ThePaterPiper wrote::text-+1: :laughing-rolling: not one to mince words hey crow? But none a truer word said. From the flavoured vodkas I have tasted, it’s like comparing fresh squeezed orange juice to mix up cordial. Some prefer cordial, but if you can have fresh squeezed for just a fraction more coin, then why not?
Yeah mate the truth is not always what ppl want to hear but what they should hear. No point filling these new guys up with horse shit or letting ppl think every method wins a prize. Blokes come here to learn and get the best advise, if ya want bullshit check out YouTube or dare I say it the HBS advise.
Mate do the cuts, take small samples say 200ml at a time ( pirckle jars are great but glasses or anything glass will do) . Now if ya like me sense of smell is tricky and let's face it we aren't making after save so much more important is taste. My was of doing this is I get a tablespoon and a tea spoon and a mug of clean water. I ladel out 1/3 of the table spoon of water and starting at the mid run jar I add a teaspoon of spirit and taste.
This is ya mid hearts, either end of ya exceptable heart will be similar but not exactly the same, experience will teach you what no one can. Then move say 5 jars in on direction and taste, if its about the same add all them jars to a pot , repeat into out find a many jar and work back to see where hearts end. Do the same in the tails direction. Here's a hint, heads will burn the front of ya tongue tails the back of ya throat whereas heart will give ya a warm mild burn evenly. Do air ya jars for at least overnight and a few days is better if its not hot. You can reuse all the faints except the first and sometimes second jar as the are fore shots containing almost no ethanol but plenty of crap like acetone, acetate and methyl alcohols (but no actually the main concentration of methanol as some believe)
Soaking proof : OK oak has a whole bunch of compounds that vary greatly in how soluble there are, the most soluble is tannin (think cold black tea) now a little tannin goes a long way and too much is way too much, the higher the proof the stronger the solvent is so you will get an imbalance of the compounds leached out with an excess of the more soluble ones. That is what most ppl are talking about when they say something is over soaked and its bloody awful .
My initial post wasn't ment to be brash but I don't see the point in stroking egos, no body did that to me and my crap ideas were corrected quick smart and I am damn greatful for that