Oak chips how much to put. A simple recipe for making moonshine on oak chips (chips)

One of the best alcoholic drinks is moonshine on oak chips, the recipe of which is very ambiguous. But amateurs believe that moonshine is moonshine. And they don’t even suspect what pleasure they lose if they don’t take into account either the method of preparing this drink, or other important parameters, such as storage conditions, additives, spices to add aroma / taste, and other nuances.

What moonshine to choose

Infusion of moonshine on oak chips is suitable for the following types of it:

• sugar;
• fruit;
• grain.

From fruit options the best is considered made on grapes (chacha). However, this is already a matter of taste. These three types are most suitable due to the special effect and chemical reactions between substances. If you use oak chips with other species, the consequences can be very unpleasant ─ bitter taste, harmful substances, pungent odor, etc.

Tannins contained in wood chips, when interacting with ethyl alcohol change it taste qualities, color, and smell. These qualities are also influenced by such parameters as the characteristics of the tree and the exposure time.

Thanks to various manipulations, you can get a drink with notes of chocolate, fresh flowers or fruits, vanilla and many more wonderful tastes and aromas.

If the prepared product does not have desired properties, and there is no strength left for its subsequent processing, then special flavoring additives can be used. These tinctures are sold in small bottles, they are concentrated, and a few drops are enough to completely change the properties of the liquid, depending on its volume.

What kind of oak to choose

Just as a person is affected by the climate, which determines the color of the skin, etc., so the oak is affected by where exactly it grows. In other words, the properties of the drink that will come out of it depend on the place where the tree grows. Despite the fact that cognac, whiskey, wine, vodka and other alcohol can be obtained from moonshine, different varieties of the same tree will help to make different drinks. See this video for more details:

Oak growing in France is predominant in popularity. There is even a special classification according to regional characteristics, but it is more suitable for making wines. True, of course, not everyone has the opportunity to order wood from abroad.

In general, in Western Europe, winter (aka stone), summer and pedunculate oak stands out. Good wood in Russia can be divided into species by region, which includes 3 main types:

1. Khadyzhensky district north of Krasnodar.
2. Afipsky district.
3. Apsheronsky district and north-west of Krasnodar.

Valuable varieties of oak also grow in the following places: the Caucasus and the Crimea, Tatarstan and Bashkortostan (along the Kama River), the islands of the Ural Mountains, the Voronezh region, Western Ukraine, Belarus.

Preparation of oak chips

Oak chips are also called chips. They are "squared" pegs measuring 2x2x10 cm, but other sizes are also allowed, for example, 15x3x0.5 cm.

Before use, you should work on their cleaning and processing.

But if there is not enough time or opportunity to make oak chips on your own, then you can simply buy ready-made raw materials at a pharmacy or specialized wine stores. Processing wood chips is needed not so much for disinfection, but to give moonshine special properties ─ smell, taste and color.

Ready-made raw materials can be bought at the pharmacy

Preparation begins with soaking the chips in water, during the day you need to change the water up to 5 times. This stage allows you to clean the tree from excess tannin.

The next step will be soaking with soda solution, lasts 6 hours. The decoction is made at the rate of 1 tsp. soda with a slide for 6 liters of water. It is up to the moonshiner to decide which water to use, since there are no clear rules on this matter. However, the purer the water, such as spring water, the better.

This will shift the quality of the drink in a certain direction by a couple of percent, and only rare gourmets will feel the difference when drinking future alcohol.

Further work consists in washing the pegs and boiling them for an hour. In this case, it is best to use fire with the lowest possible intensity. Then the raw material is suspended so that it dries in a day. To do this, you need a well-ventilated room without extraneous odors. That is, the stable is not suitable for such purposes. For information on how to prepare wood chips, see this video:

At the next stage, oak chips for moonshine should be fired in a pre-prepared oven with a temperature of 160 to 200 ° C.

The temperature itself plays a role, since it depends on how much the tree is smoked from the inside.

The degree of roasting will affect the properties of the future drink. In addition, you should think in advance how to make sure that the firing is distributed evenly over all the chips. To do this, they must be at least the same shape.

There are 3 main degrees of "roasting":

1. Light - the color of the chips should turn light brown, and the color of the alcohol should then become straw. The aroma will be floral, with hints of vanilla.
2. Medium ─ the pegs should be brown, and the color of the future liquid, respectively, darker and richer. Such firing will help to prepare a drink with the smell of caramel and almonds.
3. The longest, at which the color of the chips will turn dark brown, like the color of the drink, which will give it a taste of dark chocolate.

Your own way of processing raw materials is also welcome. Thus, you can get a personal and unique drink.

tincture recipe

First you need to prepare all the items and raw materials. How much oak chips per liter of moonshine should be put depends only on the experimenter himself, since the recipe sometimes varies greatly. But ideally, it is necessary to infuse moonshine in the amount of 1 liter with 30 - 60 g of wood chips, and the fortress should be about 45 °.

All this is poured into a glass or stainless steel container to the neck, so that there is as little air as possible.

Then it is hermetically sealed with a metal or wooden lid/stopper. Such a solution should be stored for 3 to 6 months in a dark, cool place. For more information about the tincture, see this video:

There are no clear rules for how long to infuse a drink. It depends not only on the type of oak tree, but also on the type of moonshine itself. glass jars they are good because even in the dark you can see the color and, possibly, unwanted sediment through them.

If alcohol needs to be poured for some event, and the production time does not allow this, then about 0.3 g of vanillin, a couple of peas can be added to the liquid allspice and a few carnations. Thus, after 2-3 weeks, guests will be able to try the resulting product.

Tincture of moonshine on oak chips instant cooking will not have the necessary and healing substances, and for color you will need to use caramel. The latter contributes to a decrease in strength by 2 - 3 ° ─ this moment should be taken into account during the first stage.

What Not to Do

When making moonshine on oak chips, it is not recommended:

1. Too long frying of chips (you should practice on a smaller number of pieces of wood to begin with).
2. Using a damp or damp tree (it is better to look for dry branches).
3. The use of plastic containers (in no case should this be done ─ alcohol corrodes most types of plastic, as a result of which a drink prepared for consumption can become poisonous).
4. Use too many ingredients and spices (too many additives can only spoil the taste, and it will be very difficult to fix it).
5. Overdo the drink (otherwise from quality product you can get a liquid with pungent odors).
6. Mix the infusion of moonshine on oak chips according to unverified recipes in large quantities so as not to spoil the entire batch.

Conclusion

If the basic instructions for making moonshine at home are followed, then you can get a drink that will be comparable to expensive whiskey or cognac. In addition, do-it-yourself work always gives pleasure ─ at least moral.

But the same recipes can lead to different results, there are many nuances that affect the properties of alcohol during its manufacture. You just need to remember all the conditions and every little thing, so that next time you can take all this into account and make a better drink.

Hennessy for cheaters:

how to make "cognac" from moonshine?

Recipes proven by generations!

Homemade "cognacs" are one of the most common topics of discussion on forums for homemade alcoholic beverages. Their recipes have been improved for hundreds of years, and now many moonshiners manage to make, if not a complete analogue of real cognac, then its very high-quality replica, which, with proper exposure, becomes an excellent product, tasty, fragrant and beautiful in its own way.

I’ll make a reservation right away - you won’t get “cognac” in the full sense of the word by any of the methods below. However, even the low-grade booze that is sold in our stores is not and cannot be cognac. However, it is quite possible to make a wonderful, very special drink with its own flavor and aroma properties. And your product will be much better than any Koktebel.

Today we will give the two most common, thousands of times proven recipes - home-made cognac from moonshine on oak bark “in Latgalian style” and the so-called “village” cognac on oak chips.

Homemade cognac from moonshine - recipes on oak bark and wood chips.

On the forums I met the phrase that comparing real and homemade cognac is the same as comparing a living and rubber woman. This approach is completely wrong! Each of these recipes has its own special charm. Cognac from moonshine on oak bark is not a chemical fake, but a living one, noble drink and also made by hand.
Continuing the analogy: if the original cognac is a pretentious Parisian fashion model, with whom, except for the philosophy of Deleuze, there is nothing to talk about (and even only in French), then our home-made “cognac” from moonshine is a healthy village laughter, with which even to the hayloft, even to the BAM construction site, even to Siberian exile.

Cognac from moonshine at home. A little about raw materials.

As already mentioned, it is impossible to make cognac from moonshine with your own hands, but you can make a good, high-quality original drink. Naturally, this requires three things - high-class alcohol, correct proportion ingredients and long exposure.

As for the quality of moonshine, all the authors of the recipes are unanimous - it should be the highest! A good grain double or triple distillate is suitable, or rectified, cooked in beer column and diluted to the required strength. The best cognacs from moonshine at home are obtained if grape alcohol was used for them - chacha or its simplified counterparts. Now let's talk about the second mandatory ingredient - oak. Do-it-yourself cognac from moonshine can only be made if you have specially prepared wood from this tree. Why is it so important? Chips or chips are, so to speak, an ersatz barrel - a common and affordable replacement for oak wine barrels. What will oak give to our drink?

1. Tannins. Dissolved substances of the tannin group give the drink astringency and a peculiar bitter aroma, which softens with aging.
2. Aromatic acids. During the biosynthesis of lingin contained in wood, natural flavors are released. There are many of them, but first of all it is syringaldehyde (it gives a smell similar to lilac) and more pronounced vanillin. Imagine, it is contained not only in vanilla beans and shopping bags, but also, for example, in cinnamon, cloves, olive oil, coffee, and, of course, in oak wood.
3. Lactones and phenolic compounds. Also an important element of the bouquet of drinks aged in barrels or on wood chips. During the heat treatment of wood, substances of the furan series are formed in it, giving our cognac the very aroma of “caramel”.

Oak is the main component homemade cognac

So, oak is tannins, vanillin and caramel. If not chips or wood chips are used, these flavors and aromas must be artificially communicated to the drink. Therefore, recipes for home-made cognac from moonshine on oak bark often include additional ingredients- e.g. natural wine, vanilla sugar or pods, caramel syrup.

In general, enough theory, let's go directly to the recipes for homemade cognac from moonshine.

Cognac in Latgale. Recipe proven by generations!

Latgalian tincture is the most common way to ennoble moonshine “under cognac”. The recipe was invented in Latgale - the historical region of modern Latvia, which has a long tradition of home brewing. There are extremely many variations of this drink, but there is one classic recipe, which has been used for generations and always gives a good, stable result. We will bring him.

Ingredients:

• 3 liters of moonshine at least double distilled, diluted to 50 degrees.
• Oak bark (sold in a pharmacy) - 2 tablespoons. I recommend that you pre-soak the bark for 10 minutes in boiling water, dry it, and only after that put it in a drink, otherwise it will contain too many tannins. You can also replace the bark with an equal amount of oak chips.
• 3 cloves.
• Nutmeg(whole) - 1/5 part or ground - on the tip of a knife.
• Coriander - 1 crushed grain or ground - approximately 0.5 grams.
• Sugar - 3 tablespoons.

Cooking:

1. Sugar must first be dissolved in a small amount of moonshine, as an option - make it simplecaramel syrup .
2. We put all the ingredients in a jar, pour in moonshine and add syrup, shake everything well and set aside in a dark place.
3. The infusion time is from two weeks, but not more than a month, so that the alcohol base does not draw too much tannins out of the bark. When insisting on the battery, the time is reduced to a week - 10 days, but this is not a very correct method, it is better to wait.
4. After the tincture has acquired a brown color and a bright aroma, it must be filtered, bottled and kept for at least six months in a dark place.
   They say that after two years of aging, Latgalian cognac becomes especially pleasant. With each month of rest, the drink becomes more and more rich, soft and similar to real cognac!

   Homemade cognac from moonshine. Country style recipe

   This version of the drink, in principle, is similar to the previous one, but it uses much more ingredients, and there are many cooking variations - for every taste. I will describe recipes that use oak chips, so before you make cognac from moonshine in this way, you will need to prepare the material. Well, or buy it in special stores. How to prepare and burn oak chips is written at the end of this article.

   Ingredients:

   • good moonshine 45-50 degrees - 3 liters;
   • Oak chips of medium roast - 6 pieces 10 cm long and about 4 × 4 mm thick.
   • Sugar - 2 tablespoons (for caramel syrup);
   • Rosehip - 15 small berriesin this article );
   • 3-4 black peppercorns;
   • A teaspoon of large-leaf black tea (it is better to take a good one, as a cheap one can be dyed);
   • St. John's wort - 1 small sprig or a teaspoon without the top of the pharmacy ground. This ingredient is better to put less than more.

   Cooking:

   1. Make caramel syrup - light brown.
   2. Put all the ingredients in a jar, pour alcohol, add caramel, close the lid tightly.
   3. Insist in a dark place for a week, then pull out the prunes (if you use it) and vanilla.
   4. The total infusion time is from two weeks to a month (no more), the jar needs to be shaken periodically.
   5. When the aroma has become pronounced, and the color dark enough, the liquid must be filtered through several layers of gauze, then through a cotton filter.
   6. Leave to rest in the bottle for at least 3 months, preferably longer, in a dark, cool place, so that the tannins in the drink soften, the tastes become friends and rounded, and the aroma becomes softer. If a precipitate appears after settling, filter again.

   As we can see, it is not so difficult to prepare cognac from moonshine at home, the drink turns out to be beautiful, fragrant, with a multifaceted taste. The longer you keep it, the better it will be!

   Preparation of oak chips at home

   And now let's talk about the ingredient that is included in many recipes for homemade cognac from moonshine - oak chips. She does it this way.

   1. A dry oak chock or log is taken from a trunk or a thick branch.
   2. The wood is carefully split along the grain. It has been proven that alcohol penetrates wood by 2 mm, so the optimal chip size is 4×4 mm.
   3. Chips are placed in cold water for 12 hours.
   4. After this time, the old water is drained, and the chips are poured with fresh water, in which you need to put soda - about a teaspoon per 5 liters.
   5. After 12 hours of infusion, the water is drained again, the chips are placed in a colander and placed on a steam bath - they need to be steamed, not boiled.
   6. Our raw materials are also steamed for about 12 hours, on low heat. When the water that boils in a saucepan turns brown, it must be drained and replaced with fresh water.
   7. Now the chips need to be pulled out and dried in the air for the same 12 hours.
   8. The next step is warming up. The tree must be laid out on a wire rack and put in the oven at a temperature of about 150 degrees. Keep for about 4 hours.
   9. After another 12 hours, repeat the procedure. At this stage, a pleasant smell of vanilla and caramel should appear. We hold again for 4 hours, let's rest for another 12.
   10. And the final stage is the actual roasting. To do this, the oven must be turned on at 200 degrees, if there is, set the grill mode. Bake until the wood chips begin to smoke. Once that's happened, you're all set!

   
   

   As we can see, preparing oak chips for cognac from moonshine at home is a rather long process, but not very laborious. This is useful if you are going to be making a lot of oak aged drinks. Such material is stored indefinitely in a warm, dry place, it can be used as needed.
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The ability of oak barrels to improve the quality characteristics of many classic distillates is used in the aging of cognac, whiskey, Calvados and some wines. Not every moonshiner has the opportunity to purchase and store oak barrels at home. Do moonshine masters solve the problem of aging their own drinks with oak chips? crisps.

Similarities and differences between oak barrels and chips

If the chips are cooked correctly, they went through, like a barrel, roasting, soaking, with their help moonshine will acquire the necessary qualities:

• soft taste;
• vanilla, fruit, chocolate shades of aroma;
• beautiful coloration.

Sophisticated moonshiners believe that using oak chips instead of barrels, one cannot count on an identical result. In addition to transferring tannic, extractive, aromatic substances to the alcoholic drink, which the wood chips cope with, the porous inner surface of the barrel provides gas exchange.

However, craftsmen, using oak chips, provide gas exchange without adding moonshine to the container by a third and, thereby, creating an air gap.

Choice of wood

Botanists number about 600 varieties of oak. Which one
suitable for aging moonshine? The answer to this question, as well as to many others in home brewing, rests on the prevailing stereotypes and marketing tricks of merchants. Do not chase rare breeds. For the manufacture of chips, the wood of the pedunculate oak, which is widespread everywhere, is perfect. Even specialists can hardly distinguish its aroma from European rock (in our country it is often called Caucasian), white American and other exotics.

Much stronger taste and aromatic qualities of aged moonshine depend on other factors:

• what part of the trunk is used (the best is considered to be taken closer to the core);
• parts of a living plant or stained deadwood are taken (fresh raw wood contains a lot of tannins, and they are already washed from dead wood. This determines the duration of the heat treatment);
• age of trunks and branches (preferably oak wood over 30 years old).

Moonshiners living in climatic latitudes where they do not grow
oaks, are forced to use purchased joinery products as raw materials: oak parquet, plinth, opanelka. The main thing is to make sure that they are not processed by anything. Before dissolving them into chips, it is better to cut off the surface layer.

You can buy ready-to-eat chips. They differ in size, degree of roasting, oak species. There are also exotic proposals: wood chips made from barrels from under Whiskey Jack Daniel's.

Making chips

Cut pieces of dry wood into blanks up to 10 cm long, which are split into small pegs. Alcohol penetrates to a depth of 2 mm, so the optimal transverse size of the chips is 4x4 mm.

Next take? soaking. It is best to do it in two steps. First in clean cold water 12 hours, then, changing the water and adding 1 tbsp. a spoonful of baking soda per 10 liters of water, another half a day. Rinse when finished.

Heat treatment can be done in two ways: boiling or steaming.

1. Boil chips should be on low heat for about 1 hour after boiling.
2. Steaming is more laborious and time consuming (up to 8 hours), but it gives a high-quality result. Do you use a special steamer for this? pressure cooker or sieve, colander.
   If you do not thermally process the chips, then you are guaranteed to get moonshine with a strong smell of wood and an astringent taste, ironically called "skirting".

After finishing the heat treatment, the chips should be dried and burned. For roasting use a grill, barbecue, gas burner. Good result gives slow languishing chips in the oven at t? 150C for 5-6 hours. It is worth making blanks of varying degrees of firing: from from light tan to deep charring, for creative experiments in obtaining aromas of moonshine:

• light roasting gives floral, fruity notes;
• average? spicy, caramel;
• strong? smoky and chocolate tones.
  Store chips in a tightly sealed container.

Proper insistence on oak chips takes a long time: from 2 to 6 months or more. The color and aroma of aged moonshine are gaining gradually. Attempts to accelerate maturation by heating, turning chips into sawdust, degrade the quality. Per liter of distillate add from 5 to 30 gr. chips. Constant control and tasting will tell you the required period of infusion of the drink and the rate of making chips, taking into account your preferences.

As a rule, oak chips are not reused. Distillates made from different raw materials are suitable for infusion: sugar, grain, apple, grape and others.

Not everyone can afford to buy high-quality elite alcohol because of the high cost. But it is quite possible to make good brandy or whiskey at home. To do this, you need to prepare a grain or fruit distillate and keep it in an oak barrel. Such a drink will be much better than cheap analogues that we offer to buy in stores. But again, there is a small snag here - the acquisition of a good oak barrel which also costs a lot of money. There is a way out, replace the barrel with oak chips. Chips are easy to prepare yourself.

The tannins contained in oak wood, when in contact with alcohol, improve its quality, saturate it with new aromas and tastes. Fruity notes, vanilla, chocolate and floral aromas appear in the distillate infused with oak chips.

To a greater extent, alcohol made from fruit or grain raw materials is insisted. After infusion, it has the taste of the raw materials: apples, grapes or grain taste. But even ordinary sugar moonshine becomes more pleasant and aesthetic, the taste becomes softer, it is easy to drink.

Attention! To infuse moonshine, chips are made not only from oak chips. For infusion, wood of cherry, apple, bird cherry is used. Each type gives the distillate astringency and originality of tastes and aromas. Each home distiller is determined for himself with the choice of the desired breed himself, depending on his tastes.

Instructions for preparing oak chips

Currently, many specialty stores and online stores offer oak chips for moonshine or cognac of various qualities, different roasting and oak origin. Often you can purchase low-quality material, so if you can find raw materials on your own, it is better to cook wood chips with your own hands. Oak chips for moonshine have a larger contact area compared to a barrel, so the infusion process is faster. People often ask how much oak chips per liter of moonshine are used. The usual sample is 2-4 grams per liter. Too much a large number of, can spoil the alcohol. The taste of the drink will be dominated by the smell of wood, which is not very good.

1. For chips, you need to choose oak logs of old oak. Oak branches are not used for wood chips. Also, oak bark is not suitable, in which there are a lot of tannins.
2. Remove bark. Saw the log into chocks of 5-7 centimeters, then split into sticks 0.5-1 cm thick. Such chips can be placed in the neck of an ordinary bottle.
3. Put the required amount of wood chips in a saucepan, pour water and stand for a day. Every 3-4 hours it is necessary to drain the dirty water and fill it with clean water.
4. Pour the chips with soda water solution. One teaspoon per 5 liters of water. Soak in soda water for 6 hours. Then rinse the bars in cold water.
5. Pour the chips with clean water, put on fire and cook after boiling for about 1 hour.
6. Spread the wood chips on a mesh pallet, dry in a draft during the day.
7. Arrange dried oak chips on a baking sheet. Preheat the oven to 140-160C, place a baking sheet in it and keep the chips for 2 hours.
8. The final stage is roasting the chips to the desired firing. The taste and color of the resulting home-made alcohol depends on the degree of roasting. According to the degree of roasting, wood chips are divided into three types:

• Light firing - light brown color of chips, occurs at the moment the first haze appears. Light roasting gives the distillate a fruity-floral aroma with slight hints of vanilla. The color of infused moonshine turns straw.
• Medium firing - brown chips. The infused distillate contains almonds, coconut and caramel. The color of the drink is more saturated closer to cognac.
• Strong firing - chips of dark brown color closer to black. Distillate with taste of chocolate and smoke.

Video instructions for preparing oak chips.

How to insist moonshine on wood chips

As an alcohol base, it is necessary to use fruit or grain moonshine with a strength of 40-45% after the second fractional distillation.

Ingredients:

• Moonshine - 3 l;
• Oak chips 10-12 gr;
• Caramel for color - 1 tbsp;
• Vanillin - 1 sachet;
• Allspice - 3 pcs;
• Carnation - 3 pcs.

How to make a drink on oak chips.

1. Place prepared oak chips in a jar, pour moonshine. Add spices and vanilla.
2. Close the jar and insist the contents for 3-4 months. Once a week, you need to open the jar in order to saturate the infusion with oxygen. It is better to use an aquarium compressor and turn it on for 3-4 minutes. In the process of infusion, it is necessary to taste the drink, excessive infusion threatens alcohol with excessive saturation with tannins. As a result, you can spoil the moonshine and get a plinth.
3. At the end of the infusion, prepare caramel from sugar and water. Kohler will give the drink a noble color. For cooking, put sugar in a pan and pour in water at a ratio of 3: 1. Cook over low heat until brown, let cool and pour into the moonshine. Mix well until completely dissolved.
4. After infusion, filter the drink through a cotton-gauze filter. Pour into bottles, cork well. Wait a few days before use. Ready moonshine on oak chips to be stored in a cool place for an unlimited time.

Due to the high cost, purchase a real quality whiskey or cognac not everyone can afford. There are also cheap analogues on sale, but they are of low quality. You can make excellent aged alcohol at home. To do this, you need to insist moonshine on oak chips. As a result, we will get a high-quality drink prepared by our own hands.

To infuse moonshine, you can use not only oak wood, but also apple, cherry, bird cherry and others. It all depends on the personal taste preferences of a particular distiller. These woods contain tannins, which give the distillate astringency and a range of different flavors.

At the moment of contact of wood with ethyl alcohol, chemical reactions occur, during which tannins are converted into other compounds. The longer this process lasts, the richer and more interesting the aroma of the drink becomes. Unfortunately, the same cannot be said about the taste, which will require further development. That is why experienced moonshiners use various flavors. Details can be found in the article "How to soften moonshine."

How to prepare oak chips?

You can order oak chips in an online store, but no one can guarantee their quality. They are also sold in specialized stores. But not every locality and city has such stores. Therefore, if it is possible to get natural raw materials, it is better to make wood chips yourself.

1. Prepare poles, preferably from old oak, then the drink will have an exquisite bouquet. Branches for insisting are not suitable.

2. Remove bark. It contains a lot of tannins that give the drink bitterness, so it is better not to use it. In the absence of a suitable starting material, many still use oak bark, since it can be bought at every pharmacy. However, the taste and color of the drink are, of course, not the same.

3. Chop the poles into chips 15x1x0.5 cm in size - these are the optimal dimensions for them to pass into the neck of an ordinary glass bottle.

4. Soak wood chips in water for a day. During the entire soaking time, change the water 3-4 times. During this time, excess tannins will come out of the wood.

5. Pour in soda solution (for 5 liters of water, 1 teaspoon of soda). Withstand about 6 hours.

6. Rinse the pegs and transfer to a container of clean water. Boil over low heat for about 1 hour.

7. Dry wood chips during the day. It's better to keep her in limbo. In this case, the room should be well ventilated.

8. Roast the wood in the oven at 150–160 °C. In addition, you can use an air grill or microwave. The color of the drink (light, medium, dark brown) and aroma (floral vanilla, almond caramel or chocolate) depend on the intensity of roasting.

When the wood chips have been prepared correctly, the drink has straw tones. If the colors are different, then a mistake was made.

Recipe for insisting on oak chips

As a basis, you can take any moonshine (sugar, fruit and berry or cereal), the main thing is that it be well cleaned, with a strength of 41–45 degrees. With the help of oak chips, you can imitate the infusion of alcohol in a real barrel. Moonshine acquires astringency, noble aroma and pleasant golden hues.

Ingredients:

• 1 liter of moonshine (strength 45 degrees);
• 50 grams of wood chips;
• 1 tablespoon caramel;
• 3 grams of vanillin;
• 3 peas of allspice;
• 3 cloves.

Cooking.

AT glass bottles or jars lay oak chips in the right amount. Pour moonshine, add the rest of the components, close tightly with lids and put in a dark, cool place for several months. The number of chips and the time of infusion, everyone chooses to their liking. You can experiment first on small volumes, and when the result is satisfactory, make your own recipe.

Spices are optional. They can speed up the cooking process. It is important not to overdo it, as excess spices can significantly spoil the taste of the distillate. Permissible addition herbs(St. John's wort, thyme, oregano).

Burnt sugar gives moonshine a beautiful color, but affects its taste. Some like it, others consider this supplement superfluous. Preparing caramel is very simple. You need to pour sugar into the pan, add water at the rate of 3: 1 and simmer over low heat until the color turns brown. In order not to burn the caramel, it must be periodically tasted from the moment when the color turns golden. Add the finished mixture to moonshine.

After the completion of the infusion process finished product must be filtered through cotton wool or a coffee filter. In order for the alcohol to be fully saturated with oxygen, at the time of filtration, the outflowing purified jet must fall into the container from a height of 0.5 meters - this favorably affects the taste.

You need to drink the drink in small volumes. Remember, no matter how tasty moonshine turns out, it still remains strong. alcoholic drink which should not be abused.

If the finished tincture is poured into branded bottles, then hardly anyone, in principle, will be able to distinguish home-made alcohol from expensive store-bought alcohol. Of course, provided that your guests are not professional sommeliers.