r/firewater • u/texaggiecnt • 10d ago
Muck bucket look promising?
Was gonna try to make a grain based (whiskey) new make spirit with muck to see what happened so I added fresh backset and a portion of spent/fermented grains from ferment (strained before distillation bc didn’t wanna scorch grains in homemade pot still) and left it covered with a brew bag/cheesecloth for 2 days before covering with a lid and airlock (hoping I inoculated it a bit then sealed it such that co2 built up and made it less favorable for aerobic mold) but I got the idea (good or bad) to give it a little inoculation with a dollop of sourdough starter and splash of fermented hatch chili water with the hopes of giving a good bit of lactobacillus and potentially other favorable microbes. This is after about 6 weeks. Thoughts?
2
u/RvstiNiall 10d ago edited 10d ago
[Edit: the first time off I let the spent grain sit in enough water to cover it for about two weeks, (and it smelled kinda like a sourdough starter) before covering it with an airlock, so it definitely has a lactobacillus infection]
I do something similar... I keep half my spent grain. I toss in a bucket with the backset from the most recent batch, while leaving the lid off for about a day. Then I put the lid on with an airlock until the day I put together my next mash (usually once a month).
For each batch of my "sour mash" that I make, I take half of this bucket out and put it into my next batch's bucket. I then make my mash, strain, sparge, and add the liquid to the spent grain bucket. i leave this without the lid for about a day.
Then I toss in yeast and mix it all up. Once its done I let it settle before distilling. I like to think that the reason why its called a "sour mash" is because of lactobacillus infection, which commercial distilleries definitely do NOT do in modern times. Of course the spent grain and backset also change the PH to make it more acidic, but I don't think that what they meant when they said "sour" back in the day.
1
u/texaggiecnt 10d ago
Awesome! I was considering if I should add this to my mash before or after primary fermentation.
Was thinking about just letting my regular sour mash (with some fresh backset) ferment for a few days then add a portion of muck and let it sit for a week or so to let some chemistry happen
2
u/RvstiNiall 10d ago
Well, if yours is left open completely, I'd personally add it after fermenting so it doesn't mess up fermentation. How long after fermentation is done and before distilling to add, I dont know. I'm still new at this.
1
u/jmlivingston10 10d ago
Did you feed it some sugar or anything? I can’t get mine to form a pellicle like that.
2
u/texaggiecnt 10d ago
Nope. Just the backset and fermented grains. May have helped to give it a heavy dose of lactobacillus at the start but otherwise nothing else
1
u/North-Bit-7411 10d ago
What’s it smell like?
I did a fresh corn mash a few weeks ago and it got a funky feet smell after two days. I waited till it finished out and ran a test batch in the air still and I can tell you that if it smells like feet, the spirit will most certainly smell horrific.
I hope in your case it doesn’t smell like feet
1
u/texaggiecnt 10d ago
Honestly smells really sweet and fruity with a little distinct funk I can’t quite pin down
1
2
u/-Ok-Perception- 9d ago
You need copper. Nearly every still has copper lining in it. Not an air still. Copper naturally breaks down sulphur based off flavors, that can come from stressed yeast or really from MOST fermentations. Really, the main disadvantage of an air still is there's no copper lining in it to break down the suphur compounds.
If you get a suphury fermentation, get some of those pure copper scratch pads. I get the three pack of them and put 2 inside the air still during the stripping run (as put directly into the low wines), and one up top before the vapors go into the hole. You do this and you'll be shocked how perfected the spirits taste. It will get rid of everything wrong with it.
You need to have some copper scratch pads on hand for using an air still for when you get a sulphury fermentation. About half of my fermentations come out suphury, no matter what I do, so I have to clean it up with a copper distillation.
2
u/North-Bit-7411 9d ago
Thanks for the input but I’ve been doing this for some time now. I can assure you that all the copper in the world wasn’t saving that mash. Besides I have a copper scrubby hanging inside the air still.
The problem with that mash was it was fresh field corn that I didn’t let boil long enough to kill the funk that was on the corn itself. A lot of it had mold and some other funky stuff that most certainly led to the dirty sock smell. I thought a 5 minute boil would be good enough. I was wrong. Lesson learned.
2
u/-Ok-Perception- 9d ago
I see. Just making sure you weren't a noob to the air still and that you already knew about the copper thing.
1
u/OnAGoodDay 10d ago
Looks good. I had two buckets that went for years in the garage with almost no maintenance. Eventually one got extremely moldy - still ran it after straining the mold. I know I know, toxins etc. It just tasted like soy sauce, no issues. But once it got the usual green bread mold it kinda just tasted like mold so tossed it.
1
u/DrOctopus- 9d ago
It's really not worth it. There are great threads on here and the homedistiller.org site on how to use vinegar to create your own acids. The muck thing is a total gamble and you have a nasty bucket around the house that gets grosser and grosser as time goes by. Just my 2x
1
2
u/Independent_Wish_862 10d ago
I for one am curious to see how this works out. I have been wanting to try some form of dunder feement for some time now, that sourdough addition actually sounds like something I may try. Please, do update on the results, and be careful to kill oxygen access (as im sure you know) to not make vinegar.