Bona fide brewing microbiologist checking in. Good discussion. pH sub 4.5 will keep you safe for sure (a little ethanol % never hurt too)...BUT the overzealous fermentation buffer guy needs to take heed. We've all had tap water sugar washes crash hard and yeast flock out short of dryness due to pH being out of yeast biological operating range (too low). So some folks will buffer this with something Calcium Carbonate based....or even Calcium/Sodium Hydroxide. If a wash is front loaded with a very high pH clostridum could certainly take hold along with some other enteric beasties. It might even halt the fermentation completely (that would take a lot). So just remember....buffering with chalk or oyster shells is good and usually necessary if not running all grain ferments (which have tons of buffering capacity) but monitor with pH strips. It shouldn't ever go above 5.5 or dip below 3.5...start to finish....even if you're doing some weird ass lacto soured thing. Lastly if you do get off flavors/aromas...they may or may not distill out. Check the boiling point of the compound and if it's anywhere near 170F you can't seperate it from ethanol. For instance Diacetyl (butterish aroma). If your mash smells like it, your distillate will smell like a CONCENTRATED version. Also bear in mind the sensitivity threshold. Look at Butryic Acid (vomit smell). The boiling point is much higher than ethanol but the sensory threshold is wickedly small....so if your wash just barely resembles it, your distillate could reek of it (it'll be in the tails if you do). Ok my fingers are tired.
As alway a ph question. My ph always drops below 3.5 for my all grain mashes. Usually it is around 3.3-3 with a remaining gravitiy around 1.020/1.015. From that point the ferment is very very slow. Is there a way to keep it up without buffering oder adding things during the ferment?
@@deniselias5405 Simply adding something like calcium carbonate isn't technically buffering, although it kinda is, it's actually changing the alkalinity of the water. You can use an actual buffer (weak acid/conjugate base) if you want to try and prevent the pH from dropping huge amounts.
I'd just like to point out that boiling point isn't everything, and it often takes a back seat to other properties like solubility and density. Isoamyl acetate is a good example of that, it comes out in the heads cut, but it has a BP of 122C/288F. Simply because it will be floating on the surface of the wash and evaporate away. Ethyl acetate is another example at 77C/170F, it has a low water solubility (and even lower at higher temps), and low density, so an overwhelming majority of it gets expelled in the heads cut as well. But since it has some water solubility (due to the slight hydrogen bonding between water and it), and it has a low odour threshold, you'll find some of it will inevitably show up in the hearts.
Adam W You're not wrong. The delicate dance is not only completely dynamic over the course of a distillation but difficult to predict. Not so difficult to repeat thank goodness!
Little anecdote to back up the "Drinking water was like russian roulette" quote. Living here in Antwerp (Belgium) for about a thousand years the only thing you could safely drink in and directly around the town/city was femented stuff. Once a toddler was taken away from the breast it would start drinking a low ABV beer and would continue to do so for the rest of their lives. It is sometimes said that a person living here could spend their whole lives without ever drinking a drop of plain water. This necessity formed into "tradition" and up untill just a few decades ago you would regularly find a bottle of "table beer" (just a rather foul but sweet tasting low ABV beer) sitting next to a pitcher of water on the breakfast, lunch and dinnertable.
Lost track of an all grain wash that I fermented on the grain that sat for two years before I distilled it and it was some of the best stuff I've ever made.
@@markkrone6567 not a distiller, but I dont see why your wash would lose abv by sitting around. And abv peak, again its not losing abv so sorry of yes? You want it to have finished fermenting and cleared up, so I guess yes at its peak abv?
@@alm1261 Alcohol is quite volatile, so an open casket would lose abv over time. A relatively low abv wash with a bubbler shouldn't however drop noticeably, even over a many years. I had wild cherry wine sit in a glass container with a bubbler for 7 years, and the abv was the same as when the wine was young (around 12%), even though the bubbler's water had completely evaporated.
Made a rum wash years ago where I ended up moving before it finished fermenting and I actually forgot about it found it and it was not the best smell in the world but ran it and it ended up tasting like green apples and sweet pears.
I recently ran a 3 year old 10 gal sugar wash . The wash sat in the garage for a about a year . It then went to a mini- storage for 6 months, then back home under my r v for a year and a half. From 4/21 to 5/24 . The wash was racked from fermenter into 2 5gal buckets for three years . Small potstill w/thumper . 1 1/2 qt 0f 74 % mellow vanilla fruity tasting sugar shine . This video had an influence in my decision to keep the wash as long as I did . Thanks for the video .
Never got a vinegar or similar in 6 years of fermentation. Edit: damn sure no rotting flesh ! Fruit and juices, etc, for high abv wine. 3 years of beer, no problems, yet. 1 1/2 years of distillation, corn and barley, add wheat or rye, then all barley, so far so good 👍 (drinking a single malt as I type 😁) I've been lucky I guess. Great upload Jess !! 🥃 Thanks
That was a good job exsplaining the hazardous issues out there. I had a wash that got an infection before the yeast took it over and it smelt like baby poop very early on. I finished the fermentation and ran it and while I'm sure it was safe I never got rid of that faint smell in the spirit. So if it happens again I would just toss it, because trying to get the smell out of the fermenter was ridiculously hard.
Recently I found that I had forgotten to put one of my washes through the still. It has been sitting for about 4 months. Had asked some of my mates here if it was OK to put through the still. Because none of my "expert" friends had not shared my experience they were reluctant to give comment or just simply said, "chuck it". Glad I watched this vid of yours so will put it through tomorrow and see what happens. Thanks mate
This video is great for people new to the craft because it is way too easy to let your imagination get away from you when you start seeing "weird" stuff in your product. Eventually weird becomes normal, and actual weird stuff becomes easy to identify.
Thank you very much, I'm new to distilling and I had no time to destil my mash last week and I was scared that I needed to trow it away. Thanks for the knowledgeable content. Sorry for the bad English Btw you are the best youtuber for Destilling
I had the white film on top of my wash only after 2 weeks of fermentation and I was skeptical till I tried a shot glass worth of it and it tasted amazing still lol, honestly better than when I tasted it at the 1 week mark. Tastes straight up like a good wine can’t wait to run it in the still😅
If you're afraid of all that, just take a look at how Hampden Estate make rum, their fermentation, the muck, the overall hygiene of the distillery. If they're fine you're fine
Great topic. I made a wild apple cider I intended to run through together still, but forgot about it in a he basement of my in-laws farm. When I pulled it out, it had a big kombucha style SCOBY on it and smelled like dirty feet. I started running it for the heck of it, but stopped early as I there was little to no alcohol, the distilled product was also very bitter.
Glad I ran across this video. I've dumped 2 mashes in the past because they smelled like puke. Stunk up the whole garage. Guess I should have ran them if I could have tolerated the stench.
One point is that to get vinegar, you will need to have a source of oxygen. So if you keep your lock on top of your container of wash, you should get no vinegar from your ethanol. Chemical reactions: sugar -> ethanol + carbon dioxide: C6H12O6 -> 2 C2H5OH + 2 CO2 ethanol + oxygen -> ethanoic acid (vinegar): C2H5OH + O2 -> CH3COOH + H2O
Unfortunately, common sense isn't so common any more . . . :D But I love your discussion on this! As a homebrew beer nerd, I hate it when some people get so worked up about everything needing to be absolutely sterile. And yes, I've seen people really shoot for sterile, not just sanitized.
Thank you for this video. It was very helpful. I do have a quick question though. I have been trying to learn Home distilling and pretty much every fermentation that I’ve done and distilled I haven’t enjoyed the taste of it. It doesn’t taste like a whiskey to me and I’ve recently found out that pretty much every batch that I’ve ever done the pH has dropped on it the fermentation has finished completely, but the pH did drop to as low as almost 3 is that possibly what could be causing the off smells and tastes in my distilled whiskey
I have done a lot of reading on how to be safe with smoking food. If you are making Jerky and smoked fish( as long as you get the temp up to 166 F you are normally safe. Every time I smoke and I test the product its normally over 180 by the time I pull it out
This was very helpful. I'm new here, and I was worried about this topic, but for flavor reasons. Botulism is anaerobic and cannot reproduce in an oxygen environment. I cannot see how pathogens would carry over in the vapor. Toxins, maybe. I guess a mash tun could become anaerobic if CO2 blanketed the surface of the liquid...
My first wash was tpw and as I borrowing a mate still, he didn't bring it over for 4 or 5 months. We cracked the lip open. Smell really nice, we end up drinking couple litres. That wot I don't understand about Ur videos. O can't remember see u tasting any of Ur washes or mash. I smell and taste all my new recipes.
I've had a wash turn a bit vinegary. my solution was to add a heap of bicarb soda to neutralize the vinegar. we also washed the still with bicarb and then heavily rinsed it with water in case there was any vinegar in the still. my brother had an issue where he royally f-ed up his wash and some how got ammonia in it. not only did it taste awful, but it went right through the still and everything after was tainted. the solution was to wash the still with a strong solution of citric acid followed by thorough washing. we also added a heap of citric acid to the distillant and redistilled it. in both cases, what we added chemically bonded to the impurity, creating a compound that does not evaporate, even when boiled. in both cases, the goal was clean spirit, and by the end of it, this was achieved. I'm not sure what caused the ammonia. maybe the yeast has rotten our something. I really don't know.
i had a failed ginger beer that sat in a plastic office water container for a year with a rubber bung ( with a hole) and a sheet of glass on it , ran fine turned in to 94% ,smelled a little acrid but obviously it was mostly booze !
I saw someone used a thumper filled with fruit to get the flavor of that fruit. I think it would be cool to do a apple brandy and fill a 1/2 gallon mason jar thumper with caramel, to make like a caramel apple brandy. Was wondering whats your take on using thumpers to get more flavor. Will you ever use a thumper in general?
Vinegar is an acid and is sold at around 5%. At least here in the States. In Easter Europe it's sold in a much higher percentage and is pretty dangerous. If you have vinegar and you distill it, I'm assuming it's going to concentrate much higher then 5 or 10%. Should be very careful about that.
I've literally just put a sugar wash through a T500 which was stored in my garage in a 50l keg for at least 4 years and it made a very clean mid spirit. The keg has a 3 inch opening and it just had a plastic lid sat on it from a plastic tub. Not sealed completely at all. It didn't turn to vinegar, was glacially clear and I bet had lost a lot of its esters etc over the years. It was also made with a yeast that was also way out of date. Why did it sit there for all this time? Well, I was going out with a woman who lived miles away and it just got lost under the garage junk. I am a brewer so the keg would have been well sanitised.
I use to do open oak keg fermentation,with bakers yeast( live in the bush,per online buying days)so if it went off,ie white weird stuff would grow on top,I found using mustards seed & Alum would kill the mad mold,& get it back to active fermentation,& would distill off no problem...
Brewers were among the first to realise that bad water stopped the mash fermenting. The early breweries had a tower with a big sand filter at the top. Water was pumped up and left to pass through sand filters, then it was boiled before the start of the mash. As far as a fermented wort goes what do you know that survives 10% alcohol and an hour at 90C. However a wort stood too long may have a different (better or worse) flavour or feel when drunk. Most name brands will have very precise times during the production just to maintain the taste of the brand constant.
George from Barley and Hops was talking on one of his videos and commented about a sugar wash he had sitting around for over a year, Long story short he said it came out fine.
So I went to a work conference (nurse) at a brewery. Got drunk, made bad decision to buy two cartons of their appalling barrel added sour ale (abv 11.5%) It was S#1T !! I couldn’t drink it. Sat in my shed for a year, went past it’s “use by date”…. So chuck it or still it? Stilled it #ucking beautiful. Germs- nope- distilling is killing !!
I made a sugar wash, and it smells like vinegar. The yeast took off right away, and there was airlock activity for 3 weeks. When i opened it up, there were still bubbles, but it smelled like wine and vinegar. Is that normal?
Thanks Jesse for all you do. One question re botulism. You say botulism gets killed at 85C but alcohol comes off the still at 79 C , so that isn't hot enough to kill it. Am I missing something here ?
The alcohol reaches temperatures well past 90C in steam form during distilling and is cooled down to condense back into a liquid as it comes off the still.
Thanks for the great info I had a sugar wash which after about 20 days from putting the yeast in the wash, it smelled like acetone and little white flakes formed on top of the liquid layer. I had it air locked and the equipment was to my ability and knowledge clean, i didn't distill it because of the acetone smell. Wondering why that particular thing happened. Also i filtered some washes later and the remainder which consisted of yeast and other stuff because i wanted to check if the yeast was still alive to add it to another batch or not. so i washed the yeast with cooled boiling water and then add it to a small HDPE bottle and add about 2 spoons of sugar to check if it starts fermenting that or not, and after a week again that acetone smell and white flakes formed. I also added a little amount of citric acid to lower the pH and again added 1 spoon sugar, not so much spoiler but again the acetone smell only grew stronger. I wonder what is the cause this problem. I don't have any issue if the yeast preferred fermenting sugar to acetone because that can be useful for other stuff not including drinking of course. But i want to know why that happened. All that aside I realy wanted to thank you because i started fermenting and distilling ethanol by the info mostly from you.
@@balajicherukuri6967 So that's caused by oxygen getting inside the fermentation vessel. So this means if the fermentation was done by constantly aerating the wash you could get acetone more favorably? Did anyone do that and have the result info? Thanks a lot by the way.
I was a little overzealous and started a banana mash before my still was built. well long story short It sat and I forgot about it and now I have my still. It smell's like banana beer not vinegar. I'm wondering if it is safe to run. thoughts?
Everyone who wants to get into distilling should have minimal culinary experience. Can you fry an egg, and scramble one. Bake a loaf of bread from scratch, flour, water, salt, yeast, knead, rise, bake, eat. Watch the changes, feel them as you knead it, and for an even more thorough understanding, read up in soaking grains. While it isn’t exactly what we are doing, it is part of hydrating grains, much like we do for a mash. Also, make pickles, ferment a hot sauce. Again taste as you go, watch the changes that occur, it makes the fermentation process followed by distillation much easier to understand and troubleshoot if needed. Lastly, nothing about this is exact, we have SG ranges, temperature ranges, one little difference in temperature can make a difference in fermentation timeframes. Use your head people, just because it rains in Seattle, does not indicate it raining all the way over in Las Vegas. They are different, the entire atmosphere is different, therefore the exact results will be slightly different. Relax and have fun!
My experience of running a bad 5 year old batch, thinking I could separate vinegar from alcohol, ruined all of my copper parts. I had to have all the copper sandpapered.
Once again you hit it. Common sense prevails. If in doubt, throw it out. Like your saying, I have gotten side tracked Hurricanes and ect and didn't get to the wash for a couple of months. As long as it was clean and sealed. By the way, its a lot of work to make Vinegars.
My question is about spent Mash. I have about 10gal of corn base mash that I strained good and ran down to around 100 proof. After cool down, wile still warm, I poured in containers and sealed..Haven't touched them in a couple of years??. Have to ask, do I now have a super sour mash and can still use or dump as quickly as I can..lol thx
Hi guys im in NZ and have used 8kg dextrose with classic8 turbo yeast. The yeast faild due to being way to old (best before 2018) so after 2 days of no activity i added 4Table spoons of active bakers yeast and withen 30mins all activity was cranking. Its been bubbling strong for 3 days now has started to slow dramaticly. OG was 1.136 and is now down to 1.020. Question is its still quite sweet will it be ok to leave say 1 more week and then run thru reflux still?
Whew.....ok good. I thought my mash was turning out to be a goner. There are some slightly almost furry bubbles forming.....seems like it's going to be ok though!
I'm doing it the old way and can't check gravity. I go by the cap dropping. Now it has white powder on top cap dropped I've been working long days and can't get to distilling it. Smells sweet and idk what is ontop of it
Hey there can somebody please answer me ? I have 60%+ abv vodka made and when i smell it it burns my nose , when i taste it it burn a tad bit on my tongue and bites it , is it toxic or fine ? I drunk 30mils of it and im still here chatting but still im worried a bit
I have a sugar wash with a lb. raisin i made Feb. 22. I racked the raisin after 3 weeks. ( it took about 7 weeks) I had my daughter taken from me in March to murder and a very close friend passed unexpected in May. So I have not been up to distilling.. my question is... is it safe to run? I hate to waist but want safe!
Honestly I didn't even consider botulism - I'd be far more worried about methanol, followed closely by ketones and aldehydes- formadehye and acetone being favourites. - they make for interesting fragrances, usually pretty harsh, but more importantly they concentrate in the distillate. The reason they are a problem is because they are created by wild yeasts often enough to be a problem, are poisonous at relatively low concentrations (% not ppm), and are hard to qualitatively detect. It's the reason distilling is illegal in most countries - that and human stupidity (on both sides)... Plenty of people go blind or die from methanol poisoning from tainted batches globally each year. And please, don't get me wrong - it's tried and tested technology - it mostly DOES JUST WORK - these things have had a long time for the kinks to be worked out, same as cheese and smallgoods. you can still stuff up... no pun intended... The sad news is I don't think there is an easy solution to this problem. If it tastes rough, congratulations on making hand sanitiser?
My grandad told the story of visiting a guy who was in the process of cleaning out the root cellar. He found a crock with mold on the top. Scraped it to find good homemade wine. They sat down started drinking and swapping stories. A while later dude's wife hollered down. You got that root cellar cleaned out yet? Ol' boy yelled back " not quite by Jesus" grandad said i knowed it was time to leave.
Usually clear ish depending in how long after fermentation ends. I usually overpitch the tomato paste just because its cheaper to buy one big can. And it is usually a dark pink color.
I have made a bad batch of beer once. Smelt okay, appearance great, but the test sip was horrid. A hostile chemical flavor that would hit the back of mouth and throat. Rinsed my mouth out several times to clear out the nasty taste. I made several mistakes. 1) Did a very hot water rinsing without sterilizing of a plastic fermentation bucket I had just made a wine in. 2) I did a very low ABV potential of 3% ABV. 3) Fermentation temperature was in the mid 30's C. ( a surprise heat wave in spring ). Anyhow, what happened and what it produced was horrid. Not only did I lose the batch, but also the fermentation bucket was ruined. Since then, I have a policy. Starch/grain based malts/syrups in beer buckets only. Sugars/fruits/saps in wine buckets only. Never encountered that problem again after 40 years of brewing. I am also careful of temperature of fermenting. Better to have to use brew heat belt than brew too hot.
This is not about beer! Sorry, if you got confused about the topic. I haven't a single thing In can tell you about brewing beer.We still appreciate your input dude!. :) If you want to make beer check out some brewing sites. We are talking about distilling. I have a keg still, propane powered shotgun condenser. When I owned my home and could distill outside that worked for me. I now live in an apartment/ flat. I had a wash that I did in the house and was not willing to do in an apartment, do to safety hazards. 5 years later I wanted to get back into the craft and bought a 8 Gallon with 2 Inch Diameter Dual Purpose Pro. 2000 watt element and added George's PID controller. Best batch I've ever run! I now have 4-5 gal. washes hanging around for that purpose only. Yes, I still run regular washes, but I like to do a few of these as well. If you don't leave your wash sitting in the backyard uncovered and accessible to the critters, you will have no problems. Honestly, longer is better. To those of you that are more experienced, please set me straight if you disagree. I am not an expert by any means. Piece bros, Happy distilling!
@@CP-od7tr You do realize the only difference between a mash & a beer, is that beer has hops added. The mashing and fermentation process is the same. So if you just add some hops to your mash, you have a beer. You can even distill it or carbonate it. The hops give a light grassy-citrus hint to final product.
My rule of thumb is that if you ask how it is doing and it talks back, don't put it through the distiller :-)
If it talks back, take another drink!! Lol
🤣🤣 if it talks back you have been drinking heads I guess
Thats why water purifiers have always been important.
Bona fide brewing microbiologist checking in. Good discussion. pH sub 4.5 will keep you safe for sure (a little ethanol % never hurt too)...BUT the overzealous fermentation buffer guy needs to take heed. We've all had tap water sugar washes crash hard and yeast flock out short of dryness due to pH being out of yeast biological operating range (too low). So some folks will buffer this with something Calcium Carbonate based....or even Calcium/Sodium Hydroxide. If a wash is front loaded with a very high pH clostridum could certainly take hold along with some other enteric beasties. It might even halt the fermentation completely (that would take a lot).
So just remember....buffering with chalk or oyster shells is good and usually necessary if not running all grain ferments (which have tons of buffering capacity) but monitor with pH strips. It shouldn't ever go above 5.5 or dip below 3.5...start to finish....even if you're doing some weird ass lacto soured thing.
Lastly if you do get off flavors/aromas...they may or may not distill out. Check the boiling point of the compound and if it's anywhere near 170F you can't seperate it from ethanol. For instance Diacetyl (butterish aroma). If your mash smells like it, your distillate will smell like a CONCENTRATED version. Also bear in mind the sensitivity threshold. Look at Butryic Acid (vomit smell). The boiling point is much higher than ethanol but the sensory threshold is wickedly small....so if your wash just barely resembles it, your distillate could reek of it (it'll be in the tails if you do).
Ok my fingers are tired.
As alway a ph question. My ph always drops below 3.5 for my all grain mashes. Usually it is around 3.3-3 with a remaining gravitiy around 1.020/1.015. From that point the ferment is very very slow. Is there a way to keep it up without buffering oder adding things during the ferment?
@@deniselias5405 Simply adding something like calcium carbonate isn't technically buffering, although it kinda is, it's actually changing the alkalinity of the water. You can use an actual buffer (weak acid/conjugate base) if you want to try and prevent the pH from dropping huge amounts.
I'd just like to point out that boiling point isn't everything, and it often takes a back seat to other properties like solubility and density. Isoamyl acetate is a good example of that, it comes out in the heads cut, but it has a BP of 122C/288F. Simply because it will be floating on the surface of the wash and evaporate away. Ethyl acetate is another example at 77C/170F, it has a low water solubility (and even lower at higher temps), and low density, so an overwhelming majority of it gets expelled in the heads cut as well. But since it has some water solubility (due to the slight hydrogen bonding between water and it), and it has a low odour threshold, you'll find some of it will inevitably show up in the hearts.
Adam W You're not wrong. The delicate dance is not only completely dynamic over the course of a distillation but difficult to predict. Not so difficult to repeat thank goodness!
Denis Elias why are you apprehensive about adding things to buffer pH crash in a wash that will be distilled?
Jesse sometimes I just don't know what I'd do without you. Thank you so much for sharing your knowledge of this craft. 😊
Little anecdote to back up the "Drinking water was like russian roulette" quote. Living here in Antwerp (Belgium) for about a thousand years the only thing you could safely drink in and directly around the town/city was femented stuff. Once a toddler was taken away from the breast it would start drinking a low ABV beer and would continue to do so for the rest of their lives. It is sometimes said that a person living here could spend their whole lives without ever drinking a drop of plain water. This necessity formed into "tradition" and up untill just a few decades ago you would regularly find a bottle of "table beer" (just a rather foul but sweet tasting low ABV beer) sitting next to a pitcher of water on the breakfast, lunch and dinnertable.
What you're saying is that you want those days to come back right?
Lost track of an all grain wash that I fermented on the grain that sat for two years before I distilled it and it was some of the best stuff I've ever made.
Ty for the info can you lose abv if you're wash/mash sits to long before you run it?
Or is there ever a best time to run your wash/mash when your ABV peak is highest?
@@markkrone6567 not a distiller, but I dont see why your wash would lose abv by sitting around. And abv peak, again its not losing abv so sorry of yes? You want it to have finished fermenting and cleared up, so I guess yes at its peak abv?
@@alm1261 Alcohol is quite volatile, so an open casket would lose abv over time. A relatively low abv wash with a bubbler shouldn't however drop noticeably, even over a many years. I had wild cherry wine sit in a glass container with a bubbler for 7 years, and the abv was the same as when the wine was young (around 12%), even though the bubbler's water had completely evaporated.
Made a rum wash years ago where I ended up moving before it finished fermenting and I actually forgot about it found it and it was not the best smell in the world but ran it and it ended up tasting like green apples and sweet pears.
You made heavy rum, with high ester formation.
I recently ran a 3 year old 10 gal sugar wash . The wash sat in the garage for a about a year . It then went to a mini- storage for 6 months, then back home under my r v for a year and a half. From 4/21 to 5/24 . The wash was racked from fermenter into 2 5gal buckets for three years .
Small potstill w/thumper . 1 1/2 qt 0f 74 % mellow vanilla fruity tasting sugar shine .
This video had an influence in my decision to keep the wash as long as I did .
Thanks for the video .
Never got a vinegar or similar in 6 years of fermentation. Edit: damn sure no rotting flesh ! Fruit and juices, etc, for high abv wine. 3 years of beer, no problems, yet. 1 1/2 years of distillation, corn and barley, add wheat or rye, then all barley, so far so good 👍 (drinking a single malt as I type 😁) I've been lucky I guess.
Great upload Jess !! 🥃 Thanks
did a batch with 100% oats and amylase, didn't get around to running it for months, came out spectacular!
That was a good job exsplaining the hazardous issues out there.
I had a wash that got an infection before the yeast took it over and it smelt like baby poop very early on. I finished the fermentation and ran it and while I'm sure it was safe I never got rid of that faint smell in the spirit. So if it happens again I would just toss it, because trying to get the smell out of the fermenter was ridiculously hard.
Recently I found that I had forgotten to put one of my washes through the still. It has been sitting for about 4 months. Had asked some of my mates here if it was OK to put through the still. Because none of my "expert" friends had not shared my experience they were reluctant to give comment or just simply said, "chuck it".
Glad I watched this vid of yours so will put it through tomorrow and see what happens.
Thanks mate
What was the result?
This video is great for people new to the craft because it is way too easy to let your imagination get away from you when you start seeing "weird" stuff in your product. Eventually weird becomes normal, and actual weird stuff becomes easy to identify.
Thank you very much, I'm new to distilling and I had no time to destil my mash last week and I was scared that I needed to trow it away. Thanks for the knowledgeable content. Sorry for the bad English
Btw you are the best youtuber for Destilling
Had a year old apple mash...sealed...
had funky white film on top...ran it and turned out better than my regular batch...awsome flavor brandy
Just ran 6 gallons of rum mash that was in my closet for over a year. Tastes great.
I could make a joke about that but I wont!
I use recycled yeast for my 5 gallon mead and the flavor gets better by each fermentation. Its been on three so far, and now on a fourth batch of mead
You made me choke on my top ramen with freakin “freedom units”😂
I had the white film on top of my wash only after 2 weeks of fermentation and I was skeptical till I tried a shot glass worth of it and it tasted amazing still lol, honestly better than when I tasted it at the 1 week mark. Tastes straight up like a good wine can’t wait to run it in the still😅
If you're afraid of all that, just take a look at how Hampden Estate make rum, their fermentation, the muck, the overall hygiene of the distillery. If they're fine you're fine
Great topic. I made a wild apple cider I intended to run through together still, but forgot about it in a he basement of my in-laws farm. When I pulled it out, it had a big kombucha style SCOBY on it and smelled like dirty feet. I started running it for the heck of it, but stopped early as I there was little to no alcohol, the distilled product was also very bitter.
bitter is not a good sign
Glad I ran across this video. I've dumped 2 mashes in the past because they smelled like puke. Stunk up the whole garage. Guess I should have ran them if I could have tolerated the stench.
One point is that to get vinegar, you will need to have a source of oxygen.
So if you keep your lock on top of your container of wash, you should get no vinegar from your ethanol.
Chemical reactions:
sugar -> ethanol + carbon dioxide: C6H12O6 -> 2 C2H5OH + 2 CO2
ethanol + oxygen -> ethanoic acid (vinegar): C2H5OH + O2 -> CH3COOH + H2O
"Freedom units."
As an apologetic American during these times, I appreciated that quip.
I came to the comments for this exact reason. Merica!!
Who would have thought that a republic would use the kings foot to measure anything.
Yee yee,
I will only refer to farenheit as freedom units from now on.
Unfortunately, common sense isn't so common any more . . . :D But I love your discussion on this! As a homebrew beer nerd, I hate it when some people get so worked up about everything needing to be absolutely sterile. And yes, I've seen people really shoot for sterile, not just sanitized.
Not to mention that once it's been run through the still and its at 120+ proof, it kills pretty much anything that may be present in the final product
Yeah feijoa! Looking forward to that:-)
I heard feijoada? 👨🍳
I can see it all now... Food colab 🤣
th-cam.com/video/3029wxnkuao/w-d-xo.html
@@StillDrew982 I got that reference Andy. Fear not, it's been gotten by at least one person.
Thank you for this video. It was very helpful. I do have a quick question though. I have been trying to learn Home distilling and pretty much every fermentation that I’ve done and distilled I haven’t enjoyed the taste of it. It doesn’t taste like a whiskey to me and I’ve recently found out that pretty much every batch that I’ve ever done the pH has dropped on it the fermentation has finished completely, but the pH did drop to as low as almost 3 is that possibly what could be causing the off smells and tastes in my distilled whiskey
I have done a lot of reading on how to be safe with smoking food. If you are making Jerky and smoked fish( as long as you get the temp up to 166 F you are normally safe. Every time I smoke and I test the product its normally over 180 by the time I pull it out
This was very helpful. I'm new here, and I was worried about this topic, but for flavor reasons. Botulism is anaerobic and cannot reproduce in an oxygen environment. I cannot see how pathogens would carry over in the vapor. Toxins, maybe. I guess a mash tun could become anaerobic if CO2 blanketed the surface of the liquid...
My first wash was tpw and as I borrowing a mate still, he didn't bring it over for 4 or 5 months. We cracked the lip open. Smell really nice, we end up drinking couple litres. That wot I don't understand about Ur videos. O can't remember see u tasting any of Ur washes or mash. I smell and taste all my new recipes.
Another good video, simple and to the point with great info...keep it up! :)
Thx! Have a 3 months old Gen5 UJSSM sitting on my shelf.... let's run it!
Your description of the pelical reminded me of my first Flanders red sour beer I ever brewed so cool to see it grow.
I've had a wash turn a bit vinegary. my solution was to add a heap of bicarb soda to neutralize the vinegar. we also washed the still with bicarb and then heavily rinsed it with water in case there was any vinegar in the still.
my brother had an issue where he royally f-ed up his wash and some how got ammonia in it. not only did it taste awful, but it went right through the still and everything after was tainted. the solution was to wash the still with a strong solution of citric acid followed by thorough washing. we also added a heap of citric acid to the distillant and redistilled it.
in both cases, what we added chemically bonded to the impurity, creating a compound that does not evaporate, even when boiled.
in both cases, the goal was clean spirit, and by the end of it, this was achieved. I'm not sure what caused the ammonia. maybe the yeast has rotten our something. I really don't know.
RUN IT! That's what I took away!
i had a failed ginger beer that sat in a plastic office water container for a year with a rubber bung ( with a hole) and a sheet of glass on it , ran fine turned in to 94% ,smelled a little acrid but obviously it was mostly booze !
I saw someone used a thumper filled with fruit to get the flavor of that fruit. I think it would be cool to do a apple brandy and fill a 1/2 gallon mason jar thumper with caramel, to make like a caramel apple brandy. Was wondering whats your take on using thumpers to get more flavor. Will you ever use a thumper in general?
It works for me I purée the fruit first though.
If you are just used fruit and not something alcoholic than I'm pretty sure that it is called a gin basket (even if it's not gin)
Zack perron it depends on the kind of still a gin basket is usually found in a Column still a thumper is usually found in a whiskey still
@@charlesschmidtke8427 how well does the flavor carry over?
Vinegar is an acid and is sold at around 5%. At least here in the States. In Easter Europe it's sold in a much higher percentage and is pretty dangerous. If you have vinegar and you distill it, I'm assuming it's going to concentrate much higher then 5 or 10%. Should be very careful about that.
commercial vinegar is 30%
I've literally just put a sugar wash through a T500 which was stored in my garage in a 50l keg for at least 4 years and it made a very clean mid spirit. The keg has a 3 inch opening and it just had a plastic lid sat on it from a plastic tub. Not sealed completely at all. It didn't turn to vinegar, was glacially clear and I bet had lost a lot of its esters etc over the years. It was also made with a yeast that was also way out of date. Why did it sit there for all this time? Well, I was going out with a woman who lived miles away and it just got lost under the garage junk.
I am a brewer so the keg would have been well sanitised.
I use to do open oak keg fermentation,with bakers yeast( live in the bush,per online buying days)so if it went off,ie white weird stuff would grow on top,I found using mustards seed & Alum would kill the mad mold,& get it back to active fermentation,& would distill off no problem...
"If it smells like rotten flesh"... you should probably need to stop make wash from dead bodies? :D
what about bat and goat head in the jamaican dunder pit ?
@@RoranRock those things are probably fresh meat and should be fine in my opinion
Brewers were among the first to realise that bad water stopped the mash fermenting. The early breweries had a tower with a big sand filter at the top. Water was pumped up and left to pass through sand filters, then it was boiled before the start of the mash.
As far as a fermented wort goes what do you know that survives 10% alcohol and an hour at 90C. However a wort stood too long may have a different (better or worse) flavour or feel when drunk. Most name brands will have very precise times during the production just to maintain the taste of the brand constant.
George from Barley and Hops was talking on one of his videos and commented about a sugar wash he had sitting around for over a year, Long story short he said it came out fine.
You'll be right mate just still it .
As a beer guy I've always been jealous of how little sanitation is necessary for distillers.
It's the number one factor in beer.
I have had a beer I brewed that was in the fermenter for 5-6months.
Good sanitation and it’s all good, little oxidized but no infection 👌🏻
Some of the best things come from screw ups you never know you might get a gem out of it at that point only thing you have to lose is time
Disclaimer is VERY well done!!
What is this "Common Sense" you speak of?
I have found that it usually adds up to about $0.02
So I went to a work conference (nurse) at a brewery. Got drunk, made bad decision to buy two cartons of their appalling barrel added sour ale (abv 11.5%)
It was S#1T !! I couldn’t drink it.
Sat in my shed for a year, went past it’s “use by date”…. So chuck it or still it?
Stilled it #ucking beautiful.
Germs- nope- distilling is killing !!
I made a sugar wash, and it smells like vinegar. The yeast took off right away, and there was airlock activity for 3 weeks. When i opened it up, there were still bubbles, but it smelled like wine and vinegar. Is that normal?
Dude, you are a top man :-) fantastic as always
he's the best!
Was wondering about using dunder as in buccaneer bobs rum. Is dangerous growth possible. Hate to intentionally transfer something to the wash.
Its happend twice now. My brandy wash turned slimy. No bad smell. Any info highly appreciated?
Thanks Jesse for all you do. One question re botulism. You say botulism gets killed at 85C but alcohol comes off the still at 79 C , so that isn't hot enough to kill it. Am I missing something here ?
The alcohol reaches temperatures well past 90C in steam form during distilling and is cooled down to condense back into a liquid as it comes off the still.
Pure alcohol boils off at 79C but the mix of alcohol and water you actually have in the still is hotter.
Doesn't high concentration of alcohol kill it anyway?
@@zacharyrestelli1402 Of course. Thanks Zachary.
@@MadJix The bacterium is nearly impossible to deal with, it's the toxin itself that decomposes at 85°C
“If it does smell a bit like rotting flesh...”
So THIS is how the zombie apocalypse starts
"Wired freedom units". LMAO
One of my washes was inadvertently exposed the microbial colonies from a thermal vent at 15,000 ft. depth and 600 degree's temp, should I worry?
I threw quite a few washes in my still that should have been thrown in the toilet. Ultimately what came out of the still went down the drain.
Have you ever had a plain sugar wash turn pink during fermentation?
Thanks for the great info
I had a sugar wash which after about 20 days from putting the yeast in the wash, it smelled like acetone and little white flakes formed on top of the liquid layer.
I had it air locked and the equipment was to my ability and knowledge clean, i didn't distill it because of the acetone smell. Wondering why that particular thing happened.
Also i filtered some washes later and the remainder which consisted of yeast and other stuff because i wanted to check if the yeast was still alive to add it to another batch or not. so i washed the yeast with cooled boiling water and then add it to a small HDPE bottle and add about 2 spoons of sugar to check if it starts fermenting that or not, and after a week again that acetone smell and white flakes formed. I also added a little amount of citric acid to lower the pH and again added 1 spoon sugar, not so much spoiler but again the acetone smell only grew stronger. I wonder what is the cause this problem.
I don't have any issue if the yeast preferred fermenting sugar to acetone because that can be useful for other stuff not including drinking of course. But i want to know why that happened.
All that aside I realy wanted to thank you because i started fermenting and distilling ethanol by the info mostly from you.
Hi it’s due to ethyl acetate formation combo of ethanol and acetic acid
May u got contaminated or semi expose to atmosphere
@@balajicherukuri6967 So that's caused by oxygen getting inside the fermentation vessel.
So this means if the fermentation was done by constantly aerating the wash you could get acetone more favorably?
Did anyone do that and have the result info?
Thanks a lot by the way.
Good shit !!! Once again thanks 4 your time!!!
If the rubber piece to secure your airlock fell into your mash and sat for months inside the mash, is it still safe to distill?
Yep
I was a little overzealous and started a banana mash before my still was built. well long story short It sat and I forgot about it and now I have my still. It smell's like banana beer not vinegar. I'm wondering if it is safe to run. thoughts?
Everyone who wants to get into distilling should have minimal culinary experience. Can you fry an egg, and scramble one. Bake a loaf of bread from scratch, flour, water, salt, yeast, knead, rise, bake, eat. Watch the changes, feel them as you knead it, and for an even more thorough understanding, read up in soaking grains. While it isn’t exactly what we are doing, it is part of hydrating grains, much like we do for a mash. Also, make pickles, ferment a hot sauce. Again taste as you go, watch the changes that occur, it makes the fermentation process followed by distillation much easier to understand and troubleshoot if needed. Lastly, nothing about this is exact, we have SG ranges, temperature ranges, one little difference in temperature can make a difference in fermentation timeframes. Use your head people, just because it rains in Seattle, does not indicate it raining all the way over in Las Vegas. They are different, the entire atmosphere is different, therefore the exact results will be slightly different. Relax and have fun!
Beer guy here. Y’all are crazy lol I wouldn’t let any of this stuff touch my equipment. Fruit flies?? that’s just nasty lol
Remember that the next time you crave a pickle.
My experience of running a bad 5 year old batch, thinking I could separate vinegar from alcohol, ruined all of my copper parts. I had to have all the copper sandpapered.
Once again you hit it.
Common sense prevails.
If in doubt, throw it out.
Like your saying,
I have gotten side tracked Hurricanes and ect and didn't get to the wash for a couple of months.
As long as it was clean and sealed.
By the way, its a lot of work to make Vinegars.
My question is about spent Mash. I have about 10gal of corn base mash that I strained good and ran down to around 100 proof. After cool down, wile still warm, I poured in containers and sealed..Haven't touched them in a couple of years??. Have to ask, do I now have a super sour mash and can still use or dump as quickly as I can..lol thx
08:05 Deck is my favourite word in your accent
so do we scoop the white layer on top of the mash off? or leave it and how do you know if you used enough yeast
It depends on the level of alcohol in the wash or mash the cousin of yeast asadal bacteria also may die in your 20% wash or mash
Did you say the safe plastic grade was PTFE, not sure I got you there. Tks
If you go pour it, and it comes out like jello, probably best to distill it anyway. /s
Hi guys im in NZ and have used 8kg dextrose with classic8 turbo yeast. The yeast faild due to being way to old (best before 2018) so after 2 days of no activity i added 4Table spoons of active bakers yeast and withen 30mins all activity was cranking. Its been bubbling strong for 3 days now has started to slow dramaticly. OG was 1.136 and is now down to 1.020. Question is its still quite sweet will it be ok to leave say 1 more week and then run thru reflux still?
Whew.....ok good. I thought my mash was turning out to be a goner. There are some slightly almost furry bubbles forming.....seems like it's going to be ok though!
Any concerns with mould?
OMG have you seen the DES side column 120ltr still 😘 distillers dream right there.
I have 28 gl. Of wash , 4 months old. I'm expecting it to be just fine. Heck, 4 month old wisky straight off the still. Yum. 😜
Nobody ever talks about the color of the wash... does that make a difference?
hello chasers!!!
I tried to make saki not too long ago. i let it sit for three months total, and it turned to vinigar. Never distilled it i just dumped it.
I'm doing it the old way and can't check gravity. I go by the cap dropping. Now it has white powder on top cap dropped I've been working long days and can't get to distilling it. Smells sweet and idk what is ontop of it
Ok mine is snow covered bubbles. Thx for the help. It finished a month and a half ago
What about some Green Mould ontop of a dunder pit?
Hey there can somebody please answer me ? I have 60%+ abv vodka made and when i smell it it burns my nose , when i taste it it burn a tad bit on my tongue and bites it , is it toxic or fine ? I drunk 30mils of it and im still here chatting but still im worried a bit
How do I make or save my vinegar smelling sour mash after Ten days?
Can I somehow add more water and sugar to save my mash that taste like vinegar?
I have a sugar wash with a lb. raisin i made Feb. 22. I racked the raisin after 3 weeks. ( it took about 7 weeks) I had my daughter taken from me in March to murder and a very close friend passed unexpected in May. So I have not been up to distilling.. my question is... is it safe to run? I hate to waist but want safe!
Go for it your golden
Does anybody know if a sugar wash that does not ferment out completely but still at 12% is ok to still distill ?
Can a wash/mash lose abv if fermentation is to Long???
BTW it was clear with no mold evident.
Great!!
i always check PH now as 1 batch went blue from the stuff taking metal out of the packing.
🤔If you don't clean your still&packing well your product will be blue especially if it's copper!.
the rare auld common sense eh.where did it go.thanks again for the info and entertainment.mad dog.west cork.eire
When do I test the ph to see if it is safe from botulism?
Or how do I tell if there is botulism in my mash? Don’t want that shit lmao
Honestly I didn't even consider botulism - I'd be far more worried about methanol, followed closely by ketones and aldehydes- formadehye and acetone being favourites. - they make for interesting fragrances, usually pretty harsh, but more importantly they concentrate in the distillate.
The reason they are a problem is because they are created by wild yeasts often enough to be a problem, are poisonous at relatively low concentrations (% not ppm), and are hard to qualitatively detect.
It's the reason distilling is illegal in most countries - that and human stupidity (on both sides)...
Plenty of people go blind or die from methanol poisoning from tainted batches globally each year.
And please, don't get me wrong - it's tried and tested technology - it mostly DOES JUST WORK - these things have had a long time for the kinks to be worked out, same as cheese and smallgoods.
you can still stuff up... no pun intended...
The sad news is I don't think there is an easy solution to this problem. If it tastes rough, congratulations on making hand sanitiser?
My grandad told the story of visiting a guy who was in the process of cleaning out the root cellar. He found a crock with mold on the top. Scraped it to find good homemade wine. They sat down started drinking and swapping stories. A while later dude's wife hollered down. You got that root cellar cleaned out yet? Ol' boy yelled back " not quite by Jesus" grandad said i knowed it was time to leave.
George from Barley and Hops covers this topic in numerous casts and reviews the science behind the topic.
I'd be wary of Georges videos, some of his info is dangerous or just wrong.
Is it normal for birdwatchers to get very clear ? Kind regards Ben, za
Usually clear ish depending in how long after fermentation ends. I usually overpitch the tomato paste just because its cheaper to buy one big can. And it is usually a dark pink color.
A good video. Very informative.. Moonshine Life Group
I’ll make sure to tell my defense attorney that you said it was ok
I have made a bad batch of beer once. Smelt okay, appearance great, but the test sip was horrid. A hostile chemical flavor that would hit the back of mouth and throat. Rinsed my mouth out several times to clear out the nasty taste. I made several mistakes. 1) Did a very hot water rinsing without sterilizing of a plastic fermentation bucket I had just made a wine in. 2) I did a very low ABV potential of 3% ABV. 3) Fermentation temperature was in the mid 30's C. ( a surprise heat wave in spring ). Anyhow, what happened and what it produced was horrid. Not only did I lose the batch, but also the fermentation bucket was ruined. Since then, I have a policy. Starch/grain based malts/syrups in beer buckets only. Sugars/fruits/saps in wine buckets only. Never encountered that problem again after 40 years of brewing. I am also careful of temperature of fermenting. Better to have to use brew heat belt than brew too hot.
This is not about beer! Sorry, if you got confused about the topic. I haven't a single thing In can tell you about brewing beer.We still appreciate your input dude!. :) If you want to make beer check out some brewing sites. We are talking about distilling. I have a keg still, propane powered shotgun condenser. When I owned my home and could distill outside that worked for me. I now live in an apartment/ flat. I had a wash that I did in the house and was not willing to do in an apartment, do to safety hazards. 5 years later I wanted to get back into the craft and bought a 8 Gallon with 2 Inch Diameter Dual Purpose Pro. 2000 watt element and added George's PID controller. Best batch I've ever run! I now have 4-5 gal. washes hanging around for that purpose only. Yes, I still run regular washes, but I like to do a few of these as well. If you don't leave your wash sitting in the backyard uncovered and accessible to the critters, you will have no problems. Honestly, longer is better. To those of you that are more experienced, please set me straight if you disagree. I am not an expert by any means. Piece bros, Happy distilling!
@@CP-od7tr You do realize the only difference between a mash & a beer, is that beer has hops added. The mashing and fermentation process is the same. So if you just add some hops to your mash, you have a beer. You can even distill it or carbonate it. The hops give a light grassy-citrus hint to final product.