Converted LM/VM Gin head

[AZ_Dave]

Recently added a inline gin basket in my LM/VM head. The head is a tee-cup variation, and the gin basket is a 1.5in x 10in copper tube that sits above the takeoff points below the condenser. Plan was to run it with short 18in column detuned no packing with LM valve wide open. See photo below.

I read the parent sites info on Gin and collected my aromatics basing the recipe on the London dry gin.

Recipe 6 - per Lt
LONDON GIN
juniper 10g
coriander 10g
bitter almonds 1g
angelica root 0.25g
liquorice root 1g

I ran 6Lt of 50% +1.5Lt water to get it down to 40%. I scaled the recipe x6 it was to much for the basket so I threw the half cup in to the boiler. Sealed it up and off I went. First 300 ml was oily as expected next 500ml crystal clear and smelled like gin. Then it changed color dark yellow and stayed yellow but gradually lightened. Final 500ml was pail milky yellow. All of is smells very good. So I let it sit and cleaned up. Latter I was ready to blent and bottle so i took my eyedropper and pull equal amounts out of 3 of the jars and added equal amount of water. Yuck it was so strong. So I did some reading and its not unheard of to get a light yellow. So I try blending in neutral. I ended up needing to take it to a 6 parts neutral to :1 of the Gin concentrate to get it in the tolerable range. I then made a GandT and wow it was not bad but WTF did I do?

I figure one of the following
1.Used to much aromatics for vapor infusion
2. Messed up adding the last 1.5 cup to the boiler and not taking it out
3. Created a micro column where the distillate recalculated in the basket taking out more than expected amounts of flavor.

Looking for opinions. I figure I can use the almost gallon of concentrate 6:1 with neutral or just put it back in and run it through pot still with equal amount of neutral. FIgure on the latter hoping it will remove the nasty yellow. Stuff looks like pisss

[Braz]

Don't know. I use about 6-7gr of juniper per liter of 30% low wines. You have a lot of corriander in there. I use about 1 gr/ltr.

Adding the excess botanicals to the boiler shouldn't be a problem. I do it often. Not sure why you are getting yellow gin, but it is possible. With vapor infusion some botanical oils could come over into the distillate causing the yellow tint.

Getting to the gin you want is a difficult but noble quest. I wish you good journey.

[AZ_Dave]

Thanks for the encouragement. This could take quite some time. Good news is I purchased enough botanicals to last me a few years. Looks like I need to step up the neutral production.

[redridinghood]

hey, can you guys recommend a good (trustworthy) place for purchasing botanicals? By trustworthy, I mean NOT anything made in China or some other scandalous place that was in the news?

THanks