Science has run mad! You need not look any further than right here for conclusive proof that some chemists should be tarred, feathered, shot, then hung. Enter James Gilpin…Mad Scientist. I don’t even really know how to get into this topic. It is just so wrong on so many levels. Maybe the medical angle. See people with Diabetes, like Mr Gilpin, have an unusually high amount of sugar in their…well…their pee. Eww…there I said it. Ok, so you probably have guessed where this is going, so I will just blurt the rest out. Mr Gilpin had the crazy notion that Diabetic urine, I’ll call it piss, with it’s unusually high amount of sugar could be fermented and transformed into single malt scotch…
Yes you heard me correctly he wants to make scotch from piss. He says he is doing this to raise awareness of Type 1 diabetes as a health issue. Really? Cmon! Like no one knows Type 1 diabetes exists, so you have to make a whisky out of Diabetic piss? Give me a break!
He describes the process here:
The urine is cleaned using the same techniques that we use for purifying our mains water stock. This process itself shares much of the distillery process. The thing that made life easier is that the sugar molecules are large and will form crystals which can then be removed and purified separately.
This sugar is added to the mash stock and used to accelerate the fermentation process. This is sort of a bit of a cheat as traditionally the sugars would be made form the starches in the mash. During the brewing process I make a clear alcohol sprit. This is again not the traditional method for making whisky but I adopted a commercial technique for cheap whisky and used whisky blends which I added to the sprite to give color, taste and viscosity.
So there you go. Piss Whisky. Yet another reason not to enjoy a dram of scotch. You might want to be on the lookout for Gilpin Family Whisky. Pee… it’s not just for the toilet anymore!
-Don
I’d like to credit PSFK Conference in London for this content.
Beer & Whiskey Brothers 
TMI… Ewww Ewwwww. I did NOT need to know this!
Its all in the spirit of public service Ray. You wouldn’t want to be out one evening and deciding what to drink, spot the bottle of Gilpin Family Whiskey and think, Hmmm that’s new, I’ll give it a try. No I see this as a warning to our readers!
This is the guy I wanna go to Mars with!
He does have McGyveressque qualities, but when you think about it you want a guy that will figure out how to make a gun out of a bobby pin, chewing gum, a cell phone, and some Mars dust to kill the martian that wants to eat your brain rather than the guy that will say I bet I could make vodka out of his piss. 😉
No, I’d totally go for the vodka outta piss guy. Priorities, Don.
So, prior to distilling the urine, it has to be fermented. And usually that is an open vat fermentation, and that is a smell I don’t want to imagine or contend with.
Hey I got an idea, how about I distill a big vat of nyquil. I wonder how that would taste.
I’d rather drink the Nyquil boose than what this guy is making.
Dang,
My idea for fudge made from shit might not go over so well.
Or, perhaps Dr Gilpin is making a market for you Mike. You great innovators need to stick together!
I think that’s be a hit amongst four year olds, Mike. Stick to your dreams!
P.S. I’d try it.
Oh, I’d try it…once.
Mmmm…. Pisskey.
I applaud the ingenuity here. And I jeer absolutely every single other thing involved in this God forsaken idea.
Lol!
Jim made the comment that this is the guy you want with you on a trip to Mars with his McGyver-like skills. Could come in handy, and if not, he can make drinks during the trip!
That’s a gamble. If he’s a one trick pony, you’re stuck on Mars counting out your days with nothing to look forward to but the consumption of urine.
If there is alcohol in it, it probably would be the only way to get past the boredom. So either way it works out. I figured once you get past the grossness, you could just stay drunk and not think about it, or if you did, it might be funny… 🙂