Citrus Oils in Flavored Vodkas

[RickInTampa]

Looking for a solution to our citrus oil issue......we produce flavored vodkas using macerated Florida fresh citrus. We have been toying around with increasing the flavor profile and we obviously end up with more citrus oil in our products. It tastes absolutely awesome, however, the oil causes the vodka to cloud when you add water or ice. Personally, the clouding doesn't bother me because I love the flavor, however, it is probably not conducive to increased sales!!!!

Any suggestions......

[tl5612]

I would just use less citrus. It will save you money and stop the louching. And many might argue that a more subtle/delicate flavour is far superior to that from an oil-rich spirit.

That said, if you're interested in playing around with your flavour profile further, why not try experimenting with some other botanicals? For example, cinnamon or cassia (chinese cinnamon) completment/mimic orange very well (they are very strong though!).

[Newbie in CA]

Have you tried chill filtering?

[Panoscape]

You could market it like an absinthe and make the louche a feature of the product. Come up with a cool name and start a louche lemon drink trend.

If you can't fix it, feature it!

[Artisan Still Design]

a number of years back I did a citrus macerated then distilled vodka. I found your most concentrated dose of citrus oil comes over at the very beginnings of the run. I found this was the strongest and most bitter of the citrus flavors, you can cut this like you would heads to get a clearer product. it was a very small fraction I needed to cut to keep it from louching, but your results my differ. I kept this very concentrated citrus oil aside and used it in a batch of gin for the citrus component, it was interesting gin, but I think there are better flavors to be had by using other methods.

Steve

[rumfarmer]

You could market it like an absinthe and make the louche a feature of the product. Come up with a cool name and start a louche lemon drink trend.

If you can't fix it, feature it!

I love this way of thinking!

[RickInTampa]

tl5612.....great point and I am going to play with the orange cinnamon as that is one of my favorite spices; Panoscape I love both your idea and like smoogdog, your philosophy; Artisan, thank you and I think this is what we will continue to do as I think tl5612 may be right in that the more subtle/delicate is more commercial.

I cannot tell you all how much I appreciate your assistance.....keep your eyes out for our louche lemon drink!!! I am open to names for it? Angry Lemon?

[bluestar]

We are looking at a similar decision for our Seville orange liqueur product: if we leave full extraction, it is a beautiful flavor, smell, and orange color. If we redistill, it will be more like other triple secs. But the former will louche. Let it louche when bottling at low proof, and you have the orange equivalent of a limoncello. We haven't decided how to proceed yet either.

[Artisan Still Design]

We are looking at a similar decision for our Seville orange liqueur product: if we leave full extraction, it is a beautiful flavor, smell, and orange color. If we redistill, it will be more like other triple secs. But the former will louche. Let it louche when bottling at low proof, and you have the orange equivalent of a limoncello. We haven't decided how to proceed yet either.

keep it as is and be different. I'm sure it could still be a direct substitute for triple sec in cocktails. why clone, when you can be unique but just as relevant.

[Rich Morgan]

I would just use less citrus. It will save you money and stop the louching. And many might argue that a more subtle/delicate flavour is far superior to that from an oil-rich spirit.

That said, if you're interested in playing around with your flavour profile further, why not try experimenting with some other botanicals? For example, cinnamon or cassia (chinese cinnamon) completment/mimic orange very well (they are very strong though!).

Different citrus oils, of different purities, louche at different concentrations. Their is probably dozens of different citrus (say lemon) cultivars available as essential oil, i would experiment. Also ensure that you have 100% essential oil, a lot of what is sold as essential is cut with various vegetable oils for the aromatherapy and massage oil market. My supplier has a GC/MS so we are sure of the quality.

[bluestar]

In our case, we aren't actually adding essential oil, we have extracted oils and flavors by maceration in high proof spirit.