8Ball’s Bloody Butcher Bourbon

[8Ball]

This makes a nice bourbon. The Bloody Butcher corn used in the grain bill provides an earthy taste that lets you enjoy it as a white dawg right away while you let the rest age. A sugar-head made with the spent grains is also very nice. You can use regular yellow corn from the feed store if dropping $100 for a sack of Bloody Butcher is too steep for your situation. But, sometimes you just want to splurge and this is a good way to do it:

Pounds/Grain/Percentage
12.5 Corn, Bloody Butcher, coarse grind 65.8%
1.00 Rye flaked 5.26%
1.00 Rye Malt, brown, spicy 5.26%
1.00 Wheat, feed, malt, smoked 5.26%
1.00 Barley, feed, malt, smoked 5.26%
1.50 Simpsons Golden Promise 7.9%
0.50 G. Honey Malt 2.8%
0.50 Cherry Smoked Barley Malt 2.8%
19.0/8=2.375 #/G
8.0%-9.0% abv ferment

66.00% Corn
18.00% Barley
11.00% Rye
5.00% Wheat
6.00% Backset

Diastatic calculation:

Corn 33
2-Row Barley Malt 32
Wheat 30
Rye 25

(12.5*33)+(25)+(25)+(30)+(3.5*32)=604.5 604.5/8=75.5625
1.075 target, pre-pitch & clear sample off the top.

Prepare water for mashing:
7.5G water, plus
1.0 teaspoon citric acid
1.0 teaspoon pickling lime
1/2 teaspoon epsom salts
Pinch Vitamin C (ascorbic acid)
1 table spoon gypsum
Let it stabilize 5 minutes or so.
Adjust pH, 6.0 +/- 0.5 optimal.

Start mashing grains.
Add corn and 6 ml Ferm Pro AHA-400 Alpha or other high temp liquid alpha enzymes @ 150F. Slowly bring up to a full, rolling boil and hold the boil for 15 minutes. I cook the crap out of it to bust the starches loose. Skim off any floating debris.
Cut the heat after 15 mins of boiling. Add the flaked rye. Cover and wrap your pot for 60 minutes.
After 60 minutes, uncover and let it cool to 190F, then add 10 ml of Ferm Pro AHA-400 Alpha. Stir it in and cover it up for another 60 minutes. Stir it once in awhile.
After 60 minutes, add your backset (if you have it) and cool down to 160 F.
Add 1 tablespoon of powdered alpha amylase. This is optional. I use it because I have it on hand.
Let it cool down to 149F, then add your malts. Hold 140F-149F for 60 minutes. At the end of 60 minutes, slowly bring it back up to 149F, and let it start cooling down naturally.
At 129F, verify pH of 6.0 +/- 0.5, and add 6 ml of Ferm Pro GA-150 Gluco liquid enzyme.
Add 2 tablespoons Fermax yeast nutrient and one crushed vitamin B complex tablet.
Cool down overnight to pitch temperature.

Make a yeast starter when you start cooling down. I use 12 grams of FermPro 917 in a quart of water made with 8 oz wort & 24 oz filtered water. Plain ol’ bakers yeast will work too. Your choice.

Target OG: 1.072-1.074
Target pH: 5.3-5.8
Target pitch temperature: 90F +/- 5 deg
Pitch starter and top off fermenter at 8G. Ferment on grain.

This should finish dry in 4-7 days.
Reserve 0.5G of beer and strip the rest until you have 2G of low wines. Keep 0.5G of backset for the next run. If you want, you can start your piggy-back sugar head at this point.

For your spirit, combine the low wines (include feints on your subsequent runs) and reserved beer to get a spirit charge of around 25% abv. Heat up slow, take a generous heads cut, then collect the hearts (I start @ 78%) until the parrot floats @ 60% abv. Strip the rest out as Feints.

This should yield around 0.75G @ aging strength.

Age as you wish. Toasted & charred white oak is my choice.