Making Alcoholmaking alcohol, vodka distillation, precision hydrometer, you make moonshine What makes a "Good" Turbo? It should be able to ferment to 14% alcohol in three days even when the temperature is not ideal. More important: the mash produced must contain as little as possible of off-flavors, and off-smells (the volatiles), making alcohol The benefits of rapid fermentation are obvious, but the importance of making a clean mash may not be as obvious, since later treatment with activated carbon should remove these volatiles anyway. An explanation follows, making alcohol. How to Make Quality Spirits and Liqueurs in the Home.
1. 2. Make clean, pure ethanol. Use the best available essences to convert it.
A common mistake is to try to copy the traditional way spirits and liqueurs are commercially made. You will fail unless you use exactly the same raw materials, the same equipment, the same process control, and the same maturating processes. Get just one thing wrong and the result will be nothing like the commercial drink you are trying to match. To illustrate, look what happened when a Scotch whisky manufacturer changed just one detail of his traditional process:
1. Ten years ago this Scotch whisky maker decided to buy a new still. He went to great expense to ensure the new stainless steel still was exactly the same shape and size as his old copper one, knowing full well that any changes to shape or size would alter the character of his whisky.
The new still was installed and the virgin whisky (before maturation) was produced exactly as it had been before. However, this virgin whisky had an unpleasant turnip-like smell! The scientists could not explain why the move from copper to stainless steel made such a difference...they put some copper back in the still to solve the problem! Conclusion: unless you can copy everything down to the last detail, you will fail. In this case "simplest is best." Use white granulated sugar and a good Turbo! Science of Fermentation Turbo Yeast The Science of Fermentation Page 2 of 7 You don't need to understand the science of fermentation to make good spirits and liqueurs in the home unless you want to experiment with the fermentation system, i.e., fermenting larger volumes or higher alcohol levels. But know how is the base for improvements. If you read this whole document, you will know even more then most home brew shop owners (except those who also have read it)! Seeing fermentation from the yeast's perspective helps in understanding the science. Yeast is a living organism very similar to the individual cells in our own bodies. It is easy to think of dried yeast as "just another ingredient" like nutrients or sugar. Nothing could be further from the truth. Yeast's sole aim in life is to reproduce. It does this by " budding" to produce a daughter cell identical to the parent. Given a plentiful supply of oxygen, sugar, minerals, enzymes and amino acids, it will reproduce itself every 30 minutes and one thus ends up with a bucket full of yeast! Take away the oxygen and you get much less growth and a bucket full of alcohol. |
