alcohol distillation

Apothecary techniques that incorporate herbs and distilled alcohols date back centuries. Wild-gathered botanicals were once an integral component of early healer satchel of curatives, with many herbal and flower remedies, including tinctures, still being utilized today.

Distillation is the process of extracting various components from a liquid mixture such as water, alcohol and plant matter to separate their individual constituents. Distillation relies on physical laws like Raoult’s Law and Dalton’s Law which assume that at any given temperature the vapors will rise to their respective boiling points; then directed towards a condenser – usually made up of copper tubes in a countercurrent heat exchanger or water jacket – where they are separated out to collect an alcohol-rich distillate.

Every spirit begins as an infusion of sugar-containing materials such as grains, fruit or root vegetables – known as mashing – into which alcohol-producing yeast feeds to create alcohol. During this step of mashing preparation, sugars become available for fermentation into alcohol production.

Ethanol (CH3OH), commonly found in beer, wine, vodka and whisky production processes is also what forms tinctures. Tinctures consist of alcohol mixed with water and plant matter dissolved into solution; alcohol acts both as preservative and solvent to extract compounds from this dissolved matter.

The tails are the residue from distillation processes consisting of higher order alcohols such as propanol and butanol as well as amyl and furfural. They often get bad press for having unpleasant aromas; however, their chemical composition and insolubility in water make them ideal for preserving herbal oils that can then be used in perfumes and medicinal preparations.

Distillation is the process of taking liquid mixtures, turning them into vapor, condensing it and isolating out compounds of interest–in this case alcohol–for separation by condensation. A still is used to do this process and its design varies widely, from simple pot-bellied versions cobbled together out of spare parts to elaborate wonderlands with silver column stills stretching stories high – each still’s style having an influence on both flavor and character of final spirits produced.

Craft spirits have seen an upward trend towards buying local and becoming more connected to their production process, but unlike beer and wine most spirits on the market are produced anywhere around the globe; creating an ambiguity around exactly what one can get when purchasing one gin or whiskey bottle from any specific distillery or backstory with inspirational ingredients or artisanal processes may capture consumer imagination but does little to shed light on its real production methods.

Some larger craft distillers are using fresh local ingredients to craft spirits with more of an in-your-local taste, which is certainly an admirable effort; however, this can also be very labor intensive and the costs involved prohibitive for smaller producers. However, several smaller craft distillers are making quality spirits by paying closer attention to production details – which will likely become the standard over time.