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Re: tequila or mescal

PostPosted: Thu May 19, 2016 8:28 am
by Sam.
rumdidlydum wrote:You're having a hungi :teasing-tease: :laughing-rolling:

:text-coolphotos:


Exactly my thoughts as well.

Hope you are rewarded for the effort mate :pray:

Re: tequila or mescal

PostPosted: Thu May 19, 2016 11:33 am
by tipsy
Sam. wrote:
rumdidlydum wrote:You're having a hungi :teasing-tease: :laughing-rolling:

:text-coolphotos:


Exactly my thoughts as well.

Hope you are rewarded for the effort mate :pray:


Where's the lamb?

Re: tequila or mescal

PostPosted: Thu May 19, 2016 1:18 pm
by bayshine
I thought about food in there but didn't want to mix in to many flavours 8-}
I dug a small hole to feel the top tray and my suspicions were correct....cold as a magot :handgestures-thumbdown:
Should've known as half the agave was only partially defrosted when it went in. So dug her all up and got a raging fire going in the hole with the help of a garden blower and more rocks and some bricks as well :handgestures-thumbupleft:
Wish we had some volcanic rocks here in Wa ,cause when I'd dug up the first lot all the limestone had shattered, probably when it cooled down :think: ,not helping to keep the thermal mass also.
Anyway there was heaps of steam coming out when the sand went on,so this time it should be a success :handgestures-thumbupleft:

Re: tequila or mescal

PostPosted: Thu May 19, 2016 2:12 pm
by bluc
rumdidlydum wrote:You're having a hungi :teasing-tease: :laughing-rolling:

:text-coolphotos:

Tequilla hungi :handgestures-thumbupleft: 8-} . Great Idea I have a reli with two agaves flowering not sure if I should ask if I can have them once the flower dies, Not sure they would approve..

Re: tequila or mescal

PostPosted: Thu May 19, 2016 5:02 pm
by EziTasting
bluc wrote:Tequilla hungi :handgestures-thumbupleft: 8-} . Great Idea I have a reli with two agaves flowering not sure if I should ask if I can have them once the flower dies, Not sure they would approve..


If you don't ask, the answer is 'No'!

Re: tequila or mescal

PostPosted: Thu May 19, 2016 7:53 pm
by wynnum1
EziTasting wrote:
bluc wrote:Tequilla hungi :handgestures-thumbupleft: 8-} . Great Idea I have a reli with two agaves flowering not sure if I should ask if I can have them once the flower dies, Not sure they would approve..


If you don't ask, the answer is 'No'!


Regarded as an environmental weed.

Re: tequila or mescal

PostPosted: Fri May 20, 2016 12:22 pm
by scythe
You need to get them before they flower.

Re: tequila or mescal

PostPosted: Fri May 20, 2016 3:47 pm
by bluc
oh, how do you tell when they are ready if you get them before the flower?

Re: tequila or mescal

PostPosted: Fri May 20, 2016 7:03 pm
by bayshine
I believe when they get to a certain size they cut out the center spike so the pina grows a lot larger and increases the starch content :handgestures-thumbupleft:
I'm not to worried as I can't see me getting just to much juice out of it, but will throw heaps of pulp in the fermenter with some sugar and dap and see how she goes :smile:

Re: tequila or mescal

PostPosted: Sat May 21, 2016 9:02 pm
by bayshine
Well...after 3 days,relighting the ground oven daily,I decided to cut it all up ...but it still wasn't cooked enough :angry-banghead:
So I chopped all up finer and set up me bop as a steamer :handgestures-thumbupleft:
8 hours later she was definitely done as it was much mushier and sweeter but still had a roasted flavour so all good.
Mucked around a bit with the mulcher but was very slow so grabbed the matic handle and just mashed it up in a bucket which wasn't as bad as it sounds
Now even when well mashed you still had to ring out juices and without a press I got sick of this pretty fast ...so stuff I just threw it all in a couple of 60lt fermenters.
Took an Sg from the liquid and 1035 so chuck some sugar up to 1065 and some saf malt whiskey yeast an well see how she goes :handgestures-thumbupleft:
Overall an enjoyable experience so far and was fun to eat cooked cactus, a bit like sweet potato crossed with some kind of fruit :happy-partydance:

Re: tequila or mescal

PostPosted: Sat May 21, 2016 10:50 pm
by EziTasting
Very good write up, enjoying it! Can't believe that I actually found one of these plants where I live :scared-eek: !

Can't believe it! Don't know if I should be happy or worried about getting another process started...?!

Re: tequila or mescal

PostPosted: Sun May 22, 2016 7:47 am
by maddogpearse
Hey dudes, is this what I'm after?

Re: tequila or mescal

PostPosted: Sun May 22, 2016 8:52 am
by bayshine
maddogpearse wrote:Hey dudes, is this what I'm after?

Yep.. I would say it's Americana :think:

Re: tequila or mescal

PostPosted: Sun May 22, 2016 9:22 am
by wynnum1
bayshine wrote:I thought about food in there but didn't want to mix in to many flavours 8-}
I dug a small hole to feel the top tray and my suspicions were correct....cold as a magot :handgestures-thumbdown:
Should've known as half the agave was only partially defrosted when it went in. So dug her all up and got a raging fire going in the hole with the help of a garden blower and more rocks and some bricks as well :handgestures-thumbupleft:
Wish we had some volcanic rocks here in Wa ,cause when I'd dug up the first lot all the limestone had shattered, probably when it cooled down :think: ,not helping to keep the thermal mass also.
Anyway there was heaps of steam coming out when the sand went on,so this time it should be a success :handgestures-thumbupleft:

How about using heavy scrap steel.

Re: tequila or mescal

PostPosted: Sun May 22, 2016 10:04 am
by maddogpearse
bayshine wrote:
maddogpearse wrote:Hey dudes, is this what I'm after?

Yep.. I would say it's Americana :think:

So Americana agave would give me a type of mezcal, where as blue agave would give me tequila correct?

Re: tequila or mescal

PostPosted: Sun May 22, 2016 10:18 am
by EziTasting
Correct me if I'm wrong, but I thought the 'process' more-so determine the end product... Than the plant!?!?

Re: tequila or mescal

PostPosted: Sun May 22, 2016 10:36 am
by maddogpearse
EziTasting wrote:Correct me if I'm wrong, but I thought the 'process' more-so determine the end product... Than the plant!?!?

Straight out of wiki...
Mezcal (or mescal) (i/mɛsˈkæl/) is a distilled alcoholic beverage made from any type of agave plant native to Mexico. The word mezcal comes from Nahuatl mexcalli [meʃˈkalːi] metl [met͡ɬ] and ixcalli [iʃˈkalːi] which means "oven-cooked agave".[1]

mezcal is not as popular as tequila (made specifically from the blue agave in select regions of the country),

Re: tequila or mescal

PostPosted: Sun May 22, 2016 10:54 am
by bayshine
The bottle of Don Juan Escobar that was consumed during my mezcal adventure tasted far smoother than the cheep face twisting tequilas that I can remember, so I think any of the agaves that are safe to use will make a fine tipple :handgestures-thumbupleft:
The ferment started of well last night but has slowed right down this morning so I I've checked ph, 5.5 ,so that's spot on :think: but when I stuck my arm in it to give it a good stir I still got a slight itchiness from the wash :handgestures-thumbdown:
This makes me think the agave still wasn't cooked enough and will probably kill the yeast.
I've repitched some more saf malt this morning and failing this I'll try some bakers and more dap and hope for the best :pray:

Re: tequila or mescal

PostPosted: Sun May 22, 2016 1:55 pm
by bayshine
She's going great guns now....just needed to warm up a bit.....got down to 25'c so warmed her up to 29'c and she going off :handgestures-thumbupleft:

Re: tequila or mescal

PostPosted: Sun May 22, 2016 6:15 pm
by bluc
Do you think the itchy Ness is bad or just a personall allergy you have. Your red raw skin from the sap I get the same if I pick mangos, the sap that does it, but have no I'll effects from eating the fruit.. just a thought.