Hi, dunderdome here. After a quick stint making mead, cider and pineapple wine, (the cider and wine was delicious, could drink gallons of the stuff - the mead... needs some time to rest) I got the itch to try distilling.
I tend to go all in on hobbies and almost considered building a still from scratch-ish, but sourcing the necessary copper/stainless fittings for it to be a fun weekend project rather than a bunch of stuff sitting in a cupboard forever not making any alcohol turned out to be tricky in New Zealand so I caved and bought a 35L digiboil kettle, pot still condenser and a voltage controller.
I quickly realized the enormous amount of water I'd end up using running the tap for cooling, but helpfully I had a 200L plastic drum just sitting in the garden, so one bung wrench and a cheap aquarium pump later I had the full setup.
Did a vinegar run followed by a sacrificial sugar wash followed by a not sacrificial brown sugar rum which turned out pretty nice - I rolled the backset from that into a full blackstrap molasses rum which I'm 5 generations deep with muck and dunder and all that good stuff.
Current project is all grain bourbon-ish whiskey (have posted about that in the first time board), and I really want to try making some brandy when I can get a hold of some cheap fruit.
New here, hi
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