First time corn (ab)user

[Dan P.]

So, to celebrate new family ties with the US, and to get out of my nativist, euro-centric rut, I've just bought a 25kg sack of micronized maize, with the intention of making some American style corn whiskey. Corn is something I've never used before.
Micronized maize means that it has been heated dry to gelatinizing temperature and then rolled. That's what the manufacturer says, anyway, and I'm hoping it won't require the sort of cooking shenanigans that cracked corn requires.
I'm thinking of mashing it using 6kg of barley malt (regular British pale ale malt, 2 row I guess) and 4 kg of pale rye malt.
Questions;
1. Does this ratio of malt to corn sound doable? I would actually like to get away with as little malt as is cautiously possible, to let the corn flavour be dominant, but wanted to have both rye and barley as that seems traditional for corn whiskey. I normally do malt dominant mashes so am a little worried about conversion.

2. Micronized maize; I intend to break it up a little as it comes in flakes, but apart from that was going to mash it as if it were pre-cooked (which it is supposed to be). Anyone with experience with micronized or flaked maize? Thoughts?

[ga flatwoods]

Sounds like you going to make corn flake whiskey! Add 70-90* longitude for better results if in Grenwich and south down to 30* and north to 50* latitude.

[Dan P.]

Sounds like you going to make corn flake whiskey! Add 70-90* longitude for better results if in Grenwich and south down to 30* and north to 50* latitude.

I'm sure you are trying to be helpful, but I'm afraid I can't make sense of your post.

[Twinrivers]

4 to one is a perfect ratio. Heat your strike water to 180F and put themalt in a 145F. That will make a great whiskey.

[Dan P.]

4 to one is a perfect ratio. Heat your strike water to 180F and put themalt in a 145F. That will make a great whiskey.

Putting the malt in at 145 seems a little low? And can you elaborate why I would heat the water to a strike temp of 180, if I'm going to add the malt at 145?

[shadylane]

Just a thought.
If the temp is on the low side, the enzymes can't be denatured.
Given enough time, at the right pH, the enzymes will keep on nibbling away.

[ga flatwoods]

Should be no different than rolled oats or barley. Personally I would still bring water to a boil and add the corn stirring so not to clump. Let sit for at least an hour, or until cools to 150 and add malt then. Let it sit to do its magic. You will not be able to sparge this. Rolled or flaked, be it maize, oats, or other, tends to gel and thicken. Cooking It should be much easier than ground meal or cracked corn. Adding some malt to the initial add of corn to mash water to help keep it thinned out. You could up the malt from 33% now to just under 50% if it fits your anticipated volume better. Could be corn, wheat, and rye, or corn, barley, and rye, or any combo as long as corn is 51%. I like corn, oats, rye and barley malt.
Good luck with the mash.
Ga Flatwoods

[shadylane]

+1 flatwoods, that was a lot good good advice in a few words.

[ga flatwoods]

On the longitude comment-Sorry, Being a SA! Maine to Mississippi, Florida to Canada for corn whiskey goodness. In speaking to Odin this last summer, it would seem that the opfions for corn over there are limited and he has not had great of success using corn. Perhaps it is the corn being used. Corn here may be different from any sourced from EU. Are you using a beer adjunct? If not what is the common use for the micronzed corn?

[Dan P.]

Thanks for the good advice. I may up the malt a little, but it is the case that economy is a certain factor here too, so it'll probably stay around 30-ish%. I will do some smaller trial mashes first. See how it goes.

[Dan P.]

On the longitude comment-Sorry, Being a SA! Maine to Mississippi, Florida to Canada for corn whiskey goodness. In speaking to Odin this last summer, it would seem that the opfions for corn over there are limited and he has not had great of success using corn. Perhaps it is the corn being used. Corn here may be different from any sourced from EU. Are you using a beer adjunct? If not what is the common use for the micronzed corn?

This is a reason I've never used it much before. Looking across the Atlantic, you are blessed with a lot of corn and a lot of varieties of it. Here we are blessed with barley malt. It is never cheaper to buy malt here, but it is often competitive to buy a 25 kgsack of pre-ground barley malt at £20 over a 25kg sack of some unmalted grain for £10, when you factor in cooking and milling.
The maize we have here will certainly be a feed variety, so one presumes higher protein. I can't say for sure but I suspect where Odin is the options will be even thinner.

[Dan P.]

So I've upped the malt to 6kg each of rye and barley.
The flaked corn looks promising in that it turns to mush after being put into warm water for a few minutes, but I will follow the advice given about taking the corn to gel temperature beforehand.
I'm excited about this, never having used maize before, it has a beautiful aroma.

[Twinrivers]

I used it a lot in the beginning with smaller batches. Just rack it off through a tight strainer or cheese cloth when you load up your pot. You won't be disappointed it makes a good drink

[Dan P.]

I used it a lot in the beginning with smaller batches. Just rack it off through a tight strainer or cheese cloth when you load up your pot. You won't be disappointed it makes a good drink

Why did you stop using it, if I may ask?

[Dan P.]

Made a mash sourer out of some organic wholemeal flour (rye) in a 2 liter milk jug with water and a dollop of active yogurt.
If you think ahead you can do this without addig yogurt, just meal and water. Keep it in a warm place.
About 36 hours (in a warm place) later I have about a liter of lacticly soured water in the top of the jug, which gets sterilized by boiling befor use.
With the juice of half a lemon I will see how far this goes o my first 25 liter ferment.

[Dan P.]

I tried one mash with 4:1 corn to malt ratio. Seemed to do okay, but 2:1 did better. Maybe just variation between two mashes. Happens enough times in my slightly haphazard way of doing things. I will try another 4:1 tonight, taking a little more care, which I guess is natural andproper as you are working with a lower quantity enzymes.
One disappointment is that the wonderful perfume of the maize is very much subsumed by the smell of the malt, and now it's fermenting it smells pretty similar to any pale malt AG ferment I've ever done. I'm hoping more corn flavour will be evident in the distillate.

[Dan P.]

I think I have nailed the 4:1 corn to malt mash. It just takes a little more care. It allows much more of the corn flavour to come through, and it does represent quite a good saving in cashmoney, which is nice, too.
The first 25 liter ferment has a fairly epic lacto infection, which makes it taste rather delicious, like a rather tart mango milkshake (of sorts). Whatever the case, I will not want for mash-souring backset!

[goblin]

i have been doing 3/1 corn/malt getting 1.060. what gravity reading are you getting? i ferment off grain, and cook the @$*!# out of the corn. i done 2 strips and one more waiting. are you saving the spent grains? makes good sugar head.

[Brutal]

If you can get some enzymes you could try it with no malt and make an all corn. Like Booners casual all corn. Its good.

[Dan P.]

If you can get some enzymes you could try it with no malt and make an all corn. Like Booners casual all corn. Its good.

Hard to come by in this country, unfortunately.
I also quite like the "tradition" element, or maybe the challenge, of using malt. It's a hobby, after all.
Not that there is anything wrong with enzymes.

[Dan P.]

i have been doing 3/1 corn/malt getting 1.060. what gravity reading are you getting? i ferment off grain, and cook the @$*!# out of the corn. i done 2 strips and one more waiting. are you saving the spent grains? makes good sugar head.

I'm not sure of the OG, but it was something like 1060, maybe a little higher. I mash 1kg:3 litres of water, though another couple of litres of water will get in there, as I like to freshen a ferment up with some fresh water usually about half way through. I tend to judge the suitability for fermentation by taste and consistency, as my mashes are usualy too thick to get a reliable hydrometer reading (I ferment and distil on the grain). I play mostly by ear, and I am happy to get what I get.
I don't really like sugarhead so spent grains go on the compost.
Have you tried 4:1?

[Twinrivers]

Dan, sorry it took so long to get back. I quit using it because cracked corn is way cheaper here and I get the same results.

[Dan P.]

Dan, sorry it took so long to get back. I quit using it because cracked corn is way cheaper here and I get the same results.

Thanks for getting back!
I have yet to look into cracked corn, as the flaked stuff is pretty cheap at 20p a lb.
I love not having to cook it and am happy to pay for that privilege.

[Dan P.]

Well, it's gone from around 1070 to around 1015 in two weeks. I may run it as fermentation seems largely to have stopped. I sometimes refer to brew calculators on Brewer's Friend (.com), which predict a similar FG when my mash bill is entered. Does anybody else refer to these calculators?

[Matt86]

It doesn't look like a high FG but that depends on the mash temperature profile and the yeast used. My last batches finished 1.013 - 1.012. The bakers yeast Im using does seem to battle with the last few points in comparison to a high attenuating lager strain.

I'm fermenting off the grain and boiling before cooling, beer brewing habits etc. But damn the lauter stage is slow and liable to stick easily - 1.5-1 corn (cracked then ground finer) to malt ratio.
I'm using a copper manifold system and I'm looking to add a BIAB to help with that at a later stage. Any efficency improving hints from corn experts?

For now I'm rethinking using corn, such a pain to deal with and ignoring the economics I'm not sure its worth it from a reward v. effort perspective .
Barley malt is cheap and is just a pleasure to work with especially in comparison.

[Dan P.]

Barley malt is cheap and is just a pleasure to work with especially in comparison.

Yep, I am inclined to agree. I wanted to try the corn once, just to see. I will work through the rest of this bag, and then I think back to malt, with or without minor additions of umalted grains.

[Dan P.]

Did a little test run yesterday. Obviously it's too early to issue a meaningful judgement, and I only took the hearts-most cut, but this is very promising. The different grains really complement each other, though if I were to do this again I might do 33-33-33% corn-rye-barley, as the corn is really a very sweet and quite flowery taste, and though tempered well at 66% by the rye and barley, could be more so, and it's also not without its handling ssues.

[Jimbo]

Looks like a damn fine Bourbon recipe Dan. You mention the malt overpowering the aroma, but the corn will come through as sweetness in the final aged likker. The flowery smell is likely from the rye. I use Brewers Friend too, good calculators, but the efficiency numbers and attenuation are often off, since for whiskey we mash at lower temp to make more fermentables. For example my beers routinely finish around 1.012-1.015 and my whiskeys are usually 1.005 or below. At the end of the day its like 1% differnence in ABV so nothing to lose sleep over. You can adjust the efficiency and atten numbers in Brewers Friend to match your result so you can see what your efficiency and final attenuation really was, if you care to.

[Dan P.]

Thanks Jimbo.
The flowery smell from the rye is there, but also something else. Kind of like how the smell of cooking cornmeal (surprise!) is flowery. Maybe perfumed is a better word, though rye is kind of perfumed too. Whatever the case, it's likely the spirit will settle into itself and show the grains differently with time, as you suggest.
I am drinking some right now. It is really sweet, like candy. Candy that makes your eyes go red and makes you try and dance with the dog (poor old dog).

[Dan P.]

Well, this recipe is remarkably free of both heads and tails. I just ran a 2.5 charge (i.e. half the charge had been run twice, half once). I removed an approximate "fores" section, after which I collected down to zip in one container (to be run again with further low wines from a mash currently fermenting), and, given age, I think it could pass muster. Meaning the whole run, without cuts. There seemed to be no louche even in the tails, and the heads were very, very mild. I don't know if it's the corn, or if my technique has improved, or if it's the yeast, but my AGs (barley, wheat, rye) usually run very much more headsy and tailsy. Go corn!