Irish V2

[bt1]

Howdy,

For those of you who have been here a while you’d well know my first adventure into making a decent Irish whiskey using mainly plain crushed barley and malted barley as a sugar based wash…let’s just say it wasn’t too good. In short it was way too bitey and did kamikaze runs on your tastebuds that truly hurt.

Since realised using plain unmalted barley as the primary grain was and remains the culprit… not nice in this at all. No amount of spirit runs, months of ageing or different timbers fixed it.

I’ve been pushing along with another version for the past 7 months now and am finally happy with the results. So here it be...

Background/side issues
Spuds aren’t spuds… the high starch varieties are what we need here so simply put don’t use waxy skinned or red potatoes due to their lower starch levels and higher water content. That leaves you with the normal plain white spud we see mostly…great news!

Spuds when boiled and preferably peeled(cos peeled it releases more starch) break down into Amylose another glucose bit but the good news is it’s broken down by our good mate the enzyme α-amylase found in malted grains. Btw human saliva has one of the highest levels of Alpha but I wouldn’t recommend a spit into the pot :handgestures-thumbdown:

The bill
The ideal mix depends on your prefs. I’ve tried several ratios but have settled on 1 which to me balances yield and flavour and efforts. You could choose to use more spuds/malt and less sugar.
60lt fermenter
4kg white spuds
2Lt Barson Galaxy pale malted barley or just malted barley. I use Galaxy as it's one of highest diastatic malts (makes more sugars if you like)
6 kg sugar
1/2 of DAP and Epsom salts

Process
¾ fill your fermenter to give water a chance to lose the chlorine
Put a stock pot on heat with enough water to cover spuds
Peel and cube spuds, pop them in allow it to boil to the soft stage as you would normally.

Remove from heat, mash the spuds with a little extra water, top up with water so you get down to the first enzyme break temp beta at 55c
While gently warming it add the barley and stir in well, bring the pot up to the 62c mark which gives Beta a chance to turn the starches. Leave for 30 mins or longer.
Bring it up to the 67c – 72c range for Alpha to convert sugars. This is when Amylose from the spuds gets converted. 72c being point at which alpha has quit the game

Leave for at least 45mins or longer with occasional stir, check temp/heating. I’m more like a good hour here….in no rush
You can check starch levels with the iodine test. The pot will progressively get sweeter to the taste.

Once happy pour into fermenter, I add ½ teaspoon of DAP and Epsom salts so yeast will be happier, but it's optional really.

Dissolve your sugars pour into fermenter adjust temp to yeast start 30c – 31c for a Lowan’s baker’s yeast.

Dam good stir or use the drill and paint stirrer whatever, pop the yeast in. Allow 15mins for lag phase of yeast stir it in allow a good 15 mins. with lid off for early growth phase of yeast.

Get your fermenter heating sorted to your preferred temp I run at 28c on with fermenter lid and wrap up fermenter…4.5 – 5 days she’s done.
I run it through one of the bubblers but nothing wrong with 2 x pot runs, strip and then a spirit.

Cuts as normal, air for about a week, water to 65% abv.

For timber I use a mix of raw uncharred and medium toast timber that’s been soaked in sherry. Sherry adding more depth.
The choices here are personal as I want a light colour drop but the raw timber takes the edge off and “turns” the spirit faster imho. You could choose to go a char timber if you prefer stronger colour but it will make it much the sameness in terms of flavours.

Will need a good 3 months to get real nice…if it lasts!

IMAG0018.jpg

bt1

[Distillnation]

Nice work bt1!

I will have to give this a shot when I get through my UJSM (about to strip my 1st gen in a day or two - first backset gen).

I've got a friend who has wanting to try a wash with potatoes so I'll have to let him see this. Might be able to reap the rewards without any of the work :lol:

(Only gave this a quick read through, will sit down later on and have a proper read of it)

I see that you say you ran it through the bubble but 2 pot runs (strip and spirit) will suffice. Is this a make once run once spirit, or like a rum/bko where you collect until you get enough for a big spirit run?

[bt1]

Dis,

reckon if going through the pot best as always to strip a couple at least...hard to justify a spirit run on 1 strip.

cheers
bt1

[Distillnation]

Cheers, I thought that might be right.

So doing it on a larger scale would be good to save a bit of time, get a few still charges out of the one wash.

I really need to get started on a bubbler.

So what kind of tastes do you get straight off the still?

[Lupus]

BT1
Looking at the recipe, you are going through all the effort of starch conversion with the malt enzymes, what is the reasoning behind the use of sugar? An extra kick?

Do the spuds add any flavour? Or just a carbohydrate source for sugar?

Don't mean to be picky, but curious about your thinking when formulating the recipe

[MacStill]

using spuds in other recipes such as rum etc: gives a velvety mouthfeel to the end product AFAIK ;-)

[bt1]

Howdy,

Looking at the recipe, you are going through all the effort of starch conversion with the malt enzymes, what is the reasoning behind the use of sugar? An extra kick?

Lup the end of the day I want product...sugar is cheap hit for yield. below the spud level mentioned you might as well just do a UJSM(fine drop but I'm tired of it) as there's really no taste point.

As mentioned you can vary the spud& malt ratio to sugar but I've found as less sugar is used I get to the practical point where I say this is F%^k...no yield.

Do the spuds add any flavour? Or just a carbohydrate source for sugar?

Yeh Mac's spot on here it does two things for mine...

Changes the feel...it adds width and is fairly flat on mid tongue.. you'll feel it first at side of tongue and cheeks, it has no front of tongue bite...
Causes it to turn faster to drinkable drop.

The other thing I don't believe I made clear is the use of raw oak... no char or toast and chip off the wine soak area so clean fresh oak... it does speed up the turn imho

bt1

[crow]

Potato schnapps is petty smooth, as far as i know it is just potatoes and malt used to make it but from what I've head spuds yield low and ya need a few (not every thing I've heard is true) ;-)