Home Distiller

made some rice spirit a while back, it was very smooth and pleasant, so I decided that I'd make another batch specifically to age on oak into a whiskey.

started with 8 kilos of Thai scented rice (the jasmine comes through in the spirit nicely, but you could use regular rice)
steamed and cold water added to bring to conversion temps.
loaded into a cooler (I had to use 2 because of the volume of liquid)
added alpha amylese and Gluco amylese enzymes and a squirt if lemon juce for conversion
allowed to convert for 3 hours
loaded into garbage pail fermenter (lid closed)
allowed to cool to pitching tempurature.
used ale yeast
allowed to ferment for 1 1/2 weeks

almost kept some back as rice wine, tasted quite nice, but started to get a little vinegar smell in the end (no taste yet)
so I strained it in a pillow case and ran the whole batch, approx 12 gallons of liquid.

cut only about a pint of heads and d the distillate started coming clean and smooth, all the way till the ABV dropped off suddenly.
collected about 3/4 gallon, topped up to 1 gallon with filtered water with a final ABV od 50%.
added 1 stick of charred oak (previously used in ujssm) and several toasted French oak chips.

after 2 days the oak was coming through nicely, but the rice flavour was getting a little tin, so I added 1/4 cup of uncooked scented rice to the jar.


thats where it stands now, seems to be getting smoother and more complex by the day. quite tasty, and has to be one of the simplest distillates I've ever made cuts on, its hard to make a mistake with the cuts.

Violent,

Is there any particular reason you used the ale yeast?

What was your pitching temp?

I use ale yeast, just cause it makes for some nice subtle flavour notes that you wouldn't get with ec1118, and I had originally planned to keep some back as rice wine if it turned out nice so I didn't want to use bakers yeast. I've found theres not a big difference in flavour between ale yeast and bakers yeast in the distillate, but bakers yeast dosn't make very nice beer.
considered using 71B-1122 to add to the complexity, but its meant more for fruits and wasn't sure how it'd translate to a grain based spirit.

pitching temp is around 30 degrees, some yeasts are more heat tolerant than others, so you could pitch higher, but its a bit of a crap shoot. so I usually wait till the next morning and pitch the yeast, in a carboy or a large enough fermenting vessel the volume will keep the heat in for a while so next morning its still warm but not too hot for the yeast. also I keep everything tightly covered while sitting overnight, reduces the likelyhood of accidental infection (unless thats what your after)

I remember your last rice batch you posted about and I was vary interested in making saki at the time and would still like to give that a shot. But it's to hard to find koji, and have not mashed anything to date. Could you help me out with some numbers for a 10 gal batch, in regards to amount of enzymes and sutch? And how would I keep it from turning to vinegar?

Pumpman,
No oriental grocers in your area? If you can find one, they should carry the Koji/yeast balls that would work for saki

Is that the little round dry cake balls that look like those puff balls you find in the yard?

for a 10 gallon batch I started with a 8 kilo bag of thai scented rice.
steamed the rice as you normally would for cooking.
load into a cooler (I had to split it into two coolers to fit it all)
add cold tap water to bring it down to tempurature for conversion
add approximate 1/3 cup of lemon juice to your rice.
I added 1 tsp of each, alpha and gluco amalese enzyme, to eaach cooler
stir it in to the mix.
close the lid and allow to sit for 2 hours or longer.

contents would have mostly liquified, pour contents into fermenter (if rice wine is your goal then use carboys with air lock, using appropriatr sanitization proceedures)

once it has cooled down to pitching temputature, add your yeast. I use ale yeast but choose your yeast according to your intended use.

allow to ferment untill dry.
(or if rice wine is your goal, allow to ferment untill desired sweetness has been achieved, then halt fermentation with a dose of metabisulfite.)

filter and allow to clear,
distill, making cuts by smell and taste, heads will be minimal and the sweet rice flavour will continue all the way untill %ABV falls off sharply.

keep white allowing to air for several days, or age on oak for a very smooth and interesting whiskey.


as far as avoiding infection, it all comes down to absolute cleanlyness. not something I follow too closely when my intention is to distill.

violentblue wrote:or age on oak for a very smooth and interesting whiskey.

Do you think a dark chared or light toast on oak would be best?

Also, you have previously talked about a gin recipe with Jasimine Rice. Do you think incorporating jasimine rice into your vapor path would be to overpowering?

charred or toasted its all really up to you.
I personally did a single stick of used chrarred white oak from UJSM and some toasted french oak chips.
the french oak makes for an almost fruity flavour, it definatly pairs well with the Jasmine flavour that came over in the distillate, just don't use too much, it seems you could over oak much quicker with the french oak.

jasmin rice in the vapour path becoming too strong, probably not, it is a very subtle and soft flavour, chances are you wouldn't be able to overdo it. the bit of rice I added has added a little body to the spirit, a sort of "nutty" texture that doesn't come over in the distillate.

Thank you sir time to fire up the printer.

Does anyone have any updates on this recipe?

Keen to try it, just need to order some fresh amylase. Although it doesn't specify whether its alpha or beta or gluco (not sure of difference), do you think it would make a difference?

How did you steam 8 kilos of rice? How much steamed rice does 8 kilos of dry rice make? Has to be one big rice ball...

I'd like to try this soon. Thanks for sharing.

You can use the enzymes instead of the Koji. In Korea they use Nuruk. They are both the Aspergillis fungus. The Nuruk is made from cracked wheat and purposely infected with the fungus. This is added to the cooked rice and no other ingredients are added. I guess they just count on wild yeasts on the wheat. In Korea they drink Makali it looks like Milk and is less than 6% alcohol. Sake is clear and at least twice as strong. They tell me that Sake can go as high as 40% without distillation. I'm not sure how that is possible but that is what my Japanese friends tell me. I put rice in my sugar wash and think it helps. It sure has not caused any problems yet, but I am just a Novice trying to learn.