We fix sugar mistakes - is it even possible?

The use of sugar in home alcohol production is common, but sometimes it appears not very pleasant, moonshine aftertaste. Its removal is almost never easy and paradoxically it is much easier to deal with its removal from the moonshine than e.g.. made of cider with added sugar.

A bit of theory

Moonshine aftertaste and aroma are the result of fermentation carried out on white sugar. The sugar in sugar is really only about 97%, and the rest 3% they are improvers, bleaches and anti-caking agent, at least according to the official data of the sugar factory… What else is really there, hard to guess, but already in this "minimum version" a problem may arise. All these sugar additives are just one problem - the other is the sugar chemistry. White sugar is sucrose, dwucukier, which must be broken down by yeast into monosaccharides and only then used up in fermentation. The whole problem is this, that virtually every of these stages produces some by-products. There aren't many of them, and not so much, so that they become harmful to health, but it is enough, to spoil the taste of more delicate liquors.

Now, since you already know, where does the bad taste come from, it is possible to analyze the methods of its removal. The simplest seems to be filtration or the use of activated carbon, but these are not the only possibilities

Filtration and carbon? It's not always a good idea!

Activated carbon has this great advantage, that it can retain a wide variety of substances. Unfortunately, this advantage can become a disadvantage. As long as you purify the pre-moonshine in this way, there will be no trouble. The product may be slightly more contaminated than rectified spirit, so there will be no smell or taste of moonshine either. After distillation, such a drink is almost indistinguishable from spirit. Unfortunately, if you want to remove moonshine notes, for example, ready-made cider, it remains to be seen, that you will get not only a note of moonshine from it, but also many aromas and flavors, which determine the identity of the drink, because activated carbon is not at all selective.

When it comes to filtering, its limited effectiveness is mainly due to this, that it won't keep the dissolved compounds, and this is what they are responsible for the taste and smell. Of course, that passing through a set of filters, e.g 1000, 200 i 0 may help to some extent, but any operation, which will lead to the removal of moonshine notes, it will also remove some of the preferred aromatics.

What remains? Projects!

There are such flavors, which quite effectively kill the notes of moonshine in even quite strong drinks. Garlic is the most effective in this field, but I'm shooting in the blind, that it will not fit your taste concept. Plums are a bit worse, raspberries, spices and - perhaps surprisingly - sugar. Nothing kills the taste as well, what sugar, but remember, that if there is still yeast in the drink, the addition of sugar will resume fermentation. As for the other spices - of course, they can not be used in every situation, but if a note of moonshine is felt in the cherry liqueur, you can chew her up with a few plums (dried or fresh, but rather not smoked, due to this, that it would be treating the plague with cholera). Spices will go well with the cider. So as you can see from this simple example, not every recipe is lost, if you use sugar, even if something goes wrong. Designing drinks is unfortunately a bumpy road and sometimes it leads to products, to put it mildly, not encouraging, but see - every problem can be done. Finally, it is worth quoting one more story from one author of tinctures. Asked about it, what to kill the aftertaste of moonshine in alcohol, he replied, preferably Mentos or Halls, and it all depends, how much to drink. Bless you!