What a great community you all have happening! So much to read and learn here!
Hope you enjoy this little bout me new member story I have to share.
Have had an 8 gallon Fast Ferment kit for many years and made but only a couple wine kits and a beer kit in it .. which came out pretty well. I'm retired now since Christmas 2023 so today while cleaning up my basement workshop I thought I'd dig that Fast Ferment kit out of the basement and give it a wash and see what I can make while I have all this single man with an empty nest time on my hands.
Oh also a couple years back I purchased a 5 gallon pot still on Vevor after having a few too many Evan Williams shots lol thought maybe I'd make some of my own drinkables with it but never got to it. It was the cheapest pot still Vevor had at the time .. the simple one with the condenser coil pot that sits on top of the main pot.
So we gots those above items.
As luck, or fate, would have it I was walking to the beer store with my Beagle sometime back in July and it was a garbage night. While walking down the street I did a double take at a curbside trash pile at a house that had recently been put up for sale .. what did I find in the pile but a Vevor 750 watt 1 gallon air still. it was mostly complete, missing the spout shield thing at the outlet, but after plugging it in when I got home it powered up and made heat. So on about July 18 I mixed up a 5 litre bucket of this tomato paste sugar wash recipe I found on Distillate dot org. I did nothing but let it do it's thing under my desk for 10-12 days until all the whatever had settled at the bottom. Don't ask me what the starting or ending SG and stuff was .. I just followed the dang recipe and left it alone sans a daily stir. When it was done I had a taste and thought ok lets siphon off 4 litres of the clean and give it go in the trash picked Vevor air still. 30 mins it took to heat up and then it started to flow and well .. I just let it flow and used my nose to let me know when there was little or no alcohol coming out anymore. All in I collected about 750 mL I don't have a proof measuring tool but I did have a bottle of Prince Igor Extreme 45% vodka handy. I remember watching that Popcorn Sutton moonshine documentary and remember the part where he shook the jars to watch the bubbles. I did the same with my jar and add 50 mL of distiller water at a time until I got as close to what I thought was comparable to the bubbles in the bottle of the 45% vodka as could be. In the end I wound up with about 900 mL of decent tasting stuff that makes all warm and fuzzy after a couple doubles on ice.
Now .. I want to go bigger and get more involved. 6 gallon sugar and whatever wash is coming up tonight. Not sure if I'm going to use EC1118 or this Lightning Turbo Yeast with carbon and stuff I got at the wine shop today. Also got some sanitizer, yeast nutrients, a regular hydrometer and a proof and tralle hydrometer.
Wish me luck
