Making pure whiskey

[baron4406]

Jimbo is right, just get to 'stilling. Heck the way i run is a mish-mash of Odin-Dnderhead-Rad-Me style whiskey making, and I make some darn fine sipping hootch. It spoils you for anything but the top dollar store bought hootch, just like when you start making your own beer it spoils you too. You can't drink the big names anymore just microbrews. There's no law against being different, trying new things. The only constant here is safety. Lastly you hit on an important point, what isn't addressed is how these Scottish whiskey makers let their stuff sit on oak for 8-10-15etc. years. Heck you could take Everclear and cut it to 65% with water from a mud puddle and put that on oak for 15 years you'd end up with some fine tasting stuff.

[Odin]

Lampshade, if you want to introduce new or different or exact definitions, it may be worthwhile to start a new post about that. It is not the topic of this tread. This tread is about making Pure Whiskey and the definitions used by Ian Smiley are the ones to be used. There is no semantic fuzz. I explained the method and the definitions very clearly. Or actually Ian did.

Irish whiskey making is completely different from Pure Whiskey making. It is based on potdistilling for instance. Please, I invite you all to stay focused on the methodology of how to make Pure Whiskey, 'cause that's the take here. All other discussions are interesting and deserve a place of their own. And that's not necesairily under this topic. On the contrary, instead of people talking about definitions or Irish whiskey making, I would rather have Q's about the methodology, or people having success with this method. Why? Because that is why I started this tread. And because Pure Whishkey is so great.

Currently sipping one.

Odin.

[lampshade]

One of the beauties of the Odin/Smiley method has not been mentioned yet, and that occurs by cutting the previous heads+tails down to one liter.

This insures that there is no build-up of nasties ("the sting") over time. As each generation is distilled, the heads+tails contribution from a given previous generation becomes less and less over time with each succeeding generation.

Let me illuminate this idea with an example. Say one liter of heads+tails from generation_1 is added to the wash of generation_2. We distill and again collect one liter. This liter then contains approximately 1/2-liter of heads+tails from generation_2 and approximately 1/2-liter of heads+tails from generation_1. And so on. Lets tabulate the results:

Run 1 produces hearts_1 and one liter of heads+tails_1
Run 2 produces hearts_2 and 1/2-liter of heads+tails_2 plus 1/2-liter of heads+tails_1
Run 3 produces hearts_3 and 1/3-liter of heads+tails_3 plus 1/3-liter of heads+tails_2 plus 1/3-liter of heads+tails_1
Run 4 produces hearts_4 and 1/4-liter of heads+tails_4 plus 1/4-liter of heads+tails_3 plus 1/4-liter of heads+tails_2 plus 1/4-liter of heads+tails_1

and so on ... as you can see, the re-cycled heads+tails from preceding generations is smeared, meaning the heads+tails contribution from any particular generation is becoming less and less over successive runs. This also produces a more uniform flavor profile.

I used "approximately" above because the composition of the returned heads+tails is not exactly as I shown. I made an accounting simplification for the purpose of making my example easier to understand. I might provide an exact breakdown later, but the idea is the same.

[goose eye]

Y'all telling me y'all ain't keepin 140 proof likker.
Y'all need to stomp on yalls testers


So im tole

[lampshade]

Here is a diagram of The Smiley/Odin Distill Cycle -- a peace offering to Odin for adding my semantics rants to his thread

[Odin]

You can just save more and more feints in the feints container. But adding like one liter of feints per 20 liter of wash seems good. As the generaions progress, you will get more and more feints. by the time you have enough for a batch, do a slow spirit run on the whole feints container minus one liter. The minus one liter you keep behind for a next wash. Anyhow, now slowly run an all feints distillation run. Hearts will be relatively small, but fantastic.

The nice thing in this recipe, apart for purity, ease, no ageing required, etc. is that heads and tails are better compacted when there are more. Volatiles and/or tailsy alcohols.

So you don't have to discard feints, Lampshade, you can just keep on collecting them until you have enough for an all feints run. Like your picture though!

Other things that influence taste: wide versus narrow hearts cut; early versus late hearts cut. Wide means some fores & tails might bleed in. Narrow means less so, for a lighter whiskey. Early cut means a bit more "to the left": some heads but not tails for a fruity whiskey. "Late" means the opposite.

Odin.

[lampshade]

Updated diagram. Also, here are the definitions that Odin is working with, from "Making Pure Corn Whiskey" by Ian Smiley:

• Foreshots: The foreshots are the low-boiling-point compounds that come out of the still first. They contain acetone, methanol, various esters and aldehydes, and other volatiles. Foreshots are to be considered poisonous and should be discarded.
  
  Heads: The heads come out after the foreshots, and are almost pure alcohol, except that they are contaminated with trace amounts of unwanted congeners. The heads are retained and later mixed with the tails to make up the feints that are cycled through future spirit-runs.
  
  Middle-run: The middle-run is the refined spirit and begins when the trace congeners of the heads fade away and yield to a pure clean spirit. The middle-run, when diluted with water, is the finished whiskey.
  
  Tails: At some point late in the middle-run a certain family of esters begins to bleed into the middle-run. These esters are what give the whiskey most of its character and flavour. As these esters flow into the middle-run they become increasingly intense and strong flavoured. Past a certain point they become so intense and strong that they are acrid and bitter and spoil the flavour of the whiskey. The still operator has to select a point before these acrid and bitter esters prevail, to end the middle-run. Everything following this selected-end of the middle-run is called the tails. The tails are only collected until the still-head temperature reaches about 81 or 82oC (178 or 180oF). Above this temperature there are no useful congeners but just unwanted fusel alcohols. After this point the still is switched off and the spirit-run is complete.
  
  Feints: The tails are mixed with the heads and are called “feints”. Feints are saved and recycled in future spirit-runs.
  As the feints are repeatedly recycled through spirit-run after spirit-run, they become more and more richly embewed with the desirable whiskey congeners, so each batch of whiskey is incrementally improved over the previous.

[lampshade]

To the moderators: Forgive my hubris, but I think adding something like the above post as a stickie would be helpful so that all readers are on the same page.

[rad14701]

lampshade, you're making my head hurt... Give it a rest...!!! Might have to cull your posts into another topic because you're definitely drifting off topic at this point, almost into oncoming traffic...

Once you've done enough runs you'll discover that Foreshots, Heads, Hearts, and Tails is more than enough to keep track of...


Typed before lampshade but posted after...

[lampshade]

Thanks all, I will heed Rad's sage advice (from his throne, haha). My apologies to all, especially to Odin.

[Odin]

Loved the enthousiasm though!

Odin.

[F6Hawk]

I keep seeing hard numbers for the fores pull. But isn't it more accurate to quantify them as ml per gallon of wash? Say 10-15 ml per gallon of wash, so on a 5 gallon run, we would discard 50-75 ml? Double it to be safe, if you desire. But when I see "toss the first 150-200 ml", I cringe. What if the person reading it owned a 30 gallon still? Or Rad, with his 1-gallon little guy... heck, 200 ml would be most of his run!

[Odin]

Problem with the hard numbers is, Hawk, that not every rig compresses as well. There are differences.

Odin.

[lampshade]

Problem with the hard numbers is, Hawk, that not every rig compresses as well. There are differences.

Odin.

Don't know, Odin, nor do I want to know, 'bout your side, but on this side of the pond, all rigs are tall..... haha

Now, down under... well,... I'll let them speak for themselves.

[Jimbo]

Problem with the hard numbers is, Hawk, that not every rig compresses as well. There are differences.

Odin.

And every wash is different, with more or less crap depending on the grocery list, yeast used, ferment temp, ABV bla bla.. so when I saw you write this earlier in the thread..

heads: next part coming of (Ian Smiley calculates 17% of total collectable);
hearts: middle part, the thing we are after (Ian calculates 58% of total collectable);

It made me

Its completely ridiculous for Ian to make that claim. (for the record, I have that book too, and some good stuff in it, but some utter crap as well)

[rad14701]

I keep seeing hard numbers for the fores pull. But isn't it more accurate to quantify them as ml per gallon of wash? Say 10-15 ml per gallon of wash, so on a 5 gallon run, we would discard 50-75 ml? Double it to be safe, if you desire. But when I see "toss the first 150-200 ml", I cringe. What if the person reading it owned a 30 gallon still? Or Rad, with his 1-gallon little guy... heck, 200 ml would be most of his run!

My current boilers are 2, 3, and 4 gallon and I always take 4oz/125ml as a foreshots cut even though the foreshots are substantially less, so that jar also contains early heads... My cuts percentages are skewed because I usually run in hybrid mode which compresses foreshots and heads...

[mash rookie]

Problem with the hard numbers is, Hawk, that not every rig compresses as well. There are differences.

Odin.

Odin, I would like to make two remarks addressing statements by you and the guy with the funny hat.

1.Methanol in grain washes is a myth..

2.Any still with a reflux condenser that is capable of holding a still in 100% reflux will compress heads equally well as any others. Poor fractioning stills will not seperate tails from hearts even though they may compress heads. ie; Flutes.

[Odin]

Hi Mash,

Hawk's rig gets him up to 93%. That's different than 95%+. For sure it will have an impact on compressing heads. The higher the abv attainable, the more compressed heads will be.

There is methanol in any drink. In whiskey too. Not to any large extend. Brandies have more, especially apple brandy, but there is always a little bit of methanol. Not sure how that influences what I state about Making Pure Whiskey, because it is not about methanol.


Odin.

[F6Hawk]

There is methanol in any drink. Brandies have more, especially apple brandy, but there is always a little bit of methanol.
Odin.

I was under the impression that methanol is only present in washes/mashes that contain wood-like substances such as leaves, stems, pits. And that a AG or sugar head wash contains no methanol at all. Truth or fiction?

[Odin]

Drinks that ferment with wood structures present (grapes, apples) have more than others. But there are harder parts in grains as well. And even in a pure sugar wash always some minimal amount of methanol present. The process by which yeast "cuts" sugar molecules is not perfect. 4C molecules are cut in two. 3C molecules are cut in a 2C and 1C molecule. 3C sugar is wood sugar. So wood sugar makes one ethanol molecul (2c) and one methanol molecule (1c). But as I said before this "cutting" process is not 100% of the time working 100% well. Sometimes 4C molecules (sugar) get jammed in such a way that 1C (methanol) is formed. Hence: all sugar/alcohol ferments develop some methanol. Nothing to be affraid of, but it is there.

Odin.

[F6Hawk]

Gotcha. And I figure that by doing more than 10 ml per gallon of wash, we are into heads anyway, so prolly safe enough. Those that pull 100-150 ml per 5 gal as Rad stated are safely into heads.

[Andy Capp]

Getting back on topic.........
I cant see what difference it makes as to how much feints you recycle in your next run. So long as the still is run properly and proper cuts are made you wont get less hearts. just more feints. The way i see it though is that more feints would add back more flavour. I think this is the key point with making whiskey at high percentage. Does that sound right?

[Odin]

Yes.

More feints will give over more taste. Actually, 1 liter of feints added per 20 liter wash is pretty nice. For some too strong. Then go back to maybe 0.5 liters of feints. Try 2 liters just for the sake of trying. It is probably too intense.

Odin.

[Dnderhead]

I disagree with some,much of the methanol in fruit must comes from pectin.pectin holds the cells together like glue ,when it broken down by yeast or enzymes it becomes methanol.
some fruit like apples have more.that's why granny used apples as a base for jelly. most is in the skins so "granny" boiled up things like apple peeling for pectin . with citrus its in the path.
sour /unripe fruit tend to have more.

[Odin]

Yes!

Odin.

[Rocketboy]

I don't post offten on this forum but I read everything posted. This thread has been the most informative one I've come across in awhile.
Odin, your observations have just given me one of those 'a-haaa' moments we all love. Because of my limited resources I built a still that some would call a 'hyrid' (thanks Rad!). I did this because I wanted to be able to produce a neutral as well as have a shot at something like a whiskey by simply removing the packing and running in 'pot still mode'. Some of Rad's posts steered me towards this approach because it just made sense to me. For learning how a still works and the different methods to produce spirit, I couldn't have asked for a better still. It's a simple LM 2" insulated copper tower with a 10" coil at the top and a slant plate takeoff. The column is aprox. 5.5ft tall. I use a large stainless pot and propane for heat. For a neutral I pack the column with scrubbers, in 'pot still mode' I remove the scrubbers.
Before building my current pot still, I made 50+ runs in my column with no packing to get something closer to a whiskey than a neutral. This had worked very well for me over the years and produced some of the best spirit I've tasted.
Like a lot of people in this hobby, I've been using a hybrid method for my distillations. In other words, I've used ideas from hundreds of writings and suggestions to come up with a method that works for me. Part of my method includes always including feints from previous runs in the next run. My idea of feints is anything that didn't make it to the barrel minus the first 100ml.
All that said, my 'a-haaa' moment came to me while reading Odin's observations. About a year ago, I thought I was running a corn wash in my tower in pot still mode. I could usually pull off a consistant 90% spirit in the beginning of the run and without any adjustments let it run it's coarse until I was smelling and tasting tails. On this particular occasion, it was coming off at 96%. I soon realized I forgot to remove the scrubbers from my last neutral run. I didn't want to shut things down so I let it go.
The transformation of the flavors from what I was used to getting in 'pot still mode' to what I was now getting in full reflux mode was simply amazing. I just couldn't believe how the flavors were so much more consistant through the entire run rather than fruity stuff at the beginning and the more grainy/heavier towards the tails. It now seemed as though they were all combined throughout the entire heart cut, albeit not as intense as I would find at either the begining or the end of the run.
That particular run in itself changed the way I distilled. I pay much closer attention now to how long I run in full reflux before opening the valve and can change the flavor of my spirit by altering how long I allow it to run full reflux. I also pay close attention to the precise amount of feints I add to each new wash when it's time to run. Oh, and I never remove my scrubbers!
Apparently, I literally stumbled across what Odin is telling us here. Having him explain it in this thread absolutely confirms my findings. I guess had I read the book I would've figured this out long ago but this way was much more rewarding. Thanks, Odin for the awesome thread!

[Odin]

You are welcom. Glad it works for you. Good to see my findings (and Ian's, let's not forget that) sorta come back in your thread. Accidentally distilling pure whiskey!

Great write up!

Odin.

[Andy Capp]

Odin, what are your thoughts with different recipes and how this method affects the resulting flavour compared to double distilling? Are there recipes that would benefit from single run refluxing as opposed to double running?

[Odin]

With double running, you mean thru a potstill? Or do you mean strip first, then use the Pure Whiskey making approacht?

Odin.

[lampshade]

Odin, what are your thoughts with different recipes and how this method affects the resulting flavour compared to double distilling? Are there recipes that would benefit from single run refluxing as opposed to double running?

Andy Capp,

Semantics, semantics... I didn't understand, before this thread, what exactly double distilling was (strip multiple generations and then spirit or two successive spirits of the same generation). To help others like me, I would suggest you reword your question as:

... would benefit from reflux distilling with the feints (late {weak} heads, early {strong} tails, & late {weak} tails) from the previous generation as opposed to pot distilling the same generation a second time with the feints from the first distillation.

Aahhh, my head now hurts less.

It would hurt less if my above italicized sentence was shortened using commonly accepted semantics.