sweetfeed whisky

[Stillatryin]

Gentlemen, I certainly appreciate your patience. I read through the first 9 pages of this thread before I found an SG. I'm thankin my lucky stars that I checked the forum before I dumped all that stuff. I just did an initial rack this morning and got roughly 13 gals of wash from that. I'm going to run it through an old tshirt this afternoon after it settles out some more, then filter it once more before it goes to the boiler. Many thanks for your patience. I'll let you know how this comes out. I'm going to run it like Kentucky Shiner says through my bok.

[colin-1984]

i don't have a 5 gallon bucket, so any idea how much in weight the sweet feed would be? thanks

[BoomTown]

5 lbs

my guess

Boom

[Truckinbutch]

i don't have a 5 gallon bucket, so any idea how much in weight the sweet feed would be? thanks

I'm going to be weighing and mixing my own in the next few days . I'll post inches per pound in a 5 gallon bucket if someone doesn't beat me to it .

[colin-1984]

i don't have a 5 gallon bucket, so any idea how much in weight the sweet feed would be? thanks

I'm going to be weighing and mixing my own in the next few days . I'll post inches per pound in a 5 gallon bucket if someone doesn't beat me to it .

ideal thanks

[Stillatryin]

The original formula (correct me if I'm wrong) is 3-4" of sweetfeed in the 5 or 6 gal bucket. It takes one gallon of sweetfeed to make that. My latest SF was is racked and ready to run. My ambition is to run it tommorrow, but I'm still dealing with "construction" issues with the many aspects of a bok still. Anyone who thinks that this is an easy cut and dry thing should walk a mile in the shoes of someone who's started from scratch and had zero contact with Mile Hi or any other manufacturers. I'm a few electrical connections, a few small plumbing issues away!!! CAN"T WAIT!!

[shawn2974]

I racked my first SF this past Friday and i cold crashed it in my brew freezer till sunday and it was super clear. I ran a 5 gallon wash and it seemed to have a wonderful taste and smell. Its airing out now so ill post taste tomorrow. Is racking really the best way to go?

[Ridgerunnr]

I strain mine from ferment bucket right into the still...key is run slow

[blakesduc]

I am sure this is in this post some where but anyone done this in 30 gall wash and what amounts of sweet feed and sugar was used I can do the math but looking for one that has done well

[Truckinbutch]

I am sure this is in this post some where but anyone done this in 30 gall wash and what amounts of sweet feed and sugar was used I can do the math but looking for one that has done well

KS upped a batch to 30 gal and posted weighed portions in an updated post . I'm not trying to be a dick , my notebook with that written down is in my shop or I would repost it for you . It is here if you have time to go through some more pages .

[blakesduc]

Thanks will try to find

[McShiner]

Started a batch on Sunday. Took the grey matter off of the top of (a previous batch) 3 five gallon pails and replaced it with fresh SF. Dumped all 3 into my (freebie!) 30 gal tub and filled the rest with fresh SF to about the 4" depth. Disolved 30 lbs sugar and 12 oz jar of molasses at 150*F. Poured this over the feed and stirred well. (I use a SS mixing rod in a cordless drill. Mixer looks like a keel drive shaft and propeller) poured in bottled water to make it 20 gals. At 90* sprinkled 3 packs fast yeast over the whole mix and by bed time it was 'craklin' away. Trying to keep the room at 70*F or better.

This is mostly a sour mash mix from my initial run that started 3/29. I think I needed to filter the "rack" once or twice more because I think I got that off taste/ smell someone mentioned in an earlier reply.

Opinions: I run a 15 gal keg boiler, electric, 2.5" column 18"-20" high, 2.5" x 16" shotgun w/7 3/8" tubes funneled into a 1/2" spout.

I bring the temp up (IMO) at a medium pace and at 60C turn on the condenser water(58-63F). I can maintain a tight 80C at the top of the tower. If I lower the temp down to 72C-ish, I get such a slow drip it would take me well over 12 hours to finish a 10-13 gal wash. I'm thinking that maybe I'm pushing too much thru the condenser? Too cold water? Do I need better insulation on the column? In researching more and more I find that I should have a warm product coming out. T or F ? If so, how warm?

A stripping run isn't out of the question however, I would like to keep the flavor and aroma.

First run was pushed a bit fast because i couldnt stay up all night. pulled 12 jars of 150ml ea and then stripped the rest down to 35 ABV. I think I'll toss ALL the first batch in with this next run and clean it up with the new wash. Unless anyone sees a mistake in that. Considering this will be my 3rd run (sacrificial and 1st SF), I think I might be catching on to something.

[Stillatryin]

Today was run day with the bok and the 11 or 12 gal of wash I nearly threw out. I cleaned the rig out last night with 4 gal of 50/50 water/vinegar, Scrubbed, washed everything again and charged the boiler. My 20 dollar ebay dimmer worked like a champ with the 4500 W element. I used a small pump and a 55gal drum for the reservoir/cooling vessel. All totaled, I got 200 oz. of "stuff" from 130 to 70 proof at the tails. I never got the wet dog smell, I stopped before I got to that. I've got another run that I'll pitch yeast on tommorrow morning. I'll run this when it quits fizzing, and mix all but the heads for a spirit run late next week. I can say this, the Bokokob is the SH*T... Running in detuned potstill mode is so much faster.

[Shovlryder]

I stopped by the local feed guy and all he had was corn and molasses. There are no oats in there. It smells real nice. Does this even qualify as "sweet feed"? Can I still use it? I'd hate for my $13 to go to waste. Sorry if I'm beating a dead horse here but the last batch I made had the pellets in it and it came out like a$$.

[120proof]

Shovlryder,

To me the grains in the sweetfeed really produce the flavor.. it has very little corn. I would give it a shot though.. might make an sweeter uncle jesse's. I would mill it first though but thats just me. Good luck. Let us know how it comes out.

120proof

[Stillatryin]

If there's a "Tractor Supply" outfit close to you, there a few pages back in this thread is a SKU # for the correct feed. As 12o said, maybe you could crack that corn. I don't know what addn flavors you'd be missing without the oats.

[Truckinbutch]

What TS advertises and what they are peddlin are not always the same . I ended up getting cracked corn and crimped oats from them and some dry molasses . Had to get barley from another source to mill on my own and mix my own sweet feed .

[Shovlryder]

That's great. I will look for the SKU. I didn't see it when I initially read through the thread. It would definitely help. I'm going to try a different place to buy too. In the mean time though, I'm going to try to use this stuff. I will report back on my progress. Thanks!

[trigger985]

I don't know if this was answered or not somewhere in the 160 pages of replies lol but what would the outcome be if instead of all white sugar you did 50/50 or 60/40 mix of white and Brown sugar and maybe added some molasses? Would it turn into more of a rum flavour or do you think it would just mess up the taste and goodness of this great recipe? I understand the sweetfeed already has molasses mixed in hence the sweet part but what if you added more? Thanks

[Stainless dude]

I don't think it would hurt. Give it a try..

[Cornfed50]

Hey there guys, I took off a little time and figured out a substute for sweet feed if you cant find the right stuff. I used the following recipe i devised: 3lbs of coarse ground yellow corn or meal,3lbs. of oat meal (regular steel cut oats, (not quick cooking oats) 3lbs of 2or6 row barley and dark brown sugar. I use 12lbs. to this ratio to make a 6.0 gallon total volume. I ferment at lower temps for a longer period of time. At least twenty days. It will make a good sweet feed sub. If you cant get the right stuff. Make sure to ground all your grains. Cornfed

[jbird1992]

I don't know if this was answered or not somewhere in the 160 pages of replies lol but what would the outcome be if instead of all white sugar you did 50/50 or 60/40 mix of white and Brown sugar and maybe added some molasses? Would it turn into more of a rum flavour or do you think it would just mess up the taste and goodness of this great recipe? I understand the sweetfeed already has molasses mixed in hence the sweet part but what if you added more? Thanks

I have evolved into something of the sorts. I use a mix of 60% corn and 40% crimped barley with 4 cups of feed molasses. I think the brown sugar would be a little over kill (for me) but try it see how ya like it. I didn't care for the oats but didn't figure that out til I played with it

[buddahj]

Jeremy,
welcome aboard the sweetfeed train!
i dont know where you are but i found this place here that has what your looking for... check em out if they ship at an affordable price.

Ingredients:
Rolled Barley, Rolled Corn, Whole Oats, and Molasses.

and note here:

Note: C.O.B. does not contain added minerals or vitamins.

here is the link:

https://shop.grangecoop.com/products/ro ... 62870.html" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;" rel="nofollow

if shipping is a problem the key things i pointed out are what you want. look possibly to rural areas of you location, find an agricultural supply store, call em and tell em your looking specifically for corn, oats, barley and molasses no extra added anything.
where i live a feed store in the city would be happy to mix the feed according to whatever ratio, and add molasses to my spec. but they had their own Line of sweet feed that is working great.

SALT is not good for yeast.

Good Luck!
Rastus

I'm ordering a 50lb bag today. I didn't have any luck finding it locally. Thanks for the info Rastus.

[azcz10]

Got a 50lb bag from Tractor Supply for about $12. No Pellets!
First my fermenter: 54 qt Coleman cooler with a spigot. I made a wire basket that fits snuggly inside. The outside of the basket is made from what I call rabbit wire that is fairly stiff and has about 1/4 - 3/8" square holes. Then I took stainless steel screen wire and put it on the inside and tied it all together with stainless steel wire. Works well. Simple.

About 8" of sweetfeed measured into a 5 gal bucket. Toss the sweet feed into the fermenter. Add in about 3 - 4 gallons of 180 degree water. Stir & let sit with the lid closed for at least 3 hours. When it cools down to 155 degrees F, I add about 8 cups of coarsely ground malted barley. Let it sit with the lid closed till it gets down to about 90 degrees. This is the mashing process. From what I understand, the initial 180 degree temp and cooking period extracts the starches out of the grains. Then, the 155 degree temp allows the malted barley to convert the starches to sugar. The amount of grain, water, and sugar don't have to be exact, however the length of time and temperatures for mashing are VERY important.

Drain off all of the liquid from the grains in the cooler while straining it into 5 gallon buckets. Then take some hot tap water (maybe a gallon or so) and sprinkled it over the grains to wash off all of the remaining sugars draining it into the 5 gal bucket. This is called sparging. I then removed the grain basket and put the still warm mash back into the cooler. (I discard the grain because it may be a month or two before I make another batch) Then add enough warm water so you have about 10 gallons of wash in the cooler. Measure the specific gravity. If needed, add enough sugar (white and dark brown) that's been dissolved in warm water to get the gravity up to at least 1.070 measured with a Hydrometer. I usually end up with 10 - 12 gallons.

(before I made the cooler / fermenter, I was using (2) 5+ gallon buckets. They don't hold heat well and I would always end up putting about 1 lb of white sugar per gallon of water and 2 lbs of dark brown sugar to each 5 gal bucket. 1 lb of sugar to 1 gallon of water is a good recipe. The specific gravity would always be about 1.070)

When the temp is down around 90 I pitch 6 packets of Fleishmann's Highly Active yeast that I've pre-hydrated in a measuring cup of the mash for an hour or so. Then I take a hand-held electric blender/food processor, like you'd put in a soup to blend everything, and I run it on top of the wash for 5-10 minutes to aerate it. It's been taking 6 - 7 days to ferment out. It's done when the specific gravity is under 1.00 and the taste is dry....like wine.

Just before firing up the boiler I throw in some heads and tails from the last run. Maybe 1/2 to 3/4 gallon total. I run it in potstill mode and I throw out the first 250 - 300 ml as foreshots. It comes out around 74% ABV or so. Then I collect in pint jars. Usually around the 5th pint I start getting into hearts. I let the product sit with no lid in the pint jars for 24 hours. Then I make my cuts. I usually end up with about a gallon, give or take, of pure hearts at 100 - 110 proof. There's no cutting or mixing required. It's ready to drink as is. Sometimes, I'll take a quart and put in a few Jack Daniels smoking chips and let it sit overnight. It mellows it just a bit although none of it really has a burn or bite. Every step in the process is very repeatable and predictable.

[Demonic]

Azcz10.... I would not recommend adding your prior heads to your current run.. unless you really like the taste of head in your product. Feints is your saved up tails.. heads should be tossed as it does not turn into good alcohols when ran twice only increases the ratio of nasty stuff

[McShiner]

Started this batch last Sunday evening. A one or two people asked about color of the wash. This is a 20 gal / ~80L batch and I added a 12 oz jar of molasses. I use a battery operated pump to rack my wash into 5 gallon water jugs and then into the boiler. Colander is useful in pressing down the grain in order to draw off more wash. 3 of the 4 carboys racked and settling until this weekend. Scooped off top 2" of spent grain which amounted to about full 3 gallon pail. Mash is kept moist until I get another bag of feed and time to put it together. I'll put about 5 gallons of backset with 20 lbs of sugar when at that point in the distilling.

[Truckinbutch]

Giving me more ideas that my wife wishes you wouldn't

[smokindave]

Gotta get me one of those pumps.....I just did a run, and I added some flaked rye to the mix, and it kept plugging up in my siphon. I used a screen, but some of the crud was still getting in there and was just enough to break the seal, and cause my siphon to stop. A handy little pump would make a 1 hour job, a 5 minute job.

Nice work, McShiner.

SmokinDave

p.s. any concerns about these pumps and their materials? This is all for low ABV wash transfer, in my case also, and we are boiling it, it so I don't see a problem. Just noticed that most of the ones advertised on ebay, say NOT for drinking water.

[MAD AL]

That's just the same way i rack mine that little pump is the best $18 iv spent in a while, alan

[McShiner]

Cheap pump, runs off of 2 D-cells. I'm sure there is better but for now, it makes a 5 gallon carboy weigh uh, nothing. Imagine what it does to that 30 gallon tub full of magic elixir.