by kwik44 » Sat Nov 12, 2016 5:47 am
I did an experiment this year. I have fermented 200kg of plums. No sugar added. My distillation strategy was to get mixed potstill/flute result on one hand, while try to distill like Scots do, on the other.
I have used ~40/50l plums for each distillation. I have started with my CM cooler empty, so essentially the set-up worked as potstill. Then, when my vapour temperature reached ~91 degrees celsius, I have put some water into CM cooler to stick to the 89-91 range (my choice). The first ~700ml has been marked as heads (I use to smell and taste the distillate to make sure I have got harts). Then I got ~4l of harts and when my boiler temperature reached ~97-98 (after smelling and tasting) I have collected, literally to 0, all tails (with water on CM cooler switched off). Usually also about 4l. And like Scots I have added all heads and all tails to the next run (4 times as occurred).
In the final run I have squeezed heads. Finally I got 200ml of nail cleaner, then 200ml of plum brandy with a hint of something heavy. Once I have had a grappa with such a smell I did not like so I discarded this as well. Then I have collected harts up to 99 degrees celsius in the boiler (intentionally to get some good tails into harts). I have discarded everything above 99.
Finally: 200kg plums gave me 400ml of heads, ~15l of incredibly smelling and tasting harts (~60%) and, I expect 1-2l of tails. I am ageing a chunk in a clay jar hoping 10% of ethanol will evaporate giving me condensed plum with ~50% of alcohol. Of course I can dilute the distillate but this way the aroma will be diluted as well :(
The above Idea is not mine, I came across a post on another forum. Worked for me as well ;) So with a little bit of a care planning you can get very very little feints at the end.
Last edited by
rumdidlydum on Sat Nov 12, 2016 7:18 am, edited 1 time in total.
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