Moon Shining in Broad Daylight

It’s that time of year; time to make the homemade vodka or ‘ChaCha’ here in Georgia. Now while those of you in America maybe thinking, isn’t making homemade liquor illegal? I say that here it’s not only legal; it’s a source of pride for most families.

I have run across several debates about how ChaCha is to be made. The consensus is that it is to be made from grapes and that only poor families and uneducated people would make it from things like apples and peaches or other fruits. I think it’s more of a pride in the Georgian grapes than anything, but grapes seem to be the preferred method. I tried to convince them to let me make a batch out of corn to show them the Appalachian method, but they weren’t going for it.

Let me walk you through the weekend’s events. On Saturday morning, I arrived at home to see that the still had already been set up. (See photo below). Now, what we needed to do was open the huge barrel that we had left all the grape stems, seeds, and skins in from the fall when we made our wine. My family finished that process in October, so those had been left in there to ferment for about six months. I could describe the smell inside this giant barrel but for fear that you may be having a snack while reading this, I’ll spare you.
Getting the rot from the garage to the back yard was simple enough. We got a shovel, a ladder and some buckets and the process was on. We simply dumped buckets into the cooker until it was just over half way full. Then, it’s build a fire and wait on the alcohol to drip through. Simple as that. Really, after you get the still set up the process isn’t very labor intensive. You really just need to make sure the pipes stay cool in order to help the condensation process. (See my host-dad Akif below).
Now comes the more “scientific” aspect of the job. Ideally, the first 3 liter bottle should come out at about 70% alcohol by volume. We measured this with what I thought was a thermometer at first but then realized was a float that depending on the level of alcohol in the bottle tells you where you’re at. After that your next bottle should be around 40% alcohol and then around 30% before you need to load in more grape sludge. So that’s 9 liters at 70, 40 and 30% or, when all mixed together a batch of around 47% alcohol. Just as a note here, your typical bottle of liquor in the states is around 40%.

At this point you have two options, you can either remove the grape sludge and start a new batch or poor all 9 liters back in and distill it for a second time. You will lose a little alcohol % here but the taste will get better. Or so I’m told. Our first batch came out at a total of 55% so we dumped it back and got a final first batch of 42%. “Very not strong,” said my host-dad. But that first batch still tasted like the grape sludge and burnt like fire so we had no choice.

Like I said this wasn’t too labor intensive, so while we waited for the goodness to drip from the pipes we also took the time to dump last fall’s wine that we had “aged” in plastic bottles into one large glass container as to get some oxygen into it and to balance out the alcohol there as well. The women watched the kids to make sure they didn’t burn themselves, they made lunch and all I really had to do was poor beer and haul wine bottles up from the cellar. Of course there was the testing that happened after ever 3 liter bottle was distilled. (Half shots only cause you never knew what you were going to get). By the end of the day I was not feeling so well and needless to say slept quite late on Sunday.

Sunday was the same process except we had to do everything in the rain. It rained all day and everything just turned to mud. Gross. But, one thing I can say about ChaCha, it’ll keep you warm even when you’re wet. I think we ended up with about 25-27 liters of ChaCha by the end of Sunday but we still have more to go. I hear the best grape sludge (and by best they mean the highest alc. %) is at the bottom of the barrel. So, we’ll see about that.

I’ve been drinking this stuff for about two years now and I can say that every batch and every home is different. Some taste ok. Some taste real bad. Some are high in alcohol. Some are really high in alcohol. I don’t recommend it and I can tell you I’ve never met anyone who has ever said they drink ChaCha for the taste.

I think later this week if we still have wood and the still is still set up, I’ll buy some corn and try to get them to let me make some corn liquor for them. It can’t be any worse and who knows, maybe they’ll like it. They sure loved Jack Daniels when they tried a bottle a few months ago. I was frightened at how quickly they fell in love with Tennessee whiskey. Even my one host-brother who rarely drinks was putting down shots of that.

Until next time, stay safe and avoid the cops if you’re planning a weekend Shine; unless you’re livin’ in The Republic of Georgia, in which case go for it!