theholymackerel
(stranger)
12/04/03 02:06 PM
Need help with expected output
I would greatly appreciate anyones help with this. How much booze should I expect to get with these recipies:
A) 10 pounds oats mixed to 6 gallons.
B) 7 pounds rye, 3 pounds corn, 2 pounds malted 2-row mixed to 6 gallons.
I've made these many times and while I love the product, I don't think I ever came close to a full conversion of starch to sugar.
The last time I made oat whiskey (my favorite) I only got 2 liters of 55% final product after dilution. Thats gotta be way low I think. My last batch of Trainin'-Wheel Rye (my woman loves rye whiskey but insists on lots of corn in it... then she got mad at me when i named it "Trainin'-Wheel"... go figure...) only yielded just under 3 liters of 55% after dilution.
These #'s can't be right...I must be doin' crappy mashes.
Could any of ya'll gimme an idea of what these recepies should be yieldin' ?
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tater
(member)
12/04/03 06:03 PM
Re: Need help with expected output new [re: theholymackerel]
You can check your starch content by putting some wash in a spoon and adding a few drops of iodine.Be sure to discard and wash spoon iodine is poision.When i do a 12 gallon wash with brew at 25 on balling scale i get around 3 gallons of 100 proof brew. Later said tater
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Fourway
(member)
12/04/03 07:51 PM
Re: Need help with expected output new [re: theholymackerel]
there's a chart of estimated grain yields here on the site under grain mash... It even includes oatmeal.
I stared at it for a while but I'll need to be a little more awake to work out how to apply the info there... perhaps one of the smart people (yeah we have a few of them around here) can have a peek and tell us how it's done.
my sense of it though is that with so-so but not unreasonably bad conversion (say %65-%70) and a similar quality ferment and a still that doesn't leak too much vapor you aren't really far from the mark...
based on what you've said, your last oat mash was at least %5 etoh and your last rye mash would have been between %7 and %8... so you are pretty consistantly brewing up beer strength mash.
(that's pretty traditional and it avoids some pitfalls of off flavors in higher alcohol grain mashes)
I'd guess off the top of my head that you got a more efficent yield with the oats than with your rye mix... but chances are if you are starch converting the oats pretty efficently (and it seems like you are) that your hangup with the rye isn't in the mashing but in the ferment.
I'd try cutting that grain bill by %25 or more and see if you don't get the same output.
Did you try tasting your mash at the end of the ferment?
I'm betting your oat mash is dry and your rye mash is still sweet.
what are you using for yeast?
"Please don't drink and derive" -MADD Mathematicians Against Drunk Deriving
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Blanchy
(stranger)
12/05/03 06:54 AM
Re: Need help with expected output new [re: Fourway]
Im confused 'mackrel. How did the oats ferment? There isn't any malt in that recipe to break down the starches into sugar.
Chuck
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Fourway
(member)
12/05/03 11:09 AM
Re: Need help with expected output new [re: Blanchy]
And yet... he's getting %5 abv in six gallons of mash with 10lbs of grain.
Sounds like he's got a way.
amalase additive?
malting some of the oats?
remember Chuck, you don't strictly need malt to get the starch to turn to sugar. The starch wants to turn to sugar... the enzymes just help it along, and most grains contain a little enzyme anyway.
Plenty of the old corn moonshiners didn't really do a mashing step at all, they set some of their wet cracked grain in a bag in the manure pile and mixed that into the starchy slurry of untreated corn when they pitched their yeast.
The starch would convert as the fermentation progressed... not very efficently but enough to get the %5 or%6 they were looking for with a bunch of wasted grain (which didn't cost them anything).
"Please don't drink and derive" -MADD Mathematicians Against Drunk Deriving
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Blanchy
(newbie)
12/05/03 12:46 PM
Re: Need help with expected output new [re: Fourway]
I realize this, but if there wasn't anything else added, you would get just the conversion of whatever sugars were present in the oats and whatever hydrolyzed just due to contact with the water i.e not much. I was just curious what else was added.
Chuck
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tater
(member)
12/05/03 05:03 PM
Re: Need help with expected output new [re: tater]
OH yeah the iodine will turn wash purple if theres still starch in it. Fourway ive seen corn put in sawdust piles buried under leaves and mulsh. To make malt. Never thought using manure. Dont think id wanna drink any brew with that in the recipe. lol
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theholymackerel
(newbie)
12/06/03 10:58 AM
Re: Need help with expected output new [re: Blanchy]
I used a amylise powder after over-cookin' the oats. I don't like to add malted barley to my oat whiskey 'cause it tastes better with pure oats.
I only get a small yield from the oats, but boy is it good stuff!
Yee-Haww!!!
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theholymackerel
(newbie)
12/06/03 11:03 AM
Re: Need help with expected output new [re: theholymackerel]
So do ya'll think I'm gettin' decent conversions?
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Blanchy
(newbie)
12/07/03 07:56 AM
Re: Need help with expected output new [re: theholymackerel]
They sounded okay to me. For every pound of sugar that is extacted from you feed starches, that then ferments, you will make approximately 1/2 pound of alcohol, or a little over a cup.
Another way to do it is to figure 30 points per pound of grist. Times say 10 pounds divided by 6 gallons gives an O.G. of 1.050. Say it ferments to 1.005, then the reduction is 45 points. Divide that by 7.4 give an alcohol content of 6% by volume. Multiply that by the 6 gallons gives 0.36 gallons of alcohol. At 55% alcohol, thats 10.5 pints of 'shine. You had close to 75% conversion from grain to 'shine. I think that's pretty good. You should probably just step up the amount of oats used next time to get to a potential alcohol of say 8 or 9.
You can scale this to any size you like and can get more scientific by replacing my 30 points with the actual number found four your grain (30 is always close).
Chuck
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theholymackerel
(newbie)
12/08/03 10:48 AM
Re: Need help with expected output new [re: Blanchy]
My heartfelt thanks to ya'll for the info and advise.
Blanchy: I was with ya up to "Divide that by 7.4"... where did 7.4 come from? I get the rest of yer equasion.
I wish I could add more oats but 10 pounds/6 gallons is the most oats that will physically fit. The only way I could get more whiskey from oats is to add sugar (which I don't wanna do). When I make whiskey from other grains I strain out the grains after fermentation and usually start the next batch on the old spent grains + 1.5 gallon setback+ten to twelve pounds sugar to make 6 gallons total. But with oats there are no grains left after fermentation to strain out. Truly.
Make a batch of oat whiskey and see that it is a very strange fermentation: Cook 10 pounds of oats 'till its oatmeal. Use more water when cookin' than oatmeal requires... three gallons for ten pounds grain.
After grain is cooked do a mash with amylise and beano.
Take the mashed oatmeal and put it in a 6 and a half gallon (or larger) fermenter. It will fill it almost to the 6 gallon mark. Let it cool till the next mornin'.
Open yer fermenter and stir in a quart or so of water into the top layer of oatmeal. Now ya have a thinner (more viscus) layer on top. Add yeast and amylise and beano to this layer.
As days go by the yeast/enzymes work their way down the fermentor givin' ya a bigger liquid layer on top. Stir the oats a tiny bit deeper each day (gently as not to oxygenate) bringin' some of the solid oatmeal up into the slurry each day. When ya get to the bottom of the fermenter and it stopps bubblin' yer ready for the still. No strainin' / filterin' needed.
I allways run my still slowly with a lower heat then normal for oat whiskey cause I burned a little bit to the bottom of my still once... but it didn't taste burnt... it tasted fine. Dunno why. I burnt corn whiskey batches twice while I was first learnin' and they were undrinkable, but the oat was ok...weird.
Edited by theholymackerel (12/08/03 10:55 AM)
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Blanchy
(newbie)
12/08/03 11:59 AM
Re: Need help with expected output new [re: theholymackerel]
I'm going to try your recipe. I assume that you don't age this much. The 7.4 is just the easy conversion from gravity to alcohol content. If you look at a hydrometer that has scales for both potential alcohol and gravity and did the division, you would get 7.4.
Chuck
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theholymackerel
(newbie)
12/08/03 02:48 PM
Re: Need help with expected output new [re: Blanchy]
Thanks for the 7.4 explanation.
Oat whiskey is the smoothest whiskey straight outta a still I ever tasted, but it does get much better with age. I find roughly 100 days on untoasted oak to be about perfect.
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Fourway
(member)
12/08/03 03:55 PM
Re: Need help with expected output new [re: theholymackerel]
%5 is a totally respectable traditional whisky mash abv. there is virtually no heirloom process that looks for an ending abv higher than %8.
If the output is as good as you say I'd look for a bigger cooker and a bigger fermenter and a bigger still rather than trying to muck about with your mash.
ether that or make it twice as often.
"Please don't drink and derive" -MADD Mathematicians Against Drunk Deriving
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theholymackerel
(newbie)
12/08/03 09:51 PM
Re: Need help with expected output new [re: Fourway]
As an American and an expatriot Texan... yes... bigger is better.
Yee-Haww!!!Post Extras: Print Post
Fourway
(member)
12/25/03 11:58 AM
Re: Need help with expected output new [re: theholymackerel]
Something occurs to me about this method... It should be possible to do rye the exact same way and I'm willing to bet that this method has been traditional at various times with both oats and rye...
The two things that lead to this insight are that both oats and rye are traditionally fermented "on the grains" meaning without straining or sparging after mashing...
And that there is a great deal of unsubstantiated folktale style rumor that flies around warning that mashing oats or rye can create deadly toxic bacteria.
Well it makes a lot of sense that a barrel of thick porrage at room temp with some yeast and enzymes slowly eating its way down through the mass for a fortnight could easily create some nasties that would make tasting the fermented mash straight before distilling into a pretty bad idea.
If anyone was ever to try to make beer this way they could probably count on being very ill.
So chances are that the reason that both oats and rye share the dubious distinction of a scary rumor is that both used this nifty mass of seething porrage technique.
"I'm na drunk lang as I'n hold fast to blade a grass n keep me from sliding off the world."
-Grampa
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Blanchy
(newbie)
12/25/03 10:30 PM
Re: Need help with expected output new [re: Fourway]
Fourway,
The nasties that you are thinking of would probably be the ergot fungus. This stuff is an aerobe would not do well in a fermenter. Unless you are thinking of something else.
Chuck
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Fourway
(member)
12/26/03 02:05 AM
Re: Need help with expected output new [re: Blanchy]
No I'm not thinking of ergot which only grows on live rye.
I don't need assurances, as I said I've always discounted this particular warning because while it is often repeated it seems not to be substantiated anywhere in print anywhere except for a hippy dippy book about growing a garden for home brewing.
the exact text of the warning cut and pasted from elsewhere in this forum where it has been repeated at least twice is:
(disclaimer:this is a paste of a warning which I don't give any credence to... anybody assuring me that I don't need to worry about it or expressing fear as if I was actually issuing this warning will be mocked for poor reading comprehention and MAS-end disclaimer)
Start of paste------
Malting for home use is not a difficult procedure, but it should NOT be attempted with oats or with rye.
These grains, when malting, tend to attract butryfying bacteria - these organisms, by themselves are poisonous, and so is the butanol isomers that these bacteria produce.
If you have a need for a malt of either of these grains - purchase it ready made rather than poisoning yourself with the homemade type.
End of paste---
A foo warning like that makes acres more sense if some joker tried to make beer using the great mass of rotting porrage method described by the holy mackrel now doesn't it?
"I'm na drunk lang as I'n hold fast to blade a grass n keep me from sliding off the world."
-Grampa
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Blanchy
(newbie)
12/26/03 08:42 AM
Re: Need help with expected output new [re: Fourway]
Fourway,
I have heard that it is hard to malt rye and oats with no further explanation. Maybe this is it.
Chuck
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theholymackerel
(journeyman)
12/26/03 05:48 PM
Re: Need help with expected output new [re: Fourway]
That seals it...
From now on I will allways refer to it as my "mass of seething porrage technique".
Has a nice lilt to it, eh?
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Fourway
(member)
12/27/03 07:54 PM
Re: Need help with expected output new [re: theholymackerel]
The mass of seething porrage factor may have something to do with why there are no commercial distillers making oat whiskey anymore.
"Sometimes too much to drink is barely enough." -Mark Twain
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Neener
(stranger)
12/30/03 11:11 AM
Re: Need help with expected output new [re: theholymackerel]
holymackerel:
You say cook the oats like oatmeal. Do you boil it? If so, for how long?
Then, you say: "After grain is cooked do a mash with amylise and beano. " I assume, what you say directly after this sentence is you describing how to do what is in quotes, is that right?
How much amylase do you use? How much beano?
When you say 10 # oatmeal per 6 gallons, do you mean a TOTAL volume of 6 gallons?
Approx how long does it take to ferment?
How much foreshots do you discard?
Neener
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theholymackerel
(journeyman)
12/30/03 02:53 PM
Re: Need help with expected output new [re: Neener]
>>You say cook the oats like oatmeal. Do you boil it? If so, for how long? <<
Here is the easy way: Put 10 pounds of rolled oats in yer fermenter. Pour over them 3ish gallons of boilin' water. Stir the water in with a longhandled utensil. Give the oats 10ish minutes to cook then add cold water to top to 6 gallons total and stir into the top layer to cool and thin the top layer.
>>Then, you say: "After grain is cooked do a mash with amylise and beano. " I assume, what you say directly after this sentence is you describing how to do what is in quotes, is that right?<<
When the top layer of yer fermenter is cool enough dump in yer enzymes and yeast. Add amylise as per instructions that come with yer amylase (my bottle says one teaspoon per gallon) I add anywhere from 30-50 drops beano.
>>Approx how long does it take to ferment?<<
a couple of weeks
>>How much foreshots do you discard?<<
150-200 ml
Makin' oat whiskey differs from makin' any other whiskey only in the fact that the cooked oats turn into oatmeal when cooked...you know... semi-solid. Other than that yer just makin' whiskey: starch to sugar... ferment... twice through a pot still...age... enjoy. Just like anyother whiskey.
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Neener
(stranger)
01/03/04 06:32 PM
Re: Need help with expected output new [re: theholymackerel]
holymackerel:
Thanks much for your help thus far. A few more quick questions. I REALLY want to make this oat whiskey, but I don't have the amylase. However, I DO have 1 pound of 6 row barley crystal malt. Do you think I could use this to convert the starch to sugar? It is in what looks like barley seeds. Would I still add this at the same time you added the amylase?
I also have some cracked corn (and I don't have a full 10 pounds of flaked oats). Do you think it would work to subsitute pound for pound some cracked corn for oats? I realize it would affect the flavor some. Soon I hope to get out and get a 50# bag or so of oats.
Neener
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theholymackerel
(journeyman)
01/04/04 11:49 AM
Re: Need help with expected output new [re: Neener]
You can use malted barley and ya can also use corn...but it won't taste the same. Oats have a delicate taste that is easily overpowered. That is why I make oat whiskey from only oats.
Amalise enzyme can be mail ordered from most any home brew shop.
I use rolled oats from the grocery store. They have a sale on oats every few weeks and I stock up on them. I've used oats from a feed store, but the best oat whiskey I have ever had was made from Quaker brand rolled oats.
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Fourway
(enthusiast)
01/06/04 07:15 AM
Re: Need help with expected output new [re: theholymackerel]
of you're up for the work and you can get whole unrolled untoasted oat grain you could make malted oats to use to convert your rolled oats.
it actually sounds like fun to me.
"Sometimes too much to drink is barely enough." -Mark Twain
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Neener
(newbie)
03/22/04 06:18 AM
Re: Need help with expected output new [re: Fourway]
Bump...people should really try the oatmeal whiskey recipe here. Mine isn't finished fermenting, but the smell is the most amazing smell. It smells INCREDIBLE. Updates will be forthcoming.
Neener
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theholymackerel
(member)
03/23/04 11:55 AM
Re: Need help with expected output new [re: Neener]
Did ya use just oats, or did ya use malted barley also?
What yeast did ya use?
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Neener
(newbie)
03/24/04 06:21 AM
Re: Need help with expected output new [re: theholymackerel]
I used JUST oats. For yeast, I used Whisky Yeast with Amyloglucosidase. It smells unbelievable! Although, I noticed yesterday, it is starting to smell unbelievable, but with a kick! I was pretty concerned about contamination, because when I was setting everything up, I got some backwash from my bubbler into my wash, and it had some obvious fungal spores in it, but it seems not to be an issue. It will be two weeks old on Friday. I guess I'm going to wait until it's 3 weeks. Is that what you'd advise?
I can't decide whether I should run it once through my Amazing Still and then once through my pot still, or twice through my pot still. I'm leaning toward the former, just so it will be "cleaned up" before it goes through my pot still. Thoughts?
I am VERY excited about this. I plan to age it on charred oak, and let it sit for a few years.
Neener
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tater
(member)
03/24/04 06:56 AM
Re: Need help with expected output new [re: Neener]
Got Tater wanting to try it as well. Was wondering how it would work if you got a sack of oats at feed store.Sprouted the seed and then mashed as a all green malt?
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theholymackerel
(member)
03/24/04 11:13 AM
Re: Need help with expected output new [re: tater]
Neener: Way to go! Sounds like ya got a good batch goin'. I don't know how much more time ya will need for frementation... just let it keep goin' 'till it's finished. Strippin' the wash through a pot the first time or through yer amazin' still should work out the same. Do which ever ya would prefer.
Tater: That sounds like a great idea! Give it a try and let us know how it works out.
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theholymackerel
(member)
03/28/04 04:49 PM
Re: Need help with expected output new [re: theholymackerel]
Howdy!
Friday mornin' I decided my two six-gallon oat mashes were done fermentin'. I put 'em through my still in four 3-gallon batches, combined 'em and ran 'em all together once more.
I got enough to fill one of my 5 liter casks plus a wee bit to top off the cask with.
I'm so happy with this last batch and with my new still gasket... I'm finally gettin' enough outta my still to feel that I'm gettin' a good starch to sugar conversion.
I did two thinks differently with this batch that I thought worked well. The first was instead of buyin' Quaker Brand Oatmeal oats, I bought much less expensive organic oats from the local hippy-dippy co-op market. The organic oats were about half the size of the Quaker oats, but were more aromatic, and cost about half the price.
The second thing i did differently was to simplify the mashin' process. I steralized my fermenters, dumped in ten pounds of oats in each fermenter, then filled each fermenter with boilin' water to the six gallon mark, stirred 'em and sealed 'em up. Then I wrapped the fermenters in a quilt and set 'em on top of several layers of cardboard and let 'em sit 'till they reached the high 150's in temp. I then added the amylase and the beano and wrapped 'em up again and let 'em sit 'till the next mornin'.
Late the next mornin' they were down in temp to the low 80's so I opened 'em and added lime juice, yeast nutrient, yeast energizer, and yeast (Nottingham ale yeast).
I don't know if it was the smaller organic oats, or the long slow cookin' process, but the mashes turned out much less sticky and more liquid. They were able to be stirred half way down the fermenter when the yeast was added, and were fully liquid to the bottom in two days. The "seethin' mass of porrage factor" (as Fourway called it) was almost completly elilminated. The oats also sorta stayed together and disintragrated to less of a degree. When it was time to run it through the still I was able to use a strainin' bag to remove alot of the hulls which I wasn't able to do before.
This batch also smelled better than normal straight outta the still. After I watered it down to 105 proof and filled the cask I took a shot 'cause it smelled so good.
Trully... I've never tasted anythin' straight outta a still so smooth. I liked it so much I ended up havin' more shots and gettin' lit! Hehe. I'm not used to 105 proof.
I wish ya'll luck