Five-step Mashing Procedure Using Corn As Carbohydrate.

1 MILLING

Obtain, shell, clean, and grind corn. The ratio of water to carbohydrate is, for corn, 1 gal. : 8.5 oz. into a fine meal of about the size needed for livestock feed. Use a hammer mill if possible. A livestock feed grinder is ideal for this task. Use the 3/16 inch screen. The meal should have the consistency of coarse beach sand. to eliminate any large starch grains. However, do not grind the corn into a flour. If the grains are too small, it will be difficult to strain the mash, with a resulting loss of feed grain and a mess inside your fermenter.

2 COOKING

Start with the recommended amount of water in the cooker, adding the cornmeal slowly to prevent lumping. Once the meal is stirred in, stir in 3 teaspoons of mash starter while heating the mixture to 170 F (77 C).

The mash starter enzymes can be produced at your home by sprouting barley, and retaining the liquid. These enzymes are also called mash starter. . Keep the mash at this temperature for 15 minutes while stirring vigorously. This ensures that all of the corn is hot and wet - do not skip this step. Bring the liquid to a rolling boil for 30 minutes.

Make certain that the mash does not stick to the bottom of whatever your cooking in. For large batches, consider investing in a drum agitator. This is an electric, or pneumatic device that can be attached to the side of a 55 gallon drum. I have found a clean, used canoe paddle also works very well. Remember when working with large volumes of hot liquids - safety first!

3 CONVERTING

Using a cooling coil. To make a cooling coil, wind 30 feet of soft copper tubing around a large pipe (4-6 in. diameter). Add garden hose adapters at each end (use the type that have compression fittings). If you must solder the fittings, do not use solder that is lead based.

Attach hoses to the tube and drop the assembly into your cooking vat circulating enough cold water into the coil so that it is hot coming out of the coil. Running too much water through the cooling coil is wasteful. Bring the temperature of the mash down to 170 F (77 C) and again add 3 teaspoons of mash starter. Hold the mixture at this temperature for 30 minutes.

4 FERMENTATION

Use the cooling coil to reduce the temperature to 90 F (32 C) as quickly as possible. Once the mash has cooled, add 6 tablespoons of brewers yeast. The species of yeast that will work best depends on the type of carbohydrate you started with, and the temperature of the fermentation process. This is a problem with using alcohol as fuel. Note: The energy inputs; grinding, mashing, fermenting and distilling, during the production of alcohol are quite high. Depending on what you use and where you are (climate - outside temperature), the inputs maybe as high as the equivalent of two gallons of alcohol for every five gallons end product - unacceptably high for a national fuel program in my opinion.

Stir the mash for 10 minutes, and then cover the primary fermentation container. During fermentation the mash should be kept 85 - 90 F (29 - 32 C). At this temperature, the mash will reach maturity in 2-1/2 to 3 days. The effect of lower and higher temperatures can be seen in longer or shorter fermentation times.

5 TESTING

By saccharometer reading. A saccharometer can be used, but is relatively expensive. Try to get a used instrument if possible. Another device that can be adapted is a hydrometer of the sort used by diabetics to measure their urine sugar. When properly cleaned these devices can be calibrated using a variety of sugar solutions of known concentration.

At the beginning of fermentation, the specific gravity of the mash should be about 1.080 (8 to 12% alcohol potential), while by the end of the process it will have dropped to 1.007 or less (0 to 1% alcohol potential). When the specific gravity of the mash has remains constant for 6 hours, the mash is ready for distillation. Double check for complete conversion by using both a standard starch test (using iodine) and glucose test strips available at drug stores.

File translated from T_EX by T_TH, version 3.70.
On 15 Feb 2006, 09:39.