Home Distiller

goinbroke2 wrote:Cool, thanks, I'll order some when available and see what the real difference is. If it is that noticeable, I'll go that way.

The high temp is amazing. You'll love how quickly it reduces that SMOP into an easily mixable slurry. It makes mashing a real pleasure for sure! What i'll sometimes do when my work schedule interferes is toss my grains (even malts) into the boiling water. Then let them sit wrapped up for awhile. When i'm off work, i add the high temp (sebstar) to loosen things up and cook a little longer . . . this way i can mix it and not worry about burning, especially useful with corn to really gelatinize it. Plus with enzymes, i can cook all my grains not worrying about the enzymes in malts and helping ensure no infection, especially because i malt my own barley from feed store. I still get all the flavor of the malt too. Win Win IMO.

moosemilk wrote:

goinbroke2 wrote:Cool, thanks, I'll order some when available and see what the real difference is. If it is that noticeable, I'll go that way.

The high temp is amazing. You'll love how quickly it reduces that SMOP into an easily mixable slurry. It makes mashing a real pleasure for sure! What i'll sometimes do when my work schedule interferes is toss my grains (even malts) into the boiling water. Then let them sit wrapped up for awhile. When i'm off work, i add the high temp (sebstar) to loosen things up and cook a little longer . . . this way i can mix it and not worry about burning, especially useful with corn to really gelatinize it. Plus with enzymes, i can cook all my grains not worrying about the enzymes in malts and helping ensure no infection, especially because i malt my own barley from feed store. I still get all the flavor of the malt too. Win Win IMO.

Yuppy guppy. And it seems enzymes help go drier.

ugh...just remembered how ignorant rye is to work with. Just spent a couple hours last night slowwwwwwwwwly draining the keggle and pail. Had to keep scraping the screen to get the wash to run through it. Then I squeezed by hand all 25lb's of grain. What a pain in the ass....I even had half a bag of rice hulls in the cabinet that I remembered after I was done...

So, filled the still and let it sit over night, I'm sure there will be crap in the bottom that I can get out from the drain before I turn it on. Hope like hell it doesn't scorch!

Gonna go do the strip run now.

Oh, one other bit of crap news, the keggle was fine, the pail smelled like banana's. I know lacto-bacillus smells like puke, what is the banana smell, anybody know off hand? I know it's an infection and I will search for it, just wondering if anybody knows off hand?

Well, off I go...

Wel running the strip now and have about 3L of strip and....I smell cooked biscuits...SHIT!!!!! it scorched.

Hell with it, I'm finish the stripping run. I turned the heat off, but then thought, what am I going to do, the likker is burnt...so I turned it up to about 3/4 heat and will finish it.


CRAP, this was a shit show from the very first...this should go to beginners section!

The rye slimed ya huh? LOL

Sorry to hear about the scorch. Hope the next time goes better. Live and learn! Best way is by making mistakes, and not doing them again (or reading your mistake so I don't ever do it lol).

Slimed? I guess it slimed! LOL!
you know, some people keep their mistakes quiet, I think I go overboard the other way, "ok, I really fucked up here" and move on. And yes it is a teaching point for others as well as me.

But, it's not all bad actually, when it scorched (and it did, I looked in the still after it was empty) I turned the heat down and then slowly brought it back up. Not sure if it helped, but the scorch smell lessened and it just continued with a strong biscuit smell. I just ran a strip run as I have the home inspector in this morning for the people buying my house and I wanted to get everything put away before. Went down this morning and a bit of a puke smell (shit, of all days to have that smell lingering in the basement....) grabbed the carboy of lowwines to hide in the garage and smelled it...hmmm...not as bad as I thought. I don't actually smell any "burnt" smell, just the biscuit smell...hmmm...might come out alright after all? Put it to my lips and while I was expecting "blah, low wines" it was actually a roasted or cooked biscuit taste. Yes it was watery low wines, but the burnt taste or aftertaste I was expecting wasn't there.
Not something I want to do again mind you, but it is definitely an interesting flavor addition, should make an interesting heart cut. Blend a quart of this with a gallon of corn...hmmm....

So, ALL IS NOT LOST!

EDIT: it's spelled biscuit not bisquit...who knew?

Banana aromas during fermentation are a yeast byproduct. Can be caused by the type of yeast itself (example - some Belgian beer yeasts) or swings in fermentation temperature. If I remember correctly, some yeasts throw banana if the temperature drops low.

Just seen this reply to this old thread.

Well, for follow up, it's been six months on medium toasted oak and it's quite good. Strong flavour, best either neat or a splash of water. Not too good with mixes like pop or whatever. Most think it's a high end something or other, don't have the heart to say it was a complete shitshow! Lol! Definite roasted biscuit taste, very nice neat and room temp.

Oh, and I cleaned the element and am using it still.