Alcohol Distillation and Its Connection to Terpenes

Alcohol distillation is the process by which spirits are created from already fermented ingredients (like beer, wine or cider ) using heated steam or vapour, by isolating their compounds using different boiling points and pressure. A distiller can control this ratio to optimize quality control of their final product.

Distillation steps generally concentrate certain flavour molecules while eliminating others, meaning each batch must be distilled multiple times until its desired percentage of ethanol has been met – this explains why most spirits are known as drinks rather than pure liquors.

The heads are the first part of any distillation run and contain most of the ethanol as well as unpleasant compounds like methanol, acetone and furfural which may smell similar to nail polish remover. Therefore, these components must be separated out from hearts before being sent for re-distillation.

Heads also contain higher-order alcohols, which are extremely bitter and can have an adverse impact on the flavor of spirits. They’re produced when carboxylic acids in the distillate react with water to form esters; their concentration varies depending on which raw materials were used – triticale distillates tend to contain fewer higher-order alcohols than rye distillates, for instance.