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OK. This is my first attempt at an AG distillation. It is my 10th distillation in the last 2 years of this hobby. Others were Wineo's Sugar Wash and various grain plus sugar attempts that ended with various degrees of success, or lack thereof. I'm determined to keep trying Jimbo's recipe/procedure until I get it right.

My Recipe:
22 lbs Crushed Corn
6 lbs Saniko White winter wheat malt,crushed
2 lbs Vandra Barley malt crushed
2 pkts Nottingham Ale Yeast
4 tsp gypsum
15 ml Lactic acid
12 Gal Kentucky well water pH 5.6

Procedure:
Boiled 6 gallons water added 11 lbs washed corn. Repeated process and added the 2 batches together. Added Lactic acid and Gypsum to total, Wrapped in blankets to let sit overnight. Temperature in my workshop was 45F.
Next morning the mash was 102F and pH of 4.6. Added the 8 lbs of malt and stirred in. 2hrs later temp at 90F but SG was 1.025. Added my yeast starter and sealed my fermenter. The airlock was bubbling fine after a couple of hours. I kept the mash at 65F for 6 days, then activity ceased.
Siphoned and squeezed 10 gallons into bucket to settle overnight. Pot stilled the next day. Tossed 6oz foreshots, 8oz heads, kept the next 3 pints (118,110,&80 proof). Next pint was cloudy gray and 60pr. and smelled awful; tossed that one.

My guess is my biggest mistake was plowing ahead with fermentation with an incomplete starch conversion (due to low temp when the wheat & barley were added?).

Anyway, I continued with the Gumball Head portion of the learning experience.
16 lbs sugar dissolved in 10 gallons of water. Poured on grain from AG fermentation with 2 gallons of backset, also from above. PH 5.5 SG1.055 temp 87F. Activity noted next day. Kept mash temp at 65F for 10 days after which bubbling was minimal.

Siphoned and squeezed off 11 gallons, let sit overnight. Used my pot still and ended up with 14 pints 140pr to 60pr.

I ended up mixing 3 pints of 1st run with enough of 2nd run to fill a 5 liter oak keg at 110pr.

I'll try this again when the weather warms up enough to be comfortable. I'm still trying to learn something useful at age 70.

Nice job for your first AG, 'Fish!

Its gonna take some more reading on your part to get comfortable with the dynamics of an active corn mash, but here are a couple of items to keep in mind as you do your research:

1. You don't say what your crush corn granule size looked like, but the further (larger) you get from meal the longer its gonna take to convert. The longer you can keep it closer to 190-200F the greater the chances its gonna gel (get soft enough for enzymes to work on it).
2. Using a high-temp (HT) alpha enzyme on your corn gonna shorten your process and up your yield. The enzymes in your malt work more efficiently on shortened starch chains, which the alpha enzymes will make happen.
3. You already know your malt strike temp was low. Target 149-152F and your malts' enzymes will work faster.
4. If you don't have 'tincture of iodine' to do a starch conversion test, visit your local pharmacy and pick up a bottle. Around $5-6 and will last years.
5. 2lbs/gal grain:water is an excellent gauge for mash efficiency and will tell you where you need to improve.

Keep up the reading. You're a perfect example that you're never too old to learn this fantastic hobby.

Twisted Brick

Hello Mr. Brick

Thanks for your critique on my attempt. My corn was cracked feed corn, no where near meal size. So I think the issues I need to correct are: crack size, temperature, and addition of HT alpha amylase enzymes. Lessons learned and will be applied. Next ferment will use corn meal, be diligent about temps and add the enzyme after boiling. Should I look for the corn to gelatinize after that and add the malted grains at 150F? I've also got some "decolorized iodine tincture" to test for starch conversion.

I'm grateful to all you guys for being helpful to those of us just learning. There is way more to this hobby than there appears to be I'll try not to be a pain in the rear-end.

Fish

TwoEyedFish,

Good on ya for your first full on mash. It is definitely more challenging than a sugar wash. Twisted pointed you in the right direction. What I've used in my first 3 full bore mashes was steam rolled corn. It is processed and removes much of the pain of gelatinizing. But the result is a mush that ends up being about as thick as mashed potatoes.

And that is where the HT enzymes come in, with either your feed corn or the steam rolled. The enzymes take that thick mush and thin it out to something along the lines of potato soup.

If you don't get your malt into the mid 150's, you don't activate their enzymes and they don't have the ability to convert the starches into sugars.

The downside to steam rolled corn (at least from the brew store) is that it will cost you about $1.50 per pound, so your batch costs increase dramatically. I've heard you can buy it at feed stores, but the one I went to said they didn't stock it in the summer as it got moist from humidity and then spoiled.

Twoeyedfish wrote: ↑Mon Mar 08, 2021 3:14 pm Hello Mr. Brick

Thanks for your critique on my attempt. My corn was cracked feed corn, no where near meal size. So I think the issues I need to correct are: crack size, temperature, and addition of HT alpha amylase enzymes. Lessons learned and will be applied. Next ferment will use corn meal, be diligent about temps and add the enzyme after boiling. Should I look for the corn to gelatinize after that and add the malted grains at 150F? I've also got some "decolorized iodine tincture" to test for starch conversion.

I'm grateful to all you guys for being helpful to those of us just learning. There is way more to this hobby than there appears to be I'll try not to be a pain in the rear-end.

Fish

You got it! Crack size, temp and HT will get you there, in style. Many of us use a paint stirrer in a drill motor to mix our corn into just boiling water and once it cools to ~185F add our HT enzymes. Keep the fermenter wrapped real good and the corn will gel in under 3hrs. You can stir the mash several times over the next 2hrs and will feel the corn granules lose their sharp edges and be come dull and soft. Finally, a nice thin layer of clear liquid will form on the top of your corn signifying it has gelled and the HT has done its job.

At this point your objective is to get your mash down to temp to add your malts. I add cold backset and cold water to drop the temp to 151F and add my malts, seeking 147-149F. Drifter's advice is more appropriate for beer where a certain percentage of a grain's starch is intentionally rendered unfermentable, resulting in a sweet wort. In distilling, however, we want all of the starch converted to sugar to maximize the amount of alcohol the yeast is gonna make. Therefore, a saccharification temp zone of 140-149F is perfectly acceptable, its just that the lower the temp, the slower the enzymes work. Temps 155 and above will gradually denature the malt's enzymes resulting in poor conversion.

Lastly, Drifter is correct: steam rolled corn is expensive, as is any grain that has been changed prior to getting to you. Converting corn is so easy there's no reason to pay more for it. I get 50lbs of corn meal for $14 at Restaurant Depot. They are all over the US - maybe you can find one close to you.

It's May in the mountains and time to try again:

5/1/2021
9:55am 65F ambient temp start heat on 10 gal tap water (set out for 4 days) plus 2 gal backset from 1/30/21
plus 4 tsp gypsum. PH 3.2
12N BOILING Added 15lbs corn meal and 4 lbs cracked corn and stirred for 20 min
12:20 178F Added 6ml SEBstar HTL. Stirred & covered the cooker
4:35p 145F Added 6ml SEBamyl GL +6lbs malted winter wheat +2lbs malted 6 row barley
6:00p 135F aerated with aquarium stone for 30 min and put electric fan on to cool
9:00p 90F pH 4.1 tossed in 1 pack of Nottingham Ale Yeast
Next morning bubbling away. Temp in basement stays around 65F. Smells good.

Today is the 20th and it is still bubbling through the airlock, though much much slower. It seems to me that 18 days should be too long for a ferment. What's my next step? Do I allow the yeasties to keep working?

Thanks in advance for your input.

Two Eyed Fish

Hello neighbor! Sounds like you are on the right track with that one. That oughta be a good batch. The only thing I would recommend is to add the backset at 4:35pm on your timeline above. The SEBstar HTL likes a higher pH than the GL enzyme. I let the HTL do its work and then use the backset to lower the temperature (and the pH) and then add the GL enzyme. Either way I think you've got some some good stuff on your hands there!

Twoeyedfish wrote: ↑Thu May 20, 2021 3:48 pm Today is the 20th and it is still bubbling through the airlock, though much much slower. It seems to me that 18 days should be too long for a ferment. What's my next step? Do I allow the yeasties to keep working?

It should be done base on the info and yeast used.. open the fermenter and check the progress.. the grain cap should have drop down, and clearing should have taken place.. the air lock still bubbling is by all probability just CO2.. take some clear mash liquid and check the FG as it should be down in the .995 range and if so it's done..

Then it just a matter of using a mop ringer and getting all the liquid out, let settle for a day or so, then rack it and ready to strip..

Mars

Surprising to me that your Kentucky well water is pH 5.6!

I ended up mixing the AG with the sugarhead and aged it in a 5 liter barrel at 110pr for six months, tasting every so often. Took it out of the barrel today and added it to enough distilled water to lower it to 88pr then put it in 750ml new bottles with new "artificial cork" stoppers. Came back downstairs an hour or so later and in one of the 8 bottles, the cork was out. Not popped out and across the room, but sitting crooked on the bottle top and out. I checked the pictures I had taken when I had finished bottling and all corks were secure at that time. In the old "abundance of caution" routine I have take all corks out for the present. I've never heard of pressure building up after proofing and bottling, but that's the only explanation I can come up with. Anyone else ever experience anything of this sort?

My guess would be that in proofing down you raised the temperature and over the course of the "hour or so" your now warmer booze raised the temperature of the air left in the bottle and thus increased the pressure.

Also "artificial cork" sounds like it might be a plastic that you'd want to keep away from your nice alcohol.

Also "artificial cork" sounds like it might be a plastic that you'd want to keep away from your nice alcohol.

Thanks for the heads up on the stoppers. I bought them with the bottles from packagingoptionsdirect.com

Here's what they say about the stoppers:
"This black stopper cork is designed to fit bottles with a slightly larger bar top or cork style finish. The black top is made of P/P plastic and measures 33 mm. in diameter; and the 22.8 mm. shank is made of Thermo polyester olefines, a synthetic cork material."

I assumed they would be fine to use as they were provided with Nordic style bottles that are obviously liquor bottles. Am I wrong in this assumption? They can be replaced with real cork if need be. What do you think?

The use of synthetic materials in contact with high proof spirits is frowned upon here. Mainly because nobody's been able to prove that it's 100% safe. Yes, the big boys use synthetic corks, but they dont give a sh*t about your health.
You can replace them with natural cork stoppers. Or, if you think they're "good enough" then just don't talk about them here. Me personally, I spend the little extra and buy natural cork stoppers and reuse old whiskey bottles. What little I spend on natural corks is pennies on what I save by recycling old bottles.

Point taken. I've ordered old fashioned cork stopper to swap out.