Home Distiller

Sounds cool, Blueraven, nothing like a good ferment. I'm headed towards more and more grain and less sugar, but still learning so a step at a time. I've done an all grain mash that turned out well, but there's nothing like the simplicity of a no-cook corn & sugar sour mash. That way I can get better at stillin', not worry about the mash too much and then try other mashes once I've got more experience with cuts and such.

VG,

Its the smae for me but the other way. See i was brewing beer the last few yrs but got tired of the time it takes. So i kinda understand getting to the wash via grain only. ASMOF, my last one was all grain and it was delicious..,,,really. Just by itself, no aging..no carbon either.

However, im trying the recipe abv for fun and giggles and drink of course.

Hey ive almost got my reflux done but got to get the keg hooked up to it and its heaters..so much to do;;;

chk these out:

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http://i17.photobucket.com/albums/b79/R ... Column.jpg" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;" rel="nofollow

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Makes total sense, blueraven. Never made beer so I'm starting with easy mashes. But from all my bourbon and rye drinking and reading I know that the product I'm really after is going to come from an all grain mash. No question about superior flavor. Soon I'll try my next all grain one.

Hey man, that column and condensor looks real nice. Great work. You should be runnin' real soon.

Had a great pickin' shack last night, tight playing early and then the shine and beer kicked in and we had a good old sloppy sing along.

I am not sure about SG readings in the second mash. My guess would be that you are right, but the use of a simple vinometer (https://homedistiller.org/wiki/index.php/Vinometer) would probably suffice to rectify (har har) this problem, or at least that's my guess.

You're following in my footsteps though, VG. I too learned for a few years on the simple sour mash method simply for the inexpensive and easy procedure. I've brewed a lot of beer in my life and know how time consuming it can be. The simple sour mash method allows you to learn the art of distillation without spending the time and money involved in mashing.

Let's not forget, I learned the basics of this procedure from a 4th generation moonshiner and this was the family recipe. I've also done a simple rye mash via the same method, though not as much. I don't do sour mashes for that method, I simply re-use the grains and add sugar. I love the economy and simplicity of moonshiner methods.

I've had several folks who grew up in Georgia try my simple sour mash and they agreed it's a very high quality moonshine. And let me tell you from personal experience, it's a very high quality moonshine.

[quote="Uncle Jesse"]I am not sure about SG readings in the second mash I've also done a simple rye mash via the same method, though not as much. I don't do sour mashes for that method, I simply re-use the grains and add sugar.



Could you expand on that . I don't quite get what uou are saying there.

Yes, sometimes I use cracked rye instead of cracked corn and I don't sour mash it. In other words, no backset, though I still use the no-cook method. Works pretty well and gives a different flavor.

Never tried sour mashing rye so I can't speak for any results.

What i been doin is mix the grains and heat em to ard 1435-160 and try to keep em at ard that temp for abt 8 hr and sit overnight. Next time im gonna dd some extra amyalse enzymes too.

Seems to give a pretty fair taste. somewhat corny..

thats usin the pot still not the cmpd.

if it works for you, go with it. i'm sure you can get a quality product with some practice.

Cool, another gadget to play with. Haven't used a vinometer before, but sounds like it would be perfect for this kind of reading. I have an old refractometer a friend who is a vet gave me, but unfortunately it's calibrated for reading sheep urine (to see if they're diabetic and such) and I haven't figured out how to recalibrate it!

Nothing like simple mashes, Jesse, when you're still learning to still.

An aside on the refractometer, it always reads water correctly (0 SG) but readings on wash are always high (I think) when checked against a beer hydrometer reading on the same sample. Hmmm.

I notice most of you use yeast in your mash. When you do use yeast it can cause a bad taste in your whiskey and also will cause heartburn, indigestion and hic-ups.

I notice most of you use yeast in your mash. When you do use yeast it can cause a bad taste in your whiskey and also will cause heartburn, indigestion and hic-ups

yeast is an essential part of making alcohol, wether u add it or not it is there

Rocky_Creek wrote:I just bought a roller for small grain. Looked at three, e-mailed the sellers. None of them thought it was good for corn. I use a mill for corn. Also, cracked corn from the feed store does good.

I've found out in the past , corn that's been dried with gas will not make good as corn that's been air dried, needs to be around 15% moisture.

Brett wrote:

I notice most of you use yeast in your mash. When you do use yeast it can cause a bad taste in your whiskey and also will cause heartburn, indigestion and hic-ups

yeast is an essential part of making alcohol, wether u add it or not it is there

What I meant there Brett, was most everyone here was adding yeast to their mash, yall use the yeast to make the mash to work off quicker right???? or is there another reason??

Yeast converts the sugar to alcohol. If there's no yeast the mixture will rot, not ferment. Please see the homedistiller site to learn more about fermentation.

Uh...Ummm, yeah...thats the reason we use yeast. I've found when I don't add yeast to my mashes they seem to take ...ummmm, like forever to ferment.

yeast eats the sugar to make alcohol, the only way to make a mash and not add yeast is if the natural ingredients contain a natural yeast.

Grayson i bet they make u sick the same but without all that alcohol related fuzziness

Well I nerver read any books on the matter, I just learned from the old men that made whiskey in the moonshine capital of the world. They taught me not to add any yeast at all in your mash, would give your whiskey a bad taste, heartburn, indijestion and sometimes the hic-ups. Some of my friends use yeast and I can sure tell it. But don't see I'm doing too wrong by not using it. 55 gal. mash barrel, 100 lbs. of 14% air dried cracked corn, 60 lbs. sugar disolved in warm water, it will always work off in 7 days or less in the summer months, have had it worked off in 4 days if its real hot weather, 2nd and third run dip out 2-3 ,3 lb. coffee cans of spent corn and put the same amount of fresh corn back in each time and increase sugar on 2nd. and third runs to 70 lbs. Proof on the first run is around 120-125, 2nd. and third goes up to 135-140. 3 runs makes 22-23 gal. of 100 proof whiskey before I double run it. Double run every time is always 170 proof right on the button. Where I came from they made whiskey by the barrel, not by the gal. and shipped most by river.

id say u have to be utilising the natural yeasts there so u r still addin the yeast .

never had any of those symptoms from using store bought brewing yeasts, maybe ur friends were using a cheap quality yeast or they had prolems with there mashes?

There must be several moonshine capitals of the world.Id allways been told that wilkes county north carolina was.But your right old days lots of shinners let wild yeast fermint there corn wiskey.

yes, it's true, old timers didn't add any yeast. they relied on the natural yeast in the air to do the job. in cold conditions, they would often add a packet of baking yeast to get things going.

in my experience a good distillers or brewers yeast does a great job.

I first started this mash 10-30-05 and have now done 5 cookins of it. I'm hear to tell ya, This stuff gets mighty fine. Doin it 9 gal ferms at a time with 3 gal backset.

Thanks Jesse

I have started this also. Have 2 buckets working 4 days apart ,each 6 gal. I have done the first runs on each and a second on one of them to date. I any doing striping runs and have yet to do a spirt run . Jesse says to make the cut at 70abv. is that where you are doing it? In the Making Pure Corn Whiskey book he says to take it to 65abv. Just curious how you are doing it. I'm using 2 gal. of backset . Have to say I do like the smell of the ferment. I think I will do my spirt run in a eliptical plate still that I have just made.

I have done it per instruction. Added all collected from 1st run to 2nd, then (made this part up), added 2 gal of the lowest abv of the tails from the previous run. Even though i'm doing 9 gal ferms, I am doing 2 at a time in a 15 gal keg. So that measures to 12 gal new wash + 2 gal low abv tails = 14 gal total, with no boilover. I have not measured the total volume of the keg but there is more than a gallon of space left over.
I collect till it starts to taste nasty and every subsiquint run gets deeper into the tails. My last run went to 62%. The 2nd run should have stopped before 70 but I was trying to go by the book. Its still decent, just not what I was after.
This method has proven to increase yield and improve flavor.

Practice, Practice, Practice.

Do you save your tails for the next wash Transplanted Hillbilly? My next cook off I will add mine to the striping run or the spirit. I personally keep untill 65%abv, and save the rest for reprocessing. I had incomplete ferment, so I have kept 100% backset(still tasted sweet,temp of ferment was low) .I made varyation on the sourmash that is 5parts corn,3parts 6-rowmalt,1part rye,all cooked and converted (and cane sugar for fuel )and the results was a nicely spicy hybrid whiskey. Next run should be ready in a few days.


DUHHH...I guess the tails buisness is answered in your post...please excuse my thickness.

I have also found for me the flavor is better if I collect around 45 to 50 ml/min. This may have helped during earlier cooks (it was a little slower) cause the product was a little to close to neutral for my liking. I learn something every time I do a run.
As yield has improved I have been able to keep as much as 1.5 gal/run higher abv tails that I intend to run as a pure spirit run. Got a fair portion on hand now. Should see some heads from that as I have not seen them yet past the thrown out nasties. Set up seems to start producing around 81% with the added feints.
On a sadder note I have a really busy month ahead and had to abandon this mash. I was able to find a good home for it so I will be able to visit it and monitor its growth or decline. The fellow really is confused but I will help as much as possible. Hope he can keep it going as I think its really starting to come right.
I will probably start another anyway just to see what I have learned and make improvments based on that.
1.4#'s each sugar and cracked corn/ total volume of mash.
1 sachet of yeast / bucket Gerts stuff

Could those early runs be put into my backset and rerun to flavor them up a bit before I toss the backset?

TRANSPLANTED HILLBILLY wrote:Could those early runs be put into my backset and rerun to flavor them up a bit before I toss the backset?

sure, i've done similar things before, give it a try.

i've thrown lots of runs which were so-so back into my still right before running a mash.

as far as stopping points for runs, 70% is a good place for beginners because it's very conservative. i tend to go down between 68-65%, but remember, i taste as well as read an alcoholometer. once i start to detect the taste of the tails i know it's about time to end the spirit run.

it's a corn whisky, we want to keep it on the naturally sweet side, so those tails are really obvious to the taste if you aren't a little bit careful.

TRANSPLANTED HILLBILLY wrote:I first started this mash 10-30-05 and have now done 5 cookins of it. I'm hear to tell ya, This stuff gets mighty fine. Doin it 9 gal ferms at a time with 3 gal backset.

Thanks Jesse

Hi Uncle Jesse,
As I said before on another topic, I allways read a lot before to begin or try something... So I read all your receipe on the Wiki, translated all in french (my poor mother language!), read again my translation and your text, then read all messages in this topic... Learned a lot.
Now, before to begin, let me ask a few questions (to be sure my translation and understandin' are correct) :

1. The corn, except floatin' parts after each fermentation, stays in the fermenter during the hole process. Yes / No?
2. No need to add corn, except for replacement of that floating as written at #1. Yes / No?
3. No time to loose! It seems important to ferment-distill-ferment-distill... every ± 4 days, without interruption of the cycle. Yes / No?
4. No need to add yeast... The first will survive / reproduce and will be sufficient during the hole process. Yes / No?
5. A last one, not under Yes / No form (!) : How long (I'd say how many times / batches) is it possible to make this process? Would it be possible that it never ends?
So, I surely begin with my first Simple Sour Wash experience next saturday. Sorry for these "newbie" or "illeterate" questions, but I've sometimes a real problem with translation (it took me more than 15 minutes to write this reply, with a big dictionnary by the hand!!!)
Thanks a lot for your help.

1. The corn, except floatin' parts after each fermentation, stays in the fermenter during the hole process. Yes / No?

yes

2. No need to add corn, except for replacement of that floating as written at #1. Yes / No?

correct, no need to add corn except expired corn as in question #1.

3. No time to loose! It seems important to ferment-distill-ferment-distill... every ± 4 days, without interruption of the cycle. Yes / No?

yes unless you interrupt the cycle as explained earlier in this message:

This process is continual. You'll have to distill many times a month..I was doing it 2-3x a week when I had it rolling. How do you stop a mash for the time being?

When you drain off your beer, fill the fermenter with cold, clean water. No backset, no sugar, no yeast. Let it sit this way and it will last - I'm not sure how long - but I've let it go a week and had no problems. To reactivate, rinse your grains clean, add more yeast, sugar and your water/backset mixture.

I normally save backset so I can do a sour mash. I put it into a Connie keg and store it into the beer fridge.

4. No need to add yeast... The first will survive / reproduce and will be sufficient during the hole process. Yes / No?

yes.

5. A last one, not under Yes / No form (!) : How long (I'd say how many times / batches) is it possible to make this process? Would it be possible that it never ends?

yes, continual if you treat your grains and mash properly. well, i can't say it goes on forever, but i've easily pulled over 20 runs off a simple mash before i had to discard it for other projects.

So, I surely begin with my first Simple Sour Wash experience next saturday. Sorry for these "newbie" or "illeterate" questions, but I've sometimes a real problem with translation (it took me more than 15 minutes to write this reply, with a big dictionnary by the hand!!!)
Thanks a lot for your help.

always glad to help, please let us know how your final spirit tastes!

You may wish to keep in mind if it has not been mentioned before, that the more renditions you go through, the less use a hydrometer becomes. Apparently more and more solids are in suspension throwing the reading of. The best way to know when it is done is by watching for the cap to fall. Just know how much liquid you are removing and how much sugar you are replacing.