SBB's All Molasses Rum Recipe

[Dutch41]

Happy New Year Team SBB's All Molasses Rum, I just put #5 gallons (19L) of SBB's Rum into a five gallon, medium toasted barrel and put her into storage. The rum was put in the oak barrel at 62%ABV. I'll give updates as time goes on. Be safe...

[Bradster68]

Bought myself a Christmas gift. 73ish litres of molasses. I may have to buy a barrel after this.

[Yummyrum]

I’m excited for you Bradster
Thats enough for about 270 litres of wash

[Bradster68]

I’m excited for you Bradster
Thats enough for about 270 litres of wash

Me too. I'm really liking this large batch thingy. And... this'll be my first product in a barrel.

[Zacher]

I sometimes single run this wash through 4 plates , other times I strip a wash or two and then mix them 1/3 strip to 2/3 wash.

SBB, can't wait to try this recipe and have read the entire thread. I'm just wondering, what is your approximate yield of hearts when you do a single run with 2ish gallons of molly?

[sadie33]

Bought myself a Christmas gift. 73ish litres of molasses. I may have to buy a barrel after this.
IMG_9333.jpeg

wow! that's awesome!! I have 15 gallons waiting to be stripped, I can't wait. I was gonna do it tonight, but the UJSSM was done first so I'll probably strip that, start the next gen. then it will be all about the RUM!

[sadie33]

Bought myself a Christmas gift. 73ish litres of molasses. I may have to buy a barrel after this.
IMG_9333.jpeg

wow! that's awesome!! I have 15 gallons waiting to be stripped, I can't wait. I was gonna do 5 gal tonight, but the UJSSM was done first so I'll probably strip that, start the next gen. then it will be all about the RUM!

[Bradster68]

Bought myself a Christmas gift. 73ish litres of molasses. I may have to buy a barrel after this.
IMG_9333.jpeg

wow! that's awesome!! I have 15 gallons waiting to be stripped, I can't wait. I was gonna do it tonight, but the UJSSM was done first so I'll probably strip that, start the next gen. then it will be all about the RUM!

Yes. I need to concentrate on the rum for a while also. I plan on doing another big ferment after this one. I have a pretty good supplier now,so no excuses for me.

[needmorstuff]

I posted two days ago but maybe forum got reset?

using this recipe and 2 x strips + 1 x wash into a spirit run, what yields are people getting? yours... I know they will all vary.

% heads/fores
% hearts
% tails

great recipe btw! I got a good yield at about 11% abv.

[JustinNZ]

Hey man. With this exact recipe lately I’ve been consistently putting low wines in the pot at 27-30% abv for my spirit run and after cuts keeping 45-50% of the total ethanol as hearts.

For example, if I charged my still with 50L at 30% that’s 15L total ethanol in there. I’d expect to like about 7L of that ethanol, which means 11 and a bit litres aging at around 60%abv.

For some, that’s a big hearts cut - but it’s based on taste and smell so what can I do? Only time will tell, but I’m getting better at cuts now - especially the tails transition. I don’t drink it white.

At a guess, if I was just doing jars (volume off spout), it would be 2:6:5, so very loosely (head maths) 15% heads, 46% hearts, 39% tails. Hope that’s useful in some way.

[theotherstu]

I posted two days ago but maybe forum got reset?

using this recipe and 2 x strips + 1 x wash into a spirit run, what yields are people getting? yours... I know they will all vary.

% heads/fores
% hearts
% tails

great recipe btw! I got a good yield at about 11% abv.

I'm still fairly new at this but I did another 11L.
Did 2 stripping runs and a spirit run. Threw the fores on the stripping run (around 50ml each time).
From my taste buds and also working on percentages, it worked like this

Fores: Threw away about the first 75ml (was at nearly 80%)
Heads: went from 75% to around 70%. I'd say this was 35%. Definitely icky.
Hearts: Between 70% and 45%. Averaged at around 60% - I probably went into Tails a bit, but it didn't have that cardboardy taste that other spirits I've done had, so i'll take that. 40% in total taken.
Tails: Started around 45% and I gave up pretty soon after as I was keeping this particular bit of dunder for my next run. Working from my alcohol percentages (I estimated around 1L of alcohol in total once you removed the fores), I'd say 25%

TL:DR? 35% Heads. 40% hearts. 25% tails.
I was surprised how far you can go into tails with this. I could have gone further - it didn't taste that bad. But I wanted to keep it at 60%. I'm building to get around 4L to put into the Carboy.

I'd say somewhere around 600ml from 10L. It's the 2nd batch like this I've done. Next one, I'll start doing a 27L as I've got the equipment, just not the still.

[JustinNZ]

It’s always interesting what other people do. We all seem to approach our stilling from a slightly different angle. And what comes out of my still is so different to yours and others. I generally only look at abv when recording my low wines and proofing to my desired barrel strength after making cuts - but yesterday my last jar of hearts was 58%abv at 20ish deg, which seems to be quite high for this recipe. But that’s where I detected too much tails. Maybe it’s not tails… Maybe I’m letting in too much late heads… it’s tough doing this in isolation, eh.

[Saltbush Bill]

I posted two days ago but maybe forum got reset?
using this recipe and 2 x strips + 1 x wash into a spirit run, what yields are people getting? yours... I know they will all vary.

% heads/fores
% hearts
% tails
great recipe btw! I got a good yield at about 11% abv.

I saw your original question before the reset, didn't answer immediately because i was thinking about an answer.
I don't think giving amounts or ABV % really teaches or helps anyone to make good cuts. Those things just become a crutch to lean on.
There are too many variables at play to give accurate amounts or ABV's.
What sort of still?...Pot , Detuned reflux, plated column?......if plated column how many plates....2, 3 , 4...or more maybe ?
Even a stainless pot with a long riser and a pile of copper mesh in it will give different results
to a copper pot with short riser and no mesh.
Wash / low wines / feints and the ABVs of all of those and what quantities of each are in the boiler charge will change things yet again.
Sometimes I run straight wash, sometimes through 3 plates , sometimes 4, sometimes a mix of wash and low wines , again 3 , 4 even 5 plates at times.
Sometimes I add a heap of Rum fients to the boiler charge ...other times I dont.

Who's advice on what still , what boiler charge make up, how many plates or lack of are you going to take ?
I'm not trying to be an arse , just pointing these things out , and suggesting that the best way is the trust your taste buds and your nose.
We all have to learn how to make cuts......the more you use your senses to do so the faster you will get good at it.
Another factor to take into count is boiler size.....lost of us run different sized boilers , so that counts amounts out. 500ml of this , 6 L of that and so forth.
Sorry if Ive not been very helpfull , but thems the facts as I see them.

[Zacher]

Salty(et al), I'm running this column packed with copper mesh on a 15G boiler. It's my starter set up and I'm beginning to get wifey's buy in that I'm not going to blow myself up(or the house). I've done a few whiskey runs thus far in pot still mode with good results. Good friends want to make rum so I have been researching and plan to run SBB's All Molasses. I would like to go "one and done" if possible and was thinking about running the wash in low reflux mode as I read your comment that you have run once through 4 plates. I'd just like some advice on this. Is one and done a bad idea with this set up? I have to do two runs to fill a 5L barrel with some extra white on the side for the angels so my plan is to use the dunder and feints in the second run. Thanks for any and all direction on this folks.....

On a side note, I can get blackstrap shipped or I can pick up molasses syrup from the depot. Since shipping evens out the cost I was going to go with the syrup. It has more sugar content but I'm also wondering if I will lose flavor that way.

Edit: Yummy told me my pic was not coming across properly. I don't want to take away from the thread so I deleted it. It's a 2" stainless reflux column.

[Zacher]

Reposting pic to see if it comes across properly and for site-check. Yummy LMK if it's still not coming across properly and I'll take it down again....

[Saltbush Bill]

I'm running this column packed with copper mesh on a 15G boiler.

From the photo it looks like one of those stills sold as "duel purpose".....pot still / CM reflux.

I would like to go "one and done" if possible and was thinking about running the wash in low reflux mode as I read your comment that you have run once through 4 plates.

You have more than one option as I see it, Strip a few washes then spirit run in pot mode would be one way.
Another would be to use reflux right through, in that case you could probably get away with a single run, the amount of reflux and packing you use will determine how much flavour is in the final spirit.
Having said that running low wines or a mix of low wines this way will give different results again.
Yet another method would be to run high reflux at the beginning while you compress and slowly milk off the fores and heads, then cut reflux and run pot style for the heart of the run. A little reflux again toward the end of the run should hold back tails for a while.
In short there are many ways to skin the cat, remember that your hand crafting something here, there isn't any single right way, experiment and find what works for you, and most importantly have fun and make Rum that you like to drink.
There are so many variables and ways to do things, nothing needs to be set in stone.

[Zacher]

Thanks Salty. I'll figure something out, have fun with it and report back.

[needmorstuff]

Regards cuts, I have fermented 2 x 275L washes and distilled them in pot still mode, collected 110L around 100 proof - giving me 54LPA

I fermented a 3rd 250L of wash

All fermented to around 11% abv (calculated from the stripping runs)

I didnt bother with SG or FG

I used dunder as per the recipe, didnt adjust for ph at all

Ferments start at 30c, end at room temp

I added the 110L strip + 200L of wash to the 300L still and collected through 4 8" bubble cap sections, collecting at 92% to 92.5% abv. Altogther i calculate there is around 70LPA in the still at the start, or 77L @ 92% abv.

I switched the still of as i ran out of time after collecting around 57L at ~92%, I think I could detect tails at this point. Next time I will manage my day better to recover all tails.

I collected in the following amounts
10L - figured this was all heads
5l
2.5l
2.5l
1.5L
10l
12L
1.5L
1.5L
9 x 1L

It's all been airing for a few days and i have samples of each fraction collected above, watered down to 35% abv.

The cuts guides i have found to date are all when using a pot still, I am just wondering the best approach to determine cuts with what i have and any other threads that have been created for cuts when running through 4 sections. Also when using 4 PLATES/BUBBLE sections how this affects the cuts and the smearing.

any guidance greatly appreciated.

[Saltbush Bill]

The cuts guides i have found to date are all when using a pot still, I am just wondering the best approach to determine cuts with what i have and any other threads that have been created for cuts when running through 4 sections. Also when using 4 PLATES/BUBBLE sections how this affects the cuts and the smearing.

As with the post above , I'm not going to try to give someone else advice on how they should make cuts, its an individual thing, how you run the still , some run faster than others, some slower. Some are going to put more power under a 4 plater than others , those who push the power to far will end up with a more smeared product imo.
I like to keep hearts with very little to no heads or tails when I'm running 3 or 4 plates........others do it differently and keep more.
Its just one of those things, you learn by trial and error, and at the end of the day you get what you get.
If I was in the habit of running exactly the same way , Same size boiler charge , using the same percentage of wash / low wines/ feints , same amount of plates every time....then you can probably make cuts by volume and abv..............I dont do it that way so I dont.
All of mine ends up going into the same solera barrel set up , so it all ends up being one big happy blend.
If on one run i add a bit to much heads or tails it really doesn't matter as 12 months and 2-3 barrels later its all blended together and you don't know its there.

[Zacher]

OK Satly, I'm off to the races. Bought a case of this locally:

Molasses.png (90.77 KiB) Viewed 4672 times

If I bought blackstrap I had to have it shipped and it would have worked out to about the same cost of $16/G so went with syrup. Not sure if I lose flavor this way but I guess we will see if I like it or not....what I know I don't lose but gain is sugar content. Instead of the power washer I used my mix-stir which worked great. I measured the OG for kicks with a hydrometer and it came in a 1.132. Pitched two tablespoons of DADY and they were bubbling within a few hours.

I then realized that I will have ~14G of wash with a 15G boiler. So one and done is not realistic. I'm thinking of making one more wash, then doing 2 stripping runs and a spirit run with the third wash and the low wines from 1&2. I guess I could also do one more wash, combine them 3:2 and do two "one and done" runs and then combine the hearts.

I feel pretty good about my direction but any thoughts/comments at this point would be much appreciated. Especially in regards to the two processes I need to choose from above....

Thanks!

[still_stirrin]

I feel pretty good about my direction but any thoughts/comments at this point would be much appreciated:

option 1: I'm thinking of making one more wash, then doing 2 stripping runs and a spirit run with the third wash and the low wines from 1&2.

option 2: I guess I could also do one more wash, combine them 3:2 and do two "one and done" runs and then combine the hearts.

What I would do: option 1. Because I like a “cleaner” rum and the double distillation process will give you a little better separation. You may get a little higher %ABV from the spirit run as well, and I like to take my rums up to 150 proof for bottling. I think this as the best option if the molasses has a heavy flavor as well … to make the rum a little more “refined”. As a side note, this process will also mature quicker than what you’d collect from option 2.

Now, option 2 is a good choice if you really want the most flavor from the molly. Option 2 is a 1-1/2 run process and I often use this for whiskey because of the extra “punch” of grain flavors. For a rum, it would also give you much flavor. But making your cuts may be a little more difficult because of that. The “cut lines” will be wider when there is so much of the molasses quality coming through. You can do it, but experience on how to “cut & blend” is important with the 1-1/2 distillation process.

Again, my (personal) preference is double, or even triple distilled rum. This is because I use the “deer lick” molasses ($10USD/gallon) and it is VERY unrefined. So, even after 3 runs through the potstill, it is still very “rummy”. Again, I age it white and bottle at 75%ABV. It makes a “wicked” rum and Coke.
ss

[Zacher]

Thanks Stirrin. Leaning towards option 1 as well. Would love to try one of those Rum and Cokes!

[GrumpyJohn]

I’m very new to stilling and have only a couple runs of Birdwatcher’s under my belt, so this may be a dumb question, but here goes anyway.

This post is part information and part question! SBB’s is my first crack at rum, and I have a 30L stainless still, with both a pot head and a 2” reflux tower (reflux tower is similar to what Zacher posted a few posts ahead of me). Salty’s response to one of his questions got me in a mood to experiment:

Yet another method would be to run high reflux at the beginning while you compress and slowly milk off the fores and heads, then cut reflux and run pot style for the heart of the run. A little reflux again toward the end of the run should hold back tails for a while.

So I made up a batch of about 30L and split it in half. The first half I ran by following Bill’s suggestion with the reflux tower attached. I had 2 rolls of copper mesh (about 10” worth) in the 21” column between kettle and reflux coil. Results (after I took off about 100mL of foreshots) were a nice clear likker that started out around 73% before I turned off the reflux (which I did after collecting about 500mL). Turning off the reflux quickly dropped the ABV to about 50%. ABV continued dropping pretty steadily. I ended up collecting about 800mL at an average of 40%. Temperature started climbing after that and I stopped recording ABV and just collected tails for about another 800mL. I maybe should have gone a bit deeper, but at the time I wasn’t convinced that I was going to run this stuff again. About 2.1L total collected.

Second 15L run, I changed to the pot head and decided to do a quick stripping run. By this point, 2 days after the first run, I’d pretty well decided I was going to do a spirit run on the whole batch (plus another batch for sure) in the future.

I jammed one 5” roll of copper mesh into the elbow above the kettle, leading to the pot head. This run (after fores) started out nice and clear and at 64%. I ran about 1L off and was down to about 55% when suddenly I started to get a brown tinge to the likker. The next 800mL continued to be brownish, sometimes running clear for a short time but then returning to brownish, and after that I was down to about 35%. Quite quickly after that, at about 32%, the likker cleared up. I continued to collect the clear colored, though now getting slightly cloudy likker until 15%, about 800mL more. About 2.6L collected.

The volumes and % seemed about predictable to me. What surprised me was the brownish color during what I would consider the hearts of the potstill run. Why not through the whole run? And why not the same thing during the reflux run as reflux was turned off during the hearts (I did have twice as much mesh in there though).

I’m attaching a photo of the second run with funny colors. Any thoughts or insights? I plan on mixing up a second wash soon, stripping it, then doing a spirits run… all with the pot still probably.

[Yummyrum]

It puked . That happens sometimes when stripping a Rum wash .
I try to always add a few table spoons of vege oil in the boiler and leave at least 1/3 head space in the boiler .
Don’t worry about a puke on a stripping run .Pour it all back in the boiler for the spirit run .

I would also have used stripped low wines on your reflux still experiment too . One and done always sux for me .

[GrumpyJohn]

Thanks for the reply, Yummyrum… good to know nothing is amiss. I’ll be putting the puke and the reflux run all together with the next strips and do a spirit run in a couple weeks.

[JustinNZ]

Hey Grumpy John. You didn’t ask, but… I make a lot of rum and it took me a while to finally crack and collect my low wines down to an abv (all together) of 25-28%, as per fairly common advice. There’s flavour in the end of the strip and it helps keep the final spirit run blend abv down a bit, so it’s closer to the aging strength you want. Which means less diluting with water. Putting fermented wash into the spirit run is another way. And adds a bit of flavour too.

Good luck out there. Rum - and particularly this recipe - is a lot of fun and very rewarding to people who can hide things from themselves successfully. I find the older I get the easier it is!

[GrumpyJohn]

Thanks for the advice, JustinNZ… I’ll keep that in mind and probably drag out my next stripping run longer (in about 2 weeks when the wash is ready and I find time to run it).

Part of what will be challenging for me is that I really don’t drink booze very much, and so my taster is probably not very refined. This will probably earn some gasps here on the forum, but I only have the occasional nip of likker… for me I think getting into distilling is more about the adventure and learning something new. Plus the wife wants neutral spirits for tinctures and stuff, so it’s a win win situation!

[Beefer]

I finally got enough clear time to start stripping the 150L SBB that finished a couple of weeks ago. Looking forward to improving the things I screwed up last time, mainly not stripping down far enough from what I've read. I stripped down to mid 40% abv from my notes last time but plan on aiming for mid 20% this time. Last batch still turned out great as far as I can tell - 1 full homemade badmo clone and half a demijohn on dominos but it will be good to compare the batches.

[JustinNZ]

Hey Beefer. I do 50L batches and I generally get about 15L of low wines at about 28%abv, depending on how accurate my molasses pour is and how sensible I am with my fermentation temperature. It does take a bit of time to go below 30%, but I think it’s worth it. My spirit runs end up at around 65%, which is pretty damn close to the 60%abv I like to age my rum at. And it means 3 strips plus a bit of feints fills my boiler nicely.

[Zacher]

UPDATE: Finally got to run this last night with my friends. The wash came in at about 12% and I ran about 11 gallons. I decided to do the one and done method Salty mentioned above with reflux for the heads and then pot still mode for the remainder. I packed the column with 32 inches of rolled up copper braid. That's about 3/4 of the entire column. Took about 6oz of fore-shots and then the heads came out in the first 3-12oz jars at 170. When I turned off the reflux, the temp shot up 10 degrees F and the hearts were beautiful. Got 7-12oz jars of hearts at 155 down to 120 until it started to turn to tails. I then took an additional 32oz of tails and turned off the boiler. We kept the heads and hearts together at 143, then added 48oz of water to fill a 5L barrel at 105. It tasted fantastic at 143 and at 105.....can't wait for the aging.

BUT, when I tested the tails jar, it was still at 115! So I cranked it back up this morning and ran off 3-32oz jars. First at 90, second at 70 and the third ran down to 30 proof when I shut down. So that math comes out to roughly 2% fores, 14% heads, 34% hearts, and 50% tails. I'd love to hear what y'all think of that....

End of the day, this recipe rocks and we had a great time making it. The product going in to the barrel was amazing and I cannot wait to see how it ages and takes on flavor. Thanks again Salty!

I still have 2G of wash leftover and 3 gallons of molly so I think I'm going to save 1-2G of dunder, ferment the remaining molly and throw all of the feints in with another run. I'll save that as my solera filler. Thoughts?