Aussiedistiller, Home Distilling, Moonshine, Home Brew

OK, so I've been on the lookout for mature agave plants and have managed to find a few different ones in various locations :handgestures-thumbupleft:

These should give me a better start point than the ones I thought I may have been able to salvage from our new place.



So I raided a couple with plans of roasting them on my Weber kettle, but even after trimming them back, it's going to be a squeeze. Will give it a crack though.



To anyone that's done this before, did you just cook them until they were soft or did you cook for a predetermined time?

After they are cooked, I have a 100L food grade, steel drum that I plan on smashing them up in with the flat end of a crow bar :scared-eek: Then I need to work out what batch size to make up I guess..

Cheers,
Dave.

Might be worth while to split them and doing them one at a time... slower but more efficient...

I think, from memory, they are cooked for several days... but I haven't yet done it myself.

Think bayshine did a hungi hole in the ground and cooked for couple of days..

I'd split them to make them fit :handgestures-thumbupleft:
Have read of this
http://www.ianchadwick.com/tequila/cooking.htm
Did u find out what type of agave it is?

There's some very good information in that link wobblyboot, thanks. I don't get home for a few days, but when I do, I'll trim them right up, split them into manageable pieces and pack them into the Weber. I can set the Weber up to run for about 14 hours on charcoal so it'll be case of restocking the charcoal morning and night for a few days I'd say.

I'm not sure on the variety but I'll post a pic on an agave forum tomorrow and see what I can find out. I believe though, that any of the agaves can be used to make mescal. See how we go.

I would trim them right up as there was no taste or sweetness from the leaves at all. Cut them up into fist size chunks and slow roast for at least 3 days or more, it should go a brown colour and you will taste it getting sweeter the more it's cooked.
Try to not let it dry out by putting it on ali trays with water in the bottom and keep topping it up as a lot of juice will collect an will be needed in the ferment. Maybe put some hessian over the top of it all and keep this moist as well. My ground oven wasn't as temp controlled as a webber would be so I gave it a 8 hour steam cook to finnish them off. After cooking try and bash it up as best as you can and throw the lot into your fermenter and top up with sugar :handgestures-thumbupleft:
I had success with bakers yeast, but first tried saf whiskey yeast and this just kept on stalling :crying-blue:
Good luck and keep us posted :handgestures-thumbupleft:

Thanks heaps bayshine :handgestures-thumbupleft: I'll get stuck into this on Monday when I get home. I've got some EC 1118 I was going to try first, you reckon that's worth a shot or just go with the bakers?

Do you reckon what I've got there is too much for a single 50L ferment? I've got a 200L fermenter as well but should probably stick to a small batch to begin with I reckon. There's plenty more where these came from if it turns out OK :happy-partydance: I know where some big A americana are growing on the side of the road too, but they are big and will be an effort to deal with :scared-eek:

The best we can come up with for species is either A angustifolia or A vivipara. Angustifolia is the traditional agave species used in Mexico for mezcal production and vivipara is an extremely closely related species that hails from the Caribbean. There's still ongoing argument as to whether these two are separate, or in fact, the same species.

Cheers,
Dave.

Ferment size would depend on how much of the agave material takes up in the end... you could do a small batch in the 200L (altho a waste of space :laughing-rolling: ) but it is possible ... just a thought.

Watching with interest!

I reakon as long as you have enough agave then go big :handgestures-thumbupleft:

For anyone interested "Guia del Tequila" is a good read if you can get your hands on it, my copy is Bilingual and was bought in Mexico. :handgestures-thumbupleft:

By the looks of the amount you have, I'd say 50 lt of wash plus all the agave solids :handgestures-thumbupleft:

Cheers mate, sounds like a plan :handgestures-thumbupleft: I may still ferment in the 200L as I'd say there'll be more solids than will fit in a 65..

The start of a long, long BBQ :scared-eek: Hopefully can keep them ticking over until Wednesday and I'll see how they taste.

Cheers,
Dave.

Looking good mate :handgestures-thumbupleft:
Try and keep them moist aswell and not get to dry :think: some wet hessian over the top would be the go.
Keep the photos coming :handgestures-thumbupleft:

How they looking today davez..? :-B

Coming along steady. I'm having a bit of trouble keeping the Weber at the temp I want, not sure why, I thought I was on top of that. Cooked a 6 kg brisket at Christmas time, got it to sit at 110-120C for 14 hours straight using the snake method. This time I'm having some trouble getting it where I want and keeping it there. I'll push on though and see what I end up with. Worst case, I've wasted a few kilos of sugar and some hours sitting around the BBQ drinking rum and listening to tunes, I'm sure I'll get over it..

Cheers,
Dave.

I took the roasted agave hearts out of the Weber today. I tasted some of the cooked flesh, very smokey, maybe a little burnt from one of the temp spikes, but didn't taste too bad.



Smashed them up with a flat ended crow bar in a steel drum. Then put them in the fermented and added 45 litres of rainwater.



Gave it a good stir and measured the specific gravity, pretty disappointing at 1.015, but there could still have been sugars in the flesh. Added sugar to bump it up to 1.060, it tastes damn nice as a wash, the Mrs wanted me to dish her out a glass full :handgestures-thumbupleft: I then added some EC1118 yeast. I'll go back and check it later and see if it's kicked off yet.

All going well so far.

Cheers,
Dave.

Looks a bit dry compared to my batch but mine was under cooked an so got a 8 hour steam bath and she was soft and moist after that :handgestures-thumbupleft:
Doesn't taste half a bad aye :happy-partydance:
Good luck Dave , looking good :handgestures-thumbupleft:
I think my next rnr I will get a ugly drum smoker going and do a mega batch :music-deathmetal:

Yeah I definitely need to keep more moisture in the tray and on the Hessian next time as it dried up a lot faster than I thought it would. Less mucking around trying to fine tune temperature next time too, I tried to get it to sit on about 90C and ended up with fires stopping at random and one flare up that saw the poor Weber hit 250C :scared-eek: Then I just set it up the way I cook my low and slow meats, where I know I can get it to sit around 110-120 no problem at all, and that's the way I'll do it right through next time.

Looking forward to cranking the still up in a couple weeks for sure.

Cheers,
Dave.

It was bubbling away nicely this morning, so hopefully it'll continue that way until it's done now, as I'm away from home for the next week. If all goes well I will try to run it through the bubbler while I'm home next.

If this turns out alright, I'll go back and harvest some more agave hearts, but I'll want a bigger smoker first. It really was a battle just to fit these couple in a Weber kettle. I have plans to turn one of my kettles into a Weber magnum, using a steel 44 gallon drum, so I might have to get cracking on that.

One word of caution for anyone wanting to try this recipe, make sure you dress appropriately for the task :-B . Shorts and a tee shirt just wasn't the right choice when cutting the raw hearts up. I had to bail half way through the job and have a shower as my arms and legs where on fire :angry-banghead: Came back with long legs and long sleeves and finished the job without issue.

Cheers,
Dave.