What makes these alcoholic spirits different?
What makes these alcoholic spirits different?
To find out, we hit the bar.
Encyclopædia Britannica, Inc.
Transcript
When you break it down, the formula for making alcohol is simple. It’s just yeast plus sugar, with a little heat.
But there’s a lot of rules and regulations that make these spirits what they are.
To learn more, we brought in an expert. Well, we met her at the bar.
Who ordered the old fashioned?
Sonat: Grains are really essential to making whiskey.
Whiskey can be made from any combination of corn, rye, wheat, or barley. Distiller’s pick!
All whiskey needs to be aged, usually in white oak barrels.
The rules for bourbon whiskey, however, are a little different.
Sonat: Bourbon can only be made in the United States. You can have the same mash bill in Paris, but they sure can’t call it bourbon.
And not only does bourbon have to be American, it also needs to be at least 51 percent corn.
For other spirits, the source of the alcohol is less important. Gin and tonic, anyone?
Sonat: Gin, you have to start, you know, with some base alcohol and then you need to use juniper.
Sonat: The base alcohol could be grains.
But when someone is making gin, the base could come from other things. You could make a gin with a potato base or a vodka base that’s made from some other raw material.
Just don’t forget the juniper.
For those who prefer something sweeter, maybe try a sidecar—or get tropical with a piña colada.
Sonat: Brandies are different. Brandies are fruit-based.
They’re usually pear-based or apple-based.
Sonat: Rum obviously can come from molasses, come from sugar.
If your goal is as little flavor as possible—hey, who ordered shots?
Sonat: With vodka, you don’t want flavor and aroma.
And so the way you do that is you need to distill it pretty high, as high as it will go, so that you are stripping it of all of its flavor and aroma to get almost a neutral spirit.
Okay, this is getting a little complicated. Let’s go back to the basics.
Sonat: But truth be told, you can really distill almost anything with the sugar content.
Time to close out already? So… who’s paying the tab?
But there’s a lot of rules and regulations that make these spirits what they are.
To learn more, we brought in an expert. Well, we met her at the bar.
Who ordered the old fashioned?
Sonat: Grains are really essential to making whiskey.
Whiskey can be made from any combination of corn, rye, wheat, or barley. Distiller’s pick!
All whiskey needs to be aged, usually in white oak barrels.
The rules for bourbon whiskey, however, are a little different.
Sonat: Bourbon can only be made in the United States. You can have the same mash bill in Paris, but they sure can’t call it bourbon.
And not only does bourbon have to be American, it also needs to be at least 51 percent corn.
For other spirits, the source of the alcohol is less important. Gin and tonic, anyone?
Sonat: Gin, you have to start, you know, with some base alcohol and then you need to use juniper.
Sonat: The base alcohol could be grains.
But when someone is making gin, the base could come from other things. You could make a gin with a potato base or a vodka base that’s made from some other raw material.
Just don’t forget the juniper.
For those who prefer something sweeter, maybe try a sidecar—or get tropical with a piña colada.
Sonat: Brandies are different. Brandies are fruit-based.
They’re usually pear-based or apple-based.
Sonat: Rum obviously can come from molasses, come from sugar.
If your goal is as little flavor as possible—hey, who ordered shots?
Sonat: With vodka, you don’t want flavor and aroma.
And so the way you do that is you need to distill it pretty high, as high as it will go, so that you are stripping it of all of its flavor and aroma to get almost a neutral spirit.
Okay, this is getting a little complicated. Let’s go back to the basics.
Sonat: But truth be told, you can really distill almost anything with the sugar content.
Time to close out already? So… who’s paying the tab?