Moonshine is a common name for alcohol distilled at home. Its also known as, white lightning, bush whiskey, stump, old horsey etc. Its popular to brew moonshine at home since its much easier to make than either wine or beer. The flavor and taste of moonshine is loosely defined and varies greatly depending how and with what ingredients it is brewed. Moonshine is basically any distilled spirit, mostly ethanol (even methanol can give you an alcoholic high but is dangerous and can lead to blindness or death). Here is a neat recipe for easily making moonshine at home.
Ingredients Required:
- 5 pounds corneal
- 20 pounds sugar
- 20 gallons water
- one ounce yeast
- some charcoal
- a few large pots
- a coiled copper pipe
- a pressure cooker
Method:
Start boil the water on the stove and let it continue boiling for about five minutes. Add all the cornmeal to the boiling water and keep stirring. This mixture is called mash. Take the pot off the stove. Don’t touch the mash till it is cool enough to touch. Do NOT eat any mash, its absolutely dangerous as it will lump up in your stomach or maybe form stones, and we don’t want that.
Now take some sugar in a bowl and completely dissolve it. Add the yeast to this sugar solution. Do not add the yeast when the water is boiling hot or it will kill all your yeast. Brewing yeast will make your moonshine stronger as the yeast will be able to survive higher alcohol content and ferment longer as compared to bakers yeast. Now add this solution to the warm mash and stir.
Store the mash aside in a cool and dark place and allow fermentation to happen over 5-7 days. The mash is ready to be moved once it stops bubbling. At this stage the mash is called sour mash. Put this sour mash into a pressure cooker and very carefully heat it to 173F. At this temperature the alcohol will rise to the surface.
Affix the copper pipe to the vent of the pressure cooker, run it through cold water and put a pot at the other end. The vapor from the pressure cooker will run through the copper pipe and liquefy as it passes through the cool water. The collected liquid is almost completed moonshine. For the last step, filter the liquid through a some bits of charcoal a few times. This will remove any impurities and dirt. Now you can fill up that bottle and store it up or just pour it into a glass and enjoy the fruits of your labor.
Tips:
- The amount of ingredients used in this guide will yield about 4 gallons of moonshine.
- Follow the steps correctly, making small mistakes can lead to blindness or slow death. (you have been warned!)
- Only an adult should undertake such a dangerous task
- Brewing moonshine at home could be illegal in most countries
- Selling homemade moonshine is definitely illegal so be warned if you plan to do this
Related Content:
I live in New Zealand and it is LEGAL to produce your own spirits here…
Tip: Discard the first 100mls of spirit produced as this is Methanol and can send you blind…
Once the moon shine is brewed how much water to do you cut it with? Thanks