StillSmart

Hi Everyone

I have just joined the forum after reading through the posts for the past couple of weeks.

I'am new to distilling and purchased an Air Still Starter kit a couple of weeks ago.

I fermented my first sugar wash just using the triple distilled yeast and liquid carbon that came with the kit.

I ran it through the Air Still at the weekend following Almanacs guide and am very pleased with the results.

Me and the wife both like bourbon so purchased a couple of different bourbon essences to try.

We had our first glass last night which smelt ok and tasted ok but halfway down the glass we both noticed our bottom lip tingling and going slightly numb, is this normal. The wife was a little worried I was poisoning her lol.

I read somewhere that heads can cause this but everything seemed fine whist I was running it.

I did the stripping run and then
50ml Foreshots
250ml Heads
1000ml Hearts

Collected tails in 100mls and added some back in next day after airing.

Thanks
Paul

Hi Paul

Not sure about the tingling/numb lip but Im guessing you did have some heads in there, I would guess using a Tripple distill yeast that more than the first 250 ml after the fores contained heads, turbo yeast ptoduce hire heads than other washes like lentil, TPW or kale.

From memory the guide was written with a much cleaner fermenting wash in mind and for me personally when I tried it, I found 350ml after the fores contained detectable traces of heads, with a turbo yeast this could be upto to 40% of what you collect but that's a guess, if you do another, run, collect the entire lot in 100 or 200 ml jars, this will be the best way to determin where to make a cut between heads to hearts to tails.

Thanks Anavrin for reply.

I will try what you recommend with my next wash, think I will try the lentil wash next time.

I thought I had discarded last of the heads as I no longer had the burn on tongue when tasting.

Just to get a better picture.

You do not mention alcohol strength or subsequent dilution.

What strength spirits were you drinking?

Hi YHB

It came out a bit lower than expected at 64% ABV and then diluted to 40% ABV.

Thanks
Paul

In my experience a hearts cut from the air still was always around 65%,you can bump it higher by not diluting the strip below 30%.
We have all done it,,,because we can!
I generally get a similar % from my bigger version of the air still, Whisky or neutral.
Welcome to a learning curve.

Robert.

Same effect drinking kava in Fiji. Your lips get numb, then mouth, and it continues from there as long as you continue to drink.