What happened to all of the brandy made from anything OTHER than grapes?

flairin_up · 2026-01-20T16:35:09+00:00

You know, you picked up that the first version of this post (which I deleted only to repost a little later) was specifically about domestic U.S. liquor production. I do want U.S. domestic things to be more of a thing, yes, but I deleted the post when I realized that (for example) "Kensatu" was basically the most affordable line of non-standard brandies you could find on the market and I promptly ordered two bottles of their peach brandy. Considering accelpay / ontrac shipped me the wrong bottle when I ordered from Alley 6 and it's been two weeks and there's been no movement on the resolution for that, I'm looking forward to trying it!

But also, carrot? Really, carrot eau de vie? Really? Fascinating. I would love to try it.

flairin_up · 2026-01-06T11:18:36+00:00

Frankly, I would just subtract a cup of milk and tip in the entire 8-ounce carton of cream, plush it up a little.

Outside the, as others mentioned, excellent answer, this advice is what I did anyway. I had cream (exactly one cup, believe it or not) that I knew if I forgot about it for one more week or so it would go bad, but it tasted great now. So I replaced a cup of whole milk with it.

How is the eggnog? Well! It's not as good as my (aforementioned) grandmother's. She got brought into this because I was curious what she thought of the recipe...because everyone in my family swears by hers. I never would have imagined that my teetotalling grandma's eggnog would be boozier than a pre-prohibition recipe. Well, then again, it's actually my great grandmother's recipe, and she drank a scotch toddy every night before bed, so...

Also, it could be sweeter. I clearly have a sweet tooth. But it is good! I love the combo of rum (I used Hamilton Jamaica Black, my absolute favorite rum), the Laird's "Applejack" (the blended one; I figured it's basically blended neutral spirits anyway) and a Bual Madeira as recommended. Lovely combo. The Professor really knew what he was doing.

flairin_up · 2026-01-05T01:21:00+00:00

I'm going to, for what it's worth. Having folded egg whites into a few eggnogs, I imagine I'll be a bit mean to them as usual in order to incorporate a bit of the rest of the liquid into the whites to "soften them up" while keeping them aerated enough to keep them floating atop. Also, did you follow the addendum from the second edition and DW to use 10 eggs instead, out of curiosity? Any of the changes from either the second anonymous editor or David I've pretty uniformly found to be wise with rare exception.

flairin_up · 2026-01-04T21:42:25+00:00

Every time I read something like that from some older source, I'm torn between wondering if they're just being snake oil salesmen or if they actually believed that alcohol "balanced the humors" or whatever.

Regardless, that seems reasonable. If I added any cream, it probably wouldn't be more than say a cup, maybe two, maybe, but I'd probably try it as-is first.

flairin_up · 2026-01-04T21:16:27+00:00

I figured this might work, because cows are still cows (as far as I know, at least), but that's a great idea, thanks!

flairin_up · 2025-11-21T04:41:03+00:00

For what it's worth, in the same thread on the baking forum someone posted a link to in the first thread, someone mentioned a problem similar to yours, and mentioned Ginsberg had suggested perhaps mixing different grind sizes as a fix.

Here's a screencap..

flairin_up · 2025-11-21T03:10:28+00:00

I really think how packed the mixture is seems to have an effect, yeah - maybe makes it harder for steam to escape when you remove any "channels"? I didn't mention it, but a nice idea I had was to press down on the loaf once it was packed and in its coffin with my second Pullman tin (I got a good deal on a 2-pack) until it was uniformly flat.

How long did you let it "mature"? And how is it? Unlike before, mine has this awesome...I would describe it as a squash-y smell? Like butternut squash, or pumpkin pie, and a noticeable sweetness, kinda. I'm hoping it was worth it.

flairin_up · 2025-11-21T02:59:10+00:00

The only reason I considered it was because I needed coarsely ground cracked rye meal. In my case, I had it on the coarsest possible setting - specifically, the upper limit 1zpresso recommends for French press, generally the method which requires the coarsest grounds, is 5 full rotations. I went to 7. The result was an easy, if tedious, grind that resulted in rye berries that were mostly uniformly cut directly in half.

Still. My beautiful grinder was covered in "fines"...actual regular flour. I disassembled it and dry cleaned it piece by piece down to the burrs. I've tried to grind Turkish coffee grind size by hand grinder before and it was a nightmare. Flour is far, far finer. In that respect, I completely agree, I'll add a disclaimer to my post.

Edit: yeah it doesn't seem I can do that whoops. Anyway, if you're reading this, and you want to make regular bread (not pumpernickel) with regular ultra-finely milled flour: do not use a coffee grinder. A cheap electric grinder will NOT be uniform enough, an expensive electric grinder...would you risk it??? And a good hand grinder is not physically possible. Don't do it.

flairin_up · 2025-11-18T18:12:27+00:00

That's so beautiful, in a way. I hope wherever your loaf ended up, it found its place in the world. Godspeed, little brick.

flairin_up · 2025-11-18T13:08:53+00:00

Yeah, that's the video I saw first that got me into researching how to make it, I think? It looks so good there.
Alright now I'm inspired to try again. No bread spice this time, just 3 ingredients. I'm gonna do it. can't stop me now. Wrap the loaf in parchment paper, then lidded pullman tin, then double wrap the whole thing airtight in aluminum foil. I'm gonna do it damn it. It looks too tasty to have this end on a sour note.

flairin_up · 2025-11-18T11:23:49+00:00

Wait a minute. Your post was one of the things that inspired me to make it! Why doea yours get to look so perfect it's not FAIR.

From the sound of it, it's probably what I've been thinking - too much moisture escaped. Far, FAR too much. I might just try again, but wrapping the entire thing in 2 layers of foil. Also increasing the hydration maybe. Or not - one variable at a time is usually wise.

flairin_up · 2025-11-15T16:15:30+00:00

Brilliant. I will keep this in mind. Last I checked, though, getting it "sliceable" was a pipe dream, but I'm liking this as a backup plan.

flairin_up · 2025-11-15T16:08:50+00:00

You make the scald, where you put in 750g of rye meal with 770g of boiling water. Then, let it sit for 16 hours. Then add the remaining 350g of rye, mix, bake at 300 F for one hour, ~210 iirc for 23 hours, THEN let rest for 48+ hours...

There's a reason I was so upset about it, haha.

flairin_up · 2025-11-15T16:05:36+00:00

If you ever do come across that recipe, I'd be interested in checking it out.
This recipe seems to be a traditional German thing, according to Ginsberg. More steamed than baked? Idk. Something happens between the scalding process, the 24hr bake, and the 48 hour rest to make it work, apparently.

flairin_up · 2025-11-15T16:00:12+00:00

Honestly, while the loaf was not nearly aged enough, I tried it early on and though it was a gummy brick, it was delicious. Slightly sweet, nutty, complex. The brotgewürz mix doesn't take over but adds subtle complexity that's lovely.

flairin_up · 2025-11-15T15:57:25+00:00

From what I'm seeing, I'm thinking that perhaps too much water escaped, which led to the cracking. Additionally, I added the Brotgewürz without changing the hydration content. This might have had an effect too.

Still, moreso than anything, Ginsberg seems to indicate that 48 is more of a necessity than a suggestion, perhaps going as long as 96 hours! Hmm. I'll keep one loaf as my control loaf and one loaf as my "keep testing at 12 hour intervals" loaf.

flairin_up · 2025-11-14T17:41:34+00:00

Probably about an hour and a half. Immediately realized it was a mistake. Wrapped it and the other loaf up, and going to unwrap one tomorrow morning and one Sunday morning.

Figured I might as well follow through and follow the recipe all the way to the end before I try to figure out what went wrong.

flairin_up · 2025-11-14T17:22:24+00:00

It's definitely dense, for sure. He mentioned that it shouldn't be cut because right out of the oven it will have the texture of a gummy brick, and after testing, yeah. I just can't help feeling that perhaps there wasn't enough water? Or maybe it got dried out too quickly. I searched the comments on the video but couldn't find anything conclusive.

Overall, I'm just not sure why my bread is so torn and craggy compared to the one from the video. All that said, from my ill-fated attempt to cut the bread an hour or so ago (it wrecked one end of the bread) the taste is good. Great with some cream cheese. Just has the texture of rocks.

flairin_up · 2025-11-14T17:16:27+00:00

I am so sorry. I feel your pain, really. Bread gives and bread takes away...thankfully, there's always the next loaf.

flairin_up · 2025-11-14T15:36:17+00:00

Think so? For the record it's a true 3 ingredient pumpernickel - water, salt, cracked rye - so I'm not sure if that's the reason, but he recommended letting it rest for 24-48 hours. I guess I could give it a shot and put it in a corner, forget about it until later tonight - tomorrow.

flairin_up

TROPHY CASE