Homemade bitters

[ColonialDawg]

I’m trying my hand at making bitters this year and decided to make an orange bitters and what I am going to call Holiday Baking Spice bitters.

In the first, I put some dried orange peel, some charred orange pith, clove, allspice, cardamom, and caraway seeds. I couldn’t find a good high proof neutral spirit at my ABC store (they don’t carry everclear and all the vodkas are 80 proof), so I settled on Wray and Nephew overproof white rum. The orange pith should provide some good bitter flavors.

For my "Holiday Baking Spice" bitters, I am using clove, allspice, cardamom, blade mace, cinnamon, chopped ginger, dried orange zest, and dried cranberries. For the alcohol, well, I stumbled across something interesting at the ABC store yesterday - Buffalo Trace Mash #1 White Dog. It’s 125 proof and was only $17 (I might do another batch of orange bitters with this as well, as a comparison).

I’ll let these sit for about 2-3 weeks, and then strain.

I’m still awaiting my gentian root and conchina bark. I’ll make a separate "bitter" infusion with those, then combine with my aromatic infusions. That way I can control how bitter I want these to be. I have read that this does not have to sit for as long as the aromatics. I’ll test as I go, of course.

I have some rich Demerara syrup I’ll use if needed to balance everything out.

Question for those who have made their own bitters:

Do you bother boiling the solids in water after straining? I have read some recipes that do that, and then add the infused water back to the alcohol infusion for dilution so the flavors are not diluted. I have also read that doing that doesn’t make a huge difference.

Is dilution even recommended? I know these are high proof spirits, but once again I have read many recipes that don’t bother diluting.

[Bendy]

A few notes from my experience.
1. I have not noticed a difference with boiling any ingredients than not.
2. I have not diluted during the making of any bitters. This is based on me learning the hard way to make small batches to avoid wasting large volumes of everclear or ingredients. The goal is to have enough flavor that you only need few drops to your pour of choice.
3. I would recommend making single flavor tinctures in lieu of batches with many ingredients. It allows you to learn the individual flavor profile of each ingredient and then you can mix the tinctures together in controlled small batches to tweak a bitter flavor the way you like it. You will need to invest more in hardware to make more at a time but I have had more success this way then trying to find a complicated recipe and then replicating it as needed.
4. Find Everclear it is your best friend in making bitters. Otherwise you will have a difficult time understanding how much flavor was added from your ingredients vs the liquor.

If you are looking for a good source of ingredients try pennherb.com and glassware from specialtybottle.com.

good luck

[ColonialDawg]

I looked at doing single flavor tinctures and concur that seems like the way to go. However I have limited space right now and don't know how much of this I'll keep doing. I am making small batches, though, and am also infusing my bittering agent in a separate container.