At the end of last year, a store selling moonshine stills opened near my house. I am a lover of good cognac and have always dreamed of learning how to make it with my own hands. And here is the store.
Without thinking twice, I went into it to see what devices are being sold, how much they cost. Eyes fled from the abundance of technology. Fortunately for me, there is the Internet in the country, and I decided that I should finally figure it out.
This story was sent by my subscriber Nikolai Sh.
Theoretical training
The study began in the forums of moonshiners, then the understanding came that it was necessary to study the theory.
Twenty years ago, people made devices with their own hands, felt everything on themselves and, basically, came to the conclusion that the standard installations produced today are quite reliable, technologically advanced and not expensive.
I had to download some old moonshine books. It turned out that science in the USSR was very actively engaged in this, and over the past 30 years nothing has changed in chemistry, and old books explain everything.
The forums have existed for about 20 years and the people, through trial and error, and then with the help of these books, have learned to make a very high-quality product.
In my case, a quality product meant pure alcohol. On industrial installations, it is obtained with a strength of 96,5 degrees, today it is possible to obtain the same strength on home installations of the average price category.
Hard choice
I was faced with a choice:
- Produce distillate;
- Produce alcohol.
And I solved the question very simply: a distillation column, with which alcohol is obtained, with a slight alteration, allows you to get a distillate, and of excellent quality. So I settled on a distillation column with a capacity of 19 liters above the average price category.
The standard delivery of the column included a tank of 19 liters, a lid with a valve and a coupling for a thermometer, a two-inch drawer (pipe) 0,5 m, a refrigerator and a dephlegmator.
First run
He insisted on 20 liters of sugar mash, poured it into the tank, turned on the induction cooker and waited. I did everything, as in theory and in the instructions for the device. He distilled raw alcohol in the distillation mode, poured it into the tank again, converted the apparatus into a distillation column.
And, lo and behold, acetone (the so-called heads) poured and then alcohol. I measured the degrees in alcohol, saw 94 and calmed down. It tasted good. Note that not everyone can drink alcohol, but I love it.
I went to the forum to brag that everything worked out for me, and received so many negative reviews that at first I was surprised. I began to understand and realized that connoisseurs consider only 96,5 degrees alcohol, and the rest – under-rectified.
Then the experiments began. I had to buy an additional 0,5 m drawstring, an additional Panchenkov net, stuff it tighter into the drawstring, and the miracle happened again: I got alcohol 96,5 degrees.
And the result has outdone itself. More precisely, GOST, according to which especially dangerous methyl alcohol can be no more than 0,5%, and analyzes of our alcohol showed methyl 0,001%, that is, 50 times less than allowed by GOST.
Brandy production
Cognac production requires oak barrels. They are made by all and sundry, and finding a good cooper is not an easy task. Through the review forums, I found a man who makes sessile oak barrels in Taganrog.
I ordered 2 ten-liter ones, and they were brought to me in a month and a half. After preparation, I poured alcohol diluted with filtered water up to 65 degrees into the barrels. And began to wait.
In theory, in such small barrels, the first filling cannot be aged for more than 3 months. Every month, I invited friends who were endowed with the gift of smell, much more than I, for a tasting.
After 3 months, experts said that the cognac is ripe, and it is necessary to make a blend. He prepared a tincture of prunes with alcohol, melted the sugar that is added to cognac for color, mixed everything in the right proportions and arranged a tasting.
Tasting
At the blind tasting was exhibited:
- Cognac homemade;
- Cognac Courvoisier VS;
- Cognac Courvoisier VSOP.
The results of tasting on a 10-point scale are presented in the table:
As you can see, the cognac, according to an independent blind evaluation, received a slightly lower score than natural French cognac 10 years old. One of the experts even claimed that the third cognac is French, and the second is homemade.
And then what
Everyone knows that cognac is made from a mixture of cognac spirits of different aging, which in turn are obtained from certain grape varieties. Since it is difficult to get large volumes of grapes in the spring, I decided to make two more bookmarks in 5 liter barrels of different compositions:
- Natural white wine was distilled and poured into a barrel mixed with pure alcohol, diluting the entire volume to 65 degrees of strength;
- A mixture in half of white and red wine of the same varieties from which French cognac is made, without distillation, topped up with alcohol and poured into the second barrel in the same strength;
- Since the first experiment with simple alcohol was a success, I again filled the third barrel, again ordered from Taganrog, with simple alcohol 65 degrees.
After 3 months in the third barrel and after 6 months in the first two, cognac spirit of different taste should be obtained. Let’s have a tasting with friends!
Which cognac will you choose, homemade or from the store?