Legal Moonshine

HOOCH

   Joe Mahalek, a marketing executive for R.J. Reynolds was once offered a glass of moonshine.  He was surprised at how smooth it was, as all he had ever heard about moonshine was that it was stout.  And he sure didn’t think that one day it would be his full time job to make it.  His company, Piedmont Distillers, has two brands: one is flavored with nutmeg and vanilla…..Catdaddy, and the other is more traditional, with a brisk, clean flavor….Junior Johnson’s Midnight Moon…..named for NASCAR’S hero.

It is sold in thirteen states.  And like anything that is doing good, others will copy it as they want to make money too.  They have introduced the legal versions of “corn likker”.

   Moonshine is corn whiskey made in an unregistered still and sold with no taxes. But there are almost as many versions as there have been moonshiners.

   In 2002, after years and years of illegal moonshine sampling, Mahalek created a legal version.  First he had to build and register a distillery.  The red tape alone is quite complicated and takes a long time. And in 2004 he bought a distillery that didn’t quite make it off the ground.  In 2005 he introduced Catdaddy.   Although Catdaddy smells like eggnog, it was created for those who like flavored vodka.  Then Junior Johnson's Midnight Moon targeting NASCAR fans was launched.

   Johnson used to run bootleg shine for his dad and drove in the NASCAR races to make extra money.  Delivering moonshine gave him the driving skills needed to run from the cops and for winning at NASCAR.  In 1956 he was arrested and spent a year in federal prison and Ronald Reagan pardoned him in 1986.

   Mahalek said – “to stay true to moonshine's Carolina roots but "take it up a notch" -- appealed to Johnson. The result is a corn-based whiskey that's more akin to a premium vodka than to the stuff made in a still out back. Catdaddy and Midnight Moon are triple-distilled, a process that eliminates rough flavors and the famous burn associated with old-school shine. Both also are 80-proof, on par with most premium liquors though far weaker than traditional moonshine. "It's smoother" than what he used to make illegally, Johnson says. "We couldn't afford to distill more than once. We had to sell it as quick as we could get it in a jar."

   There are a lot of people trying to master the art of making moonshine, but selling it without the proper licenses and permits will get you thrown in jail.  It is not legal to sell without them.

   But there have been a lot of novelty companies that have moonshine labels on bottles full of non-drinkable, non-moonshine (de-natured) or alcohol in them.  A lot of tourists like to buy one to take home or give to someone back home. I’ve seen them in everything from tiny jugs to small bottles and they’ve made the companies a lot of money over time.

   As long as a disclaimer is put on the bottle and no alcohol is in it, most states consider it legal.  But make sure you check on your state’s laws before doing anything.

   You could plain old water and coloring in a bottle and as long as the ingredients were listed and a disclaimer, you could sell it.  Slap a label on it that says moonshine and watch it disappear off the shelves. 

   With moonshine being illegal and having so much history along with tall tales, it makes for good sales and advertising.  We all remember the comics and movies about the moonshiners hiding out in groves of trees or in the mountains.  For some people it was exciting reading about how the moonshiners kept getting away and ignoring the stories about the ones who got caught. 

   In fact, some of the old moonshiners are still in prison.  And some have set up stills to show how they work, but they are not really producing moonshine. The government keeps track of every still.  In the old days, the “revenuers” would break up every still they ran across hoping the moonshiners would go out of business.  But it didn’t take them long to build another one close by.