Plum Brandy advice wanted

[OtisT]

I’m looking for advice on distilling brandy from some of our more experienced brandy makers. I’ve made lots of whiskey, rum, and neutral but only one batch of brandy and that was years ago, so while I know how to distill and make cuts I’m not up to speed on brandy specific techniques. I’ll share what I have planned and ask a few specific questions along the way. Feedback from anyone with brandy expertise is welcome.

I’m planing to distill a batch of plum wine for a friend who would like this distilled on a pot still. (Why it must be a pot? If it turns out nice they will be getting their own pot still)

I read about some brandies made with one pass on a pot still but most say two passes are required. I’m guessing the one pass brandies are made from exceptionally good quality and higher ABV wine to result in a single pass with both good taste and high enough ABV. I’m currently planning on a double pass. Would a third pass, or use of a thumper for the spirit run just strip flavor away or is this something I should consider?

I know wine can contain a lot of foreshots so I will be pulling foreshots slowly on each run. I’m not going by any specific volume to pull, but rather will be letting my nose tell me when I am past the fores.

Plums
Anything special I need to know about distilling or making cuts with plums specifically?

Equipment
Regarding passive reflux, is more or less better? I have a short copper pot head only 1’ tall. I could add a 2’ x 3” copper spool for additional head space/passive reflux if it would be a benefit the spirit. I can add a lot more height/space if needed.

I’m guessing my head contains enough copper, but I could easily add a roll of seasoned copper mesh if it would help. Not planning on that currently.

Strip run
First pull fores slowly. On the strip I will let it run well into tails, down until I’m pulling around 10% off of the still.

Are there any tricks at this stage to improving the profile of my brandy? Example: some folks like to pre heat their rum charge well in advance of the distillation and hold this hot temp for a spell to increase esters.

The wine is clear so I’m not worried about a scorch, but I do have a couple of big thumpers if steam stripping has any advantages.

Spirit run
First pull fores slowly. The spirit run will be done relatively slow and at a constant power level to minimize smearing.

Collection
I use paper filters off of the spout to keep the jars clean.

Collection up front will be done in small jars to ensure lots of resolution for my heads cut which is where I know a lot of the fruity goodness is located. Should I do the same for the tails side of the run?

Should I be collecting deep into tails, or is this just a waste of energy/time?

Cuts
I’m not sure what my cuts should look like. For me I have different cut preferences between rum and whiskey, but I don’t know what is typical for a brandy. I suspect the heads cut to be fairly wide (keeping more) but I don’t even have an opinion on the tails cut for a plum brandy. I’ve read just one or two general brandy comments that some of the fruity goodness can be found down in the tails, but these comments seem to be outliers. Anything specific I should be looking out for here?

Unfortunately I don’t know yet if or how my friend intends to age the brandy. I suspect this will impact cut decisions. If it will be aged on wood for any amount of time, how will this impact heads cut and tails cut specifically? My gut tells me go deeper into heads but leave the tails relatively clean.

Any advice of feedback is appreciated.

Yes, I have read Cranky’s thread and I will again. Any other threads you recommend?

Otis

[Kareltje]

Very clear description of your plans!
I have not much experience with brandys, but recently I did some research on ethyl carbamate, especially in connection with stone fruit.
Source of this probably carcinogene compound is cyanid, that is freed from the stones.
During the stripping run the ethyl carbamate is found mostly in the heads, as it is formed during the distillation.
During the spirit run the EC is mainly found in the tails, starting around 60 %ABV. In both cases accompanied by copper ions.
And it is also found that from 66 to 85 % of the EC is retained in the boiler (boiling point is 182-184 dg C)

In the EU-recommendations it is advised to store the brandy in the dark, but it is also known that once the reactions are started by heat, copper and light they will not stop. They are only slowed down. So in my opinion this storing in the dark will not help.
My own conclusion would be, to slowly strip and than store the low wines in clear light to promote the formation of EC from cyanide. When this formation is completed after about two weeks I would do a slow spirit run, keeping most of the formed EC in the boiler.

I suppose this hardly answers your questions, apart from the starting of the tails at 60 %ABV.

[OtisT]

Very clear description of your plans!
I have not much experience with brandys, but recently I did some research on ethyl carbamate, especially in connection with stone fruit.
Source of this probably carcinogene compound is cyanid, that is freed from the stones.
During the stripping run the ethyl carbamate is found mostly in the heads, as it is formed during the distillation.
During the spirit run the EC is mainly found in the tails, starting around 60 %ABV. In both cases accompanied by copper ions.
And it is also found that from 66 to 85 % of the EC is retained in the boiler (boiling point is 182-184 dg C)

In the EU-recommendations it is advised to store the brandy in the dark, but it is also known that once the reactions are started by heat, copper and light they will not stop. They are only slowed down. So in my opinion this storing in the dark will not help.
My own conclusion would be, to slowly strip and than store the low wines in clear light to promote the formation of EC from cyanide. When this formation is completed after about two weeks I would do a slow spirit run, keeping most of the formed EC in the boiler.

I suppose this hardly answers your questions, apart from the starting of the tails at 60 %ABV.

Thanks for the reply. I’ll check with the wine maker to see if the pits were left in during the ferment.

Info on the rest between strip and spirit runs is interesting. I’ll likely not experiment with this now unless some experienced brandy makers confirms the benefit of this. Regardless, I do want to read more about it.

I’m not for making cuts by % and will go by my senses. I do track this data though, so when I get to making cuts I’ll make note of where 60% is to see where that falls. I suspect that the ABV of a cut location will vary based on the kettle charge ABV along with the quality of the ferment/low wines.

Otis

[Kareltje]

I guess you want to read for yourself and not trust my story for my nice blue eyes.

https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1002/jib.14
Ethyl carbamate kinetics in double distillation of sugar cane spirit

https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1002/jib.48
Ethyl carbamate kinetics in double distillation of sugar cane spirit. Part 2: influence of type of pot still

https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10. ... .tb04618.x
ETHYL CARBAMATE FORMATION IN THE PRODUCTION OF POT STILL WHISKY

I have only a link to the Dutch version of the EU-advise:
https://eur-lex.europa.eu/legal-content ... 22&from=NL
AANBEVELING (EU) 2016/22 VAN DE COMMISSIE van 7 januari 2016 betreffende de voorkoming en beperking van verontreiniging van eau de vie van steenvruchten en vruchtendraf-eau-de-vie van steenvruchten met ethylcarbamaat en tot intrekking van Aanbeveling 2010/133/E
But I suppose an English version can be found close by.
Indeed:
https://eur-lex.europa.eu/legal-content ... 22&from=EN

[Odin]

A few things to consider. A fruit brandy still would be great, since plum brandy is a fruit brandy. So a column with some plates would be perfect. Most flavor will be found where heads blend over into hearts. In order for the fruity, headsy flavors not to be over run (especially if you run a potstill), go for lower vapor speeds, so lower power settings. Cut in quite some heads. Try to prevent any tails smearing. If you want to age do so on a light toasted barrel for a shorter time than your whiskies or rums. Try to run your hearts cut close to barrel aging strength, so aim for 65 to 70% as your hearts cut. A 1.5 distillation approach on a potstill would be perfect. Or a run with 2 plates on a fruit brandy still. With one thing to think about: a third plate set-up will give you better control over tails, and tails you do not want to get over. Tailsy flavors ruin any fruit brandy as a general rule to live by.

Regards, Odin.

[NZChris]

Unless you are going to be making and consuming stupid amounts of it, don't worry about the EC and just go ahead and double distill it like any brandy you have never run before, disregarding advice from anyone who says to add water at any stage except final proofing. Strip it with the alcometer in the collection vessel, aiming for maybe 25-30%. Spirit run into at least a dozen jars, then create a blend you like. viewtopic.php?p=7577412#p7577419

Also, disregard advice from anyone who says it should be single distilled unless they come from a village who's sole distiller has destroyed the villagers tastebuds to the point where that is their idea of fine brandy and they are going to be the ones drinking it. I've done this for two people, against my advice, and I gave them all of their product except for a small sample, (I usually keep a share). They both liked it and have drunk it all, but my samples are still my idea of nasty many years later.

[OtisT]

A few things to consider. A fruit brandy still would be great, since plum brandy is a fruit brandy. So a column with some plates would be perfect. Most flavor will be found where heads blend over into hearts. In order for the fruity, headsy flavors not to be over run (especially if you run a potstill), go for lower vapor speeds, so lower power settings. Cut in quite some heads. Try to prevent any tails smearing. If you want to age do so on a light toasted barrel for a shorter time than your whiskies or rums. Try to run your hearts cut close to barrel aging strength, so aim for 65 to 70% as your hearts cut. A 1.5 distillation approach on a potstill would be perfect. Or a run with 2 plates on a fruit brandy still. With one thing to think about: a third plate set-up will give you better control over tails, and tails you do not want to get over. Tailsy flavors ruin any fruit brandy as a general rule to live by.

Regards, Odin.

Thanks Odin. All good advice. A plated 4” column is next on my build list, for sure. I’ll keep your plate count suggestions in mind for that day.

I will do the spirit run relatively slow compared to one of my “typical” whiskey or dark rum spirit runs. I notice a positive difference in my pot stilled light rums when I run slower than normal, and it’s good to know that also can help with fruit brandies. Both are headsy, no tails, spirits so it makes sense.

Thanks for the advice on tails. I suspected that tails was not something I want in brandy, and you confirmed it.

I don’t know yet if I will be able to try a 1.5 run. I’m not sure exactly how much wine my friend has. I do plan to run the strip down pretty far for low wines with a low ABV. I think 25% low wines will put me just a few % over barrel strength spirits so I won’t need to add much water to proof It down.

Otis

[OtisT]

Unless you are going to be making and consuming stupid amounts of it, don't worry about the EC and just go ahead and double distill it like any brandy you have never run before, disregarding advice from anyone who says to add water at any stage except final proofing. Strip it with the alcometer in the collection vessel, aiming for maybe 25-30%. Spirit run into at least a dozen jars, then create a blend you like. viewtopic.php?p=7577412#p7577419

Also, disregard advice from anyone who says it should be single distilled unless they come from a village who's sole distiller has destroyed the villagers tastebuds to the point where that is their idea of fine brandy and they are going to be the ones drinking it. I've done this for two people, against my advice, and I gave them all of their product except for a small sample, (I usually keep a share). They both liked it and have drunk it all, but my samples are still my idea of nasty many years later.

Thanks for the reply Chris. I want flavor, so as you suggested I don’t plan to water anything down unless absolutely necessary. As I mentioned in the previous post, I will strip this down far to aid in this. A 30% LW charge usually gives me a cut averaging about 70%, so I’ll be shooting for LW somewhere close to 25%.

Because I’m new to brandy I’ll likely go a little overkill on the jar count to make sure I don’t miss my desired cut point. I’ll use extra small jars around where I think the heads cut will be, increasing jar volume when I’m into hearts then switching to smaller jars again with any slight hint of tails in the air. Small jars for me are filled with about 2% to 3% of the runs total volume. I’ll check out your blend link too.

Ya, I am skeptical of most, not all, accounts of good tasting single pass Pot stilled spirits. Most I have smelled/tasted are not that good to down right nasty. I know it’s doable, but not common. I was playing around with some small batches of rum last year and I actually surprised myself when I made one nice single pass rum in my mini that I was happy to keep. It was not as smooth as my double pass rum, but it was pleasant enough and it had the smell of banana in it so I decided it was a keeper. I also tasted the most wonderful single pass brandy at this years PNW meet&greet event OVZ hosted. I’m trying to contact that distiller (not a frequent HD person) to get some tips from him and to verify his stuff was pot stilled. When he said it was made in a single pass I assumed it was made on a plated still but he swore it was just a pot.

Thanks again. I always appreciate your humor and advice. Otis

[cayars]

I'm with NZChris. No water. Do your stripping low enough so that you don't have to think about adding water.

As much as I love thumpers I would NOT use a thumper for brandy nor a flute. It's far to easy to lose the base spirit taste in Brandies so I'd use a pot still to try and retain the base fruit taste as much as possible when distilling. Speaking of base fruit taste, personally what I'd do is hold back a bit of the base wine to mix back in when distilled to add some of the base flavor back.

Either do a pure strip run and then a spirit run or a 1.5 type run. Likely would depend on the ferment % you are starting with. Speaking of which, do you know the ferment ABV of the wine itself? Have you tasted this wine yet? You can make the 1.5 to 2.0 run when you start to strip it and determine what ABV you get out of the still. As Odin mentioned you want to try and target barrel strength to avoid cutting with water on the spirit run.

Do you know what he added to it when making the wine chemical wise?

Since your friend is getting into distilling, why not have him help you make the cuts/blends after your run is complete? You know he'll be wanting you to show him this sooner or later anyway. This way you get some of his input as well on the finished product.

Carlo

[NZChris]

I don't bother with using jars in the middle when it's obviously going to make the cut, so I might calculate I need twenty 500ml jars, but in practice I might use three or four at the start and four or five for finding the tails, the middle all in demijohns. I make a a sample from the combined demijohns, taste that, then add from the end jars until find the jars that spoil it. That way, I'm not destroying my tastebuds before I get to the part where I choose my final blend.

[cayars]

Same here as well. Just no sense in collecting small jars when you know it's going to get used. ABV and taste will tell you when you're getting close to a cut over point of heads to hearts and then from hearts to tails.

The only time I'll use a bunch of jars is something I'm experimenting with like GIN with new/different spices and I'm not sure where they will show up and how strong they will be. But even then it's normally not in the hearts section but I like to check the progression/recession of botanicals so I need pretty much even jars for that.

[NZChris]

LOL. After taking a foreshot, I collect my gins in one jug, just checking with a teaspoon that it is truly finished at the target volume.

[OtisT]

I'm with NZChris. No water. Do your stripping low enough so that you don't have to think about adding water.

As much as I love thumpers I would NOT use a thumper for brandy nor a flute. It's far to easy to lose the base spirit taste in Brandies so I'd use a pot still to try and retain the base fruit taste as much as possible when distilling. Speaking of base fruit taste, personally what I'd do is hold back a bit of the base wine to mix back in when distilled to add some of the base flavor back.

Either do a pure strip run and then a spirit run or a 1.5 type run. Likely would depend on the ferment % you are starting with. Speaking of which, do you know the ferment ABV of the wine itself? Have you tasted this wine yet? You can make the 1.5 to 2.0 run when you start to strip it and determine what ABV you get out of the still. As Odin mentioned you want to try and target barrel strength to avoid cutting with water on the spirit run.

Do you know what he added to it when making the wine chemical wise?

Since your friend is getting into distilling, why not have him help you make the cuts/blends after your run is complete? You know he'll be wanting you to show him this sooner or later anyway. This way you get some of his input as well on the finished product.

Carlo

Hi Carlo. I don’t have any details on the wine yet. I hope to taste the wine and get details like total volume, ABV, residual sugars and how it was made in a few days time when we meet. I’ll post those details once I have them.

My friend is a professional fermenter and distiller, but she has only operated large commercial stills and doesn’t have her own equipment yet, which is where I come in. . We’ve done some small batch distillation together before. It’s always fun to compare differences between large scale processes and how I have learned to do it on a hobby scale. Night and day.

Otis

[OtisT]

I don't bother with using jars in the middle when it's obviously going to make the cut, so I might calculate I need twenty 500ml jars, but in practice I might use three or four at the start and four or five for finding the tails, the middle all in demijohns. I make a a sample from the combined demijohns, taste that, then add from the end jars until find the jars that spoil it. That way, I'm not destroying my tastebuds before I get to the part where I choose my final blend.

I do it similar to the way you do it most of the time, though I use two (2) or three (3) half (1/2) gallon jars for pure hearts rather than a demijohn. Also, when I know a recipe well I will use one big jar up front to catch all of the early and mid heads in one large jar, and of course one big jug at the end when I know I’m past my tails cut. With my mix of small and large jars, I often end up with 15 to 20 containers when all is said and done.

Otis

[cayars]

I'm doing that right now with Rum being run. All going into a 5L or two.
Gin is new to me and I've only ran a few batches (4 this past week) so I don't have a lot to go on yet as to when the different tastes will come over. Every small batch has been different to try different spices in different proportions and help me zero in on what I'm shooting for.

For this purpose I do like the multiple small jar approach as it makes it easy to sniff/taste each jar along the way to pick out the different botanicals. Kind of makes it fun. Almost all the jars have gotten combined after the fact except for one that had very bold cumin and only a small part of that got used. The rest got tucked away for later mixing. Once I dial in a recipe I like I'll pretty much collect in one shot knowing how many ML to pull per boiler charge since it's all premade up. It should be one of the easiest runs to do down the road after getting my recipe dialed in.

[NZChris]

Gin is multiple botanicals and each one has components that are strongest at different points during the run, so the need to select a cut is only really valuable when you are running the individual botanicals for later blending.

For a single botanical, like plum, you are only looking to cut out heads and tails unless there has been sugar added, in which case, removing the most flavorless hearts jars may improve the blend.

[cayars]

With Gin the reason I ran multiple small jars was to be able to remove a single jar or two if I overdid any particular spice while playing.
This was/is an exception to the way I normally collect for most spirits.

I'm looking forward to seeing how this Plum Brandy turns out.

[HDNB]

my advice is to drink it when you make it. I did some plum brandy that was spectacular as new make. i "saved" this special spirit for some undetermined point in the future for specials sips...after about 2 years the flavour diminished and it now tastes like vodka. the plum flavour is long gone.

[cayars]

HDNB, have to tried to infuse some Plum flavor back in with a plum or two? You really got nothing to loose by trying it.

[Odin]

my advice is to drink it when you make it. I did some plum brandy that was spectacular as new make. i "saved" this special spirit for some undetermined point in the future for specials sips...after about 2 years the flavour diminished and it now tastes like vodka. the plum flavour is long gone.

Probably due to heads oxidation.

Regards, Odin.

[zach]

HDNB, have to tried to infuse some Plum flavor back in with a plum or two? You really got nothing to loose by trying it.

I did this (macerated plums in the brandy) a few years back and was unhappy with the result. Tasted more like a flavored brandy

I just finished drinking a 2017 plum brandy that I double distilled and it was a little light on flavor. I like white brandy either single run in a detuned reflux column or 1.5 distilled in a pot combining low wines back into the original wine.

Two weeks ago I made a single run grappa in a short marble packed column. I tossed just 100 ml of fore/heads from a 5 gallon charge and kept everything unitl the tails hit. I collected 2.5 liters at 120 proof that I diluted to 100 proof. The flavor was good.

[cayars]

What I do is take a small amount of spirit and use this to macerate with. Then blend back the maceration with the final for just a bit of more fruit taste. It usually only takes a small amount to make the base fruit taste more apparent. Too much will ruin it hence the careful blending of the macerated portion back into the base.

Another way you can do this also is to macerate some GNS or existing spirit if you have it. Throw this back in when doing the spirit run so it does get distilled but adds some of the flavor back in prior to the final spirit run. You should not get anything tasting artificial doing it this way.

[NZChris]

I haven't tried it with plum, but we didn't like the result of steeping a peach in a peach brandy for a few days and everyone thought the non-steeped brandy tasted much nicer. I sampled it few years later and liked it so much that I put it in the feints collection.

[dova]

In the past, I've only singly distilled my plum mash. I take cuts and I then blend them to taste and ABV. Somewhere along the line I read that Slivovitz was traditionally only singly distilled. I now want to do doubly distilled batch. I took separate cuts during my "stirpping run", but for the second distillation, should I just combine all my cuts and redistill that combined mixture, or keep the hearts separate and combine the heads and tails to redistill?

Thanks

[CoogeeBoy]

For what it is worth, Cristof has been very helpful to me in PM on brandies.
I have copied him in and hope he will be able to provide some insight and useful advice as I am sure he will!

He advised me to do a double distill on my pear brandy and I am glad I did. I can't help but wonder what extra flavour a thumper filled with the solids from the mash would do to the brandy but that is not the way it has been done traditionally from what I have seen, particularly with plum brandy (I did one of those also but the yield was low, I think I was too hard on my stripping run and cut it off too soon).

[Cristof]

If you distill twice, you don't need to separate cuts on first run but only on second run. So I would mix it and distill all together.

[dova]

Thanks you all.

[Slivovitz]

Look at some of my posts. I just ran 9 gallons of slivovitz the second time. I did 50 gallons, ran each pot to 10% and got about 9 gallons total.

I'll update my posts soon.