they would do it. Then it says they have unpleasant flavors? So why would you add them back in? Did I miss something?

PP I had the same question if you go to BD's link and on the right side their is a small picture of a copper alembic commercial pot still, click on it and you can read the whole article unless I missed something.

[blind drunk]

They don't aerate their worts Seems like they stress their yeast to get the flavor the distilleries desire. That's the impression I get.

[mash rookie]

How I read it is that they are calling heads fore shots and tails feints. I think it says they run like lots of us do. Adding what we call feints (heads and tails) into the next run or spirit run in their case and make cuts on the spirit run.

[blind drunk]

Here's something I posted in the rerunning feints thread. It's on the Springbank site.

[tmu]

Hello, thought I should have a look at this forum as some of you are actually reading my blog.

Bushman&Prairiepiss: I believe (no solid science behind this) that reusing the feints and foreshots in the following batches helps (especially higher) ester formation as the fatty acids (feints, stinky stuff) are mixed with the higher alcohols (heads, solventy stuff) to produce more esters (fruity,sweet stuff). The yeast bit http://whiskyscience.blogspot.com/2011/ ... vours.html might help understanding the esters. The alcohol yield is also increased by the use of previous foreshots, as it contains high amounts of ethanol, too. I should post something about ester formation in both distilling and fermentation some time soon. If you feel confident, you should check on the Springbank distillery regime of using the feints and the foreshots.

mash rookie: some distilleries have open mash tuns, some are closed, and some have rakes at the bottom of the tun, so some aeriation happens, but generally the worts are practically unaeriated. This helps to keep the cell-growth to the minimum and spirit yield to the max. And yes, the yeast becomes stressed, especially as no additives (yeast nutrients) are allowed in scotch-production. Especially anaerobically grown brewer's yeast (if used) becomes exhausted long before the end of usual fermentation times.

[blind drunk]

@ tmu - what a great coincidence. I was going to contact you through your blog and invite you over. Nice to have you on board. You have a excellent blog.

[Prairiepiss]

Hey welcome aboard. Nice to have you here to comment on your blog. Be prepared for the onslot of questions.

What I was really referring to is the fact you stated foreshots and feints. After MR pointed it out. I must be reading it incorrectly. By foreshots I do beleave you are referring to what we would normally call heads. Or a combination of foreshots and heads. Some of us do rerun heads and feints or tails. But I think its safe to say most if not all do not rerun what we would call the foreshots. Maybe just a little clarification on the terms you use would help us understand?

[Bushman]

+1 welcome and thanks for the additional input!

[tmu]

Foreshots=heads, feints=tails. For me, that is.

[Prairiepiss]

Ok most here would consider the first 150ml per 25 lts the foreshots. That 150 ml is not the same for everyone. But these are where most of the really nasty stuff is so most throw those out. Or at least it is encouraged around here. So you see why we had questioned what you said. It makes more since now.

[rad14701]

Greetings, tmu...

To expand upon what has already been discussed...

There are four separate cuts - foreshots, heads, hearts, and tails... Foreshots should be discarded, at least from our discerning perspective... Heads and tails constitute feints around here even though from a politically correct standpoint only tails would be considered feints... We just call whatever you would re-run as feints being collected in our feints jar... If they were to be used for future blending purposes we would keep our late heads and early tails in separate containers... The re-running of foreshots is a practice that distilleries use in an effort to milk every dollar they can out of the alcohol they collect due to taxation... We can be a whole lot more discriminate in what we keep than the commercial guys because we aren't chasing the almighty dollar... We choose to make the best spirits possible instead - and do in comparison to commercial spirits...

Nice to have you aboard, tmu...

[Samohon]

My thoughts exactly Rad... When it comes to the tax-man, every $$$ counts if you want to make any kind of a profit...

Welcome to the jungle tmu...

Nice to have you as addition...

[blind drunk]

Also, I think, the distilleries are in a rather large time cycle, so the cuts can be bigger. Here on HD, we are trying to cheat time, for the most part, so we make tighter cuts.

[King Of Hearts]

Great Read... Still to finish reading but none-the-less, a great find DB...

I have been reading quite a bit about the addition E150 Caramel:

Here are some other whisky distilleries that uses caramel, E150 to colour their whiskies:

• Auchentoshan
• Bowmore
• Bunnahabhain
• Cragganmore
• Dalwhinnie
• Glenfiddich
• Glengoyne
• Glenlivet
• Highland Park
• Isle Of Jura
• Lagavulin
• Oban
• Strathisla
• Talisker

Something else to experiment with: and so the hobby continues...

Thanks man... Great Find...

E150 is Euro color system equivelent to 75 lov ABS

[Prairiepiss]

It is taxed on the among of fermented alcohol. Correct? Not how much actually goes out the door?

Is it regulated on what is done with it? Like can you take the feints and heads from a whiskey run and throw them in a vodka run? Or do they need to stay with the intended product line?

Or even collect them like we do and run them separate to make a neutral for flavored spirits? Say you run the whiskey off and keep the good stuff sell it as a premium product. Same with a grain vodka. And take the collected heads and tails and run them for the flavored stuffs. Pretty much what I do now?

[King Of Hearts]

It is taxed on the among of fermented alcohol. Correct? Not how much actually goes out the door?

Is it regulated on what is done with it? Like can you take the feints and heads from a whiskey run and throw them in a vodka run? Or do they need to stay with the intended product line?

Or even collect them like we do and run them separate to make a neutral for flavored spirits? Say you run the whiskey off and keep the good stuff sell it as a premium product. Same with a grain vodka. And take the collected heads and tails and run them for the flavored stuffs. Pretty much what I do now?

I know a distillery that redistills the feints for liquors.

[Samohon]

It is taxed on the among of fermented alcohol. Correct? Not how much actually goes out the door?

Is it regulated on what is done with it? Like can you take the feints and heads from a whiskey run and throw them in a vodka run? Or do they need to stay with the intended product line?

Or even collect them like we do and run them separate to make a neutral for flavored spirits? Say you run the whiskey off and keep the good stuff sell it as a premium product. Same with a grain vodka. And take the collected heads and tails and run them for the flavored stuffs. Pretty much what I do now?

Yeah, thats right PP. As soon as the beasties start to do their thing, the two legged ones arrive to do thiers...

Mod Edit: Deleted said post for you Burbankbrewer... Thanks for the Heads Up on E150...