This is a traveling distiller with his still. I gather he drives around at harvest time and stops wherever people have been fermenting their rice. He takes the rice wine and makes it into a more potent rice moonshine. I gather the still works pretty fast as there was a pretty large flow of alcohol coming out the other end. He was working at two pm when I left the house and was still there when I came home after five. I took a picture when I was going by the first time, and then when I saw he was still there I asked to take more pictures. When he saw how interested I was, he told me I should take three pictures. One of him stoking the fire, one of him ladling out the booze and reading the alcoholometer and one of him drinking the delicious product. I took as many as I could, most of which have been uploaded for the readers enjoyment.
This is the first picture I took. The light was the best, so this picture came out the clearest. Click on it to see the stream of moonshine coming out of the condenser.
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The next picture is the first one I took on the way back.
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Stoking the fire under the boiler
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Adding more coal
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The rightfully self satisfied smile of the distiller. I know I'd be smiling at least that much if I had my own still.
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Filling the tasting bowl directly from the condenser
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Checking the specific gravity
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Tasting the finished product
If you enjoyed these pictures please don't write or comment to tell me its a hydrometer not an alcoholometer. To me, it will always be an alcoholometer.
2 comments:
Distilling: The operation in the pictures would produce a much safer beverage than some of the illegal stills in the hills of Kentucky. There the preferred condenser is an old automobile radiator, which tends to add a little lead to the mix. I worked in a legal operation in Louisville for a short time before entering the Navy. We used steam heat for cooking the mash and for heating the still. Much safer that way. No chance of setting the alcohol afire. Of course the old pot still doesn't produce the high proof product that you can get from a multi plate bubble cap column.
In the 1950s I worked in a chemical plant in Louisville. One of our employees commuted from Buffalo, KY down state. HE brought in bootleg from time to time. It was good stuff, properly aged, no contaminants, but pretty strong at 100-plus proof
kentuckian
You should write in this blog again...
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