What exactly is an infusion

[Guest Bobcat Hill]

We're having a hard time finding a definition of infusion. Are the flavors added into the mash and then distilled? Is it also an infusion if the flavors are added to the finished distillate?

[Spazsquatch]

Your latter definition is the only one I've ever seen. If you added it to the mash it would just be an ingredient IMO.

[Guest Bobcat Hill]

So to take this to the next steps, do infusions have to be approved as a formulation? What if your infusion flavors are mostly fruit and a bit of candy. Would this be difficult for formulation and labelling?

[paul@mbroland.com]

You would likely need to go through formulation.

[stillwagon]

Using a Gin basket during distillation, this is considered infusion is it not? The oils of the botanicals involved are "infused" into the distillate vapor as they begin their exit of the still....

[Charles@AEppelTreow]

I see 'infusion' getting more use as a competition category equivalent to a mistelle. A fortified wine that is fermented (much) less than port. Like vermouth without the herbs. No real reason that kind of product can't be made as what I understand to be a 'dry liqueur'.

And I agree with Paul. Send in a formula. (And see what the ALFD says.)

[stillwagon]

I have been struggling with this term as well. The question was of the process, what is an infusion? Is it an actual industry term? Or is it a marketing tool? Is maceration a sort of infusion? Or is it simply adding an ingredient even though you are removing the bulk of it after the process? Is the use of the gin basket infusion? or is it simply adding the essential oils of the botanicals being used?

[bluestar]

Gin basket is not an infusion. Infusion happens in a liquid. No liquid is carried into the condenser. Now, if you have a basket in a the path of condensate, that would be an infusion. But gin baskets are usually not located so that the condensate on the botanicals will go into the product, but rather drip back into the column or pot.

[stillwagon]

That helps me a great deal. The botanical basket that the stillmaker added to my still is in the path of the vapor as it is placed between the column and the shotgun. So the material cannot drip back to the column.

[bluestar]

That helps me a great deal. The botanical basket that the stillmaker added to my still is in the path of the vapor as it is placed between the column and the shotgun. So the material cannot drip back to the column.

That placement is not unusual, but it usually set up so that anything condensing on the botanicals goes somewhere. It should go into the column or pot. A classic example is locating it directly under a dephlegmator. If instead it is installed in something that is the equivalent location of a thumper, that could work too. Still not an infusion.

[stillwagon]

I think I have it now. Maceration is the soaking of a substance to soften or break up its constituents. Infusion is the constituents of that substance's inclusion in the liquid it is soaked in. Hydrodiffusion is the extraction of the essential oils of a substance through which steam passes.

But is it not infusion when those essential oils are left in the distillate? It is still a component of the substance being incorporated into the liquid that was used to extract it. When it leaves the condenser it is a liquid combined with the base used for its extraction, as you state, is a requirement for infusion. Or is this not how the TTB or the industry views it? If this is the case, then how is this process defined?

I only ask as this is how my still's botanical basket is set up. The vapor passes through the botanicals, then is condensed. There is no opportunity for it to drip back into the boiler.