Home Distiller

Hello All-
First, thanks to everyone for posting. I've avoided countless mistakes by reading here and I haven't been disappointed with anything I've made largely due to the guidance you all have provided.

Just curious if anyone has run into this. I have read the Arroyo papers and was collecting deep into tails chasing rum oils with an all molly (blackstrap) wash. I had stripped two batches, added some leftover wash and was doing a spirit run. Early in the tails, I got a jar that had an overwhelming smoky aroma and taste. It was permeating, like walking through a burnt house. Then it disappeared...a car hit a telephone pole down the road...power went out...never got the rum oils...but I digress. I didn't notice it at all in the stripping runs, the stripping runs were faster but not scorched, the still was cleaned between runs, the spirit charge was clean (no sediment) and run low and slow. I used Golden Barrel blackstrap. Fermented in Stainless steel, cleaned and sanitized. Racked into cleaned and sanitized glass carboys for settling and racked into the still to minimize solids in the distillation. I can't imagine it's due to residual material left behind from another product as I've never gotten a similar smoky effect even from peated malt.

Anyone ever had smoky distillate from all-molly rum wash? Just want to know if It comes through from the process of making molasses or if it's normal.

I dont have experience with all molasses, but i did have a similar smell when i made a rum from a very dark, soft (like semi dried playdoh) jaggery. I ran it through a short packed boka column (20") to bump up the abv and ran it in one run. Towards the end of the run it became not so much smoky as charred smelling and tasting. Like picking up a piece of burnt campfire wood and biting it, or standing in a heavily burned forested area. It also had a generally tails crappy taste, but the burnt aspect was overwhelming. At the time i thought itd scorched, so i ended the run (abv was about 30%). I didn't save any of the jars that had the smell as feints. When i dumped the dunder into a bucket there was no sign of scorching and the dunder didnt have any of that flavor or smell. I reused the dunder later with a blackstrap ferment. I was a bit worried that the burnt smell would be in the next product, but when i ran it that flavor and smell wasn't there, even down to about 20% abv....

I later thought maybe it was an artifact of the way the jaggery was cooked. It really smelled like burnt wood, and general carbon-i-ness.

I wish I could answer your question about what causes it, but whatever its from, that jaggery rum was the best rum I've made.