Lined up and ready to go

It's that time of year again, and this morning I took a number of my distillates down for judging in this year's competition.

Here are all my little soldiers, lined up in a row, ready to go into battle...

Left to right - Vodka, Gin, White Rum, Chilli Vodka, Pommeau de Normandie, Bourbon, Golden Rum, Malt Whisky and Cherry Brandy.

The Vodka we've discussed before, and is a sugar wash distilled twice through the alembic still.
The Gin and White Rum are essences added to a neutral spirit.
The Chilli Vodka we've also talked about earlier, but I chickened out which the 'in your face' boldness chosen by The Siberians and opted for the diced cayenne without seeds.
The Pommeau is 'Pacific Rose' apples with caster sugar and a splash of natural vanilla soaked in neutral spirit and is one of the top things I've made.
The bourbon is a Kentucky Bourbon essence with neutral spirit, but back blended with a portion of a 2 year old batch that had been on wood.
The Golden Rum is a surprise success. It was a mix of 2 essences that I'd had lying around but I dropped the alcohol content way down and it's been around since November.
The malt whisky was fermented from malt extract and then casked in a sherry-soaked 1L American oak barrel for 14 months. When I took it out and bottled it I was disappointed that the sherry flavour was very dominant and the the oak almost wasn't there. It was the third time I'd used the barrel and I think that it could do with re-charring. I've lifted the oak a little by using chips after bottling.

We'll know in December what the judges think.

Chilli Vodka

Back on 23 March I made some Chilli Vodka. My first attempt was to just cut a chilli from the garden, push it into a bottle and top up with 45o neutral spirit.

Then I thought I'd open up some more surface area and split a chilli in two, left the seeds in, pushed that into a bottle and topped up with spirit.

The third version was a finely chopped chilli with no seeds.

The distilling competition is coming up next week so it was time to get the samples out of the cupboard and see which was best. I asked some Siberian friends who have some experience with Chilli Vodka to do a blind test. The 3 samples were labelled A, B & C.

The darkest one, on the right side of the photo, was the chopped chilli, which to my mind looked the most interesting. However the split chilli with seeds was voted by the panel the best, so that's the one I'll submit. The chopped chilli came in second and the whole chilli rated third.

Now we'll have to wait and see what the competition judges think...

Hi, ho, hi, ho, it's off to work she goes...

We've been having a problems with the grass:alpaca ratio lately, and so the alpacas have had run of the property. It's been quite fun having them stroll past the kitchen window or pop up outside the bedroom. They are creatures of habit though, and they love watching the chickens being fed in the morning and saying "goodbye" as we go to work...

They have knocked hell out of the hostas and eaten all the mondo gras, but we wanted to redevelop the entance way anyway. Ah well, they've just raised a 'like to do' job to a 'must do' job.

Here's what they look like...

In earlier posts I mentioned making both prosciutto and limoncello, so here's what they look like so far:

The prosciutto:

It was a 10kg leg from a free-range South Island sow. It was packed in salt for 45 days and now hangs in the garage. Around mid November the bone will get removed and it gets pressed and hung for another 6 months. I think it'll be a fine prosciutto and my wife thinks it'll be a fine case of botulism. We'll see who's right...

Limoncello:

There was a mass of lemons on the tree at the bach, so when life hands you lemons - you make Limoncello!

The jar on the right is the zest of 10 lemons (45grams), 500ml of vodka and 250ml of 1:2 water:sugar. That will be ready to bottle and drink in a couple of months.

The jar on the left is the zest of 12 lemons (60grams) and 1L of vodka. I'll leave that to steep for 2 months and add sugar solution and leave it for another month before straining and bottling and leaving it for a further month +.

Friday night brew night

I have a friend that is very keen on home brew and has done quite well in a brewing competition.
He has been encouraging me to do more all grain brewing and it is great fun. Last Friday night I made another Irish Red Ale with a few tweaks from my last batch.

First 16 litres of water was bought up to a temperature of 76oC and a mix of malted and roasted barleys were added and left to 'mash' for 60 minutes.

I've added a thermowell into the side of my pot still and can now run it through a temperature control unit, so I take that up to 76oC and use it as a hot water tank. I put small steps on the bench to get a good head of pressure for rinsing the grains after mashing, and always conscious of good health and safety practice strapped the still to the stairs. No fun thinking of 15 litres of hot water tipping over the kitchen floor!

After sparging 27 litres of wort was bought to the boil. Hops were added at the start of the boil and it was left on a rolling boil for 60 minutes.

At the end of the boil it was cooled as rapidly as possible down to about 24oC and then poured into a fermenter. The Irish Ale Yeast was then pitched in.

Under airlock, it is now in the hot water cupboard and bubbling away quite merrily. I like the smell of the hall now, but not all in the household are so impressed...

Bottled and ready to sleep for a month or more.