I decided to try this version of an all grain sweet feed recipe because it seems that so many members are curious about doing it this way and I thought it would also be a way to get us sugarhead distillers going with AG mashing with something a little more familiar. I'm using the SEBstar and SEBamyl enzymes from enzymash.com and a no-cook steeping method to make this process as simple as possible. This is not to say that other techniques can't be used. It would be interesting to see other methods, including traditional ones, explored by other members. For instance, some members are now using steam rigs to cook and mash their grains, and/or using various rest steps to get more efficient conversions. This recipe could also be accomplished with malted grains which would also give a different flavor profile. The grain bill can also be varied for your own flavor preferences.
I would like to say up front that much of the reason for the somewhat convoluted methods I'm using is because of limited resources. I do everything related to this hobby in my basement which currently has no running water and very limited cooking facilities. I carry my water from the kitchen to the basement in one gallon jugs. My strike water is heated in my 5 gallon still boiler. Because I can only heat water a little at a time, I mash in 5 gallon buckets. My boiler is electric running on 120V service. It takes near an hour to heat 4 gallons of water to boiling. From start to finish, the preparation of 4 five gallon bucket ferments took about a day and a half. The long and the short of what I'm trying to say here is – if I can do this, so can you. And yes, this is the first time I've ever done an AG mash.
This is the ingredients list for one 4 gallon batch in a 5 gallon bucket:
- 2.5 lbs. coarsely milled corn
2.5 lbs. coarsely milled barley
2.5 lbs. Quaker Old Fashioned Oats
12 oz. store brand sweet table molasses
4 gallons water
Citric acid or backset for PH adjustment if necessary
3 ml SEBstar HTL liquid enzyme (0.36ml * 7.5lb = 2.7ml rounded to 3ml)
3 ml SEBamyl GL liquid enzyme (ditto)
1 seashell or ½ cup crushed oyster shells
3 tablespoons baker's yeast
These amounts are for one 5 gallon ferment bucket and leaves about 2 inches of head space in the bucket. I did this for 4 buckets for a total of 16 gallons of wort.
Day 1 -
- I weighed out the grains (Corn, Oats, Barley (COB)) into 4 five gallon food grade buckets – equal proportions of 2.5 lbs. each (total of 7.5 lbs. In each bucket). The grains are all unmalted. The corn and barley were milled to a coarse grind. The oats were Quaker Old Fashioned (rolled oats) straight from the container. I'm using just under 2 lbs (1.875 lbs.) of grain mix per 1 gallon of water. You could scale the grain/gallon ratio up for a higher OG.
Boiled 4 gallons of PH adjusted water (down to 6.0 - adjusted with citric acid) and added it to one bucket of grains. This lowered the temperature to approximately 190 dF. Note – you could use backset for PH adjustment if you have it.
Added 3ml of SEBstar HTL and stirred vigorously with a big ole ss spoon. Covered with a bucket lid and wrapped with a large bath towel.
Repeated the previous two steps for each of the 3 additional buckets.
Stirred each bucket every 15 to 20 minutes and checked the temp. It took each bucket 2+ hours to drop from 190 dF to 150 dF.
When each bucket reached 150 dF, I checked conversion using iodine. All 4 buckets successfully converted. Checked and adjusted PH to approximately 5.0 and added 3ml SEBamyl GL as each bucket reached 150 dF.
Allowed the 4 buckets of wort to cool overnight.
- Next morning - added 12 oz. of sweet table molasses to each bucket and stirred well.
Checked the OG of each bucket of wort. OG's were as follows:
- Bucket 1 – 1.053
Bucket 2 – 1.055
Bucket 3 – 1.055
Bucket 4 – 1.054
Aerated all 4 buckets using an oil free air compressor and dropped a big scallop shell into each bucket for PH control. Crushed oyster shells from the feed store could also be used for stabilizing the PH.
Pitched approximately 3 tablespoons of bakers yeast on the surface of each bucket, sealed the lids and secured the airlocks (5/16” clear hoses to a shared ½ gallon jug of water). The airlocks were bubbling within 15 to 20 minutes. - Bucket 1 – 1.053
When the ferment finishes, I'll allow the wash to clear for a few days, rack it into empty buckets and then press the remaining grains with a butt press. If you don't know what a “butt press” is (AKA, “ass press”), do an “HD Google Search”.
Day 6 -
- Ferment followup - The ferment went strong for about 4 full days and then began to slow down. After 6 days the airlocks are bubbling about once every 10 to 15 seconds. I will allow it to sit undisturbed for a few days more before checking the FG – can't do anything with it anyway until after the weekend.
- Checked the FG of each bucket as follows:
- Bucket 1 – 1.001
Bucket 2 – 1.015
Bucket 3 – 1.005
Bucket 4 – 1.000
To separate the wash from the grains, I started by trying to rack it off – big mistake. The large amount of grain almost immediately clogged the siphon hose. I then went to the “butt press”. It worked perfectly. One difference in my method – I didn't sit on it. I filled the top bucket with water for the weight and also put some bricks on the bucket lid. I ran the wash (2 buckets at a time) out of the butt press into 3 five gallon plastic water jugs. I recovered about 13 gallons of filtered wash from the 16 gallons of liquid I started with. This should be enough for 3 good stripping runs. I hope to do the stripping runs in a couple of days. - Bucket 1 – 1.001
- I plan to do 3 stripping runs in my 5 gallon pot still without the thumper. The spirit run will be done with the low wines diluted to at least 30% with the thumper charged with diluted low wines.
- I'll be doing my usual 3 cycle nuking method, which consists of a long low power nuking using toasted and charred white oak sticks, seal the jars, bring to room temp, move to the freezer for at least 3 hours, back to room temp, unseal, back to the microwave, and repeat for 3 complete cycles. This will then go to 1 gallon pickle jars for at least 2 months of aging off the wood.
I may also put a portion on toasted/charred white oak sticks in a glass jar for long term aging. For this, I would like to try T-Pee's aging method.
Summary -
- This was done to illustrate that a SF recipe can be done using an AG method and possibly produce a superior result. If you do this method, I would also advise not using a premixed bagged SF such as Producer's Pride All Grain. For a good conversion it will be necessary to mill the grains and I'm not so sure that's a good idea with the molasses in the premixed stuff. I used the traditional equal proportion COB mix for purposes of illustrating that something similar to the sugarhead recipe could be accomplished using an AG method. I opted to put the molasses in after conversion because I didn't want to take a chance of affecting the conversion process. It also seems logical that it wouldn't serve any good purpose to include it at the beginning.
The circumstances under which I had to accomplish this recipe were very demanding and arduous. I'm certain that it would be a much simpler method for those members who have the working facilities to be able to put together a single larger batch in a more efficient way. My mashing method was somewhat dictated by the limited facilities I had available to me.
I look at this as somewhat of a baseline. You can bring to it your own experience and methods - alter the grain bill, grain to water ratio, cooking and mashing methods, raw grains or malted grains, etc. I hope that some of you who like Sweet Feed whiskey will give this a try, put your own spin on it, and use it to jump into the AG method. If you try it, please post up with your results.
Good luck and stay safe.
