By
George Brozowski
Good
old-fashioned moonshine seems to be taking on a new
shine these days. Back in the day, it was notoriously strong
both in flavor and alcohol content. Fast forward to today
and you find almost every moonshine distiller flavoring their
shine with just about everything grown within spitting distance
of their distillery. Actually, they used to do this even way
back when because the shine was so caustic, it needed to be
diluted and flavored just so people could stomach the stuff.
Today,
all that has changed and even plain old straight up moonshine
won't make you gag and cough because it's made with good ingredients
by master distillers who really know what they're doing. At
least, that's the theory. As with any flavored spirit, everyone
with a tongue, mouth and a nose will disagree or agree with
just about everyone else about the taste of just about everything,
and I'm not just talking about booze here. Having tasted the
full flavored lines of some distillers, I have to admit that
some of the flavors are pretty good, some are so-so, and others
just plain horrible. And some of you have agreed with my rants
and raves, while some have disagreed, and some of you have
even disparaged me, my family, my pets, and even my sign of
the zodiac for my opinions. I am grateful to all of you good,
bad and ugly people for all your beautiful, sadistic, sarcastic,
and even sweet input. After all, it's a free country and we
are allowed to be as right or wrong as you and I want to be.
So
today we get to try four of SweetShine's
ten flavors: Black Walnut, Cremma
Lemma, Ginger and Cranberry Clementine.
You gotta figure that these folks just might know what they're
doing since their 12 acre farm has been around since the late
1700's. It started out as a bloomery, that's a cheaper, simpler
way to produce iron than by using a blast furnace. By the
1800's, that production was replaced by three stills purchased
for the princely sum of $74.00 dollars and nobody's looked
back since then, not even during prohibition.
The
bottles are tall and thin and beautifully decorated with old
fashioned labels that look like they could have been produced
back in the 1920's Let's start with the Cremma Lemma
and see if, as they like to say on the bottle, it's full of
vice or virtue. Well, it certainly smells delightful, sort
of like lemon cheesecake, but I might have to pass on this
taste test. It physically looks like milk that's gone bad
with little pieces of milky parts floating about in it. My
momma told me not to drink milk that's gone bad, and this
sure looks like milk that's gone bad although it does smell
mighty tempting. And then this idiot writer read the top of
the bottle cap, and there, as plain as day, were the words
"all natural shake well ingredients will separate or
settle". Well, that was certainly unsettling, so let's
go back and give it another shot now that I've shaken the
hell out of it and shaken off my fears as well. The nose is
a creamy, lemony delight with a touch of sugar in it but no
ethanol vapors whatsoever. It is bright and tart and tangy.
On the palate, it is very lemony and creamy followed by a
sweet citrus note and quite yummy with no burn at all. The
finish follows suit with a lemony, cream like after taste
that lasts a medium amount of time. I'll just bet that this
stuff mixes well with other ingredients and makes one interesting
dessert drink.
Next
up is the Cranberry Clementine, which by
the way, I shook the hell out of just to be safe. The nose
is a combination of cranberries and oranges, again with no
discernible ethanol. It tends to lean to the tart side with
just the bare essence of citrus. On the palate, it leans in
favor of the oranges over the cranberries, but the cranberries
are there. It is light, not too sweet, and fruitfully tasty.
The finish is smooth, tart, but not too tart, and of course
sweet, but not too sweet, making it well balanced. I could
go for a flute of champagne mixed with this accompanying a
Sunday brunch!
The
third entry is the Ginger flavor. The nose
has a very earthy aroma of muted ginger and sugar and possibly
a hint of cherry, again with no appreciable alcohol vapors.
On the palate, it is sugary sweet and tangy with subtle ginger
flavors and a touch of pepper that makes it quite interesting.
The finish is earthy, sweet and gingery, with a bit of spice
that's nice and lasts a fairly long time. This is definitely
a prime mixing candidate, although I wouldn't mind trying
it with some sushi.
And
last, but I hope not least, is the Black Walnut
flavor. This is definitely the darkest in color of the bunch
and looks just like black coffee. My goodness the nose actually
presents like black coffee up front, with oily walnuts in
the background and it has no traces of sweetness nor alcohol.
It is oily and thicker than the others with hints of blackberries,
coffee and walnuts on the palate. The finish finally exhibits
some sweetness, along with the coffee and walnuts and a touch
of pepper and lasts a good long tingly time. I like this one
as much as all the others because they are all true to their
flavors and don't taste artificial, although they all seem
to contain a fair amount of sugar as well as all the other
ingredients. These are fine quality liqueurs and well worth
their price point. Just don't be afraid to shake the shit
out of each bottle before opening so you don't experience
any unexpected consequences like I did.
SweetShine's
products come in 375ML bottles which are half the normal 750ML
size most distilled spirits come in, so for a fair comparison,
just do the math. The Cremma Lemma (21.5%
ABV) and Ginger (23.8% ABV) and Black
Walnut (39.7% ABV) and Cranberry Clementine
(15.1% ABV) are all $24.99, while their Hard Lemonade
comes in at $12.99 and the Chocolate Raspberry
ups the ante to $28.97.
For
more Rants & Raves click
here.
http://bloomerysweetshine.com/