how to make the least flavorful fermented alcohol of at least 5% ?

General Homebrew Discussion
1

In japan there is a class of drinks called chuhai, which are clear alcoholic carbonated drinks which range from sweet to super dry and even bitter. most of the sweet ones are pretty meh, but i would get one that basically tasted like an excellent gin and tonic in a can, bone dry, with natural tasting citrus and herbal elements. 8% for 500ml and about $1.50 each, it was a hell of a way to drink.

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I of course want to recreate that. White claw is doing fermented alcohol water now, I feel like if I could make something like that, and add juniper, citrus and other recommended gin ingredients.

  1. I want to recreate a very cheap price point.
                      -a fully or mostly dextrose fermentation? Adding vodka to water and carbonating it would be more expensive as spirits have a minimum price point here in canada of about $25 / 700ml - so that is why that idea is out.

  2. I want it to be very dry. at most 1.0005, ideally under that.

  3. I want fresh tasting citrus. I’ve never added citrus or really any fruits to my beer before… so, any ideas on if it will or how to keep the lemon-lime flavour fresh and not like cooked marmelade or something. C-hops are a possibility.

  4. I want it to have an absolute minimum of yeast character

  5. Don’t care about colour, It doesn’t need to be clear or pale or anything.

I’d say something like

boil .5kg pilsner DME, .5kg dextrose in 14 litres of water for an OG of 1.025, add yeast (nottingham?, W34?). after 3 days of active fermentation, add another 1kg of dextrose in 4 litres of water to step it up to reach a potential alcohol of slightly more than 5%

Cold crash it really hard and minimize transferring any sediment to the highest degree.

2

https://byo.com/article/hard-seltzer-made-easy/

[quote]Hard seltzer
5.25 gallons/20 L
OG = ~1.031  FG = ~1.000
ABV = ~ 5%

Neutral Base Ingredients
21 L reverse osmosis (RO) or distilled water
4.5 g gypsum (adjusts calcium concentration to 50 ppm)
1.65 kg cane sugar
11.5 g packet SafAle US-05 or other neutral yeast strain
2.5 g Yeastex 82 yeast nutrient added with yeast pitch
2.5 g diammonium phosphate (DAP) added with yeast pitch
2.5 g Yeastex 82 yeast nutrient added 36–48 hours after yeast pitch
2.5 g diammonium phosphate (DAP) added 36–48 hours after yeast pitch

Flavorings
2.8 mL lime extract added after CO2 bubbling (if used) and carbonation
2.8 mL lemon extract after CO2 bubbling (if used) and carbonation
420 mL pulp-free orange juice (single-strength, not from concentrate) after CO2 bubbling (if used) and carbonation
14 g citric acid powder after CO2 bubbling (if used) and carbonation
[/quote]

BYO recommendations…

3

Excellent, i had looked at some of those before, forgot to base any ideas on them.

Anyone ever made this thing before though?

Looking at it, I can see already I would replace cane sugar with dextrose IMHO. definitely agree with the nutrient additions. hmmm might be good

4

We covered it, too

https://www.experimentalbrew.com/podcast/brew-files-episode-68-hard-times-seltzer-town

5

This has no benefit of saying you made it yourself but why not steep a neutral spirit with the ingredients you want to add and then mix it with carbonated water?

Not trying to criticize people over hard seltzer but this seems like going to great lengths to make something very easily made in the most difficult way possible–and I say that as somebody who both brews and has a kegerator just for homemade non-alcoholic seltzer water.

6

I believe he said vodka starts at $25/700 ml, and is looking for something cheaper.

7

The spirit of this is to be cheap, as opposed to buying spirits with duty paid on them. Turbo yeasts were invented for just this purpose - yeast with nutrient to get them to ferment a cheap source of sugar (molasses) which would then have cheap chemical flavourings added to create alcopops, to get teenagers laid in those countries where they are officially allowed to drink.

I don’t know Japan well enough to know what their cheapest source of sugars is - some kind of hydrolysed rice starch perhaps? I guess in the US then corn syrup perhaps?

8

Sugar and nutrients makes sense for cheap and easy.  Possibly champagne yeast as a neutral yeast because champagne yeast has low nutrient requirements.  Staggered sugar additions could make for a cleaner flavor.

Sushi rice, amylase and sake yeast could be another way to go although Wyeast’s sake yeast is quite aromatic (to me melon, pear and apple)so if you were going for melon, apple or pear seltzer could work well.  I understand that WhiteLab’s is less aromatic but I don’t have any experience with it.  You would have to buy everything in bulk to make prices reasonable.

9

The most recent hard seltzer I did I used Pure Turbo yeast because it’s supposed to be very neutral and as previously stated, it already has the necessary nutrients. I didn’t realize until I rehydrated the stuff that it is about 30% bentonite by weight. I have no idea what the purpose of bentonite in brewing yeast is, but what a freaking mess. That batch got dumped.
  Skip the grain, use only sugar and yeast nutrients, and if you’re kegging, flavor to taste with syrups or whatever at kegging. If you’re bottling then you need to add any flavorings that have fermentable sugars before or during fermentation, unless you think you can accurately calculate the amount of attenuation you’ll get and use that for your bottle conditioning. Most seltzers, especially fruit flavored ones will need some sweetening, which if you’re bottle conditioning means lactose.

10

lol rice in japan is pretty expensive and not wasted. they invented HFCS and would obviously import cheaper sugars from around the world. its probably sugar or something idk.

yup, i’ve got a champagne yeast sitting here now ready to go actually.

i’ve never used amylase enzymes before, if someone wanted to do this, i would just use a wine yeast with rice/amylase especially if i wanted a clean flavour.  i like making sake or rice wine but it takes a bit more effort than making beer and also a lot of temperature control.

i’ve mostly heart turbo yeasts are really not neutral and throw off a lot of odd flavours in favour of simply fermenting very fast and to a high ABV.

Thank you very much for mentioning bentonite though, that strips out colour and flavour really well and makes stuff super clear. I’d definitely use that after a fermentation.

@Visor, could you describe how your hard seltzer turned out? Was it any good?

Looks like if I did it today, i’d go with staggered additions of dextrose, staggered nutrient additions, maybe a very small amoutn of hopping? like 5-10 IBU, EC1118 type yeast or something and bentonite to clear it after.

another reference point would be kilju i guess

11

I just realized how close I am to being able to make this.

I will post the recipe when I do it soon.

12

I’ve made several Fred, the 1st was mostly a proof of concept and establish a functional method. Cane sugar, dextrose & maltodexrine to give it a little body, some mild spices and lactose cuz it’s a ladies drink and they usually like their drinks sweet. It was very bland but drinkable, the tasting “panel” unanimously said ditch the body additives. The next was a requested cranberry seltzer that was well received but really needed about twice as much sweetening than it had. There was a sweet tea seltzer that they also liked, but it needs about 3 times as much tea. The last batch was pomegranate and it ultimately got dumped, it had a fairly strong vinegar smell and taste, I don’t know how much of that was from the pomegranate and how much was process flaws. I personally don’t care for any of it cuz I’m a beer lover, but I didn’t brew it for me.

13

Thanks for the detailed reply Visor.

I’m going to make it as dry as possible  and flavour with 6-8IBU of magnum hops 1oz of juniper berries and as yet not finalized basic gin botanicals.

Other people have commented that citrus should be added to secondary only to avoid a “fermented weird” citrus taste.

Will fine it with either benonite or sparkolloid, whatever the wine store i asked has.

Summing up:

  1. I want to recreate a very cheap price point.
  2. I want it to be very dry. at most 1.0005, ideally under that.
  3. I want fresh tasting citrus.
  4. I want it to have an absolute minimum of yeast character
  5. Don’t care about colour, It doesn’t need to be clear or pale or anything.

I think I’ve got all of these covered except number 3.

Anyone know about citrus flavouring? Lime ideally?

14

My 1st test batch I added 1tsp bottled lemon juice to 1.3 Gallons seltzer with the priming sugar at bottling, it was okay but would have been better with 1 tbsp. Another time I added the juice and pulp from 4 lemons to the BK of a 2.2 gallon batch, if you go that route you’ll want to filter/strain out the pulp before the BK, as I found out it won’t settle out in the cold crash. IIRC that batch was a bit overly lemony.

15

Update will come of this in about 15 days, colour is a pale green.

I messed up one variable thanks to COVID, in a way.

I got my dextrose from a reliable bulk place that is not a homebrew store, but buying from them I also got “yeast flakes”, nutritional yeast flakes, assuming “it’s dried dead yeast… it’ll do fine as a nutrient”. Reading after I brewed, that stuff is full of umami flavour, described as “cheese-like”…

Ugg, anyway, I used bentonite, let’s see how it goes.

16

Secondaried it today. Just tasted from the sample tube, gravity 0.997

Colour is near-opaque greenish white, uncarbonated. taste is watery and mild, limey, very light juniper, herbal, some weirdness but for an as of now murky brew that will now be chilled for clarity, it is REALLY clean. very little alcohol taste at all.

step 1 - not a failure. complete

i recently purchased a citric acid solution intended for making homemade pop and lemon oil. might add both in small amounts just to give it some kind of bite, again its very watery tasting.

Will take a pic when it’s really done and describe it further.

The bentonite did not yet succeed at clearing it up. Anyone have another suggestion? Gelatin for sugar alcohol?

17

Final post, unless anyone is interested enough to reply.

i won’t bother to take a pic because of an issue that ill explain.

result: successful in most regards - a very drinkable nearly free alcohol

recipe:
20litres distilled water (16 litres first then 4 litres for addition)

k1v-1118 wine yeast
bentonite

~12 grams crushed juniper berries
-1 tiny tiny black pepper
5 grams coriander (1.5 tbsp)
3 small lime rinds–
1 lime’s juice
1 cardamom pod crushed
1 bay leaf
1 2.5cmx1cm bit of cassia

boiled for 20 min

1kg dextrose added at 20 min

5 grams magnum hops at 20 min
botanicals at 15min in a metal bag
1/2 whirfloc at 10min
2g flaked yeast nutrient at 5min
2.5g DAP at 5 min

added yeast when cooled, two days after visible signs of fermentation boiled 4 litres of water with 1kg dextrose and same nutrient/DAP additions

OG of about 1.048

added bentonite in primary directly, fermented pretty cool around 60F

relatively slow seeming ferment and FG 0.997

carbed with 150g dextrose

appearance: almost crystal clear with a yellow-greenish tinge, some bubbles but not comparable to beer and zero head formation at all, even for a second

aroma: none, maybe slight lime/citrusy acid

taste: overall perception is like flat diluted lime juice in water with very small resiny/bitterness tinge, some lemongrass. no alcohol taste at all. earlier after bottling i did taste juniper and some more of the herbs and botanicals

body: feels really flat

issue #1 weird botanicals, too bland - earlier on the cassia and whatever other botanicals were creating odd tastes. i did not want alcohol lime juice or skeeter pee, but a kind of gin and tonic taste. solution: find a better botanicals suggestion (i just used what i had) and probably triple to quadruple the dosage of them, while removing cassia, cardamom and black pepper. of course you can use whatever other flavour you particularly like your hard seltzers to be - cranberry, rootbeer, etc

issue #2 incorrect yeast nutrient - i was trying to go really cheap and picked up my dextrose from a bulk food product store, they had “flaked nutritional yeast” - i assumed - ‘hey it’s dead yeast, i’ll boil it and it will just be vitamins.’ well i found out after i had already boiled, that no, it is not. it has a flavour described as ‘cheesy’ and is used as vegan MSG, adding lots of umami taste. in the end i dont taste that weird umami flavour in it now at all, but it was present earlier on. solution: use a proper yeast nutrient duh

issue #3 no carbonation - this is the biggest problem by far. i added enough bottling sugar to reach a high (~3.0) degree of carbonation. i never have problems with bottle-carbing my beer, but this one seems like it is not going to. maybe it was the bentonite stripping out yeast? not really sure what happened. if this was carbonated the way it was intended it would be extremely crushable. this is the crucial failure and i unfortunately don’t even have a solution. solution: ??? don’t add bentonite ?? anyone? or of course keg it

considering how super mild this is in taste at ~6.5% ABV, my next goal is to take this and make a pseudo cheap-variety korean soju. this will again probably be very confusing for some of you as to why i want to make garbage, but i am simply too used to being able to get nearly free ~15% alcohol shots at any time. korean green bottle soju is 10 dollars a bottle here in canada, its $1.50 in korea and i can make it for about 50cents a bottle.

18

First of all, thanks for sharing you details here. It’s always cool to see someone’s recipe development process, and it’s great to reference back to when I get similar crazy ideas.

I’ve tried similar experiments in the past (Hard Tang, and Hard Pepsi come to mind), and after my results I’ve just decided that if I ever do this again I’ll keg with a neutral spirit, quality flavor extracts to taste, and some acid or something like TrueLemon. I’ve just never had good luck with a clean enough ferment by yeast. There is always some flavor that I’d rather not have in my finished product. It’s unfortunate that you can’t get a handle of cheap rum or vodka up your way, because that is really the best way to go, I think.

How long did you let your bottles carb up for? I suspect that the bentonite removed most (but not all) of the yeast. You might need to give it a few weeks longer than usual - stash this batch and come back to it in a while. Next time maybe add a pinch of dry yeast to each bottle at packaging to replace what was stripped out.

I think you will get much better results adding flavor extracts to taste. Apex Flavors makes a Gin blend if that’s what you’re shooting for. I haven’t used their stuff yet, but they come highly recommended and I have several flavors en route as they speak for home soda/hard seltzer making. If you want to DIY it more, then I’d make tinctures from each of your botanicals, start dosing a glass of your clear product until you have the right ratio, then scale it up to a full batch.

19

Ya, ditch the bentonite, as far as I’m concerned that stuff should be used for cat litter and drilling mud, and not much else.
  I won’t try to guess why your juice didn’t carb worth a squat, the few batches of seltzer I made carbed up nicely, no head retention to speak of but still nice and bubbly. I think it was my 1st batch that I added some maltodextrine to help with the head, IIRC it did hold a little better than the later batches, but the ladies it was brewed for didn’t like the very slightly heavier mouthfeel so it was deleted subsequently.

20

Thanks for the interest and advice.

Yup, I understand completely just using vodka. This is an experiment in cost primarily. If I wanted a drink or two, i’d just buy a small bottle of vodka (200ml is minimum $8.95 here) and add it to water.

Again, this stuff tastes super clean, i fermented low on this wine yeast, and it is slowly, slowly continuing to carbonate, if i raised the temp in my beer storage room to mid 60s im sure it would carb quickly. But i’ll just wait, its super drinkable as is now.

Yup, no more bentonite. BTW this ended up at around 6.5% ABV and it feels full enough, i wouldn’t want it any heavier I think.

I think I’m going to go ahead and make the modern soju style stuff using the same yeast, double the dextrose and just using hops and some juniper. Again, this is probably really confusing and seems pointless for someone who isn’t korean, but having soju at any time of day and without caring about the price is kind of a right of the korean male in exchange for putting up with a bunch of other stuff. It’s not even good tasting, but its as cheap as water, whereas in canada its 10 bucks a bottle.

I’ll see how it tastes and might add activated carbon if I can find it.

To summarize, I want to make a clear example that kilju can be successful.