New Corn Whiskey

[Bombo80]

I wanted to start another corn whiskey, similar to what I had done a year ago.

Close to Booner's all corn recipe, but with a slight twist.

18# whole corn, processed into corn meal using a commercial coffee grinder.
4# sugar
20ml Ferm-Solutions High temp enzyme
8ml Ferm-Solutions gluco-amylase enzyme
2 gallons fresh, hot backset from the bourbon I just ran.
4.5 gallons boiling water

Added the backset fresh off the still. Then added the boiling water and mixed in the corn meal with a paint stirrer on a power drill.
Once the corn meal was all incorporated, and there were no dry spots, I added the high temp enzyme. That really thinned it out quite a bit, almost immediately. I continued to mix this for about a minute or so. I covered the bucket and wrapped it in a sleeping bag to rest. I checked it at 1 hour, and mixed it some more, and then again at the 2 hour mark. I let it sit until the mash was about 155*, then I added the gluco-amylase enzyme. This thinned it out even more. I wrapped it back up and let it sit overnight.
In the morning, it was still too hot to pitch my yeast, so I just gave it another mix and wrapped it up until after work. When I got home it was at 85*. Perfect to pitch the yeast. I aerated it very well and added 1/2 cup bakers yeast, sealed the fermenter and put an airlock on it. I checked it the next morning, and it was going like gang busters. I let it go one day, then added a bag of oyster shells, for pH management.
I checked the OG with a refractometer, and had 22 brix. Holy Crap !!! That is a gravity of 1.092. A bit higher than I was expecting, but I will take it.
By my calculations, that is about 83% efficiency.
I should have added another gallon of RO water to bring it down, but I just thought of that right now.
Oh well, I will just deal with it this time.

[Chauncey]

why the 4 lbs of sugr? thats what made your sg so high

[Bombo80]

The added sugar was about half the amount I added first batch I made. The first batch I only got an OG of 1.053. So I had a very low efficiency.
But the first batch I didn't have the high temp enzymes. All I had was the standard powdered alpha amylase, that I added once the mash got below 158*.
I wasn't expecting over 80% efficiency with the corn. This was the last of the corn from the same original bag, and I didn't have a very good starch conversion on any mash I made with it.
Even if I would have left the sugar out, I would have had a OG of 1.070.
So it is pretty obvious that the high temp enzymes really helped out, as well as the gluco-amylase too.
Like I said, if I had been thinking straight, I could have added more water to bring down the gravity.

[Chauncey]

The added sugar was about half the amount I added first batch I made. The first batch I only got an OG of 1.053. So I had a very low efficiency.
But the first batch I didn't have the high temp enzymes. All I had was the standard powdered alpha amylase, that I added once the mash got below 158*.
I wasn't expecting over 80% efficiency with the corn. This was the last of the corn from the same original bag, and I didn't have a very good starch conversion on any mash I made with it.
Even if I would have left the sugar out, I would have had a OG of 1.070.
So it is pretty obvious that the high temp enzymes really helped out, as well as the gluco-amylase too.
Like I said, if I had been thinking straight, I could have added more water to bring down the gravity.

If you're getting good conversion now and all I'd suggest dropping the thin mash w sugar and going all grain. Corn is cheaper than sugar itself. Just more work.

[ShineonCrazyDiamond]

Just more work.

Not much!

[Samyguy]

Just use 2 to 2.2 lbs corn to a gallon of water
add enzymes and backset and cook like you said
You should be good to go, that's what I use.
Comes out great!!

[Bombo80]

Samy,

That is exactly what I plan to do the next round. Payday I will be getting my 50# bag of cornmeal, and try a big batch of corn mash.

[fizzix]

Hey Bombo, that corn meal can be a pain to cook without scorching. Here's a tip I learned from ShineonCrazyDiamond
where you pour boiling water onto the meal and let it sit. In SoCD's words:

"Put the corn into a 6 gallon bucket. Fill bucket up with boiling water. Wrap in blankets, stirring as frequent as you like.
Mine takes about 3 or 4 hours this way to naturally hit mashing temp, so I stir 2 or 3 times during this time."

[Bombo80]

That is exactly how I did this batch, and how I plan to do all future mashes.

[Samyguy]

Good Luck!!