Feints

After a spirit run has been completed, it is the distiller’s job to remove the undesirable early heads and late tails from the collected distillate. Collectively known as feints, the heads and tails portions can then be combined and re-distilled in an all-feints run or selectively added to a subsequent stripping or spirit (generally just tails) run.

Taking the time to manage feints promotes consistency of flavor across batches and allows the distiller to recover a portion of usable alcohol. homedistiller defines feints collectively as the separated heads and tails. Depending on region, feints may refer to just the tails.

See also: foreshots, heads, hearts, tails.