HomeDistilling

[jamiebenedickt]

Any of you fellow Hillybillies ever home distill? Ethanol of course.

[joshuaream]

When I was in college we used to distill ale (not beer) and make cheap unaged whiskey. Anything with hopps tasted even worse than the white dog we made. I don't really know why we did that instead of just drinking the ale, but it seemed cool at the time.

It wasn't too far from you, Missoula.

[Mud Hawk]

You can ferment apple cider (or even apple juice without preservatives) and freeze it... most of the water freezes and what you can siphon out is cider jack. I don't think that method is illegal either... Pitch in some corn sugar and Red Star "Montrachet" champagne yeast will produce a lil' higher alchy-hol content... Another plus to the Montrachet yeast is it packs a fairly solid "lees" on the bottom of the carboy so you don't even have to mess with a secondary fermenter.

[Mud Hawk]

If anybody is interested, Google "Ed Worts Apfelwein"...

It is a great starter into the brewing world. The recipe makes something extremely close to German Apfelwein (apple wine). Figure about $25-$30 and three months wait for a five gallon batch from your local grocery store (outside of the cost for a five gallon glass carboy, airlock, one step sanitizer, Montrachet yeast, corn sugar, and bottling supplies). Guess you could be in full production for under $75...

[Scotto]

When I was in 8th grade, our science teacher was teaching about alcohol, and rattled off an easy way for people to make wine. I wrote it down in my notebook and bam, I had wine fermenting in my bedroom closet a few days later. It had quite a kick. A couple buddies pitched in for grape juice and sugar, and I was doing up to 5 gallons at a whack.

I was always doing some crazy stupid stuff.

[jamiebenedickt]

Originally Posted by Scotto

When I was in 8th grade, our science teacher was teaching about alcohol, and rattled off an easy way for people to make wine. I wrote it down in my notebook and bam, I had wine fermenting in my bedroom closet a few days later. It had quite a kick. A couple buddies pitched in for grape juice and sugar, and I was doing up to 5 gallons at a whack.

I was always doing some crazy stupid stuff.

LOL thats good stuff there.

[Kevin Young]

No distilling here, but lots of brewing. Have left the world of Ales behind for lagers. 10 gallons of amber marzen lagering at 33 degrees F. in the fridge now, will be ready for kegging in a couple of months.