Moonshine from apples at home – all about distillation

In Normandy, apple brandy, proudly called Calvados, is distilled with the help of old Charentes Alambiques. Our craftsmen prefer to drive by ferry and conventional devices, called moonshine. They do not know the vanity and arrogance inherent in the inhabitants of Europe – it is necessary to be closer to the people. And that’s true!

In fact, making moonshine from apples at home, organoleptically not much different from Normandy brandy, is not so difficult. In the last article, I told you how to cook the simplest autumn fruit mash. Not the best brew, but not the worst either. Then I completely forgot to mention methanol, which is released during fermentation as a result of the “decomposition” of pectins, which apples are so rich in. At the same time, pectins are most of all in the pulp, and especially in rotten.

It is often possible to meet the statement that methanol is formed just during the distillation of fermented raw materials. But still, there are more “scientific treatises” that say that during distillation, the methanol that has already been formed during the fermentation process is simply concentrated. In principle, if the distillation is carried out according to all laws, then methanol in the final product is negligible and it cannot harm a person (even in the most thoroughbred cognac or Calvados this potent poison is present).

But for the paranoid, I decided to write a slightly different recipe for apple mash, cooked “in white”, that is, from apple juice. Also, the mash recipe below is considered much better than the recipe with fermentation on cake. On all fronts, starting with organoleptics and ending with laboratory studies (and they were carried out). But first, read the article on making cider – this is the easiest way to get high-quality apple mash from juice. We prepare the cider, keep it a little, distill it twice and into a barrel or onto oak chips.

Braga from apples for moonshine “in white”

The recipe is quite simple and it makes no sense to describe it in certain proportions. There is a theory that was described by a certain mak210 on the forum.homedistiller.ru forum (perhaps the best forum for moonshiners). The theory is backed up by detailed laboratory studies and the opinions of certified tasters.

The main theses are:

• 1 g of sugar gives very, very approximately 0,6 ml of absolute alcohol (AC);
• apples of central Russia do not contain much sugar, about 7-10%;
• even if you take summer varieties with a sugar content of 10%, then logically they will give mash with a strength of no more than 6% – this is not enough, so you need to add sugar;
• most often recommend for mash at least 9% alcohol by volume;
• wild yeasts can give unpredictable results, so it is advisable to use CKD (pure yeast cultures).

Now we put the above into practice. Now it’s winter, therefore, apples contain less sugar than they should (but here you should focus on taste or measuring instruments). If we take the sugar content in the amount of almost the minimum 7%, then only 100 * 7 = 0,6 ml of AC will ferment per 4,2 ml. We need 9 ml by volume or so, hence: 9-4,2=4,8. Further: 4,8 / 0,6 = 8 g per 100 ml, that is, for every 1 liter of apple juice, we need to add 80 g of sugar.

We extract juice in any way convenient for us, defend it for a day and decanter – we need clarified, pure juice. Then add yeast and ferment. The popular Saf-Moment baker’s yeast is not recommended – they ferment poorly, give low alcohol content, but at the same time the wort acquires a distinct musty smell. Better wine or try alcohol (I’m not sure about the latter, most likely, rapid fermentation with alcohol yeast will kill the smell completely and worsen the organoleptics in general).

After fermenting, the mash can be left in the cold for a day or two, and then removed from the sediment. It may be appropriate to clean with bentonite. In principle, you can distill. The distillation process is briefly described in a previous article. The usual distillation according to all the rules, so if you have studied the material on this topic, then there should be no problems (the only thing is that you can select heads even a little more than it should be: not 50-70, but all 80-90 from 1 liter). Therefore, let’s move on to more sophisticated methods for obtaining “au de vie”.

Steam distillation of apple mash

Just a little theory that can be successfully put into practice. It is difficult and generally undesirable to distill thick mash by direct heating. Firstly, such mashes often burn, which greatly affects the taste of the resulting product. Secondly, the thick, which remains after distillation, contains a decent amount of alcohol and it is at least not reasonable to throw them away. Apple mash on cake is just such a case, so it is better to distill it with the help of a steam generator.

The steam generator is a conventional distiller, a distillation cube into which water is poured. When heated, water, according to the laws of physics, turns into steam, which passes through an insulated tube and enters the wort boiler with mash. Further, everything is simple and prosaic: the steam warms up the thick wort, then it also begins to evaporate, but then everything is scientific – columns, dry steamers, coils and other stray moonshine.

The wort boiler, which, again, looks like a normal still in general terms, is equipped with a bubbler – this is a filter system that allows steam to pass through the thick without obstacles. Simply put, it is an ordinary metal tube (usually made of copper or some inert metal) with holes or slots. Thick steam is supplied to this tube through an insulated hose, then it dissipates through the holes and moves on.

The steam distillation process is more than accessible in this video:

So, after steam distillation, we get quite a high-quality distillate with a strength of about 65% (although it can range from 50 to 90 or more, it all depends on the equipment – you can also connect a column to the wort boiler). The resulting apple moonshine can already be consumed, but it is better to distill it fractionally a second time, taking away the heads and tails. All by science. You can do this with an ordinary “household” distiller, but if you are aiming to get calvados alcohols, it is better to use alambic.

Distillation of apple moonshine in alambic

In many cognac houses in France, they still use the old Charentes Alambiques to produce raw alcohol. For the production of Calvados, such designs are also used. In practice, this is a “quasi-continuous” distillation plant, with an economizer. Invented back in the 20th century, the Charente Alambique is still used by the French because of its simplicity and functionality. To acquire such a colossus for home use is expensive (for 2 liters it will cost 3-XNUMX thousand USD), so we will consider an ordinary copper alambik. Recently, this miracle of technology has become available to a wide range of fans of home brewing.

There will be separate articles about the charms of the alambic, as well as the steam generator. In short, this is a traditional still used to distill everything that can be distilled, from folk moonshine to complex essential oils for perfumery. In most cases, they are bought as a gift – the shiny unit looks painfully impressive. But we judge, as they say, not by clothes. The main value of the alambic lies in the material from which it is made, namely copper. Copper reacts with some substances that are not desirable in the drink, in particular with sulfur compounds.

Do not forget also that copper has a high level of thermal conductivity – saving energy at current prices plays a significant role in moonshine. By the way, you can heat up a copper alambik with anything: on an electric stove, on gas, with firewood, and even on an induction stove with special gaskets. Now there is a great demand for Portuguese alambicas, so the producers are trying their best to surprise their customer. Constructions of the sea, up to full-fledged brew columns.

So, the main goal of distillation with alambik is to get the “body” of apple moonshine containing a minimum of harmful impurities. For example, let’s take a distiller with a volume of 10 liters – this can be bought for 12-15 thousand rubles. We fill it with 70-75% of the total volume with mash. We install the “helmet” and start heating. At 70 ^оThe first output of the product will begin with, that is, the heads will go. We reduce the heating power by 30% and take the number of “heads” we need. Usually they take 10% of the expected yield of the product, but if you don’t want to bother with the calculations, determine the fractions by smell – they will clearly carry acetone from them.

When the smell of the distillate becomes pleasant, apple, it’s time to select the “body”. We return the desired temperature. We drive until there is 40% of the fortress in the jet (well, or as our men do, while it burns). Some advise to stop the selection of the middle faction already at 50-60% of the fortress, but this is a personal matter. After selecting the “body” we pick up the “tails”, you can drive dry. Tailings are usually added to the next run to increase product yield. The resulting moonshine from apples can be diluted to the desired strength and consumed in a week.

It is absolutely impossible to drink the head fractions, but you should not pour them out either. Some people use them to make various poultices for the joints, but it is better to leave them for disinfection, which is very important for brewers.

If you still intend to make something similar to Calvados, the “body” of moonshine can be poured into a prepared barrel and aged for at least 1 year, and preferably a minimum of 3. You can also speed up the process and insist apple distillate on oak chips or chips. Don Pomazan described how to prepare oak chips and then use them in his article on “cognac” from moonshine – I recommend it for review. By the way, it has been experimentally proven that it is better to infuse apple moonshine on lightly roasted wood chips for 2 months at a temperature of 40 ^оC.

In short, the process looks like this:

1. We take an oak board and grind it with a knife to the size of a match.
2. Fill the wood chips with water and keep it at a temperature of 50 for half an hour ^оC.
3. Drain the water and place the chips in the oven for 1 hour at a temperature of 120 ^оC.
4. We use the resulting ersatz barrel 1 to 3, that is, we fill the jar (or any other container) by 1/3, and then fill it with moonshine from apples.
5. We insist 2 months at a temperature of 20-40 ^оC (thermostats are used for high temperatures in production).

In the same way, you can insist on apple tincture – first we get apple alcohol through maceration, and then add wood chips to it. They say it’s a decent product.