StillSmart

Sometimes you eat the bar.

Sometimes the bar eats you.

Sometimes life is indeed a bag of shit.

Robert

Duffer26 wrote:Sometimes you eat the bar.

Sometimes the bar eats you.

In the same philosophical vane..

Sometimes you're the pigeon and sometimes the statue...

Looks like both washes are just about complete. SG reading on both is just below 1000 so will shut off the heat and let them settle for a few days.

Learned a lot from this brew. Firstly, the addition of more nutrient even though the lentils are supposed to contain enough. Was telling the owner of our local HB shop about this brew yesterday. I mentioned to her about the extra nutrients and Vitamin B1 tablets. She said that I should use them all the time as she has had more success with brewing over the last forty years by using them.

Heat - This wash loves the heater at 28/30 degrees. Accidently switched them off for 24 hours while fermenting. Looked like it had stopped until turning them back on again and seeing the reaction a few hours later. If the heaters were on constantly throughout, this brew would have finished within five days.

And finally the PH levels. Started off with PH 5.2 and checked daily. PH dropped dramatically for the first two days right down to 3.3 so brought back up to 5.0 on these two days. Third day it was brought back up to 4.8 and day four 4.2. After day four I made no more additions of Sodium Bicarbonate.

Chubbs wrote:

Heat - This wash loves the heater at 28/30 degrees. Accidently switched them off for 24 hours while fermenting. Looked like it had stopped until turning them back on again and seeing the reaction a few hours later. If the heaters were on constantly throughout, this brew would have finished within five days.

And finally the PH levels. Started off with PH 5.2 and checked daily. PH dropped dramatically for the first two days right down to 3.3 so brought back up to 5.0 on these two days. Third day it was brought back up to 4.8 and day four 4.2. After day four I made no more additions of Sodium Bicarbonate.

That is prety much the way that I do this.

Robert.

I've had this wash on for 4 weeks now.

It finished fermenting at a low temp after 3 weeks at 10%, quite happy with that.

It has shown no sign of clearing. How long should this take?

I'm in no rush but I worry about it going off or something.

If someone could help me out......

Regards, Marc.

It's finished. Double distilled and filtered.

Tastes like shit.

I am not a fan of lentil because I don't believe it is AS neutral as KALE. However it should NOT taste like shite.

Answer #1
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Off flavours start in the fermentation and then transfer. So I think the answer is 80% in how you fermented it & 10% how you stripped it. 10% is still magic.

I recall you were planning to run this hotter (26-28) and will a good dose of Gypsum to adjust the water. What happened?

Did you fiddle with the PH? I have a theory that people mis diagnose PH swings when the actual cause is a water deficiency. PH is a complex subject and non linear

Answer #2
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When you say "Tastes like shit" - can you describe it? I nearly typed a list of descriptions - perhaps it is better that I don't put the ideas out there.

It's hard to describe the taste, maybe I can taste the lentils with l lot of harshness.

I absolutely agree that something went wrong with the wash as it too tasted like crap, not off or infected just not nice like my other washes that I taste.

I didn't mess about with this wash re PH at all.

It ran at very low temperatures 16 ish.

I was quite drunk when I made the wash but I am a very high functioning drinker.

The people I work with never know I'm blitzed, which is lucky because
they'd never get in the cab if they did.

Duffer26 wrote:


It ran at very low temperatures 16 ish.

I think this might be it - what yeast did you use ? Yeast stress (being to cold) can cause off flavors.

Allisons.

Interestingly my next temperature controlled wash
which is a hybrid (lentils, tomato paste and spinach) is clearing now and tastes lovely.

Tasting the stuff really does help. I have been dripping into various ferments for years now and it is amazing what your taste buds tell you.

I think it makes perfect sense that if a wash tastes nice so will the likker.

IMO, being a fan of Lentil washes, and a user of Allinsons almost exclusively, it is your temps. that were wrong.
Allinsons works best, fastest and cleanest at 28 to 30°C.
Just sayin'.

@ Mash,stop dripping into your ferments, it really can't be beneficial

Robert.

Hello to everyone.

I am looking to experiment with a lentil wash next week, and would ask; what specific type of PH strips should I purchase to use when testing the PH of my mix? I have 100 of those that say they should only be used for testing saliva and urine. Wiould they be sufficient?

Regards,

Philip