Flavour to expect

Cookie

Hey guys,
I know this might be the dumbest question on the whole forum however I am really new to distilling and would still love some answers ahah.
I was wondering what to actually expect the flavour of home distilled spirits to be?
So far I have only distilled box wine and made a handful of errors in the process so it tastes pretty bad. That being said, I don't think it is much worse than drinking straight vodka. essentially what I am asking is should I still expect the ethanol flavour of bought spirits to be in anything I produce or could it mask the ethanol taste better?
Any help would be much appreciated
Cheers

NZChris

I started by deciding what I wanted to make, (rum), then researching what I needed to do to make that.  I suggest that you do the same.

gurkan

What you currently make is a some sort of Brandy (grape). So if you don't trust your palate and don't know what to expect for now, then as a practice you can get a bottle of commercial brandy to taste and a nail polish remover(acetone) to smell. See if your product resembles which one more than the other.
The "ethanol flavour" you mentioned might be heads, tails, or even foreshots, I don't know... So you should also definitely read this topic:
Novice Guide for Cuts (Pot Still) by kiwistiller

Metalking00

Like gurkan said, what i used to think of as the flavor and smell of ethanol was actually the combined flavors and smells of a lot of different things. The first time i made a true neutral (I started with a reflux column, now i have a pot still too) was eye opening, partially because i got to see the other compounds mostly separated from the main body of ethanol. Turns out, what i thought of as "alcohol taste and smell" was mostly heads.
Im far from being an experienced distiller, but so far i prefer my spirits to many of the store bought ones i used to think were ok. I havent completely stopped buying commercial spirits, but the ones i do buy have gotten considerably more expensive. Another way distilling saves you money  

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Yummyrum

For the sake of this topic , from what you have said in your other posts , you are using a pressure cooker still or what we would call a Simple Pot still .
Straight Ethanol doesn't really have much of a smell or taste when you dilute it down to about 20% or so . When you smell or taste it at higher strengths it has vapours that sting your nose and a bite that will burn your mouth and throat . So first off , it's really important when you are sampling that you do it at a sensible level around 30 and no more that 40%ABV .
Having said that , there a a few members that love to sip at higher strength . Personally not me .
Now straight or pure Ethanol is something that is almost impossible to get from a Pot still . You need a good reflux still that can seperate the fractions to get that .
The closest you will get on a Pot still is what some call the heart of hearts , or , the very middle bit . You can very clearly visualise this from Kiwistillers excellent diagram below

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You'll notice the jars either side of centre have increasing amounts of heads or tails . This is the part of the flavour . Some of it is what you want , some of it isn't .
The stuff at either ends is plain horrible .
Now that middle jar of mostly Ethanol from a Pot still will still have a lot of flavour in it ( and I'm not talking about the nostril  or mouth burn ) compared to one from a reflux still .
The middle jar from a reflux still will taste similar to a Vodka . It will have very little flavour at all .
The middle jar from a Pot still will clearly have the flavour of the base from which it was distilled , either grain, Mollases , fruit etc  .
But one jar out of 20 isn't a lot of booze , so the cuts you choose will include some of those jars either side of centre and that is where you will pickup the desired flavours that you blend to get the profile that you like .
You can expect about the middle third of those jars to be able to be blended . The other two thirds are either to Hearst or too tailsy . If you add them by greed , it will spoil your finished product . For a Rum , I tend to go further into heads and leave the tails out .
Now that's what you end up with after distilling and blending ..... but that's just the start .
Flavoured spirits like Rum ,Whisky and Brandy derive  a significant part of the flavour from being aged in Oak barrels .
Bundaberg Rum for example claim that 80% of their flavour comes from the aging process ...  That's a lot .
And oak aging does take time , expect about a year for something OK .
Sure you'll read that beginners say that a spirit tasted great after a few weeks on Oak , but really that is nothing in the real time frame that is required to start getting your spirit to taste like what you might expect .
Will it ever taste like a commercial spirit ?
Well it can taste similar . But when you concider how many Brand of Whisky or Rum there are and how different they all taste , yes , you can get one in the ball park , but getting one to taste exactly like your favourite in my opinion is pie in the sky .
I have always been a Bundy Rum fan , and have chased that flavour for as long as I can remember. I've read and watched every snippet of info I could get my hands on to see if I could replicate that flavour . Never even come close . Made a lot of good Rum and a lot of horrible stuff , but nothing like I have wanted .
Just my opinion and experience .My recommended goto . https://web.archive.org/web/20171228074 ... ory/theory
Some of it is outdated but most of the basics are correct .

JLP-IV

One of my biggest fears is that I'll have spent all this $ on my equipment, and spent all the time reading and researching, only to not even like the product that I make.

bcook608

An excellent breakdown! Thanks Yum!- New users start here
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- My Rigs

bcook608

If you don't like the product that you make, try something different. Start with small batches if you're not sure. (5 gallon mashes at a time so you don't waste money on a recipe you don't know if you like yet.)
You know what you like, whether it be whiskey, gin, rum, etc., but if you make a spirit that you like on the commercial side and you don't like it that means that you likely have a procedural error somewhere. There are a ton of charts out there for mash bills of the major distilleries. Look up the spirits you like and see what their ratios of grain are and find a recipe that is close to that to start.
There is so much room for improvement and such a vast selection of recipes to choose from that I think you'll find it virtually impossible NOT to find something you like.- New users start here
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Dougmatt

Do you (or the OP) like to drink sprits in general?   If so then I believe you can make spirits you like to drink BUT it takes patience.  I make a lot of wine.  When I started that hobby, I used kits that made “wine” in 30 days.   At the 30 day point I remember thinking wow this is terrible.    So I researched and learned about tweaks and process changes, how the wineries I appreciate make their wine, and built my skills to the point I knew a lot more about what makes a product I like.  Today the wine I make at 30 days still tastes terrible  

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.   
At 1 year, it’s ok.  At 2 years it’s pretty good, and those original kit wines I made many years ago, are now much better ( even though I can taste my mistakes)   
I am getting to the point where I have spirit that has been on oak for a year and a half.  It isn’t even close to what It tasted like when I made it and is starting to be something I can enjoy neat. The major distilleries whose product you may like, likely AGE their product in oak barrels.   Time is perhaps the biggest investment we need to make in our products.  Cuts are important as stated earlier, but then we have to let time do it’s work.

Yummyrum

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Great advise there Bcook
I think that is where home distilling has the edge . We can keep trying various things until we find what we like .
Imagine being a beginner commercial distillery . You need to make reasonably large batches to make it pay , but you can't get it wrong . A few big bad batches could  cost you your reputation or even your business .
We have the benefit of time , small batches and no pressure .My recommended goto . https://web.archive.org/web/20171228074 ... ory/theory
Some of it is outdated but most of the basics are correct .

Metalking00

And the extra benefit of producing for an audience of one. I make it to my tastes (as best i can, anyway). If other people dont like it, they dont get more. Thatd be hard to turn into a business...

Cookie

Hey, thanks a lot for the help. that is priceless advice
I think some of the issues with my first run is that whilst I did discard the foreshots, I may have included too much of the heads.
Another issue could be that I diluted it down to 40% with an alcoholmeter which was probably too strong to really taste the flavour. I also haven't really had any brandy before so I don't have a baseline to compare it too.
Personally i am a fan of whiskeys more than anything so I am going to attempt to ferment my own alcohol for my next run. As i am still a true beginner, my local brew store recommended i start with a sugar wash and then add whisky essence after distillation.
Do you think these essences can give results anywhere near as good as the oak barrel ageing or should i keep my hopes low?
Sorry for all the questions but last one i swear, i saw online that you could add charred oak to the spirit if you dont have access to oak barrels. would  this be a decent idea or is it just worth buying an oak barrel?
Thanks a bunch for the advide
Cheers, Cookie

Ben

Try the ujssm recipe on tried and true. It takes no special equipment outside a fermenter and a still and makes decent whiskey.:)