Quinta Essentia Alchemy

Awesome, thanks. So I’m not the only one wondering, apparently.

My apologies if there is something I am missing, but I haven't been able to find any information on the TTB's proposed American Single Malt definition or a release date. I can't find anything in the TTB Public Guidance section, the Class/Type designations and the Chapter 4 Class/Type resource is still listed as 04/2007. The last mention of anything was a flurry of articles written in Spring 2023 and a docket update stating "01/00/2024" as the final rule date, but nothing since. Does anyone have any insight into when or if this standard will be made public? Additionally, I know a lot of distillers have gotten approval for the term on their products, so I am wondering what, if any guidance was given during the COLAs process. I would hate to go through the process of label revision, approval and printing just to find out the products don't meet the published standard.

We are looking to procure NY State-distilled whisky that complies with the NY State-Labelled regulations for Farm Distilleries. We are most interested in Bourbon, Rye and Malt, but would also entertain offers of other grain spirits. Ideally, these would be fully or nearly-fully aged (ca. 2+ years old) and in casks 10 gallons or larger (ideally 30-53 gal). We are fully license with numerous Transfers in Bond in place, so this would be for immediate sale after samples are approved.

This is big if true. When do you anticipate making wheat available? I'll buy it on day one.

It does seem like they got a few decent pieces of equipment out the door before things went to crap. I'm glad you had a good experience and were able to recover some of your investment. I also appreciate everyone highlighting the issues with Corson (nearly went down that dark path myself years ago; one of my clients unfortunately did). It's important that this community police itself. The fact is that the vast majority of vendors and distillers have been doing this for less than a decade and there is a lot of hubris, predatory marketing and just plain ignorance driving the industry and it needs to be called out, especially when it's so egregious. I hope your purchaser has the same positive experience you did.

Get your product and run away. Even if the above reasons most people are giving are true (brushing you off or inflating the cost to see if you'll "bite"), that's a supremely shitty way to do business. Transparency and honesty should be at the core of all discussions. If they can't give you a justifiable reason, walk away. They'll only continue to try to roll you. I've been working on locating bottlers lately for a client and came across a few possible candidates for you: I spoke with someone at Strong Spirits in KY the other day and they seemed pretty awesome, though I didn't get pricing yet. They are capable of doing very small batches, which will likely be your biggest barrier. Laird's does contract bottling in NJ, but their capacity minimums are much higher than Strong. I've sent clients to Lidestri in NY before, not exclusively for bottling, but product development and co-packing. I do see some concerning online reviews regarding how they manage their shipping dock, so that's worth exploring. You don't want a pissed off shipper handling your product. Good luck. This industry is full of weasels. Beware.

Hi Sudzie. I just stumbled across this by accident. I wonder if the differences you are seeing are due to a longer optimal steeping time of the corn grist that will allow for more complete hydrolization of starches, thereby making for a more rapid early ferment? Assuming that there are still viable enzymes in the finished mash, which there should be if you're using exogenous enzymes, there is a continuation of the saccharification process during fermentation. Over the course of four days this would even out between the two processes, but perhaps you're "front-loading" more available sugars in scenario "B". Your enzyme manufacturer should have a chart of ideal pH & temp that "B" process may be more aligned with than "A". Just a thought.

Yes, and thanks to all for that. This post is meant to aggregate peoples' experience and preference for one type of condenser, not to be antagonistic or assert that one is superior. I have personally found that coils are safer, but there are compelling arguments to be made for both styles and I want to hear them. In most of the comments above, the superiority of one style over the other has to do with the traditional materials used; copper vs. stainless. Eliminating that variable we get: Tube in Shell Pros: Compact size Less surface area contact time (also a Con for certain spirit types such as Cognac or Scotch when a longer temp gradient is desirable) Less chance of occlusion or blockage (though, as I mentioned earlier, occlusion of the condenser should never be an issue) Coil Pros: Better control of thermal gradient, especially important when using a reactive material such as copper. Safety. Totally anecdotal, I admit. I haven't seen this topic addressed on these forums before and want to understand all of the subtleties at hand. Thanks again for everyone's input.

@JustAndy, I finally had a moment to read that link, thank you. Excellent insight into the quality considerations of various condenser styles and operation. I am genuinely looking for input and insight I am lacking. For something to have become the de facto industry standard, there almost certainly is a reason beyond size or manufacturing ease. I don't know what that is. The article @JustAndy linked points out that quality was seen to suffer at certain facilities in Scotland after a changeover to tube in jacket (copper construction, no less). So if manufacturing is simpler and construction materials can be the same why was one adopted over the other?

Right, and I bet you've seen that first-hand, right (no need to answer :~). This is what prompted the question. Assuming all other things are equal (coolant temp, contact surface area, distillation running time, condenser material) is there any other specific advantage to a tube in jacket over a coil in tub? I see a whole lot of dangerous condenser designs (imo) and very few manufacturers that are willing to even admit that this design is problematic. I think that this mainly comes down to lack of actual distilling experience, but without a serious failsafe system like @Southernhighlander installs standard, these condensers are woefully under equipped. I even see designs that are meant to be hooked up to a garden hose!

I'm going to just bump the original question a bit here. The question of copper on the cooling side has been conflated a bit with condenser design. I appreciate the dialogue regarding copper precipitates, but the original question was regarding intrinsic design qualities. Copper in not intrinsic to coil condensers, even though it probably constitutes 90% of beverage alcohol still design of that style. I have seen the word "efficiency" used here quite a bit, but I am not sure it is being properly used. A condenser will condense the vapor it is fed and require the same thermal capacity to do so. Some stills may be designed to run over a much longer period of time and have an appropriately-sized condenser tube that reflects that, but that is still design, not an intrinsic deficiency in the coil design itself. Could someone with more insight expand on this?

This is a major quality argument for coils. Theoretically, this could be achievable with a stainless coil, but the reactivity of the copper in many brandy styles is seen as intrinsic to quality. I'm not sure I agree with this, but I also realize that they know far more than I do on the subject.

What do you mean by "efficiency"? Assuming cooling fluid type and temp being the same, both condensers would run just as efficiently, i.e. require the same thermal capacity to condense the same vapor. Tube in jacket are certainly smaller pieces of equipment, but when you're talking about equipment that routinely exceeds 10' in overall length, the difference between a 12" dia. and 36" dia. condenser is negligible. Multiple vapor paths would reduce risk of occlusion, but if there is occluding material in your condenser, it's not going to be the thing to save you; you're already screwed. I have never seen a still that does not dramatically reduce the vapor path at least once and usually multiple times before it reaches a condenser (lyne arms, columns, vapor baskets, etc.). I have seen a few tequila/mescal still earthenware designs that take spirit directly into a condensing apparatus of some sort, similar to an Alquitar, but still there was significant restriction of the vapor path going in. I agree that most products should not see copper on the cooling side of vapor, however, Cognac, Armagnac and plenty of other traditional producers are adamant that this impacts flavor and aroma positively, so I'm in no position to doubt them. And I think it has much more to do with quality than tradition or primitive machining. They make changes to process in other areas; impingement burners as opposed to wood fire, for instance. Your last statement may be true for illicit distillation, but many, many distilling processes both traditional and modern employ them and for good cause. One of which is intrinsic safety. Again, I have never seen a coil release vapor. If you've been distilling with a tube in jacket for any length of time, I would bet that you have, no?

Because the coolant volume and ratio to vapor in a water bath is significantly higher than in a tube in jacket. When a tube in jacket overheats the coolant, it takes mere minutes to get to a release of vapor. On the other hand, I have never seen a water bath even come close to overheating.

I have been chewing over a question for nearly a decade now and, frankly can't come to a balanced conclusion. I would like to hear others' input on this: What is the benefit of a tube-in-jacket condenser system over a traditional worm/coil and tub setup? I have worked hands-on in dozens of distilleries over the years and beyond a doubt over-boil vapor release situations, that being where a loss of water pressure or similar coolant flow event, have been the most common and dramatic safety issue I have seen. I would bet that any distillery operating for more than 6 months has seen a vapor release of some sort due to the design of tube-in-jacket systems. I have brought this to numerous manufacturers and have been met with both incredulity and acknowledgement of the problem. A few have even offered reasonable, low-cost safety backup systems such as external vapor venting as a standard feature (looking at you, @Southernhighlander). For the most part, however, I don't see any system redundancy or failsafes in the vast majority of distilleries I visit or manufacturer designs I see. So back to my original question. What, if any, specific and unique benefit does tube-in-jacket have over a coil designed with the same throughput rate? Let's do this, nerds.