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I was over at Redwood Hillbilly’s a couple of days ago. Catching up and critiquing our whiskeys. We have a little diffrent taste ln what we like as far as types of whiskeys. I’m safe saying he’s a bourbon with rye guy. And I’m into scotch styles. Bourbon being second to this. But he did taste my all barley whiskeys. He detected what I had suspected that there was some heads present. His suggestion was to nuke a small amount and see if some of the heads would steam off. So the next day I took 400 mls of my cherrywood smoked barley whiskey and heated in the microwave to 160 deg fahrenheit and let it cool uncovered naturally. I checked the volume and about 20 mls steamed off. That evening I did a taste test with the Un-nuked. The difference was very noticeable. Now I’ve read the post on nuclear whiskey but it’s more about extracting flavor from oak from what I’ve read.
Is there something to nuking finished whiskey for some heads removal? I haven’t had anyone else do a taste test, just me. Has anyone used nuking to remove small amounts of heads?
Thanks
JBC

Higher temps create evaporation. Evaporation favors the lighter molecules. That's how you got rid of heads.

Next time, may I suggest you just bubble O2 or air through it. O2 will oxidize especially the ethyl acetate part of the heads, creating esterification (taste), and a slight raise in ethanol. That's a gain rather than a loss. Instead of evaporating heads, you are now aging them in an accelerated manner.

Odin.

JBC there is somthing in the nuking thread about nuking to mellow it out as well, can't recall who said it or what ever but seen it discussed there alright.
I've never bothered with it, I just suck it down with heads to punish myself for poor cuts.

I've also read what Odin mentions, to airate it helps to mellow it out too, Riku and Zbob both swear by it, again I've never tried it.

What I've tried though is to cut up an apple in a quart of booze, one week does wonders to mellow it out.

Odin wrote:Higher temps create evaporation. Evaporation favors the lighter molecules. That's how you got rid of heads.

Next time, may I suggest you just bubble O2 or air through it. O2 will oxidize especially the ethyl acetate part of the heads, creating esterification (taste), and a slight raise in ethanol. That's a gain rather than a loss. Instead of evaporating heads, you are now aging them in an accelerated manner.

Odin.

I have a small air pump. I can rig a glass tube to one end and run it into the bottle. What amount of time do you suggest oxygenating? This is for about 1,500mls. I was experimenting with the addition of heads for flavoring. The scotch spent one year on oak with a cork. Maybe I should have opened the bottle for longer periods, or left it on the oak longer? Cutting back a little more heads in the future I’m sure will help. Just trying to find that sweet spot between heads and hearts.
JBC

JellybeanCorncob wrote:

Odin wrote:Higher temps create evaporation. Evaporation favors the lighter molecules. That's how you got rid of heads.

Next time, may I suggest you just bubble O2 or air through it. O2 will oxidize especially the ethyl acetate part of the heads, creating esterification (taste), and a slight raise in ethanol. That's a gain rather than a loss. Instead of evaporating heads, you are now aging them in an accelerated manner.

Odin.

I have a small air pump. I can rig a glass tube to one end and run it into the bottle. What amount of time do you suggest oxygenating? This is for about 1,500mls. I was experimenting with the addition of heads for flavoring. The scotch spent one year on oak with a cork. Maybe I should have opened the bottle for longer periods, or left it on the oak longer? Cutting back a little more heads in the future I’m sure will help. Just trying to find that sweet spot between heads and hearts.
JBC

Difficult to say. I use fishtankbublers in my experimental washes. Of which I do like 50 to 60 a year. It really depends on your goals. How much fruitiness do you want in your product? And on the amount of heads. What I usually do is aereate for 2 hour turns and then taste. Helps create a guide line.

Odin.

Odin wrote:Higher temps create evaporation. Evaporation favors the lighter molecules. That's how you got rid of heads.

Next time, may I suggest you just bubble O2 or air through it. O2 will oxidize especially the ethyl acetate part of the heads, creating esterification (taste), and a slight raise in ethanol. That's a gain rather than a loss. Instead of evaporating heads, you are now aging them in an accelerated manner.

Odin.

Hmmm.... ethyl acetate is the ester of acetic acid and ethanol. Did you mean acetylaldehyde?

Bubbling O2 or air will indeed reduce the heads, but I suggested nuking it as a quick test, essentially a distillation where we don't capture the distillate but keep the "backset" as the desired product. This is also the mechanism that we use when "airing out" our new make, but slower due to the reduced temperatures.

(Posting with redwood)
Ethyl acetate is already an ester, not sure air/oxygen is gonna do much for it. Transesterification is a thing where esters turn into other esters, heat should speed that up. In fact I've recently read some chem papers describing microwave facilitated esterification. But really I think the nuking thing is mostly just boiling off some of the heads, including ethyl acetate.

Air/oxygen is most often cited as turning wood compounds into tastier things, but of course it can affect many other things as well.

Odin: I do like the fruityness but not at the expense of a headache. I’m going to try the air bubbles in my liquor with heads bite. But I hope I don’t have to do that in the future.

Swede: You a funny man! Drinking heads is not my happy place. And your right, I did see mention of nuking for heads removal in the “nuclear whiskey thread”. It’s just such a damn long read and I could not find it again.

Zapata: thanks for the your input.
And Redwood: Thanks for sharing your knowledge with me. I think I saved my cherrywood smoked whiskey.
See you soon.

JBC

JellybeanCorncob wrote:
............ I’m into scotch styles................there was some heads present................

Scotch has "Heads" and "Tails" noticeably in the finished product - stay with what YOU like !