Aussiedistiller, Home Distilling, Moonshine, Home Brew

Good evening all. Ive finally come to running my still and i decided i wanted to do it rite. I originally planned a all grain but due to budgetary restraints its gonna haveta have a bit of white death added ( i fully admit i prob dosent really need sugar but an effort vs cost vs quantity vs quality arguement has arrisin ) now feel free to throw your 2 cents in as you see fit.
My idea
10kg joe white pale malt
10kg steam flaked barley ( its actually sprayed lightly with molasses and the local produce sells it as sweet feed )
10kg cracked corn ( i put it through my mill on 2nd largest setting to break it up more )
6kg white sugar
Lowans yeast hydrated well before hand
150L rain water

My dodgy calcs give it a yeild of 6.5% before sugar and 8.6% after sugar with and efficiency of 85%

I wont be cooking the unmalted grain rather doin a dump plenty boiling water on them and wrap the fermenter up with sleeping bags stiring occasionally and monitoring temp once temp is about 69-71 ill add the malt and wrap it back up. I will be fermenting on the grain.
I hope to pack this away for few months and drink on the ujssm style sugar head that i will use the spent grains for..

Please be honest with your critiques. If you see a hole plug it

You should really gelanatise the corn, you won't get much conversion out of it if you don't

I'm not too up on malts, but that particular Joe white malt seems to have a very high diastatic rating, you may be able to use less or add more regular grains - ive seen mention of phone aps n such, have a search

Raw sugar over white for me, adds more caramel n vanilla notes

I like it. It will be simillar to Irish whiskey, my fav. Most likely a teelings if you make good cuts and go light on oak.

I would gelatinze the corn in a pot on its own. Then add to mash with malt grains for conversion or vica versa depending on your equipment. You will improve yield.

:text-+1: turn corn to porridge or you will get zero..

Cook the corn if want to turn into alcohol and add a kilo of the joe white pale malt at about 72 Celsius as corn goes like glue and the malt grain makes a big difference quickly.

I know that cooking it is the optimal way but i read a forum thread about a yank that puts boiling water on top of his unmalted grain and wraps the tun up well with blankets then comes back hrs later when its at strike temp to pitch malt.. it sounded so much easier than cooking corn. And i dont really have that option as i dont have a pot nowhere near big enough

Use one of the 3 boilers you have for just the corn - the 25l one has a concealed element? Or either of the 2 bigger ones on gas, the big one will hold the whole mash...

A paint/plaster stirer on a drill would be a great addition to the process.

None of my gear is really setup for that the only boiler with a drain is the big one and its only got a 6" hole on the top and that would make mashing a disaster.. so against everyones advice i decided to have a go at a no cook mash. I boiled 120L water and bucketed that onto the grain that was at 0820 stired in real well then blanketed it up real good just got back home from muaythai and stirring it in again and its still at 85 degrees.. its pretty thick and gloopy probably not as much as should be but its tough to stir. Im gonna keep it wrapped up till it comes to 69 then pitch my malt

ainzy wrote:I know that cooking it is the optimal way but i read a forum thread about a yank that puts boiling water on top of his unmalted grain and wraps the tun up well with blankets then comes back hrs later when its at strike temp to pitch malt.. it sounded so much easier than cooking corn. And i dont really have that option as i dont have a pot nowhere near big enough

Is what I did it works I would grind it to a coarse grind to help gelatinize..

I ground the corn pretty good. I mash in bout halfa hr ago its working off now at 66° its sweetening up okish i guess ive only ever done beers in which the vast majority was malt so i am expecting it to take a fair bit longer. Was pretty cool watching it thin out like 5 minutes into mashing in.. it smells pretty good

Well firstly today was an experience. Deffinatly a few take homes from this one. Firstly the corn grind was ok not good but ok. I had mega difficulty grinding up the feed store streamed barley do quit doin that early.. i ended up useing 8kg sugar in 180L total water so bumped up the Alc % buy about 2.6 according to the calculator. I can say i got some conversion because the wash is deffinatly sweet ill take a sg reading once its a pitchin temp . I will deffinatly be doing this again but i will grind the grains to flower.
Once this wash is run i will be useing the whole boiler load as backset and adding sugar.. the thin mash will be put up for ageing and the sugarhead will be sipped on.
Thankyou all