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ADKdistiller

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  1. Looking for straight bourbon for sale. Looking for a variety of mash bills for blending. Ideally we're looking for aged 4-6 years but we will consider everything.
  2. Hello, We have our own sales team and currently we're writing out invoices by hand. We have Quickbooks Desktop currently that we use to make our invoices after the fact. It's way too messy and inefficient, especially since we're trying to get sales people throughout the state. Does anyone know of a good sales software that can be used on an ipad that will sync with QB desktop? Thanks! Mike
  3. Honestly we found it continuously got better as it aged. We released the bourbon when the first round of barrels were 20-22 months and it's gotten rave reviews and is flying off the shelf. We notice a big difference in barrels that are even only a few months younger in age. The 20-22 month old barrels are substantially better than 16-18.
  4. Hi Everyone, I plan to do my first run of malt whiskey in a few weeks. I plan to use peat smoked malt for 15-20% of the mash (I love peaty scotch if you can't tell). Having never done a single malt run or a run with smoked grain I'm curious about how difficult it may be to discern my heads/tails, mainly the tails. I have a lot of experience running bourbon and rye. Also, I plan to distill directly off the wort. Can anyone give me any info/advice? How the two would compare (bourbon/rye vs single malt)? Tasting notes? How the smoke affects the distillate flavor? I did do one malt whiskey run. The very first time I ever ran my still. A local brewery goofed on a batch and gave it to us to run through the still. No hops were added. I remember the tails being much sweeter than bourbon or rye. Cheers!
  5. On a related note - any advice on how to handle barrels once emptied? Will they be fine with the residual bourbon in there or should I be concerned about bacterial/fungal growth?
  6. Hi Guys, We're set to start pulling out bourbon barrels soon (15 gal). How much do you typically charge for your used barrels? There's plenty of breweries around me who would take them I'm sure. Do you typically get back the full price for what you paid them? Less? More? Cheers, Mike
  7. Hi everyone, I've been barreling bourbon for a little over a year now in 15 gallon barrels. My oldest barrels are about 13 months. I have a few questions about knowing when they've reached their peak quality and should be removed. 1) How long do people typically age product in 15 gal barrels to get the HIGHEST quality bourbon. If time was not a factor. I'm in the northeast US, we get all 4 seasons and have big seasonal temp swings. I realize this question can vary depending on a lot of different factors. Just a ballpark range would be helpful. 2) How would you describe the taste when it gets too oaky? Is the oak bitter? Acidic? Any obvious tasting notes? 3) I've noticed in my 5L barrel it will get worse, better, then really bad (I was afraid it was too oaky but let it ride) then REALLY good. Is it the same with larger barrels? If it starts to taste bitter or a barrel from a month earlier tastes more pleasant should i just empty the barrel? Or let it ride and move on to the next phase? Winter is taking hold here, so the aging process may more or less halt until spring since our rick-house is not insulated. Cheers!
  8. Unfortunately our Kothe mash tun imploded (FYI Kothe gives you zero support). We did our bourbon mash out of our still for 6 months and it worked just fine, unfortunately it was just half the volume. We would pump to a separate jacketed tank to cool. Have to say though, very happy to have our new MT. We went with Korson and they are fantastic.
  9. Bluestar, thanks for the advice. What style filter do use? A simple catridge filter like a Pentek? Plate and frame? Any specifc models you could give me that you've had success with would be extremely helpful. Thanks!
  10. Powdered carbon can be easier IF you can filter it properly. It most definitely has a positive and profound effect of my distillate, I'm just trying to figure out the best way to filter it.
  11. Hi Everyone, I'm using powdered activated carbon to carbon filter my spirits but we're having trouble removing all of the carbon. Currently we're using a Pentek 10" cartridge filter with a 0.5 micron filter. It appears to remove all of the carbon but after a period of time we notice black sediment in the bottom of our bottles. What are other people using to filter out PAC? Any pointers or specific filter types/models? Thanks!
  12. Hi Everyone, We've been working hard to develop our business plan to show investors or the bank (we'll need money very soon), but we're having trouble nailing down a realistic number for bottle sales in the first year. I know there's a lot of variation depending on what you sell and where you are, so I'm not looking for that as an answer. I'm just wondering if anyone is willing to share their actual numbers of how they did and what their situation was. Below are our details. Located in Lake George, NY. A very popular tourist destination and only 30 minutes from Saratoga. We will launch with Vodka, Flavored Vodkas, Moonshine and Gin. We will be releasing young whiskey later in the year We have a tasting room on site We have a distributor lined up with a signed commitment letter in western NY. My questions are: What did you do for first yr sales out of the tasting room? Through a distributor? Through self distribution (selling yourself to local bars, liquor stores and restaurants)? How were sales of t-shirts, hats, glasses, etc? I realize your situation may be different from mine, I'm just looking for some real numbers from real distilleries. Feel free to personal message me if you don't want to post it to the public. Thank you all!
  13. Hi Everyone, We have a 1000L Kothe still we just hooked up. A local brewery gave us a wash and we ran our first ever batch through the still. We're still learning our equipment and I wanted to reach out to the forum to get some help with some of the issues we're having. 1) Dephlegmator - When the guys from Koval came to set up the still, they said we wanted to run our dephlegmator at around 77C. This has proven very difficult. The dephlegmator is cooled by the water that exits the condenser - the condenser temp is controlled by a thermostatic valve on the ingoing cooling water. As the distillation progresses, the temp of the dephlegmator will increase and the ABV in the parrot will drop significantly (seemingly way before it was supposed to). We had to then increase our cooling to compensate, long story short the temp and our ABV ended up being all over the place for most of the distillation. Has anyone else run into this? Since other factors play a role in the dephlegmator temp (vapor temp, volume of vapor) do you think it would be a good idea to get the dephlegmator on it's own, separate control system that can self regulate the temp of the dephlegmator itself? Also, is it a good thing that the dephlegmator temp increases as the distillation continues? Will this allow for compounds with a lower vapor pressure and higher BP which could add valuable flavor components to make it through into the tail end of the hearts? 2) The plates - What effect have you all found in terms of adjusting the liquid level in the plates? I have in my notes from when the Koval guys came here is that having the plates more closed (high liquid level) gives higher separation (cleaner distillate) that having them all the way down. Is this because it forces all of the steam to condense when it hits that plate? Wouldn't having the plates more open force more liquid to drain back into the previous plates and into the still and also have a purifying effect? What effect to do see in ABV off the parrot with the plates? Effect on the flavor? Difference in upper plates vs lower plates? Any recommended ways to run it? Thanks everyone, hopefully I can repay the favor with some needed info for you one day! ADKdistiller
  14. Hi Everyone, We have a 1000L Kothe still we just hooked up. A local brewery gave us a wash and we ran our first ever batch through the still. We're still learning our equipment and I wanted to reach out to the forum to get some help with some of the issues we're having. 1) Dephlegmator - When the guys from Koval came to set up the still, they said we wanted to run our dephlegmator at around 77C. This has proven very difficult. The dephlegmator is cooled by the water that exits the condenser - the condenser temp is controlled by a thermostatic valve on the ingoing cooling water. As the distillation progresses, the temp of the dephlegmator will increase and the ABV in the parrot will drop significantly (seemingly way before it was supposed to). We had to then increase our cooling to compensate, long story short the temp and our ABV ended up being all over the place for most of the distillation. Has anyone else run into this? Since other factors play a role in the dephlegmator temp (vapor temp, volume of vapor) do you think it would be a good idea to get the dephlegmator on it's own, separate control system that can self regulate the temp of the dephlegmator itself? Also, is it a good thing that the dephlegmator temp increases as the distillation continues? Will this allow for compounds with a lower vapor pressure and higher BP which could add valuable flavor components to make it through into the tail end of the hearts? 2) The plates - What effect have you all found in terms of adjusting the liquid level in the plates? I have in my notes from when the Koval guys came here is that having the plates more closed (high liquid level) gives higher separation (cleaner distillate) that having them all the way down. Is this because it forces all of the steam to condense when it hits that plate? Wouldn't having the plates more open force more liquid to drain back into the previous plates and into the still and also have a purifying effect? What effect to do see in ABV off the parrot with the plates? Effect on the flavor? Difference in upper plates vs lower plates? Any recommended ways to run it? Thanks everyone, hopefully I can repay the favor with some needed info for you one day! ADKdistiller
  15. Our moonshine is a whiskey - all grain, no sugar added, we'll distill it to ~70-75%. So would I classify it as just whiskey? Would they still let us call it moonshine on the label? Sorry for the newbie questions, your help is greatly appreciated.
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