Rum Talk......

[Jimbo]

Gonna place this here:

http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1 ... 0380.x/pdf" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;" rel="nofollow

Someone help remember page 17 on the Rum talk thread.
Thanks.

wow LWTCS!!

thanks for the reading material, just at a time when i am needing to understand my molasses addiction....

beautiful

Good read. Thanks Larry.

[LWTCS]

Gonna place this here:

http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1 ... 0380.x/pdf" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;" rel="nofollow

Someone help remember page 17 on the Rum talk thread.
Thanks.

wow LWTCS!!

thanks for the reading material, just at a time when i am needing to understand my molasses addiction....

beautiful

Good read. Thanks Larry.

Your very welcome.

[nerdybrewer]

Gonna place this here:

http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1 ... 0380.x/pdf" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;" rel="nofollow

Someone help remember page 17 on the Rum talk thread.
Thanks.

wow LWTCS!!

thanks for the reading material, just at a time when i am needing to understand my molasses addiction....

beautiful

Good read. Thanks Larry.

Your very welcome.

Good read, thanks!
I'm learning things, and it doesn't even hurt!

[LWTCS]

Yeah, that one is a little easier to digest than the Arroyo paper. For me anyway.....

[sparky marky]

Interesting reading material.
I wonder what bacteria are cropping up in MY local flora...

[raketemensch]

This might be a better thread to ask...

What are y'all's favorite dark rums? So far I've only had Meyers and Gosling's, Appleton will be next to try.

[nerdybrewer]

Mine.

[still_stirrin]

I really like the Black Seal (Goslings). And the Krakken is good too. I used to like Meyers but not so much anymore (too sweet).

I'm a fan of dark rum poured over a glass full of ice cubes. So, the Black Seal is very "user friendly".
ss

[Beerswimmer]

My favorite is Appleton. You can taste the funk!

I recently bought 5 gallons of Earth Juice Hi-Brix molasses and I'm not impressed with the ferment at all. Extremely weak, even with added nutrients. Has anyone used this before??

[LWTCS]

Well if it's this stuff here I bet the ash content is off the charts.

http://www.planetnatural.com/product/hi-brix-molasses/" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;" rel="nofollow

[Bushman]

My next fermentation will be rum, starting to save my strawberries (freezing them) for strawberry daiquiri's.

[Beerswimmer]

Well if it's this stuff here I bet the ash content is off the charts.

http://www.planetnatural.com/product/hi-brix-molasses/" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;" rel="nofollow

It is. Any ideas?

[LWTCS]

Well if it's this stuff here I bet the ash content is off the charts.

http://www.planetnatural.com/product/hi-brix-molasses/" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;" rel="nofollow

It is. Any ideas?

Beyond treating the molasses before fermentation,,,nothing very helpful.
There is a thread around here that explains the cleaning process on the hobby scale.
One of my customers explains that he dilutes and heats the molasses, then pumps it through a residential 12" long sediment filter cartridge. Can't recall how much liquid he can pump through before the cartridge clogs? But he is a commercial operator and is likely doing a couple hundred gallons at a time. I think a twin pak of those filters is about 10 or 12 bux. The housing is about 60 bux and usually comes with a cartridge.

I would personally rather spend a bit more on more suitable molasses than to add more time and processing equipment to the operation. But I'm lazy.


I think that molasses is made from beets?

[Beerswimmer]

It's made from cane. I got it from a hydroponics store at a steep discount, never again. I'll stick to the feed and fancy molasses from now on. I've never needed to clear molasses before this. I just let it settle for a day and pour it off of the trub. This stuff isn't even about clearing, just don't ever use it period. A lesson learned.

[Shine0n]

This has become my go to read thread, great stuff guys
I've ran many rum washes with fancy, dark brown sugar and a couple of weeks ago I did my first with dB sugar and feed grade mol. I'll share my recipe and see what yall think.
This is for a 15 gal ferment,
16 lbs dB sugar
2 gal feed mol
1/2 cup bakers yeast
H20 to top off to 15 gal

I rehydrated the yeast with some diluted wash for a starter and pitched at 90°f
I took a week to finish and ran 2-3 days later, I did a strip run just because I didn't know what to expect from the feed grade. I took a pint off the still of good hearts and kept for sippin.
I ended up with 2.75 gal of low wines and I'm waiting for the other ferments to finish to add to them.

Well, after a week a decided to drink that pint with my pops watching the Cowboys game and christ man man that was the best, buttery, funky, sweet rum I think I've ever tasted!!!!!
So from now on I will just do a single spirit run and keep that a way.
I forgot to mention that I run a 15 gal keg with a 7.5 gal thumper.

All that being said I wanted to thank everyone who has thrown out their ideas and I plan on many many more rums in the future.

Shine0n

[Bushman]

Very similar to what I do. Mine is a variation of Hooks Rum:

Fermentation
For a 5 Gallons ferment at 10% abv.

Ingredients
5 lbs of panella sugar
.5 gallons of blackstrap molasses
3/4 teaspoons of DAP
1.75 gallons of dunder (if using it, plus calcium carbonate). If not, then use 1 heaped teaspoon of citric acid.
lees from the previous ferment. (Optional)
Clean, well aerated water to make up the final volume.

1 TBLS of dried bakers yeast.

Keep ferment around 25-30 ºC.


Vary the molasses/sugar ratio to your taste. More molasses equals stronger taste.

Vary the proportion of dunder to your taste. More dunder equals stronger taste. About 1/3 is a good place to start.

Throw all the ingredients into the fermenter, and use hot dunder from the still, or hot water, fill the fermenter to halfway to help dissolve everything, and help sanitise it all. Stir well for a few minutes. Cover and let cool overnight. Top up with plain clean water. Make sure the ferment is well aerated. Then pitch yeast straight on to the surface. Cover loosely. I don't use airlocks.

I use town water and add a very small pinch of vitamin C powder (as sodium ascorbate or ascorbic acid powders, from the health food store) to neutralise any chlorine or chloramine in the water. Works very well.

[nerdybrewer]

This has become my go to read thread, great stuff guys
I've ran many rum washes with fancy, dark brown sugar and a couple of weeks ago I did my first with dB sugar and feed grade mol. I'll share my recipe and see what yall think.
This is for a 15 gal ferment,
16 lbs dB sugar
2 gal feed mol
1/2 cup bakers yeast
H20 to top off to 15 gal

I rehydrated the yeast with some diluted wash for a starter and pitched at 90°f
I took a week to finish and ran 2-3 days later, I did a strip run just because I didn't know what to expect from the feed grade. I took a pint off the still of good hearts and kept for sippin.
I ended up with 2.75 gal of low wines and I'm waiting for the other ferments to finish to add to them.

Well, after a week a decided to drink that pint with my pops watching the Cowboys game and christ man man that was the best, buttery, funky, sweet rum I think I've ever tasted!!!!!
So from now on I will just do a single spirit run and keep that a way.
I forgot to mention that I run a 15 gal keg with a 7.5 gal thumper.

All that being said I wanted to thank everyone who has thrown out their ideas and I plan on many many more rums in the future.

Shine0n

Yeah the center hearts cut is fine isn't it?
What I like to do is take a pint (or more) of the hearts for drinking / mixing and put the rest in the barrel for aging.

Are you saving any backset for dunder?
Using dunder every time seems like using sourdough starter, you get the generational thing going where some of the first batch is in every batch you make as long as you save some for next time.
Adding backset / dunder instead of water increases the unfermentables and can throw off your gravity reading but you're adding and compounding flavor instead of just water.

[Shine0n]

I did save the dunder and will add 10-15% on the next ferment, I'll also save some for aging and I'll let it get nice and funky too. Lol
I have a brand new 55 gal fermenter that I'll use, I need to buy a spigot or two and place one very close to the bottom to remove solids periodically and one 1/4 way up to remove my desired amount per ferment.

I also plan on using some dunder for a sf, add to the thumper along with some feints and see what kind of yum yum I can concoct and more than likely I'll use dark brown sugar for the sf ferment.

I've read this thread quite a bit over the last few months and seem to find ways to improve my rum, I can always rerun if I don't care for it or let it sit and check it a few months later.

I'm pretty bad about not taking notes when I experiment for some dumb reason and have made an awesome drink and can't remember how... oh well that keeps me experimenting even more which is a great deal of fun too. This is a new year and I will try to take notes this year on everything outside of my usual runs.

[Shine0n]

I did an experiment with one quart of hearts from the last run and I think it may turn out pretty good.
28 Oz 125 proof bold rum
20 raisins
1/16 teaspoon orange zest
2 drops (too expensive) vanilla extract
15 Sq inches of med toasted oak

I have completed 2 cycles of nuked aging and have removed the raisins, now I will let this sit for 6 months and check to see. I love rum now I've found 2 recipes that are repeatable everytime, they are both my own too.

I've taken what I've read and took the parts I liked and left what I didn't and made some rum that I'm very proud of!
Thanks everybody who inspired me and given advice and posting their results from proven and experimental methods. I so look forward to makin a load of rum this year, I was given 2 53 gal local wine barrels for free and I might try and fill one this year.

I will fill 1 with water and let sit for a spell and once I have 25 gallons of rum I will drain it and start filling. It may take quite a long time to fill but I also plan on letting it age 5 years once full.
It's a long term goal but I can see 2022 being full of rummy goodness.

[Shine0n]

Update on the orange rum raisin, there's only one word for this,- scrumdiddalyumches!!!
I proofed it down to 90 and I had to put it away. Too good to sit in plain sight.
The only thing I'll do differently next time is keep the raisins in for longer.
I have enough mol and dB sugar to make a 30 gal ferment and what I get off from these 2 runs, half will be done like this for 2018 4th of July bash and keep the other half white.

Damn that's good rum. Mmmm m

[baznkez]

HI,
I Am interested in other peoples molasses RUM ventures from dunder washes, stripping , to stilling & oaking .
I use 5kg of molasses , 3kg raw sugar ,ec118 yeast and nutrient ferment for 12days , then rack it to fridge for another couple days then strip it , use backset to start another wash etc ,then pot still the 2x strip runs , air for 24 hrs then blend my cuts from there i cut to 65% abv add american oak chips into the US cleaner for 45mins up to 65degrees , cool overnight repeat this 4 x then bottle and aerate with carbonating stone , then cork in demijohn for it to breath for a short time before drinking . it actually turned out really smooth and nice oak taste

[Yummyrum]

HI,
I Am interested in other peoples molasses RUM ventures from dunder washes, stripping , to stilling & oaking .

May have posted this in an abreviated form around here but heres the picture version .

This is 100% Feedstock Black strap Molasses with no sugar bump . Costs me $30 for the molly $5 for the yeast and gas maybe $10 worth .
Add 10 liters of Dunder and about 10 of water to my big O'L Pot ( which is an old 68 liter wash tub with a plate soldered over the drain hole . and get it hot but not boiling .
Add 30 liters of Molasses and stir it to dissolve .I use a paint stirer in a corless drill . Its just to mix it not aerate it . (The pic only shows 20 liters of Molasses as the other 10 was still in the shed )

Split the mix between my two 60 liters fermenters . I have a magnetic drive pump which makes transferring easy . (I used to have the BOP up on a bench and gravity empty into fermenters but It was killing my back lifting up pales of molasses that high .)

Then I top up each fermenter to 50 liters .I use the hose as it aerates as it squirts in . I also occassionally use Salt Bush Bills method
Dissolving Molasses , the easy way if I have Hot Dunder from the still but generally mine sits around until its cold

Add A teaspoon of Epsom salts to each Fermenter .

When its about 35-45 degC , I add a cup of Lowans bread yeast .

Heres some Start Stats .

Start gravity ...off the scale but it looks like 1.140
pH is 5.4
Don't need shells or any buffer crap . Don't need any yeast bombs or Nutrients .

Its is done fermenening after 2-3 days but I'll leave it a week to settle before distilling .

Finish Gravity is 1.050
Finish pH is 5.0 .....see no shells needed

Run each 50 liters fermenter in my 80 liter boiler with Feints from last rum run and add a table spoon of vege oil to help with pukeing .
Run it through my 4 plate still .

This will give me around 9 liters @ 92%ABV off the still after cuts .
Dilute down to about 70% ABV and Oak with medium toast American Oak Dominoes for as long as I can ....usually 6-12 months

That works out to nearly 30 700ml bottles of Rum @40 ABV . .....not bad for about $1.50 a bottle

[baznkez]

Hi mate ,
that is awesome as i am new to rum making as such what does the Epsom salts do ? correct the ph ?? , and do you not you need nutrients if u keep using backset or dunder???

[Yummyrum]

Hi mate ,
that is awesome as i am new to rum making as such what does the Epsom salts do ? correct the ph ?? , and do you not you need nutrients if u keep using backset or dunder???

Yeast need Magnesium but its about the only thing that Mollases is low on , otherwise it has all the other ingredients naturally in it that yeast need . Incidentally , you will find that Magnesium Sulfate ( Epsom Salts ) is one of the main ingreadients in Commercial Yeast Nutrient Salts . .

Dunder is not added as a source of Nutrients .We mainly add it because of the flavour that builds up and gives the Rum more charactor . Also it has a low pH and Commercially ,it was mostly added to slow up really fast fermentaions but as it was often stored in big tanks or pits that would grow moulds in them which also changed the flavour .Some of Jamacan Rums use this method . Personally I am not a fan of this and went down the festering Dunder pit route for a couple of years but I did not get a fuzzy feeling from it however a few around here do . Incidentally IIRC most Australian Rum manufacturers don't use Dunder ...its not essential but It seems to help .

I just add fresh Dunder straght from the still or save it in pales until I need it . The trick is not to use too much and you will not have pH issues . If you stick to 10% and 15% at an absolute max you'll be right .Mollases has a huge amount of Minerals and organic mater in it as well as all the Phosphoric acid and Calcium Carbonate which is added to it during the sugar refining process so it is basically a big pH buffer . When the boiler boils the alcohol off , the Dunder gets even more condensed and "thicker" . You will notice my start and finish SG readings would make a beer brewer laugh their heads off . .....but it is due to all the unfermentable matter in there .

[Saltbush Bill]

i am new to rum making as such what does the Epsom salts do ?

Most washes will benefit from some Epsom Salts (magnesium sulfate). Its probably easier to ask what Epsom salts dont do to make yeast happy. One of the many things it does is to stop or slow yeast flocculation.

"flocculate"
verbtechnical
form or cause to form into small clumps or masses.
"it tends to flocculate in high salinities"

A google search for " magnesium sulphate and yeast flocculation" will reveal many things if you want to spend a lot of time reading..........other wise you can just accept the fact that Epsom Salts is good for your rum wash.

[acfixer69]

You a smooth talker their salty. I had rum with lunch today. Think I'll stuff some ES in my bi-carb on a half shell

AC

[Single Malt Yinzer]

https://www.bostonapothecary.com/operat ... liography/" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;" rel="nofollow

If you haven't checked out Boston Apothecary in the last week or so he's uploaded a bunch of French Rum papers. Tons of good info.

[zapata]

Whoa, cool biblio!
Especially:
http://www-bcf.usc.edu/~forsburg/history/eijkman.html" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;" rel="nofollow
Rice, koji, schizo mollasses hybrid. And this is a real thing, not wierdos like us making it up at home just to be nerdier than the next guy!

[Shine0n]

Good lord man, that made my brain hurt at 430 am. lol

Very good read from all I did read and still have quite a way to go to get through all those links but I will finish them in due time.

As it happens I am a rum weirdo and always interested in the science behind it, I actually had to break out a dictionary to even know what the hell some of the things mentioned were. lol

My lab is a barn, my setup is that of a typical rum distillery, my science is messing with dunders and specific infections to dictate different esters caused by them.
On my latest dunder (potatoes and soil) I found a pronounced pineapple smell and taste once added to low wines and distilled at 30%, after 6 months the pineapple has almost diminished but is still on the backend while sipping on the rocks, it's a very good rum and has been aged on AO med toast until last week. Nice, smooth, bold, and by far the best rum to date but I'm still young and willing so I may just find better and bolder in the future but for now that's where I'm at and I'm very pleased with my product.

I'll keep up with this thread and keep on reading to get a fuller understanding of some of the science behind the quest in which I seek. GREAT RUM!

Shine0n

[ElCubanazo]

Whoa, cool biblio!
Especially:
http://www-bcf.usc.edu/~forsburg/history/eijkman.html" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;" rel="nofollow
Rice, koji, schizo mollasses hybrid. And this is a real thing, not wierdos like us making it up at home just to be nerdier than the next guy!

Oh wow that's super interesting. First time I've I've heard/read of these "schizos" what exactly are they?

Also TIL arrack is just a general word in Asia and Middle East for "liquor" much like "aguardiente" or "moonshine", etc. I thought it was always rice but apparently varies where you are.

Damn it, now I wanna make a rice whiskey. This hobby is time/space consuming enough just making rum! Lol