uncle jesse's simple sour mash method

[Frosteecat]

OK...I guess I was under the impression that that was too low. I need a PH ref chart for different ferments so I don't try to fix something that aint broke!
Thanks!

[baron4406]

Dang on my 6th ferment and it finally happened-stalled wash! Went to run it last thursday and it looked clear with a little bubbling, so I tasted it. Wow it was still sweet. Tested it and it was SG 1.02....uh oh. Let it sit until today and its still sweet. That's 10 days and my previous washes fermented dry is 5 days or less. This wash hasn't moved in a week. Quick order to Amazon for some Calcium carbonate and a PH tester. Dang it!

[Titus-a-fishus]

Tried splitting your wash and adding more water and then more yeast?
Make sure it's warm enough as well.

TAF

[jmesle]

Ok just a few questions on UJSSM . I've done about five runs now following the recipe. 2 times now when it was done fermenting I siphoned it off and just added the water per the recipe. I didn't get to run it right away so it sat in the fermenter about week before I did my run so that I could add my backseat. It had a film on the surface prob some type of mold ,so I threw it out. Would it have helped if I just added the sugar and corn without the backseat. I t seems if u just keep right on going with the ferments and the runs, there are no problems. I have 2 lil kids and they take priority over everything in my life... Most of you already know what I'm talkin about. No time!any suggestions?

Next question my last run for some reason the spirits has a tint to it. Real light but noticable. After it aired out it cleared up a bit and does look better. There are brown flakes floating at the top of some of my cuts. I have seen it before on other runs but not this much. I have read in here about runnin the pot to hot would produce this. It was not run hard, ran it bout 2 to 3 drips per sec. Does my still need cleaned or something. I was just going to do a vinegar run again but, did figure Id need to do that after only 5 runs. I just figured I'd ask the experts. Let me know what you think

[baron4406]

Tried splitting your wash and adding more water and then more yeast?
Make sure it's warm enough as well.

TAF

Its plenty warm, and I thought of splitting it up but not sure how to do that. This was my only packet of Nottinham Ale yeast and I don't wanna mix yeasts. I ground up some Tums last night (they were the 750mg tabs- about 8 of them) and stirred them in and I'm getting a slow bubble thru the fermenter this morning, about one bubble ever 20 seconds.

[Andy Capp]

Ok just a few questions on UJSSM . I've done about five runs now following the recipe. 2 times now when it was done fermenting I siphoned it off and just added the water per the recipe. I didn't get to run it right away so it sat in the fermenter about week before I did my run so that I could add my backseat. It had a film on the surface prob some type of mold ,so I threw it out. Would it have helped if I just added the sugar and corn without the backseat. I t seems if u just keep right on going with the ferments and the runs, there are no problems. I have 2 lil kids and they take priority over everything in my life... Most of you already know what I'm talkin about. No time!any suggestions?

Next question my last run for some reason the spirits has a tint to it. Real light but noticable. After it aired out it cleared up a bit and does look better. There are brown flakes floating at the top of some of my cuts. I have seen it before on other runs but not this much. I have read in here about runnin the pot to hot would produce this. It was not run hard, ran it bout 2 to 3 drips per sec. Does my still need cleaned or something. I was just going to do a vinegar run again but, did figure Id need to do that after only 5 runs. I just figured I'd ask the experts. Let me know what you think

No point siphoning it off unless your ready to strip run it. Just leave it under the airlock to clear for a while untill your ready. Give your still another cleaning run with 50/50 vinegar/water then run some feints through it. It sounds like the same problem i had after sweetfeed run.

[CuWhistle]

Here's a tip for young players. Before you suck on the end of a siphon hose of hot backset, make sure you have ice cubes in the glass your drinking from. It helps a lot!

[baron4406]

Finally my PH meter showed up, and as I suspected the PH was in the low 3's. Tried about 20 more TUMS tablets and was able to get it into the high 3's, I really need my 5lb of Calcium Carbonate to show up. Dunno if this wash is any good honestly I think the fruit flavored Tums may have ruined it lol. I may dump it all and start over maybe try to find some cracked rye. Lesson #1 should be on the front page of this recipe, don't start this recipe without a PH meter and a good stock of CC. This was my 7th wash (not my 6th like I originally said) and I was using the 20% backset and never went any more.

[Andy Capp]

Here's a tip for young players. Before you suck on the end of a siphon hose of hot backset, make sure you have ice cubes in the glass your drinking from. It helps a lot!

Geez your keen siphoning hot backset. I was refering to the wash when siphoning.
When i use hot backet i tip it out of the keg into a spare stockpot on the floor. Only scald my ankles that way

[Andy Capp]

Currently doin a strip run on gen 3, using 60% corn,30% rye,10% rolled barley and 33% backset. Tastes a bit different off the still than the all corn did. Will do about 5 strips and then a spirit run with that. Hoping to get something with a bit of extra taste. Have been diluting to around 35% for spirit run but read 28% might be better for flavor so i will give that a crack as well.

[Odin]

Andy,

Dilute with wash, not with water. For extra taste.

Odin.

[CuWhistle]

Here's a tip for young players. Before you suck on the end of a siphon hose of hot backset, make sure you have ice cubes in the glass your drinking from. It helps a lot!

Geez your keen siphoning hot backset. I was refering to the wash when siphoning.
When i use hot backet i tip it out of the keg into a spare stockpot on the floor. Only scald my ankles that way

I use a fairly long hose but it did get a little warm when it didn't pull over the first time so I had to try again. I think I'll have to cut a hole in the side of the boiler and put a tap in. I've got a good quality stainless ball valve in the shed so I think I now have a use for it. I'm not too keen on trying to lift and pour over 20kg of hot stainless steel and liquid. My spine is totally rooted so not a good idea for me.

I just posted in the novice section about this but I'll ask here as well. After I took the required recharge backset out of the boiler, I then added a 25 litre wash of birdwatchers to the remaining hot leftovers and did a stripping run. There was a very considerable transfer of the UJSSM corn flavour and aroma into the straight sugar wash output. Is there anything wrong here or is it a good thing to do? It seems to be a good way to get some flavour into a plain recipe to me.

[Odin]

Depends on what you want Cu. Neutral? Don't add UJ to your BW. A whiskey with full flavour? Don't ad BW to your UJ.

[baron4406]

Well about 20 Tums tablets raised the PH enough so that it was around 1.00SG this morning so I threw my feints in with this wash and did a stripping run. Ended up with 2 gallons of low wines. Yes i run my feints with my stripping runs, works great for my purposes. As for my wash I made some BIG changes. First I scooped about half the corn out and replaced it with 2lbs of cracked wheat and 1lb of cracked rye. Put them in the hot backset (50%)with 7lbs of sugar and been stirring it every 15 minutes for over an hour now and it smells awesome. When its to 90deg gonna add it to my fermenter and adjust the PH with CC (it came today!!). Now that i have a good PH meter and 5lbs of Calcium Carbonate I'm gonna ratchet up the backset may even go to 100% since guys are having luck with this. Just trying new things with this recipe and seeing what works.

[CuWhistle]

Depends on what you want Cu. Neutral? Don't add UJ to your BW. A whiskey with full flavour? Don't ad BW to your UJ.

Understood!

[baron4406]

Holy crap on a cracker, this modified wash of mine from a few posts up is the most aggressive ferment on UJSSM yet. I checked it this morning and the airlock was actually full of grain. I pulled it off and washed it out. This baby is really going to town. I needed 4 tablespoons of CC to get my PH up to 4.7 and that appeared to really get the job done. I'll say it again, get a good PH meter and some Calcium carbonate if you are gonna do sour mashing. I honestly can't wait to run this. BTW this is my 8th ferment.

[blind drunk]

Hey, baron4406, which pH meter do you have?

[baron4406]

http://www.amazon.com/Hanna-Instruments ... B0006ZZDP6" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;" rel="nofollow

That one. works good and it comes with a nice case plus 4.01 and 7.01 solutions for calibrating it

[Kidnapper2]

I am now stripping my first gen of this stuff. Simply awesome. About 1/2 way into the run now and it taste amazing. Can't wait for the future generations of this

[CuWhistle]

I am now stripping my first gen of this stuff. Simply awesome. About 1/2 way into the run now and it taste amazing. Can't wait for the future generations of this

I can't wait to run my 1st gen in a couple of days. The sweet run had me behaving as what rad would call a "giddy school girl".

[mrwoody1985]

here i go again! so i have 3 fermenters all with UJSSM in them! 2x 30ltr and 1x70ltr. but this only leaves me with 1 spare fermenter and i want to tackle a few other recipes aswell. so the progress is this, 2x 30ltrs have had 1st stripping run and all spirits were collected together (heads,hearts and tails) but each 30ltr run are seperate from one another! the 70ltr hasnt been stripped yet as it is still fermenting its 1st ferment, soo what im thinking is this! i want to clear up my 2 30ltr fermenters for other stuff! if i run each 30ltr UJSSM adding the spirits reserved for them like normal (from stripping run), take my cuts as normal (on 2nd gen) and save my feints,

so after this i have 2x empty fermenters, 2x lots of cut 2nd gen spirits and 1x60ltr UJSSM still on 1st ferment, so i now take my hearts and oak age them... and add the feints to the 1st stripping run from the 60ltr? ill also prep the backset with sugar ready from 1 of the 30ltr spirit runs (so its nice and cool already for fast turn around for 2nd ferment! does this make sense? is this the way to go about this? thank you

[ipee7ABV]

i would keep the ujssm going and get a couple of 20l buckets for other stuff.

[mrwoody1985]

Haha yeah that's good in theory but at what point do I say, that's enough lol. 4 fermenters going at a time is extreme for me. And I'm still new to the hobby so I don't wanna jump right in without feeling the water

[CuWhistle]

Haha yeah that's good in theory but at what point do I say, that's enough lol. 4 fermenters going at a time is extreme for me. And I'm still new to the hobby so I don't wanna jump right in without feeling the water

Slow down there champ. It's not a race. I am doing nowhere near what your suggesting you have on the go and I've got spirits running all over. Forget about running 110 litres of UJSSM and just do 30 at a time. My 1st gen ferment only took a couple of days (less than a week) after the initial ferment and it will produce more than enough for me and my relos. It's ready to go tomorrow.

I currently have the UJSSM in a 30l, a birdwatchers in a 30l, an Apple Cider 30l almost ready to put into vinegar mode and an empty bottle. I've only been doing this for a couple of weeks and I have about 15 litres of drinking material plus a couple of bottles of stuff (heads and tails) to put into the still on second runs etc. I bought 18 x 2 litre glass flagons + a 5 litre aging / oaking bottle + about 20 700ml product storage bottles. If I was doing your quantities I'd be needing more.

I have used some bourbon barrel chunks and some essences and now already have, vodka, bourbon, scotch, white rum and Malibu (coconut rum) at drinkable and nice, plus 5 litres of bourbon in the second rinse for nearly 2 weeks.

Go for quality not quantity. Not that what I have so far is excellent, but the 1st run UJSSM hearts is quite yummy.

[mrwoody1985]

ive been brewing spirits for 2 years and beer for years before that BUT i was doing it the way the brew shop told me! it was only good for 1 person (them) and to be honest the only reason i have so much ujssm is because when i signed up to this site the 1st thing i did was make a ujssm, but quantity's were wrong (30ltr) so i put another ujssm on with correct quantity's. (30ltr) then i acquired a 70ltr fermenter and thought ill just have the 70ltr as my ujssm so i made the 70ltr also, storing its not a problem as i have 40-50 empty spirit bottles and plenty of cupboard space under my bar, and i have plenty of thirsty mates! i now have another 30ltr fermenter! i am going to dedicate 1 maybe 2 fermenters to sugar washes as i just got a basic reflux still.. but the question at hand is, would the plan i put together work? i plan to slow down and im not after quantity, im after experience and variety, i will learn by my mistakes i guess

[CuWhistle]

Forget about your thirsty mates brother. Give them jungle juice after the first couple and they wont be able to tell the difference, but just don't poison them (or at least not too quickly anyway). Sleeping out in the cold at this time of year builds character and stimulates shivering which is good for pissed people.

All I'm saying is that it appears you have a hell of a lot of gear on the ferment ATM. I have less than half that and I'm doing my best to keep ahead of it with distilling, airing, blending, filtering and flavouring, oh and tasting. I had the stills (pot and reflux) running for 18 hours or so over the weekend and I'll be looking at another 10 to 12 before or over this coming weekend.

I won't be putting another sugar wash in straight away and I'll probably just strip the one that is in now, but I will keep the UJSSM going as my main priority. I figure a 20 litre wash, once a week for a couple of weeks will provide plenty to keep me busy and from my promising early results I'd like to do a good job of it.

I have recently started to accumulate some brown sugar as I'd like to do a pot of rum, but I'm in no hurry. I'll just grab bag each time I'm at the shops.

I was at the supermarket the other day and they had a deal on liquid malt extract so I bought 6 kg. I've done some nice beer out of it before but I was thinking some malt whiskey might be worth trying. I can do whole grain but this may save some time and effort, plus grain isn't cheap.

[ipee7ABV]

ive been brewing spirits for 2 years and beer for years before that BUT i was doing it the way the brew shop told me! it was only good for 1 person (them) and to be honest the only reason i have so much ujssm is because when i signed up to this site the 1st thing i did was make a ujssm, but quantity's were wrong (30ltr) so i put another ujssm on with correct quantity's. (30ltr) then i acquired a 70ltr fermenter and thought ill just have the 70ltr as my ujssm so i made the 70ltr also, storing its not a problem as i have 40-50 empty spirit bottles and plenty of cupboard space under my bar, and i have plenty of thirsty mates! i now have another 30ltr fermenter! i am going to dedicate 1 maybe 2 fermenters to sugar washes as i just got a basic reflux still.. but the question at hand is, would the plan i put together work? i plan to slow down and im not after quantity, im after experience and variety, i will learn by my mistakes i guess

with your reflux still if you get too much ujssm you can do spirit runs and get a good nutral. i love them because there is no messing with nutrients or re-pitching of yeast. i have 7 20l ujssm of varing grains going. i wish i had 70l containers

[midlife_rebel]

I am currently having the same problem as a few on here with washes getting slower. Currently I am using 30% backset but a thought came to me today regarding 100% backset.... lets say my wash stalled at 1.030 from an original 1.090 (these numbers are all just for illustration), then I threw it into my boiler and ran it. I would think that any unused sugars would still be available for the next ferment (if using this 100% backset again) and I could merely adjust back up to the original SG.

Is my thinking flawed here or is this in theory possible?

[yankeeclear]

Not a good idea to run your wash with high percentage dissolved sugars. Sugar can/will burn and gunk up your entire distillation apparatus.

[midlife_rebel]

Good point Yankeeclear..

Actually my wash is around 1.015 and its only been a week so I expect it to drop a bit yet...twas an interesting thought though.

I can't see it making too much a problem though for the external heat guys. I have boiled sugar water on the stove a few times with no problems...but I could see huge problems for guys with internal heating elements.