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Did you use enzymes?
I just mashed in 2kgs of oatmeal, 10kgs of very finely ground corn and water to make it up to 45 L - and boy it was Solid, but once i added the 1st enzyme and let sit overnight, it got all loose and runny
(Going to do another today and yet another tomorrow)

I added no enzymes. When did you add yours? When I first mixed everything up it was easily stir-able, but it seems to have settled out and congealed overnight. It wasn't just thick, it was literally a one piece solid mass. Pushing the mash paddle in like a knife took a lot of force. It felt like clay. Since it was a good temp for pitching I added the yellow label yeast while I tried. txobreak it up figuring that the enzymes there would help a bit, and they did. Id like to find a way to prevent it from becoming a brick in the first place, if possible. Im a mechanic and have pretty calloused hands, but I actually got a blister from trying to break that stuff up!

Im thinking that HT enzymes might be a good addition next time during the mixing and cooking phase, Ill have to look into getting some- I've never used any before.

i literally just finished with the next 7.5 kgs of fine ground corn (have to do in two batches as i only have a 30L pot.)
using the paint stirrer while SWAMBO slowly poured in the grain, i got to almost able to mix it all. Had to do the last bit with a large wooded spoon - that's how thick. and it was very heavy to stir in.
checked temp - right for the HT enzyme (around 80°C) - added it
within minutes i could stir it easily.
it will now sit overnight and i'll add the next enzyme in the morning - let it sit all day and pitch yeast around 6 tomorrow night.

HT Enzymes work like a treat!

for ref. my first enzyme breaks down the starch into dextrin, and the second converts the dextrin to dextrose
i leave them a lot longer than they say (60 - 90 minutes according to mfg) - but i leave them for a good 12 - 18 hours between additions. Works very well for me

Ill look into getting some HT enzymes. Which ones do you use?

I am in South Africa, and get from a local supplier (Distillique) - branded as Dextrolique Plus and Sugralique Plus - obviously their own branded label
Somebody on this forum will be able to give you a name of a suitable enzyme in your neck of the woods (wherever that is )

Thanks. Ill look into whats available around here.

Metalking00 wrote: ↑Wed Mar 30, 2022 12:32 am topped up with boiling water

How much water? I do a thinnish mash especially when doing cooked corn. I use 4 liters water to 1 kg ground corn (about 2 lb corn / 1 gal water). It does get hard to deal with but not like you describe. At 3 l/kg (2.5 lb/gal) the pain increases.

I use the "raw process" to avoid this scenario entirety. Add water at about 38C to ground corn, add angel, stir twice daily for about 3 days. It does take longer to finish but never turns into corn glop!

If you're in the US Sebstar HT enzyme worked for me but a bit pricey. The fermsolutions enzymes are more economical and get good reviews here but I haven't used enzymes since I discovered angel.

I used 6kg corn for a total volume of 25l. Not sure exactly how much volume the corn takes up, but it probably ends up being 2.3-2.5lb/g. My previous bstch of corn,barley and wheat used the same amount and never turned too thick, so i tried the same grain amount this time with the all corn and the same boiling water treatment.

I use boiling water to reduce the risks of infection, as my fermentation area is shared with roommates. Dont want any unsound stinks wafting around that could bring my hobby to a halt...

Do you ever have any issues when doing your raw process? The corn i use is pregelatinized (at least partially), so it should respond well to your method, i think.

Let's remember this method does not involve boiling water or enzymes. The last section of comments is taking a direction off topic. If you want to gelatinize and use enzymes, talk about that in any one of the other "regular mash" threads.

ShineonCrazyDiamond wrote: ↑Wed Mar 30, 2022 4:00 am Let's remember this method does not involve boiling water or enzymes. The last section of comments is taking a direction off topic. If you want to gelatinize and use enzymes, talk about that in any one of the other "regular mash" threads.

sorry

Metalking00 wrote: ↑Wed Mar 30, 2022 3:39 am I used 6kg corn for a total volume of 25l.

I would have added 24l of water so I would call your mash thick, not excessive but I like thinner.

Metalking00 wrote: ↑Wed Mar 30, 2022 3:39 am Do you ever have any issues when doing your raw process?

If I'm reasonable I haven't had anything but good aromas. I stir it 2-4 times a day until I seal it under a ferm lock so any offensive smell wouldn't have time to get very strong before I dumped the batch. Hasn't happened yet...

The ONLY time I have gotten bad smells using angel was when I was seeing how lazy I could be and put whole, unground feed store corn in room temp water and added angel yeast mixed with some 32C water, way outside recommended methods. It never started digesting the corn or fermenting. After a few days it smelled like poo (not sewage, straight POO!) So, I can mess this stuff up but I had to get really wacky.

Another experiment trying to sprout the same corn in a bucket of water gave me the same smell after a few days. Not going to do that again and I blame the corn and my methods not the angel yeast.

Big_dog wrote: ↑Sat Mar 12, 2022 9:58 am Started a 25g batch of all corn a few days ago. Stirring twice a day. Just ground up 50lbs of corn, added hose water, threw in the yeast. Doesn’t get any easier than that. Very active still. I’m thinking it’ll be a couple weeks because I used cold water, but I’ll update when it’s done and volume and % after strip.

Update, did a stripping run and then combined the rest of the mash with those low wines. Threw out about a half gallon of fires and heads, at about a gallon of 70% of what I think is hearts, starting to smell some tails coming in.
That’s pretty good in my opinion for just grinding up some corn with my drill, putting a hose on it for a bit and chucking in some yeast.
Tastes better than my ujssm’s, cheaper, and honestly just as easy.

I made 100% corn with corn meal from my local Restaurant Store (~$25 for 50 lb bag).

105F water in 4 gal water with paint mixer & drill. 10 lbs per 6 gal fermenter, but added in 3.3 lb "pours" from a pitcher in 1 hand & the drill in the other. As grains were added, it brought down temp to 95F pitching temp. Never got the hard to mix oatmeal condition.

Every couple days, "swirl" the buckets.

Thanks for the input. Ill try it with cooler water next time

Just received my angel yeast and 25kg corn flour day before yesterday.

As luck would have it, yesterday was stillin day. She who must be obeyed wants vodka and panty dropper and espresso martini, and wont drink most commercial anymore.

It occured to me i can kill two birds with one stone, i set the stripping still up fed from the tap and restricted the water flow to put out the hottest water possible without losing vapour.

I filled two 25l fermenters half way with hot output water, added 6.25kg of flour and shook them like crazy, and they turned to the thick stew like consistency as described. Then i filled them all the way up with further hot water and used a powered stirrer (some m10 allthread with a rc boat propeller mounted on the end does a lovely job and fits into narrow mouth fermenters) before wrapping them up in a blanket overnight to slowly cool.

Two 50l strip runs gave me enough hot water to fill 4 25l fermenters and a little more to top up the water butt ready for the spirit run on the recirculation pump.

No water wasted at all, 100l of corn wash pitched with angel this morning and trying to climb out of the fermenter.

Tldr: for the tightfisted out there (like me!) You can save yourself the energy required to heat water by setting up your next ferment as you strip the last one.

Winner!

Maybe I'm way off, but I've used this a few times and so has my buddy.. The remaining funk smell reminds me of vomit, even after sitting for 2 weeks.. It certainly works but the ester profile (is that's an accurate description) strikes me as rotting grapes mixed with a faint vomit like odor.

I did try my buddy's batch that's been sitting on oak for 6 months and it has turned into a subtle purple grape profile on the nose. The taste isn't really affected as far as I can tell, but whatever ester's they produce I just can't seem to find a way to rid the mash of that profile.

I feel like I've used this enough times just now start to question whether my nose is just too sensitive to settle off notes that others don't pick up, or potentially I'm just doing something wrong even though it's pretty straightforward.

EDIT: running a post oak smoked oat wheat whiskey right now. The smoke reminds me of mescal and it appears to be overpowering the funk. I'll know better tomorrow. It's definitely persisting, albeit much more subtle with all this smoke profile

mmm grape ape

Dancing4dan wrote: ↑Sun Feb 27, 2022 5:11 pm I ran the flaked corn / yellow label ferment. Used a pot still to run first 40 L then did 1 1/2 distillation using the LM/VM head on a riser without packed column. Added the four gallons of low wines from the pot still to a very clean 22 L wash and did a 1 1/2 distillation.

Results are 500 ml head cut, then 2+ gallons at 170 proof hearts. 2 L tails. Tastes great. Pretty happy with that. Surprised by the small heads cut.

Will definitely try this on cracked feed corn!

This has been on oak since I last posted after being proofed down to 120 proof. French oak chips (yes I know about the end grain thing) and a previously used toasted American oak spiral.

Pretty good considering the short time! Really impressed actually.

The next thing will be yellow label yeast and cracked corn.

RockinRockies wrote: ↑Thu Apr 07, 2022 8:41 am Maybe I'm way off, but I've used this a few times and so has my buddy.. The remaining funk smell reminds me of vomit, even after sitting for 2 weeks.. It certainly works but the ester profile (is that's an accurate description) strikes me as rotting grapes mixed with a faint vomit like odor.

Check your PH, under 5 at pitch will help with help with that, so im told. Havent bothered testing myself as the once or twice ive smelt it, it hasnt come through the still.
Ymmv

Sanitation is super important if you use the "no cook" process. Gelatinization/pasteurization temps can certainly assist if it's a recurring thing (environmental).

squigglefunk wrote: ↑Thu Apr 07, 2022 11:23 am mmm grape ape

It's very similar to that. I just tasted my buddies again that's been in a quart jar with a stick. It's overwhelmingly grape ish with subtle puke in the background. We're going to let them sit a year.

Here's the thing though: with my batch, to I didn't like how grungy the flavor was with two plates, so I kept everything, had 5 more gallons of wash, 5 gallons backset, and recycled everything I originally collected.

Ran through two plates again.... All that funk and grape/vomit, has disappeared. I will stick to DADY and bread yeast from now on, but the angels did clean up with a second pass. This post oak oats has a very similar profile to mezcal. Is recommend for folks in Texas if you can smoke some grains with it. You'll enjoy the outcome

RC Al wrote: ↑Fri Apr 08, 2022 1:59 am

RockinRockies wrote: ↑Thu Apr 07, 2022 8:41 am Maybe I'm way off, but I've used this a few times and so has my buddy.. The remaining funk smell reminds me of vomit, even after sitting for 2 weeks.. It certainly works but the ester profile (is that's an accurate description) strikes me as rotting grapes mixed with a faint vomit like odor.

Check your PH, under 5 at pitch will help with help with that, so im told. Havent bothered testing myself as the once or twice ive smelt it, it hasnt come through the still.
Ymmv

Thanks. You know, I'll actually try this again with that in mind since I have just enough for another 50 gallon mash.

In keeping with the OPs theme...

I picked up some small tapioca (cassava starch) pearls to test out the Angel Yellow Label 'Starter of Liquor Making' product I've used on different grains already. Well, tapioca is a highly refined and nearly pure starch from the cassava root and the Angel product seems to be ripping through it.

I simply put a 500g bag of small pearls into about 3L or so of hot tap water in a 4L jug. After letting it cool to 30°C I pitched 25g of the aforementioned Angel product and wrapped it up with a source of heat to maintain ~30°C. It is still going on day 4 but the tapioca and trub are down to less than 2.5cm deep from the tapioca occupying about 2/3 the volume at pitching.

Smells and tastes very clean as an ongoing ferment, curious to do a few and run them.

An odd experiment... OK mostly medley of mistakes and some interesting results.

I did a Golden Graham malted barley mash a few weeks ago. Date not recorded. But it was approximately a month ago. It was a S*%t show of a day for several reasons not related to the mash.

80 lb Golden Graham. 10 lb rolled oats. Approximately 32 gallons of water. Barley was fine ground through a roller mill. Course flower. The mash was done in two batches and the results added to two fermenters. I will call them A and B respectively. On the second batch (B) there was poor conversion due to low temperature, uneven split of yeast starter and a lack of Camden. Or all of the above. Ferment (B) took longer to start fermenting. Both ferment had heat belts and blankets for insulation.

Yeast was 2 Tbsp Bread yeast. 2 Tbsp DADY. 2/3 Tbsp yellow label. Rehydrated and split between both fermenters (this didn't happen to be even) . Mixing yeast strains works for me. This is the first time I added YL to the mix.

The second / slower ferment (B) finished first. When I lifted the BIAB it was obvious there was a lot of grain left that didn't get converted and fermented. Drained it all, cold crashed and did stripping run. As expected the yield was low.

I decided to do a sugar ferment on the leftover grain and Trub from (B) (Let's call this sugar head B.1). Added hot tap water at 150*F. Added 9 kg sugar. Now there is a twist. I add in the Trub from two previous Yellow label flaked corn ferments from 22-01-15 and another from 22-02-04. My assumption is there was still active yeast and possibly some enzymes remaining. This was about 2 1/2 gallons of trub that had been sitting waiting for a steam strip. Ferment took right off.

And another twist. Two weeks ago when the first Golden Graham ferment (A) finished, I drained liquid from the sugar head (B.1) to make enough room for the BIAB from the first ferment (A) to go into what was left in the sugar head (B.1). Now there are two BIAB containing Golden Graham and oats in a full 20 gallon fermenter along with the remains of the sugar head. (I will call this B.2) Added in 1 Tbsp Yellow label. Again a heat belt and a blanket for insulation.

B.2 is vigorously fermenting one month after the grains were originally mashed and fermented. Very clean ferment. Fantastic smell of concentrated Golden Graham malt. The BIAB keeps floating up and pushing off the lid due to Co2 production. I was hoping to pull the BIAB today and cold crash but it just keeps going. Temp is holding at 96*F.

Just bought two pounds of Yellow Label yeast. Plan is to do a no mash barley next time I do barley. Will also be doing cracked corn no mash. I suspect that Yellow Label will save a lot of time and energy by avoiding a mash even using barley malts.

FWIW this yeast has made some excellent CROW, 100% corn, Irish, & rice whiskeys (plus subsequent sugarheads).

I also used it to for a refluxed rice wine made into a neutral that even the SWIMBO labeled as "evil" (as in deceptively smooth).

Using it in conjunction with another yeast (like DADY) is an interesting concept, however.

This is my latest.....put it on today and 4 hours later it looked like this ....damn things gone wild.

So far Ive done four of these, the grain bill is 70% corn, 20% malted barley, 10% malted rye. Had to use the malts as I cant get unmalted here, and figure it will just add flavour anyway.
These have all been done in a 60L fermenter, and consisted of , 7kg corn, 2kg barley, 1 kg rye....roughly 32L of water and 50grams of Angel yeast.....the first 3 fell a bit short of filling the fermenter......sooooooooo.
This time I fudged the figures a bit and added a bit more of this and that to make it up to a full fermenter......the one thing I did measure / weigh carefully was the yeast ...I increased that to 68 grams .....probably more than was needed for the increase in water and grain.
The last two Ive done have been kept at a constant 31-33c...they seem to love it there......this one with an extra bit of yeast is going nuts.
Once this one is done I will have 50L of low wines to run.....The plated column is staying away from this one, and the old potty is getting dragged out.

Nice Salty . Going all high tech with that numbers warming thing

You might want to show what you got in that box .( not the Fermenter , got that , the heating thing etc )

Yummyrum wrote: ↑Sun Apr 24, 2022 4:24 am You might want to show what you got in that box .( not the Fermenter , got that , the heating thing etc )

Yummyrum wrote: ↑Sun Apr 24, 2022 4:24 am Nice Salty . Going all high tech with that numbers warming thing
You might want to show what you got in that box .

Well I was trying to keep it top secret , but spose I can give you a peep.
viewtopic.php?f=83&t=87046

So what seems to be the ideal number of grams of yellow label yeast to kilos of grain?