The Practical Distiller Part 9

SECTION XI.

ARTICLE I.

_Observations on erecting Distilleries._

Those who are about to erect distilleries, have a handsome subject for consideration; the advantages, and the probable disadvantages that may arise from building on a particular site, or seat. The contiguity to a chopping mill is a material consideration--Wood forming an important article, should be taken into view--Grain merits also a great share of attention. The water which forms, by no means, the least important ingredient should be well a.n.a.lyzed; and a share of thought is due to the subject of a market for the whiskey, spirits and pork, produced from the establishment.--And should the water then prove good, soft and proper for fermentation, can be bro't over head, and the chopping mill is not very inconvenient, and wood convenient and cheap, and grain plenty and at reasonable prices, and a market within one hundred miles, I have little doubt but that with proper economy and observance of system, the establishment will prove very productive; and may be progressed in with cheerfulness, and a reasonable hope of a fair retribution to the owner.

A proper seat being fixed on, with sufficient fall to bring the water over head, for it is very material, and an immense saving of labor--material, because it prevents a loss, in running the stills, from pumping or want of water in the cooling tubs. The size of the house follows, as requiring some more than usual calculation--houses are generally made too small, giving great inconvenience, and preventing that nice attention to cleanliness, which forms a very important item in the process of distilling. I would recommend a size sufficiently large for three stills, and to mash six hogsheads per day--one of col.

Anderson's patent improved stills, I would consider, in many situations, as most desirable; at all events, I would recommend the preparation of room enough for three stills, if even it should be the intention of the owner to erect but two--for it is very probable, that after some experience, he may determine to pursue the business more extensively, and add the patent still.

The size then established, I would recommend the lower story to be 10 feet high, this will leave room for the heated, or rarefied air to ascend in the summer above the cooler, and more necessary air in the warm season of the year, and prevent the unpleasant effect of a too warm air on the mashing hogsheads, and the sowing of the stuff in fermentation--and moreover, prevent the unpleasant effects of smoak on the distillers eyes. But it is important that the house should be erected on level ground with doors opposite each other, with plenty of windows to afford a draft and recourse of air, at pleasure, during the warm season; and so that in the winter it may be closed and preserved perfectly warm--to which end it is most expedient the lower story should be well built with stone and lime, and neatly plastered--the windows well glazed, with shutters &c. Thus provided, and a thermometer placed in the centre of the house, a proper temperature may be kept up in the air of the house--for there is a certain degree of warmth which exceeds for fermentation--this degree of heat, then correctly ascertained by the distiller, he may by a close attention to his duties, fires and the thermometer, always keep the air of the house in nearly that same and most approved state; and even by a well timed observation guard against storms and casualties. To effectuate this grand and important object, some have divided the stills, placing the boiler at one end, and a singling and doubling still at the other; this mode will ensure, in cold weather, the success of the measure more fully--others have placed all the stills in the centre of the building--a plan that will do better in the winter than in the summer, and one I think less favourably of than that of dividing them.

During the winter, the north or northwest side of the house should be kept quite close, permitting the house to be lighted from the more temperate southward exposure. To calculate the window sashes to open by hinges, or to be taken entirely out in the summer, at pleasure, is in my mind advisable.

SECTION XII.

ARTICLE I.

_On Wines._

Presuming this work may be rendered more desirable to farmers, from the introduction of some receipts for making domestic wine from the common hedge grapes, or such as are common on fence rows and on high rich grounds, and which are pleasantly flavored after receiving frost, and also for making cider in the best mode for preservation. I have extracted a few from various author's.

_Receipt for making Domestic Wine from the Autumn Blue Grape._

About the latter end of September or about the first white frosts, gather the grapes which with us grow along old fences and hedges--pick all the grapes from the stems that are juicy, allowing two bushels thus picked a little heaped, to the barrel. Mash them well between your hands in small parcels, either in earthen pans, or some convenient small vessels--put them when mashed into a tub together, and add a little water so as to soak the pumice.... After stirring them well together, squeeze the pumice out from the liquor with your hands, as clean as you can--then strain the juice through a hair sieve. If the juice seems not all extracted from the pumice at one soaking and squeezing, put water to the pumice and squeeze them over again; take care not to add too much water, lest there should be more than the cask will hold. If after all the ingredients are added, the cask is not full, it may then be filled up with water. To the liquor thus prepared, add two pounds of good, clean, rich low priced brown sugar, per gallon, stirring it in the tub till all the sugar be dissolved; let it remain in the tub, and in a day or two it will ferment, and the sc.u.m rise to the top, which must be carefully skimmed off--then put the wine into a clean nice barrel--do not bung it up tight. There is generally a fermentation in it the spring following, when the grape vines are in blossom, but racking it off just before that season will prevent its working too much. If it is wanted to be soon ripe for use, put a quart of good old brandy after it is racked off, to the barrel, and give it air by leaving the bung quite loose.

This mode of manufacturing wine for domestic use, is convenient and not expensive to those who have it in their power to manufacture maple sugar. But the nice housewife or husbandmen of ingenuity, will, I fancy, devise some more neat mode of compressing the juice from the grape--as pressing it by the hand, would seem less cleanly, though the fermentation generally cleanses sufficiently.

_Currant Wine_

Is managed in the same way. The same quant.i.ty of sugar is presumed to answer--The juice is generally well strained thro' cloths, and when well stirred, &c. with the sugar, and neatly racked off, is put by in a loft to ripen, in sweet casks.

ART. II.

_Directions for making Cider, British mode._

The apples after being thrown into a heap should always be covered from the weather. The later the cider is made the better, as the juice is then more perfectly ripened, and less danger to be feared from fermentation. Nothing does more harm to cider than a mixture of rotten apples with the sound. The apples ought to be ground so close as to break the seeds which gives the liquor an agreeable bitter. The pumice should be pressed through hair bags, and the juice strained through two sieves, the uppermost of hair, the lower of muslin. After this the cider should be put into open casks, when great attention is necessary to discover the exact time in which the pumice still remaining in the juice, rises on the top, which happens from the third to the tenth day, according as the weather is more or less warm. This body does not remain on top more than two hours; consequently, care should be taken to draw off the cider before it sinks, which may be done by means of a plug.

When drawn off, the cider is put into casks. Particular attention is again required to prevent the fermentation, when the least inclination towards it is discovered. This may be done by a small quant.i.ty of cider spirits, about one gallon to the hogshead. In March the cider should be again drawn off, when all risque of fermentation ceases. Then it should be put into good sweet casks, and in three years from that time, it will be fit for bottling. Old wine casks are to be preferred; those which contain rum are ruinous to cider. Large earthen vessels might be made with or without glazing, which would be preferable to any wooden vessel whatever. When we compare this with the hasty American mode of making cider, it is not to be wondered at that the English cider so infinitely excels ours.

ART. III.

_The following is a very highly approved American mode of making Cider._

Take care to have every necessary utensil to be made use of in the whole process, perfectly clean and free from every foreign smell. For this purpose, before you begin your work, let your mill, trough and press be made perfectly clean, by thoroughly washing, and if necessary, with scalding water. The casks are another material object, and if musty, or any other bad smell, one end should be taken out, and with shavings burn the inside; then scrub them clean, and put in the head, scald them well afterwards, and drain them perfectly; when dry, bung them tight and keep them in a cool shady place until wanted for use.--The apples should be quite ripe, and all the unripe and rotten ones, leaves, and every other thing that can tend to give the cider any disagreeable taste, carefully separated from them. I have found from careful attention and many experiments, that it is a great advantage to the cider to be separated from the gross parts as soon as possible; for this purpose, I tried several methods: that which I found succeeded the best, I shall now relate, as by following it, I was able to preserve my cider in a sound state, though made in the early part of the season. I took a large pipe, of about 150 gallons, had one of the heads taken out, and on the inside of the other laid on edge, four strips of boards, two inches wide, and on these strips placed a false bottom, filled with gimlet holes, three inches a part. On this false bottom, I put a hair cloth, (old blanket or swingline tow will do) so as to prevent any sand from washing into the s.p.a.ce between the true and false bottoms; I procured a quant.i.ty of coa.r.s.e sand, which was carefully washed in repeated waters, until it would not discolor the clean water--then dried the sand, put it in the pipe, on the hair cloth, (coa.r.s.e blanket or swingline tow,) about 9 inches thick.

Thus having every thing in readiness, I went through the process of making, as quick as possible, by having the apples ground fine early in the morning, putting them in the press as fast as they were ground; and then in sufficient quant.i.ties pressed out the juice, and put it over the sand in the cask, (having previously bored a gimlet hole in the side of the cask), between the true and false bottoms, in which I introduced a large goose-quill, stopped with another. The pipe was placed so high, as to admit of a cask under it, to receive the liquor as it ran from the quill, which, if rightly managed, will be perfectly fine, and being put away in a cool cellar, and stopped close, will keep well, and prove of an excellent quality.

This process is easy, and in every person's power to execute, as the liquor, by being cleared, from its gross feculences, will not run into that violent fermentation, so destructive to the fine vinous flavor, which renders good cider so pleasing a drink.

_Query._ Would not a quart of good apple brandy to each barrel of cider, made in this way, prevent any fermentation?

But it is generally believed that cider is the better for having undergone a fermentation, becoming then more active and light; cider that has undergone condensation, or has been boiled down until strong, has been found to keep sound some length of time, but it is too heavy and destructive to the appet.i.te, cloying the digesting powers.--And by too frequent use, I fancy, will ultimately produce ague and fevers; and I fear, cider made according to the foregoing receipt, would have a similar effect, but in a lesser degree.

I would recommend after a due attention to cleanliness, in the apple mill, trough, press and casks, that the apples be a.s.sorted, and having been exposed to the air, under a roof or shed some time, selecting the sound only, that they be ground fine, and let stand soaking in the pumice twelve hours, and then pressed off, through a clean rye straw cheese (being the most common and convenient in the country,) and when flowing from the press, a vessel should be provided, with the bottom full of gimlet holes, in the style of a riddle, on which lay a coa.r.s.e cloth, then a layer of clean sand, over which a parcel of coa.r.s.e rye straw, and suffer it to filter thro' this vessel into the large receiving tub; the rye straw will intercept the coa.r.s.er pieces of pumice, and may be changed frequently--This mode will rid the liquor of all the coa.r.s.er pieces of pumice--then I would recommend that the cider should be placed in open hogsheads, such as are used for mashing grain in distilleries; those being raised about two feet and an half high on logs or a scaffolding, under a shade or covering--a spile hole bored near the bottom of each, so as to admit a barrel to stand under the spile--in this state, I would recommend it to stand until it undergoes a fermentation, carefully watching the top, and when the pumice is found to have risen, to skim it off carefully, then having previously provided sweet barrels, draw it off by the spile hole, adding from a pint to a quart of apple brandy to each barrel of strong cider, bung it up tight, and store it where the frost will not injure it. In this way, I presume it will keep well--and if the party be so disposed, I would recommend any bottling to be done in April, and during clear weather, though it is safe to bottle immediately after having undergone a thorough fermentation.

_The following Receipt to make an excellent American Wine,_

Was communicated to the Burlington Society for promoting domestic manufactures, by Joseph Cooper, Esq. of Gloucester county, state of New Jersey, and ordered to be published;--which, from its extreme simplicity, and economy, shewing the convenience with which a very pleasant, healthful beverage, may be kept by every family in our country, is published in this work. And moreover, as it may have, in some degree, the happy effects of correcting the baneful and pernicious effects of coffee, which is so commonly used for breakfast in our state at present.

Coffee, when first introduced, was used as a medicine only, and given only in a well clarified state, and sparingly--both from its soothing and pleasant effect, it become common, and now it is almost the only beverage used at breakfast by the farmers of Pennsylvania, and indeed, people suppose the morning repast is not genteel, unless the board is decorated with this foreign beverage. If it was used in a moderately strong well clarified state, it would be less injurious, but it is too frequently set down in a non descript state, difficult to be named, mixed with the grounds, and so far from clear, as to be ent.i.tled to the epithet of muddy, and sweetened with bad sugar, carrying with it to the simply ignorant family, using it in this state, the cause in a great measure of destroying the tone of the stomach, overloading it, and by and by, the introduction of a kind of dumb ague, or chill, followed with a fever, and often creating intermitting and remitting fevers--consequences arising out of the free use of bad provisions--which diseases are oftentimes kept up by the use of this infamously prepared coffee, for when the country people get sick, coffee is too frequently used as the only diet.

It is particularly injurious to bilious habits--souring on the stomach, becoming acid, creating acidity, and preventing the glandular juicy supplies from producing the usual fermentation of the food in the stomach--rendering the chyle vitiated, which in its usual route, imparts from the intestines, nourishment to the blood. Thus conveying its baneful properties by this active vehicle, chyle to the blood, rendering it foetid, discoloured and by and by, often as difficult to be named in its adulterated state as the composition which gave rise to it. Had we not very many instances of new diseases--complaints which the most eminent of the medical faculty can with difficulty name, or treat with judgment, without first having made many essays and experiments fatal to the lives of hundreds, which are increasing with every approaching season, and all since the adoption of coffee. (True, the free use of ardent spirits and other luxuries operating on the effects of indolence--of habits, produced by the wealth and independence of our agricultural and commercial people, and growing out of an imitation of the elevated, affluent of society, born to fortune, and the successful professional characters;) a doubt might present itself as to the propriety of attributing many of those new complaints to coffee ... but to a too plentiful use of bad provisions, and an indulgence of bad habits, we must attribute to them. And as badly made coffee is among the most pernicious kinds of food, and particularly when taken in the morning on an empty stomach, and that too made from very green coffee, (dreadfully poisonous when used too frequently before it acquires age and a whiter colour,) it may be condemned with greater propriety. And whilst this beverage is condemned and so highly to be disapproved of, it is well if we can invent a light, pure, active and healthful beverage to be taken freely, between or at meals, calculated in its nature to correct in some degree, the unhappy effects of bad provisions--it is therefore I mention the

_Receipt for making Honey Wine._

I put a quant.i.ty of the comb from which the honey had been drained, into a tub, to which I add a barrel of cider, immediately from the press; this mixture was well stirred, and left to soak for one night. It was then strained before a fermentation took place, and honey was added until the weight of the liquor was sufficient to bear an egg. It was then put into a barrel, and after the fermentation commenced, the cask was filled every day for three or four days, with water, that the filth might work out of the bung hole. When the fermentation moderated, I put the bung in loosely, lest stopping it tight, might cause the cask to burst.--At the end of five or six weeks the liquor was drawn off into a tub, and the white of eight eggs well beaten up, with a pint of clean sand, were put into it--I then added a gallon of cider spirit, and after mixing the whole well together, I returned it into the cask, which was well cleaned, bunged it tight and placed it in a proper situation for racking it off when fine. In the month of April following, I drew it off for use, and found it equal in my opinion, to almost any foreign wine--in the opinion of many good judges it was superior.

This success has induced me to repeat the experiments for three years, and I am persuaded that by using the clean honey, instead of the comb, as above described; such an improvement might be made as would enable the citizens of the United States, to supply themselves with a truly federal and wholesome wine, which would not cost more than twenty cents per gallon, were all the ingredients procured at the market prices, and would have the peculiar advantage over all other wines, hitherto attempted in this country, that it contains no foreign mixture whatever, but is made from ingredients produced on our own farms.

[_Columbian Magazine, November_ 1790.

Doubtless the foregoing wine will be found strong, and if not well clarified, or rather fined, may be heavy--and therefore will be found excellent when diluted freely with water, and when about to be drank, two thirds of water will be found necessary, and an improvement.

Bottling the foregoing wine in April, will certainly render it more excellent, and I fancy it ought to be drank mixed with water, during warm weather, and between meals, as in its pure state it may be found heavy. The gentleman who made the foregoing experiments, drew it off in kegs--this we presume was done to prevent its souring--as cider will suffer, and become hard after broaching the cask, whereas whilst full it remained sound. All American vinous liquors are liable to sour, because we rarely understand or practice the proper mode of manufacturing.

Complete cleansing and fermentation is absolutely necessary--and when fermented, it must be well fined, and then drawn off in nice casks, or bottled--bottling is certainly the most effectual, and if a farmer procures as many as three dozen of black bottles, they with three kegs of seven and an half gallons each, will hold the barrel.--The kegs well bunged, will preserve the wine sound, and when a keg is broached, it must be immediately drawn off and bottled. The bottles when emptied, ought to be rinsed and stood up in an airy closet to drain.

_To make Elderberry Wine._

_The editor is happy in introducing the following receipts which he is confident is hardly known in America. The great quant.i.ties of the Elderberry, which yearly goes to waste, might with very little trouble be manufactured into one of the most wholesome and agreeable wines ever introduced into America._

To every two quarts of berries, add one gallon of water, boil it half an hour, then strain it, and add to every gallon of liquor, two and an half pounds of sugar, then boil it together for half an hour, and skim it well; when cool (not cold) put in a piece of toasted bread, spread thick with brewer's yeast, to ferment. When you put this liquor into the barrel, which must be done the next day, add to every gallon of liquor, one pound of raisins, chopped, and stir all together in the barrel, once every day, for a week, then stop it close. It will not be fit to tap 'till the spring following the making; and the older the better.

_To make Elderberry Wine, to drink, made warm, as a Cordial._

Equal quant.i.ties of berries and water boiled together, till the berries break, then strain off the liquor, and to every gallon thereof, put three pounds of sugar, and spice, to your palate, boil all up together, let it stand till it becomes cool, (not cold); then put in a piece of toasted bread, spread thick with brewer's yeast, to ferment, and in two or three days, it will be fit to put in the barrel, then stop it close.