Home Distiller

So I'm pulling on the big boy pants and going AG.

URRV because I need Vodka for my SO and to make some kaluha and Gin whilst my Whiskey matures to something palletabe.

Now I'm a lazy git so will try to do it the way that suits me the best, I don't have the tools to follow the instructions to the tee so we'll see how she goes.

I started with 10 kg White Rice.
I had the intention of milling it all for better efficiency but got 2 kgs in and was told I kept the kids awake, so all of it went in the fermenter, milled and unmilled.

I stuck all the pots and the kettle on full with water, I got 20-24liters in total that I threw on top of the rice, got me to 170F
In with SEBStar, still like a mad man for 10 min, on with the lid.

looked in an other 5 min temp down to 150F ( or so I thought) so in with the second batch of enzymes.
Stir again for a good while, check the temp 160F!!!, all the steam made me misread the thermometer, crap may have dentured my SEBAmyl , oh well we shall see how it turns out.

Give it 15 more min and stir again, still 160F and most of the water was absorbed by the rice already.

Stop for 5 min and give pregnant wife a footrub, start to type this up.

Keep stirring every 15 min

Checked gravity after 3 hours, only about 1.06.

Said sod it added about 18 l water , checked gravity 1.03, balls.... that's what happens if you take to many short cuts

Threw the yeast anyways and stuck the lid on it.
If nothing else I know that i cut one ore 4 corners to many

Suggarhead on the lees to save the day

oooo. that sebstar likes 185-190* (and a couple hours)

you can always add a bit more sebamyl at 150* but if you are fermenting now, whats done is done.

enzymes are Ph finicky too, so keep some backset to sour the (next)mash when you move from sebstar temps down to the sebamyl temps, since they like a bit lower Ph too.

hope you get a good bottle or two. cook the hell out of it and get all you can for the feints jar, and mix it with the next run...if memory serves me you still have two more fermenters to fill up!

good luck!

yeah , I know I didn't follow protocol.

I tried to do it the way that would suit me the best with the tools I have, and since Vodka wash I'm not overly disappointed about the outcome, I rather try and fail on this one and know better for a whiskey mash than to waste my first whiskey try playing around.

Yeah I reckon a bottle or two will be all I can expect, not to worry, a sugar head on the lees and recycle the faints and I should get two more after that, should be enough for herself anyways.

If I read and converted that correctly, you mashed 20 lbs. of rice in 5 or 6 gallons of water.

I understand you don't want a critique of your procedure. OK. But I'm the curious type.

Why rice?
Why 4 lbs. per gallon?

And you got SG 1.060? Hell, that ain't bad. It's 8 or 9% potential alcohol. What were you expecting?

What is URRV?

Uncle Remus

Sp- rice is very finicky. Expect it to take longer than usual. Also see if you can find any asian markets or groceries stores around you. Let a couple koji balls and pitch them in. They work as you are fermenting so you'll get higher yield and it makes good wine too.

Skow by intention I mashed with half the recommened water to be able to throw the rest of the water on to bring her down to pitching temp the same evening.
URRV is Uncle Remus Rise Vodka, I just did not add the sugar to keep it AG.

Yak, oh yes the Koji balls forgot that I could try to find some to save the day. Will have to have a look there tomorrow, cheers lad

I'm guessing the sebamyl did some of it's job before it was denatured from too high of temps.
You could add a second dose of gluco and let it work at fermentation temps.
It's slower at lower temps but it's still working.

Cheers shady I'll give it a whirl, didn't manage to get to the Asian shop today.

That's OK. The nice think about koji is it works at the same time. Converts starch to sugar to alcohol but it only seems to work on Rice

Checked the gravity again for the craic, 1.03, must be that the enzyemes are still converting it's deffo fermenting away, almost knocked my head off when i stuck my nose in there.
The mash tastes fairly crap alright, not funky gone off crap, just alcoholic rice water, not top of my flavor chart. but then again, not after flavor on this one.

SP, I'm really interested in seeing how this turns out. I'll hopefully be starting a URRV this week. I'll be doing it with the SEBstar and SEBamyl enzymes with a little sugar added.

I'm sure you'll get a nice yield with just enzymes using the right protocol.
If memory serves me right rice has the same amount of sugar available as barley.

down to 1.025 yesterday, was only 20C though so I threw in my aquarium heater, hopefully that should speed things up.

Checked on it last night, down to 0.994 and still fizzing away, a very clear layer on top, should finish out dry today or tomorrow.
Should be able to start stripping over the weekend after leaving it to clear for a few days.

Got mine going several days ago. It's been bubbling nicely, but I haven't opened it up to take an sg. I have 4 five gallon buckets. One started at 1.060 and another at 1.052 and the other two were somewhere between that. Mine is a partial AG - has about 3 lbs sugar in each bucket.

SP, do you have any plans to strain/press the grains when it finishes? I've heard so much good stuff about this recipe - can't wait to taste it.

Good stuff SC
What was your rice water ratio and did you take SG before hand?
Just interested to see what you got to compare notes in such.

I made myself an ass press and have a BIB that I was going to load the rice into before putting it in the press.

You'll get a fair amount of sampling out of your batch 20 gallons at about 8-9%, should give you about a gallon keep depending on your cuts, I'll be happy with a quart with my low SG.
But I'll do a sugar piggyback on it with the faints from the AG so that should hopefully make a nice drop as well, the sugar head will be for Gin, Kaluha and such, I'll keep the AG "unmolested"

SP, I used 6.25 lb of rice per 4 gallons of water. That's a little more than the original recipe calls for which was about 5 lbs of rice per 4 gallons. I went with what I had in a 25 lb bag of long grain rice split 4 ways or 4 five gallon buckets. I also used 3 lbs of sugar in each 5 gallon bucket which is close to the same as in the original recipe. I didn't take an sg of the converted rice. The OG of the final wash, after adding the sugar, for the 4 buckets was 1.060, 1.056, 1.053, and 1.052. I steep cooked with 4 gallons of boiling water in each bucket. I can only guess that I got a better cook on some more than others.

I plan to distill it with 3 or so strips with the thumper attached and then do the spirit run also with the thumper attached. I hope I get a decent yield from it. My ultimate goal is to use half of it to make an "Odin's easy gin".

I'll also be using an ass press to strain it. I put a 5 gallon paint strainer in my sieve bucket and then pour everything into it. I fill the top bucket with water for the weight and also put some bricks on the lid for extra weight.

Yes, I look forward to comparing notes. Good luck with yours.

them enzymes rock.
I got about 36l wash that i stripped down to 8l( about 2 gallons) of 35% lowwines, the enzymes must have been very busy after I pitched the yeast as I was only at 1.030 then.
I reckon i got about 80% efficiency with my halfarsed approach, not bad, not bad at all.

Downside on this recipe though is that it stunk the house up, according to the wife that is , I have a very poor sense of smell.
Can't wait to do the spirit run

SP, good to hear about the higher than expected yield. I've heard that the enzymes do continue to work during the ferment. Maybe that's why mine is taking so long to finish. It's been about 12 days and it seems to still be going strong. I haven't opened up any of the fermenters to check the gravity and probably won't until the airlocks stop bubbling.

Looking forward to hearing about your spirit run. Good luck with it.

SC you obviously aren't as nosy as me, I know I should not stick my hands in these, I just can't help it!
Yeah I say you will have a fair amount of lowwines once done, prob about 7 gallons.
so you may have to do 2 spirit runs on your still, 5g right?

I should have about 13 to 14 gallons of strained and cleared wash when (if) the ferment finishes. That should give me enough for about 3 stripping runs in my 5 gallon pot still with a 4 gallon thumper. I usually get about a gallon of low wines per strip. So, hopefully about 3 gallons diluted to 4 gallons for the spirit run and hope for about 3/4 gallon (after cuts) of finished product at 75 to 80 percent ABV. That's an optimistic estimate based on a good ferment. That would translate to about 4 to 5 quarts diluted to drinking ABV. I would consider myself extremely lucky to get a higher yield than that.

ah yeah, for some reason I saw 5 x 5g fermenters and didn't think of headspace and the amount of water the rice retains.
you doing a piggyback on it for extra yield or calling it a day?

It won't be a piggyback. It was a one-off kind of thing mostly for my wife. I was also planning to use some of it for and "Odin's easy gin" for myself (gin & tonic). Maybe again one day in the future. Mine has added sugar. I might try it as an AG next time.

The bubbling seems to have slowed a little. I might open one up and check the sg tomorrow. Where are you with yours? Have you used the ass press yet? I was kind of wondering what to expect. I understand that a rice wash can be a gooey mess at that point.

I did the ass press, didn't work overly well, i need to put a tap in the outer bucket to constantly drain her or raise the draining bucket a bit from the bottom of the outer bucket.
It was bit of a pain alright, but have not done a grain one so can't compare it to anything else, I may have left a liter or so of wash but was fed up with it.

I'm mainly doing it for my wife as well but thought I may as well do a piggyback to use for gin and kaluha. Helps with keeping the hands of the stuff that is on oak.

Once I get that out of the way I'm shooting for a Irish style whiskey, hope to have the new still sorted by then.

I was lucky with the ass press. Just a few weeks before making mine I bought a beer brewing kit at the flea market for $8 (USD). There were two 6 gallon buckets with the kit - a fermenter and a bottling bucket. The bottling bucket has a drain valve at the bottom and because it's taller than a typical 5 gallon HDPE bucket, it gives a lot of space at the bottom when the sieve bucket is stacked inside. I run a 5/16" clear hose from the drain to a 5 gallon plastic water jug. I set the ass press on top of two stacked milk crates and the 5 gallon jug on the floor. I fill the top bucket with water for the weight and stack some bricks on the lid for extra weight. The one time I've used it so far, it has worked great. I don't even try to siphon off the clear stuff. I just pour everything into the ass press and do a secondary clearing in the water jug.

I hope you'll be posting up about your piggyback as well. I won't be doing one, but I'm sure that others who are following your thread might be interested in hearing about it. It's been a pleasure following along with your progress and comparing notes on our respective ferments. Keep us posted on the outcome of your spirit run.

SP, I posted up my FG's over in the URRV discussion thread - http://homedistiller.org/forum/viewtopi ... 8#p7331438 . I'll be pressing it soon.

wow you really document it well I need to up my game.

I"m doing the spirit run there now, running it really slow to get best possible separation, I don't mind a bit of smear when doing whiskey.
Usually I'd collect about a liter every 30 min but it's more like a liter an hour for this run, it better improve the finished product as the slowness (yep it's a word) it's killing me, one hour in and still in heads..

in to jar 6 now, and it's gorgeous hearts!!
very smooth, warm finish prob mainly due to high proof.

Can't wait to do the cuts tomorrow