Homebrew / Moonshine - Sink vodka appreciation

[Troonos]

Maybe I should have worded the question better, has anyone that has make a wine recipe that calls for a can of grape concentrate been able to get similar results substituting grape juice instead? I love making juice wines, but in some of Jack's recipes he uses some grape concentrate to add body to wines that other wise would be to light. While on the subject of Jack Keller here's a pdf with a bunch of recipes from him.

As long as the juice you use has the same specific gravity contribution as the reconstituted concentrate, you're totally fine.

 

[Orange Rhymer]

Apologies for the doublepost but this was way too cool to not share. After an immense autistic session of browsing taiwanese usenet boards I have uncovered two incredibly detailed recipes. I know not everyone has google so I will also attach a text file to the recipes as well.
Taiwan Beer:
Google Groups (8/20/1999)

Plum Wine:
Google Groups (4/8/1999)

If anyone attempts these let me know!

Ancient Chinese secret, Huh!?!

Spoiler: joke reference

Side Note:
I used Jack's receipe for Dandelion Wine. Came out excellently. Essentially fermenting a white-grape wine must with a concentrated dandelion tea extract, using champagne yeast.

 

[Waff]

After long testing here is my recipe for maple and pine wine;

*3lbs of maple syrup
*1/2 teaspoon of lime juice (this raises the ph of the wine)
*1 gallon pine tea
*yeast
*yeast nutrient

1.In order to make the tea, grab a branch of a pine. your mileage may vary but I prefer the needles that produce a magenta color. Fill a jar until you have around 350ml of needles in it.
2.pour a gallon of spring water into a pot until it begins boiling and pour the needles into it. after boiling on medium for 10 mins put it on simmer for 10 more minutes.
3.leave pine needles in overnight
4.in the morning seperate a good amount of needles from the water then pour that newly brewed tea into a filter to get out any dirt, grime, or leftovers. you should be left with a beautiful amber/magenta tea.
5.get out your fermentation jar, add the 3 pounds of maple syrup to it and fill as much tea as you see necessary to the soon to be must.
6.once placed together stir until you have a consistent murky brown color. add 1/2 a teaspoon of lime juice.
7. in a small cup mix some warm water with your yeast and wait 10 minutes. place into the must and (optionally) add your yeast nutrient.
8. Now you are done! Add on that airlock and wait for the bubbles on the top to stop.

Im going to post this somewhere more substantial for long term access once Iet it age for two weeks but from my unfiltered taste, it primarily tastes like a strong taste of pine with a hint of maple. Maybe the taste will enhance with aging but yeah not really what I had expected. Feel free to experiment, add, remove, etc. stuff to this recipe and let me know your thoughts!

 

[Evan Kor]

Always always remember that when distilling, you have to throw out the initial 5+% due to it being methanol. If I were distilling, I'd throw out at least the first 8%. Chubbyemu has a video about a guy who got really sick(may have died, don't remember) after making moonshine and not getting rid of the methanol.

 

[Hantavirus]

While you are right that you must cut the foreshots, they are absolutely not methanol, at least not in significantly higher proportion than the hearts will be. Methanol has a very similar boiling point to ethanol, and in fact forms an azeotrope with ethanol, meaning it is impossible to separate the two by distillation, at least at atmospheric pressure. The "distillation can concentrate methanol" myth is a result of Prohibition-era propaganda meant to cover up the feds' practice of intercepting clandestine alcohol and poisoning it or even selling poisoned moonshine on the black market themselves by blaming bootleggers, many of whom had been making their own hooch for generations before Prohibition and would mostly know how to not kill people with their product.

Foreshots are composed mainly of acetone but have some ethanol and methanol in similar proportion to the wash and the hearts. They work great as a cleaner, fire starter, etc. but should not be recycled into the wash like the feints, i.e., the heads, where the "drinkability" is a matter of taste. There is much less of a clear line between heads and hearts, so many people will toss their heads cuts back in and do another run, or save it to throw in the wash for the next batch.

 

[BotulismSandwich]

While you are right that you must cut the foreshots, they are absolutely not methanol, at least not in significantly higher proportion than the hearts will be. Methanol has a very similar boiling point to ethanol, and in fact forms an azeotrope with ethanol, meaning it is impossible to separate the two by distillation, at least at atmospheric pressure. The "distillation can concentrate methanol" myth is a result of Prohibition-era propaganda meant to cover up the feds' practice of intercepting clandestine alcohol and poisoning it or even selling poisoned moonshine on the black market themselves by blaming bootleggers, many of whom had been making their own hooch for generations before Prohibition and would mostly know how to not kill people with their product.

Foreshots are composed mainly of acetone but have some ethanol and methanol in similar proportion to the wash and the hearts. They work great as a cleaner, fire starter, etc. but should not be recycled into the wash like the feints, i.e., the heads, where the "drinkability" is a matter of taste. There is much less of a clear line between heads and hearts, so many people will toss their heads cuts back in and do another run, or save it to throw in the wash for the next batch.

Is there any meaningful test for methanol vs ethanol concentration for the amateur distiller? It's one of the first things I thought of when I was testing a Raman spectroscope I was setting up for a client at work, but I don't have thousands and thousands to buy one of my own

 

[VeteranOfTheRetardWars]

I know it’s the brewing thread but I couldn’t find anything more relevant, I started a large batch of vinegar with some cheap but decent sweet red wine that was on sale, can’t wait to see if it goes well. I actually used to work in a gourmet olive oil and vinegar warehouse so I learned quite a bit about that world, it’s a very similar world to the wine world with how in depth it can go but for now just something basic to see if I’m retarded or not.
My plan is that if it actually works I’ll infuse some with strawberries, that would be great for salads and cooking and such. One day I may go really hard in the paint and brew something specifically to make into a vinegar, but one step at a time for now.

 

[Hantavirus]

Is there any meaningful test for methanol vs ethanol concentration for the amateur distiller? It's one of the first things I thought of when I was testing a Raman spectroscope I was setting up for a client at work, but I don't have thousands and thousands to buy one of my own

No, there is no easy way to test for methanol without GC/MS, the whole "blue flame" thing is another Prohibition-era urban legend. The best methods are preventative. Methanol forms from fermentation of pectin and lignin, so high-pectin washes should be prepped with pectinase enzyme before pitching yeast, and you should generally avoid using large amounts of woody bits in your fermentation. Generally though, unless you are going out of your way, you are unlikely to get a serious quantity of methanol, and don't forget that distilled spirits are very high in the best natural antidote to methanol poisoning: ethanol! In fact, if you go to the ER for methanol poisoning, they will administer activated charcoal to stop you from absorbing any more, then pump you full of medical-grade EtOH, as it is competitive with methanol for the same liver enzymes and allows the body to metabolize the methanol into less toxic byproducts.

 

[Catgirl Tyranid]

No, there is no easy way to test for methanol without GC/MS, the whole "blue flame" thing is another Prohibition-era urban legend. The best methods are preventative. Methanol forms from fermentation of pectin and lignin, so high-pectin washes should be prepped with pectinase enzyme before pitching yeast, and you should generally avoid using large amounts of woody bits in your fermentation. Generally though, unless you are going out of your way, you are unlikely to get a serious quantity of methanol, and don't forget that distilled spirits are very high in the best natural antidote to methanol poisoning: ethanol! In fact, if you go to the ER for methanol poisoning, they will administer activated charcoal to stop you from absorbing any more, then pump you full of medical-grade EtOH, as it is competitive with methanol for the same liver enzymes and allows the body to metabolize the methanol into less toxic byproducts.

This was my favorite part about researching brewing when I first got the wild hair to try making mead.

I was cackling madly to my wife that the antidote to bad booze was good booze.

 

[Squanto Airi]

I know it’s the brewing thread but I couldn’t find anything more relevant, I started a large batch of vinegar with some cheap but decent sweet red wine that was on sale, can’t wait to see if it goes well. I actually used to work in a gourmet olive oil and vinegar warehouse so I learned quite a bit about that world, it’s a very similar world to the wine world with how in depth it can go but for now just something basic to see if I’m retarded or not.
My plan is that if it actually works I’ll infuse some with strawberries, that would be great for salads and cooking and such. One day I may go really hard in the paint and brew something specifically to make into a vinegar, but one step at a time for now.

How does one make a homemade vinegar?

 

[VeteranOfTheRetardWars]

How does one make a homemade vinegar?

Really you just get some type of wine and add in what’s called the vinegar’s ‘mother’, which is the bacteria that converts alcohol to acid, and cover with muslin to allow oxygen as the bacteria needs that to work. Then you just wait, after a while you should have vinegar.
The basic recipe I found was just wine and apple cider vinegar with the mother, theoretically there’s no reason why this shouldn’t work but only time will tell.

 

[The Fuck's Going On Here]

So I had made 3 experimental meads. Used something like 3.5 lbs honey/gallon for the primary. Added some star anise there for the flavor. Got it up to a nice 12% ABV.

Then taking it into different samples (with a control sample, of course), I made a blueberry anise mead using blueberry crush in the secondary, a kokum mead using the kokum syrup my Indian friend gave and a simple spices mead with addition of clove, cardamom, and cinnamon.

The blueberry-star anise mead was a great dessert wine thanks to the crush backsweetening the mead. I wonder how it might compare to me getting some actual blueberries or blueberry juice instead.

The kokum was nice as a dessert wine (once again, syrup backsweetened the mead) with a unique kinda tart flavor. Kinda felt like a sorta midpoint between cranberries and lemon or something. The only issue was the flavour overpowered the star-anise; couldn't detect anything there. Still something new and nice; definitely feels like it might be a good summer drink.

The final was the spiced wine. This was a semi-dry mead and was perfect. Clove and cardamom smell, cinnamon and star-anise taste. Sweet but not "too sweet" like the dessert wines. If it were christmas and cold outside, this would be the absolute perfect drink to have.

Now am setting up the next batch. Got an idea about a lemongrass ginger mead. Was reading up that it might be best to make a tea of it and use that tea in the mead either in primary or secondary. Anyone have any experience or tips for doing it like that?

 

[Troonos]

So I had made 3 experimental meads. Used something like 3.5 lbs honey/gallon for the primary. Added some star anise there for the flavor. Got it up to a nice 12% ABV.

Then taking it into different samples (with a control sample, of course), I made a blueberry anise mead using blueberry crush in the secondary, a kokum mead using the kokum syrup my Indian friend gave and a simple spices mead with addition of clove, cardamom, and cinnamon.

The blueberry-star anise mead was a great dessert wine thanks to the crush backsweetening the mead. I wonder how it might compare to me getting some actual blueberries or blueberry juice instead.

The kokum was nice as a dessert wine (once again, syrup backsweetened the mead) with a unique kinda tart flavor. Kinda felt like a sorta midpoint between cranberries and lemon or something. The only issue was the flavour overpowered the star-anise; couldn't detect anything there. Still something new and nice; definitely feels like it might be a good summer drink.

The final was the spiced wine. This was a semi-dry mead and was perfect. Clove and cardamom smell, cinnamon and star-anise taste. Sweet but not "too sweet" like the dessert wines. If it were christmas and cold outside, this would be the absolute perfect drink to have.

Now am setting up the next batch. Got an idea about a lemongrass ginger mead. Was reading up that it might be best to make a tea of it and use that tea in the mead either in primary or secondary. Anyone have any experience or tips for doing it like that?

What were your gravity readings post-backsweetening?

 

[The Fuck's Going On Here]

What were your gravity readings post-backsweetening?

Going through my notes, the initial specific gravity (before fermenting) was about 1.16. Post-primary was 1.06-1.07. After secondary, the SG for the two sweet meads was about 1.09-1.10, while the spiced mead was still 1.07.

 

[Troonos]

Going through my notes, the initial specific gravity (before fermenting) was about 1.16. Post-primary was 1.06-1.07. After secondary, the SG for the two sweet meads was about 1.09-1.10, while the spiced mead was still 1.07.

Nice, that's a strong dessert range. I'm really falling out of love with the 1.010-1.030 sweetness that a lot of mead makers settle on. After drinking and brewing Schramm's-style meads, I think a fruit bomb mead is best above at least 1.060 at bottling. It's a great balance with the high acidity and tannin from large volumes of whole fruit. Good job.

 

[SwiftBucks]

Is there any meaningful test for methanol vs ethanol concentration for the amateur distiller? It's one of the first things I thought of when I was testing a Raman spectroscope I was setting up for a client at work, but I don't have thousands and thousands to buy one of my own

Honestly just get rid of the first 8% and then don't worry about it. You can always see if your shine burns blue in the dark. Any adulterants make the flame have orange, but good shine burns pure blue.

With shine it's not worth splitting hairs about what's poison and what's not once the foreshots are out. The entire process is basically foolproof and runs itself.

 

[Zhores Medvedev]

I'm going to be brewing some cider here soon and was wondering if you all had any yeast recommendations? I generally just go with some primer blanc or some other basic wine yeast, but I was wondering if you all here had picked any especially good yeasts for cider.

 

[Honored guest]

I'm going to be brewing some cider here soon and was wondering if you all had any yeast recommendations? I generally just go with some primer blanc or some other basic wine yeast, but I was wondering if you all here had picked any especially good yeasts for cider.

I've been using larvin 71b for my ciders and they've come out pretty good, but I haven't done a side by side tasting with different yeasts so take my opinion with a grain of salt and a glass of cider.

 

[Troonos]

I've been using larvin 71b for my ciders and they've come out pretty good, but I haven't done a side by side tasting with different yeasts so take my opinion with a grain of salt and a glass of cider.

No, you're right. 71B is the best choice for sweet fruit brewing. It preserves all the delicious fruit character really well.

 

[Orange Rhymer]

Really you just get some type of wine and add in what’s called the vinegar’s ‘mother’, which is the bacteria that converts alcohol to acid, and cover with muslin to allow oxygen as the bacteria needs that to work. Then you just wait, after a while you should have vinegar.
The basic recipe I found was just wine and apple cider vinegar with the mother, theoretically there’s no reason why this shouldn’t work but only time will tell.

I actually got a 'mother' one time in a batch of organic pickles.
Go to farmer's markets, sometimes you get lucky.