Home Distiller

Well, a year in and SugarVodka'n'Rum under my belt I'm now trying Bourbon. I don't think it's going too well.

I'm following the Jack Daniels Black Label recipe, what's coming out is very good but there ain't much of it.

I'm getting a yield of about 1/2 litre at about 135-140 prooffrom 5 kg's of grain. Is this about right or should I be getting more?

So far I've been using sugar and molasses, with rather high volume yields (obviously).

I just want to know if I'm in the ballpark before I start tweaking my mashing/fermenting. Am I? Or is something basic not working properly?

Thx.

how big of a wash and what was the SG of it. did it finish out?

should be some were around 1 to 1 1/2 l . do not know you proses but something is not right.

awesome handle...

thats pretty low, but thats par for the course. This all grain business takes some practice.

Its so worth it tho...

Keep trying... I have found that following a recipe like JD black label is pointless and just make what works. That usually involves more malt, lots of boiling grain before adding malt and accepting the fact that an 8 or 10% abv mash is a huge success. This is really where doing stripping runs and a single slow spirit run come into play. Tell us in detail what you have done so far and you will get plenty of advice!

Welcome to the forum...

i think I meant to post this here, and not the other place I wrote it...

believe them when they say patience, practice and low yields are normal...and believe them when they say the yields will get better.

it is easy to think we understand a thing, and having read so much how can this be wrong?

but this is a technician's game...slowly adding experience and knowledge from doing it


my all grain yields went from very low to better after eight or nine ferments - mostly because I was able to free up more and more starches for conversion as I boiled the corn and broke it down better, and also from getting higher starting gravities (from being able to have two pounds per gallon instead of only one).

Hi UnclearFizzyCyst

I am just starting to go down the all grain route as well and I am going to start off with what I understand to be the easiest way to do this. Looking around at other postings the easiest all grain that you can do is a 100% all malt barley. As barley is the easiest grain to get where I am based this is what I am going to attempt to do. I am currently trying to get my barley to malt. I'm sure that that is going to be a learning experience in itself. But once I do manage to get it sorted this is the routine that I intend to follow. I'm not sure what posting it came from - but it looked simple enough for me to follow so I took a copy of it.

If you have 10 pounds of malted barley, crush it and put it in the cooler first, then stir in 3 gallons of water that's heated to 165 degrees. That should make the mash temp about 155 degrees. Close the lid and go do something for an hour.

After 1 hour drain the liquid from your cooler into a your fermentor and add another 3 gallons of 180 degree water to the grain and stir. Let that sit for 15 minutes then drain that into the fermentor. Stick the fermentor in a tub of cold water to cool it. When it cools to 70f degrees pitch your yeast and you're done.

If you want, you can then add a couple more gallons of 180 degree water to the grain and drain it off to use for your next mash.

Malted barley only needs 30 minutes to an hour to fully convert. Unmalted barley needs to be cooked first (like corn) to gelatinize the starch.

This is what I intend to try first and will go onto other grains from there. What I understand that this will give me would be an unpeated scotch. I think that scotch is (or at least can be) made from 100% malt barley so that is what I am going to go for. I figure that I may run into problems if I don't get all of my barley to convert though as I don't intend to do any cooking (at least at first)

Good luck

atticpc wrote:Hi UnclearFizzyCyst

I am just starting to go down the all grain route as well and I am going to start off with what I understand to be the easiest way to do this. Looking around at other postings the easiest all grain that you can do is a 100% all malt barley. As barley is the easiest grain to get where I am based this is what I am going to attempt to do. I am currently trying to get my barley to malt. I'm sure that that is going to be a learning experience in itself. But once I do manage to get it sorted this is the routine that I intend to follow. I'm not sure what posting it came from - but it looked simple enough for me to follow so I took a copy of it.

If you have 10 pounds of malted barley, crush it and put it in the cooler first, then stir in 3 gallons of water that's heated to 165 degrees. That should make the mash temp about 155 degrees. Close the lid and go do something for an hour.

After 1 hour drain the liquid from your cooler into a your fermentor and add another 3 gallons of 180 degree water to the grain and stir. Let that sit for 15 minutes then drain that into the fermentor. Stick the fermentor in a tub of cold water to cool it. When it cools to 70f degrees pitch your yeast and you're done.

If you want, you can then add a couple more gallons of 180 degree water to the grain and drain it off to use for your next mash.

Malted barley only needs 30 minutes to an hour to fully convert. Unmalted barley needs to be cooked first (like corn) to gelatinize the starch.

This is what I intend to try first and will go onto other grains from there. What I understand that this will give me would be an unpeated scotch. I think that scotch is (or at least can be) made from 100% malt barley so that is what I am going to go for. I figure that I may run into problems if I don't get all of my barley to convert though as I don't intend to do any cooking (at least at first)

Good luck

One thing not mentioned there it to put some type of strainer in front of the cooler drain on the inside. You'll need it to keep the grain in the cooler and not in your ferment. Here's a simple one http://brewing.lustreking.com/gear/mashtun.html" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;" rel="nofollow If you don't plan to do many and want a cheaper way, put a scrubby on a stick and work it down in front of the drain hole.

Ahh - penny drops

I had been going to use a sypon to get my liquid but one of the important things here is filtering everyting slowly through your grain bed. Hmm - going to have to think about this a little more. For starters I had planned on using an old paint bucked wrapped in a sleeping bag. I probably still will - but will have to put a 3/4 tap into the bottom of the bucket.

Will be a while before I can get there anyway. Need to get the malting sorted out first

Fermenting on the grain is pretty standard practice for distilling. Filtering through the grain bed and sparging are more of a beer brewing thing. This means there's nor reason you can't just dump the whole mess in your fermenter and let it go.

I syphon.

I let a wash finish and sit a couple weeks...can't rush eh? Then syphon out clear liquid.

OK, patience and practice do increase yield!

My main problem was being in too much of a hurry.

I cook my wort with the grains in a painters strainer bag (and use a 'false' bottom in the pot). Now I lauter with fresh, hot water and re-lauter with it a few times. I then let it all sit to drain overnight (my pot has a faucet).

I splashed out and brought a bottle of enzymes and add those to the warm wart too.

Doing this has brought my yield up towards the 1L mark.

I'm going to try letting it ferment longer on 1 batch and fermenting on the grain with another. I won't be making any for a few months (6-8) as my aging barrel's full and my wife's not too happy with me 'wasting' time and messing up the kitchen

Thanks for all the responses.