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Hi Wade, Just pull the foreshots off the spirit run. A sugar wash really produces few foreshots, so 50 to a hundred will be find considering you are also going to seperate the heads from the hearts.

Your pot will hold 25L of sugar wash easily. Exception would be some grain and rum runs where foaming could be an issue.

A mash is name for grain starch to sugar conversion with enzymes, a wash is sugar based.

You have the still setup correct for the low wines then the spirit run. A couple of tablespoons of bakeing soda added to the low wines after the stripping run for a bit of time helps, but is not necessary, especially if you are doing the spirit run right away. Diluting the low wines to 45% or lower for the stripping runs helps for a cleaner and smoother final product.

Have fun."

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Wade,

When I first started I was a total newbie. I mean like a total virgin. I had great help getting started with my new still. I am only trying to pass along what I learned and share as others did so nicely to me.


The hearts are what you want to save to drink, After the foreshots, after the heads, come the hearts or middlings, then the tails which have the oily smells and other products which have a higher boiling point. for a neutral, you will want to make definate cuts, and save only the hearts.

Man O man, with your knowledge of brewing, you are in for a real treat. Mashing potential like you have never dreamed of, or ever bought from a liquor store. Pure oats, millet and mixtures that will grant taste like you have never experianced. There are many.

Do some sugar runs, get that perfected to your taste, and learning the way your stll runs. When you get that under your belt, try the ambrosia scotch essence, or others. Pretty decent.

Then we will go to the grains and I will help you best I can. I could learn a lot from you on this and we could share.


Do go to homedistiller.org, which is the bible of home hobby distillers. Great read and imfo. Calculation charts are there for each type of wash or mash you would make.

Got to go, more later.

John"

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I've noticed that the fact that brewing beer is more established than this, alot of the skills used to do whiskey are not as done for you, i'm still working on malting my own grain. Which will cut the cost of my beer down to 1.5 a twelver from 3.5. But never would have looked into it if it werent for getting into this craft. And being that i frown on using rice in my beer i never used any unmalted grains, still havent gotten the hang of that for whiskey.

Good luck and enjoy!

(but i thought he said he was a winemaker? lol)"

I bet a Black Currant brandy would be awesome!!!!!!!!!! Cant wait to get into this.

"Wade, Foreshots are not as nasty as is commonly believed. They won't poison you or make you go blind unless you consume large amounts. However, they taste and smell dreadful. If you really want to experience foreshots make a grape wash and smell the fores from that. It'll make your nose hairs curl. Very muck like acetone or nail polish remover. Sort of YUK!!!

Another thing is to not confuse foreshots with heads. After you collect the fores you will get heads and they can be kept for further distillation when you have collected enough. Collect all your distillate - after the foreshots have been removed - and keep collecting until into the tails, usually about 40abv.

I collect in half pint lots and leave with a cloth cover for a day or two then taste and blend all the spirits until you have a taste that you want. Save the remaining tails and put with your heads and use them in your next distillation going through the same procedure.

blanik"