Rye bread whiskey

[GreenEnvy22]

Collected 11.5 gallons of wash, did stripping run.
Collected about 10L at 40%. I'll do a spirit run in the next day or two.

[Sailman]

Damn long day yesterday, I'm still beat. 12 hr from first drop to last. 4 Generations a 40% went into the still, approximately a 12 to 13 gallon charge. I collected about 6 gallons of cuts. One thing that I did notice this morning when I got up and walked through the room where my cuts are stored I did notice a faint green apple smell. Is this normal or is it just me smelling something that probably isn't there?

[still_stirrin]

Acetaldehyde (green apple smell) is a highly volatile precursor of fermentation. I get it when I start a spirit run. It is so volatile that it vaporizes even before the still is up to boiling temperature. Very common. In fact, open a bottle of Budweiser beer and you can even smell the green apples.

Because it is so volatile, it is effervescing off of your jars that are airing. That’s why you smell it in the room. Also, it is quite common that most people are very sensitive to the smell, so it is detectible in very small concentrations.
ss

[GreenEnvy22]

I ended up keeping 3.5L @ 66%.
Didn't notice a very strong rye smell in the white dog, but we will see how it develops after a couple of months on oak.

[Sailman]

Acetaldehyde (green apple smell) is a highly volatile precursor of fermentation. I get it when I start a spirit run. It is so volatile that it vaporizes even before the still is up to boiling temperature. Very common. In fact, open a bottle of Budweiser beer and you can even smell the green apples.

Because it is so volatile, it is effervescing off of your jars that are airing. That’s why you smell it in the room. Also, it is quite common that most people are very sensitive to the smell, so it is detectible in very small concentrations.
ss

OK thanks!!

[rubberduck71]

I ended up keeping 3.5L @ 66%.
Didn't notice a very strong rye smell in the white dog, but we will see how it develops after a couple of months on oak.

Enjoy it! This is by far one of my fav T&T's.

Hopefully you're more successful than I am not sampling it before it's aged fully...

[Fredistiller]

Hi I followed this recipe a time ago and liked it a lot. Time to do it again! A question though, why the boiling of the bread? It is already cooked. For easier siphoning? For the yeast to work better? I hope this isn't already answered yet, but I haven't got the courage to go trough the 15 pages...

[rubberduck71]

If you invert the sugar, you could just throw the bread in soon after. I haven't boiled it either & it has a great flavor when oaked for a few months.

[Fredistiller]

If you invert the sugar, you could just throw the bread in soon after. I haven't boiled it either & it has a great flavor when oaked for a few months.

thanks!

[Sailman]

After four stripping runs and a Spirit Run I barely had enough Spirit cut to 120. This 5 gallon barrel actually holds 5 and 1/2.

[The Baker]

Belt and braces man!

I like the tray under the barrel.

Geoff

[49er]

Hi guys.
This post could really go in the request for help section, but because it is based on this recipe for Rye bread whiskey, I decided to post it here.
Anyways....I've been doing mostly UJSSM over the summer but the relentlessness of it has bored me somewhat, so I have had a couple of months of no brewing, just drinking! And then I saw this recipe alluded to in another forum and the next thing was I found myself here with a rekindled enthusiasm for brewing. So I purchased 2kg of suitable rye bread from Aldi and started a new ferment along with 5kg of sugar in a 6 gallon FV (sg pointed to around 9.5% abv) The ferment stuck at around 1030, so I left it for a few days, went back and lo and behold it had restarted and finished (temp was about 28c) I left it for a few more days to clear, then stripped it, expecting nice things after having read this thread. But to my disappointment, it smelled and tasted not a lot different to all my UJSSM's! And that brings me back to my opening sentence....no matter how I tweak my recipes, they all taste the same!! I only run a pot still, with a S/S 5 gallon boiler going into a 2"x24" copper column, reducing to a 1 1/2" 90 degree bend, reducing further into
15mm which then runs through my liebig condenser 39", all of it copper. I heat the boiler with a 2.5kw element. I've no idea what, if anything, I'm doing wrong. Someone once suggested that I have too much copper and this is stripping the flavour......
If anyone can offer any suggestions I would be eternally grateful...thanks.

[SaltyStaves]

49er, you did a 6 gallon ferment for a 5 gallon boiler and you're running it as a pot still? If you are only doing a single pass, then I'm not surprised you are disappointed.

[49er]

49er, you did a 6 gallon ferment for a 5 gallon boiler and you're running it as a pot still? If you are only doing a single pass, then I'm not surprised you are disappointed.

Although it's a 6 gallon fv, I'm not filling it to capacity and only get about 4 gallons of wash at the end of the ferment, which is just right for my 5 gallon still. I've only done one run so far, but intend doing more when the weather gets a tad warmer, to give me enough low wines for a second or spirit run. However, according to Odin, he got "almost too much taste" on his first run, so I was hoping for something approaching a decent flavour too.

[SaltyStaves]

It sounds like you are mixing up the concepts of 1st generations/runs with 1st distillations.
Odin tweaked his recipe because he was getting too much rye spice flavour. That does not imply that he didn't double distill it. He even states in the OP that he did "Two distillations".

Stop drinking your low wines. They won't tell you anything useful at this stage. Ferment more, strip more and do a decent sized spirit run and make good cuts.

[rubberduck71]

Just my 2 cents thrown in here, but I did ask Odin near the end of that thread (we're on page 15 now, so maybe page 14 or 13???) about using the 1.5 distilling technique. He endorsed the idea & I've been using it ever since. Made some fine tasting stuff in my airstill which only holds 4L. The capacity actually "forced" me utilize that process... I would do a stripping run with the first 4L, ending w/ ~1L of low wines. Then add those to 3L of wash & distill that batch. Usually getting ~400-500 mL of what I considered hearts, then the balance of the distillate on that run (500-600 mL) was used as feints adding to the next batch of 3.4L of wash. Rinse, repeat, until I ran out of wash. Keep feints to add to next batch, even on the 1st run of the next gen.

I've since upgraded to a larger still, but the 1.5 technique will still be used next time I make a batch.

Duck

[Fredistiller]

It sounds like you are mixing up the concepts of 1st generations/runs with 1st distillations.
Odin tweaked his recipe because he was getting too much rye spice flavour. That does not imply that he didn't double distill it. He even states in the OP that he did "Two distillations".

Stop drinking your low wines. They won't tell you anything useful at this stage. Ferment more, strip more and do a decent sized spirit run and make good cuts.

+1

You should read this post:
[url]https://homedistiller.org/forum/viewtop ... t=11640url]

Double distill your stuff and make conservative cuts: no heads almost no tails. Give it a rest. You'll tell the difference!

And once you "understand" what you're doing. So you'll be able to play with the cuts and add some heads and or tails to match your taste.

It's so confusing and not easy to wait I know. But the learning process is one of the most exciting part of this hobby! So enjoy the journey!

[49er]

Stop drinking your low wines. They won't tell you anything useful at this stage. Ferment more, strip more and do a decent sized spirit run and make good cuts.

I'm not drinking my low wines, only tasting a teaspoon full....

[krausen89]

i am trying a recipe very similar to UJSSM but incorporating 2lbs rye bread

5lbs cracked corn
2lbs rye bread crumbs ( ground in food processor)
7lbs sugar
4Gallons water

Editing because i didnt realize there was so many pages!

I used Pepperidge Farms seedless jewish rye. Not really what is needed for this recipe but is readily available to me and has a very nice aromatic rye smell and great flavor..we shall see if its enough rye bread. For flavor to the ujssm

[rubberduck71]

krausen: if you have a Whole Foods near you, they carry that hard-to-find Mestemacher rye

[Fredistiller]

i am trying a recipe very similar to UJSSM but incorporating 2lbs rye bread

5lbs cracked corn
2lbs rye bread crumbs ( ground in food processor)
7lbs sugar
4Gallons water

Editing because i didnt realize there was so many pages!

I used Pepperidge Farms seedless jewish rye. Not really what is needed for this recipe but is readily available to me and has a very nice aromatic rye smell and great flavor..we shall see if its enough rye bread. For flavor to the ujssm

Sounds good to go. Next time try to use less sugar, like 4.5 lbs to have your gravity around 1.050. This keeps the yeast happy so they will give a better final product.

Let us know!

[Clae]

So... Im a little confused on how important multiple generations/backset are to this recipe.

Ideally, I would like to try this scaled-up in my 25gal fermenter without having to commit to months of fermenting and re-fermenting.
Would I be missing out if I just scale up the 1st generation recipe to make a single spirit run, instead of multiple gens?

[FL Brewer]

Maybe double the rye bread amount in the first generation, then back to the original amount for subsequent generations? You get flavor from the backset and the feints, that's a lot to make up for in the first gen.

[Honest_Liberty]

How does this compare in flavor against all grain or UjSSM rye hybrid?
Also, cost?

I would imagine inverting table sugar and adding malted rye from the LHBS would make a fine drop for less, considering how expensive that bread is

[Kindafrench]

Distilled 20 liters at 14 ish % yesterday. I was very unprecise with fermenting, so I took 20 liters of RO water, 1.5 kg of pumpernickel, 5 kg of sugar (inverted it) and a small block of fresh bakers yeast. As always I plunged a Vitamin B - Magnesia pill and a tea spoon of DAP in the mix. Started all fine at about 20°C, took 2 weeks to ferment. Didn‘t measure SG at all. I tasted the wash before deciding and it was dry, maybe not completely dry, but imho save enough to distill.

Refluxed in my LM offsethead, took fores very slow, after 30 mins. of stabilizing. Heads already yummy smelling and fingertasting, about 300 ml. Hearts maybe 1 liter at 94%. Early tails stuff, 300 ml. Finally tails, maybe 300 ml. All sitting on the desk to breathe a bit.
Today I will decide what to use and what to reuse and what to dump into the cleaning alcohol bottle.

I took 10 ml right out the middle of the hearts section and dilluted it with the same amount of water right after distilling.
What I wanted to find out was, will I get a product like Doppelkorn, which could be called German Vodka, and yes, it tasted almost perfectly like my favourite German schnaps.
I always wanted to try a rye mash, but was afraid of not getting what I want, plus all the boiling, malting, distilling... how... steam... no way... so I let go that idea.
But now, it‘s possible. Thanks Odin! You‘re my hero!
Will try it again in UJSM style, after my next two runs of UJSM, with which I‘m very happy, too. Already filled up my 30 liter oak barrel a year ago and going to bottle it right now.

And again thanks to HD and all you guys here. I spent so much time reading on HD and inhaling the knowledge and the spirit of y‘all. It‘s the best place on earth, if one‘s interested in everything that has to do with alcohol.

Stay safe and healthy.

[Reaverman]

Regarding the Rye vodka recipe.
I've done two gens of the whisky, switched to Vodka (where you just top up with water and sugar). Can I repeat this process, with the old bed/yeast and add backset?

[rubberduck71]

I have done that. After a couple gen's you gotta remove some of the bread trub, as it's eating into valuable liquid volume space!

The hot backset kills the yeast, but they get gobbled up by the new stuff you add when it cools...

I've not done this as a vodka, but mostly because I love rye whiskey (& I don't have a reflux column yet...).

Duck

[Reaverman]

I have done that. After a couple gen's you gotta remove some of the bread trub, as it's eating into valuable liquid volume space!

The hot backset kills the yeast, but they get gobbled up by the new stuff you add when it cools...

I've not done this as a vodka, but mostly because I love rye whiskey (& I don't have a reflux column yet...).

Duck

I was going to add a gallon on the yeast, dissolve the sugar in the backset and then cool it off with more water and add it back to the vessel when cool enough.

I have a T500 copper head, so I'll strip in pot mode and then pack the column on the second run!

[wpkluck]

I ended up keeping 3.5L @ 66%.
Didn't notice a very strong rye smell in the white dog, but we will see how it develops after a couple of months on oak.

Enjoy it! This is by far one of my fav T&T's.

Hopefully you're more successful than I am not sampling it before it's aged fully...

I gotta try it!

[m0rdecai]

Please forgive a quick technical question from a beginner: Are the starches in the bread fermented..? Wouldn't the baking of the bread kill off any amylase enzymes in the rye? And there aren't any other sources of enzymes in this recipe? Is the bread just in there as a flavor infusion?