Elixir Distilling Company

oh hell yea............ i cant even imagine.

14 hours ago, indyspirits said:

The enzymes come with documentation. I believe it's around .36ml / lb of starch.  Nice part about enzymes is you can use them during heat up so when the corn begins to gel the enzymes can get right to work. If you're using barley or rye by the time the temp is high enough to gel the starch in the corn the naturally occurring enzymes in the bar/rye have denatured.  I applaud the brave folks that use barley/rye/whatever else exclusively.  

 

 

 

 

When your using Rye/wheat etc for their enzymes youd cook your corn first - then cool until your strike temperature for mashing your malts/grains. Then add them in and hold till done etc etc.. So youd keep the enzymes from being denatured.

-S

3 minutes ago, bluestar said:

Except if you find good old white oak barnwood, that stuff is worth a fortune as finish wood for cabinetry and interior construction. We did our floors out of 150 year old resawn oak barn timbers, it's gorgeous.

No one says you cant take your just used infusing wood to build a cabinet out of when your done with your aging............... Even better!

6 hours ago, Silk City Distillers said:

 

I'd love to find some old white oak barn wood siding that was never painted, 50 years old, and make a whiskey out of an old barn.

I absolutely LOVE this idea. Its not hard to find reclaimed barn wood - if you ran it through a planer enough to get rid of ALL the paint (got to have lead in it if its old) then toast and char? Or perhaps toast it in a smoker?  This is what great stories are made of!

Silk  - this is brilliant! I got a smoker - bring me a box of wood and try this out!

-Scott 

I would agree - it should be fine to do. You may have to remove or deface the label making them unable to be sold. Then transfer and relable. With the defaced or removed lable they would be unfinished product.

Just my .02

Scott

Seems I forgot to update this... after making a couple of calls I did speak with the ABC (alcohol beverage control) in the great state of New Jersey and was informed by two different people that in fact the State does not set operating hours. Operating hours are set by the municipality. 

This did lead me to ask a couple of places why they thought they had to close at 10pm. To be fair it was two craft breweries and only one distillery so its not exactly a real survey. However all 3 of them said "I heard it from someone".  Seems to me depending on what your doing in your tasting room you might want to stay open a little later then 9 or 10pm. Especially on Friday and Saturday.

Cheers!

-Scott

5 minutes ago, Southernhighlander said:

Firefighter,

 

Since the spirit still is direct fire electric I would never put low wines in it over 30%.  If you put 85% low wines in the direct fire electric still the heating elements may ignite the low wines and you may die horribly in a distillery explosion.  I suggest either our 300 gallon mash tun/stripping/Ultra Pro Vodka Still (not listed on the site but it is the same price as the Ultra Pro Vodka still)

Our https://distillery-equipment.com/45 gallon Still.htm jacketed still with  6" 6 plate bubble plate column with our 6"x6' packed column section would be a much better option for your spirit still.  This hybrid column set up costs a great deal less than a 20 plate and it will do vodka, but the 20 plate bubble plate column would give you more neutrality.

What he said!

-Scott

You can also run the batch more then once through the still to concentrate it further I believe. Can anyone chime in on this. I have seen some very nice gin made using less then 20 plates. After the first bunch of plates you can make the spirit more pure with additional plates but the difference with each plate is significantly less. For example (and im making these numbers up so please anyone chime in) you might be at 80% or better at 6 plates and it will take 12 more plates to get to 90%. I run a test still now thats only a pot still and I can get 85% after 2 runs with no plates at all. And I make gin.

just my much less experienced .02.

Scott

Just an update -- I finally got around to running my "rice" wash. As I said above I did the beer traditionally. I only made a small test batch using 5 lbs of rice and two bags of chinese yeast balls. Ended up with a half gallon of rice wine/beer. it took weeks (i think it was about 6 and I still had a good bunch of rice left over in the wash) I ran it twice, a stripping run and again a separation run. I ended up with ALOT of methanol. My stripping run gave me about 24 ounces at about 60%abv.. I took out 6 ounces in heads and ended up with about 16 ounces of hearts in my second run and landed at about 82%abv via my mini pot test still - making roughly 32 ounces at 40%. It has an almost thick tongue feel and a slight taste of licorice. I have no idea where to go with it at this point but its really interesting in flavor. It may be worth expanding in the future. 

This was no grinding at all - cooked via a pressure cooker (but boiled would work just as well) and dumped into a sanatized bucket. Yeast balls were crushed and sprinkled over the top. Thats it.....

-Scott

In New Jersey we cant sell food.

People can call for take out or bring it in - but we are by law not allowed to sell food or operate a restaurant.

-Scott

I was wondering if anyone has a handle on regulations on operating hours? I didnt think it was controlled by anyone but the municipality.

I noticed alot of the distilleries near me seem to close fairly early. Latest I saw was midnight.

Anyone care to chime in?

Thanks

Scott

Congrats!!!

27 minutes ago, JustAndy said:

He's really giving it the hard sell, amazing he has any left in stock....

"This imported Roman, Petite absinthe (Pontica) is the best imported pontica  I can source, it looks like saw dust, smells like saw dust and is nothing like what I grow myself"

 

 

Yea I think when I contacted him he had his own he grew listed for sale.. I wonder what happened to that..

Scott

Here is where i have gotten mine in the past - He should have that in stock I think....   https://www.absintheherbs.com/1-ounce-Imported-Pontica-5-per-1-ounce.htm

Have you tried him?

-Scott

2 hours ago, Silk City Distillers said:

Oh, now we're talking.  Thanks to my wife who fixed it.

 

 

Gelatin?

Scott

2 hours ago, Silk City Distillers said:

A beautiful royal blue macro-glitter that emphasizes my rugged individualism.

 

Honestly -- green is where it is I think... Blue is so last year...... 

1 hour ago, Southernhighlander said:

I don't think the blue macro glitter would go over well.  It's to cityfied and appears to indicate metrosexuality instead of rugged individualism?

You wanted rugged individualism? How about sand?  Sands all natural too - and gluten free!

27 minutes ago, Silk City Distillers said:

This thread is way too serious, so I'm going to make glittery blue moonshine.

 

What glitter did you finally decide on?

Scott

On 4/17/2018 at 11:48 AM, Southernhighlander said:

 

What Moonshine means today.  Those who make legal moonshine and those who drink it are carrying on the traditions of individualism and the right to liberty.  They are throwing dirt in the face of those who want to dictate rules for the rest of us and tell us what we should and should not be calling the spirits that we create in our own distilleries.  They are telling the snobs and those who think that they are better than us, that they can go to hell.  Shine on brothers and sisters in the North, West and South and all over the world.  Shine on!!!

AMEN BROTHER!!! A-FN-MEN!

-Scott

Have you tried re-distilling? If you run it through again you will still bring over the oils and compounds and it might leave the color behind. Do you have a small test still to try it out on?

I dont know if this would work - or if it would effect the flavor too much - but I have re-run through my 5l test still and have seen things clear.

Just a though

-Scott

gold!

-S

6 hours ago, AK2 said:

Do you have a recommendation on a brand that would have a hard drive that copies over itself after a certain amount of time?  I am looking at the Arlo Pro 2 but further research suggests it would triple my monthly wifi bill from the 24/7 streaming to the cloud.  The best buy rep said six cameras would take 100 mpbs to operate..

Almost ever commercial level product has a hard drive or hard drives and records over the video.... when properly programmed. There are a number of things that you want to be able to set,,, one is motion recording. This will only record and use drive space  ( or potentially bandwidth) when the camera sees motion. The frame rate... which can be set as high as 30 frames per second.  Should be down around 7 unless your looking at alot of fast moving activity. Etc etc. There are alot of tweaks that can be done in order to save both drive space and bandwidth. On top of that you set this system to recycle say anywhere from 2 weeks to 2 months depending on the amount of drive space you use. With motion detection on that varies with how much activity your camera sees and whether you have set them up correctly.

A number of companies  make decent systems with good or better remote access and expandable drive space.  The cheapest ive used is HIK Vision. There stuff is good.. not my favorite and their support is ok. For you that want to build out your own pc id use Geovision. Software is free with them. Their support is just ok.... i no longer will build out a pc for this. PCs run into issues over time. Id stick with a more hardware based solution such as the HIK or one of the better brands. I love 3xlogic.  Not expensive, made in usa, excellent tech support, great online access options, hardened recorder... lots of options.  You cant go wrong with 3x. They also have the Infinias line of access control that integrates with your video so card access also gives you a recording tied to it making looking up stuff super easy.  And god forbid your not their and the cops show up and need a video to go... you can do that remotely for them and all someone has to do is stick in a blank dvd for you.

We spend ridiculous amounts on a still and barely blink.... step up a little and get a good surveillance system.  Perhaps you will never need it. But the day you do you will feel it was the best money you ever spent. 

Scott

FIrst off - I have NO affiiliation with this company at all.......  I happenend across this looking for something else and I thought it was unique. They are also mentioning on their website an industrial version as well. 
Here is the link: https://www.plaato.io/

This is an airlock (carboy sized) that digitially monitors your fermentation and talks to your phone or Ipad and lets you know about the activity, temp, ABV, and SG. Its $135... 

I wonder if it can be used on a larger sized fermenter with some sort of mods... or wait for the industrial version. Is there anything like this out there now near this price or as simple?

-Scott

9 hours ago, Southernhighlander said:

.  Also,the amount of maintenance required over 5 or 6 years was more than I thought that it would be, but mainly that is because we have so many outdoor cameras.  The dang mice or squirrels or something keep chewing the wires outside and we have had a couple of the outside cameras fail because of moisture even though they were supposed to be fore use outdoors.

Other than lightning strikes, which are def an issue, you should have very little issue with your outside cameras. Lightning doesnt even have to hit the camera if your camera's cable transients the ground for instance a ground strike can kill cameras. There are lightning protectors for this now for both coax cameras and for IP ones. As far as mice - try the teflon cable (also called plenum cable). It might not be impervious to the critters but i see alot less chew issues over the years so perhaps it tastes bad? Or try the filled outdoor (burial cable) which has a silicon or similar gel inside it. That I bet isnt tasty.

I would look into the sealed cameras. Anything with an IP66 rating or better should give more then adequate protection over time. IP67 I believe is submersion. The old school outdoor camera cases just arent as good. There are alot of companies out there that deliver a robust commercial product with a back end that delivers what I expect from a company catering to the commercial market. It is like the difference from getting a still from China, or one from Missouri.......

As far as the dangerous stuff - cameras are not life safety devices in my opinion. They however are an important thing when it comes time to go to court. Make sure the products you use are designed for commercial use and have things like watermarking to be able to prove the video or pictures are irrefutable.

Life safety devices are things like Fire Alarms - here in NJ you have to have your fire system capable of shutting off the power to a performance and triggering lights (if you have a stage and a band lets say) so the sound stops and the light comes up. You have to have doors of a certain size and exits within a specific distance of guests in your facility in case of an emergency. If you have access control such as mag locks you have to make sure that egress is NEVER impared. So no chained or locked doors, maglocks have to unlock if a fire alarm goes off, if someone approaches the door from the inside, and if all else fails there must be a button or breakglass device to allow you to shut the power off to the door within 6feet and clearly visible and clearly labelled. These are the types of things that i see that are often done wrong. Some of them so bad that people are actually put in danger. I see this weekly - this week in fact. but thats another story.

Paul,

I WISH it was like that here! You have no idea what a .................. never mind!

The reasoning they gave me back when the first enacted the law was to make sure the alarm and security vendors out here werent criminals and to make sure they had the knowledge and training to install anything that has to do with lifesafety and insurance to back it up. It also gave customers the ability to open complaints and help police the security companies. The law is so complete here it includes fire and burglar alarm systems, video security, access control. locksmithing, and even intercom systems.  Are they making money - yup! some. The fines when they give them out are hefty too!

Here if your a plumber, and electrician, etc.. you have to have a license and insurance.  By the way - New York has something similar on the books.. not sure about PA or anywhere else.

I can also tell you to this day I come across jobs installed by other companies (licensed ones at that) that are borderline dangerous. Not cameras - Mostly access control (readers, maglocks. etc).

I actually do commercial video systems and access control for a living. I am chock full of technical info and will happily answer any questions I can (no charge and not looking for work). I do NOT know every system out there. I am however very experienced in both wired (coax) and network cameras. 

In some areas you must be licensed to install cameras in a commercial space (new jersey for sure) and this can also include access control and alarm systems. So you need to be careful and check with your local building department to make sure. You dont want to have anything ever happen and some one comes back to you and gives you grief for installing without a license or permit.

That said - there are tons of self installable systems out there now - and alot of people install them by themselves.

I can tell you in the last few years I have been LOVING some of the newer hemispheric (Fisheye) cameras. They can really cut down the amount of cameras needed while providing much better coverage and when used correctly give outstanding video quality (as do most of the newer IP cameras do).

-S