I’m mainly a beer drinker. The only “hard liquor” I enjoy is whisky (preferably a good single malt scotch or good bourbon).
So … educate me. My question: Are there really only five main types of “hard liquor” in the world?"
Whisky, rum, vodka, tequila, and gin.
All of these thousands of years of human civilization, and we could only come up with five? I notice that none of those come from East Asia. East Asia has to have something.
I have to be missing something.
Brandy, as far as I can tell, is mainly distilled wine (only my most basic understanding; correct me if I’m wrong).
Liqueurs seem to be distilled versions of specific flavors. Or flavorings with alcohol added. Not really intended to be consumed alone, but as flavorings in mixed drinks.
Yeah, I’m a little confused by the question. All hard alcohols start from a base of fermentable sugars (or starches that have enzymatically been converted to fermentable sugars.) I don’t really think tequila needs its own category vs rum vs brandy. They all are basically the same concept. The darker versions of these drinks are all aged in barrels, which gives them their color and flavor, and the clear versions of these are just fermented from their respective starting ingredients and distilled to retain the flavor characteristics of their starting ingredients (the type of distillation and how many times it is distilled will affect how much of the original fermented mash flavor is present in the final product.) In the case of rum, sugarcane, molasses, or brown sugar. In the case of tequila, agave. In the case of brandy, any type of fruit (although the dark brandies we think of are generally made of grape.)
As mentioned, gin is basically a flavored vodka, even though it’s never referred to that way.
Whiskey, brandy, vodka, rum, and tequila/mezcal are definitely the most common, but there are others. Things like grappa/pisco, kirsch, or applejack are fairly distinct things as well (depending on how broadly we define “brandy”).
There’s also a LOT of variance within these categories. Bourbon and Islay Scotch have very little in common with each other, but are still classed as whiskey. Vodka encompasses a pretty broad range, as well, including potato, grain, and lately some fruit-based spirits.
If something is sweet, somebody’s fermented it. If somebody’s fermented it, somebody else has distilled it. Broadly speaking, the “big five” pretty much encompass most possible liquors: whiskey is spirit made from grain, brandy is made from fruit, rum is made from sugarcane, tequila is made from a succulunt. Vodka is pretty much anything distilled until it’s just ethanol and water.
There are hard liquors (including the obvious distilled rice liquor) from Asia, but they haven’t become popular in the west (and western liquors HAVE become popular in much of Asia).
Tequila is unique inasmuch as its liquor is distilled from a specific type of plant. Whiskey gets its distinctive color and flavor from being aged in charred oak casks, which I guess means it tastes like fancy ashes. Given that the definition of vodka is broad enough that it can overlap with some of the same source matter as whiskey, their separate categorization is kind of tenuous.
There is really only vodka and stuff aged in barrels for hard liquor. Vodka is well distilled alcohol and water. Flavors may be added later to produce derivatives, and that’s what gin is, flavored vodka. Whiskey, Rum, and Tequila are aged in oak barrels absorbing flavor from the barrels. Whiskey uses charred barrels to get the flavor from the Maillard reaction in the wood. Rum and Tequila are aged in oak barrels that haven’t been charred. Additional flavors can be added to any of these to produce derivatives. Brandy, Port, and the like aren’t hard liquors per se, though sometimes enough alcohol is added to make them just as potent.
There’s plenty of clear spirits that are not aged in barrels that are not vodka. White rum, for instance, usually just sits in stainless steel casks. I don’t think blanco tequila is aged in wood, either. Reposado and anejo are aged in wood. Clear fruit brandies (aka eau de vie) like slivovitz and kirschwasser are often just aged in glass. They don’t need to touch any wood (although aging them in wood imparts different flavors.)
Well that is true, I was mainly just categorizing the top five mentioned in the OP. Less distilled liquors like blanco tequila are different from vodka because they carry much more of the flavor of the original fermented product.
Vodka is notable in that it is defined simply as “clear neutral spirits distilled from mash.” It is, as defined, simply ethanol and water. This is why the marketing for vodka will generally be very heavily focused on things like “purity,” and the manner and number of times it has been distilled and filtered. It can and is made from almost anything: wheat, rye, potatoes, beets, really anything that contains starch or sugar can be made into vodka.
It could be argued that what comes out of the still, no matter the source, is vodka, and what you do with it after that point makes it something else.
Then again, it could also be argued that what comes out of the still is whiskey/rum/tequila/etc., and it must be made into vodka by filtering it and running it through the still again.
All depends on how you look at it, I guess. I believe this is what TriPolar was getting at.
First of all, Japan is making single malt whiskies, not “Scotch”. You can’t make “Scotch” outside of Scotland (although on that note, do not order Scotch in Scotland. You can order whisky or Scotch whisky, but not Scotch).
Second, not all Scotches are peaty. The beauty of Scotch is that variety from distillery to distillery and batch to batch. Lowland Scotches aren’t nearly as peaty as, say, Islay.
We have “only” 6 (or 5, but gin is delicious) base spirits because those are the arbitrary categories we created. For most people, brandy = distilled wine (grape-based), but there are lots of brandies made from other fruits. Calvados from apples, Slivovitz, Pálinka, Rakia are made from a variety of fruits. If you are not used to brandies, note: they do not taste sweet in the classical sense and you are not getting much apple taste.
There are oddities like “unaged whiskey,” or less fancily, “moonshine.” Clear, not “whiskeylike,” and not much different from vodka, technically (IANA distiller).
It’s not scotch, it’s Japanese whisky (sic), as it’s not from Scotland. But you’re right in that the style is closest to scotch than other whisk(e)y varieties. I’d imagine they can import it.
Otherwise, East Asia does have their own styles. There is soju/shōchū/awamori/baijiu. Which range from “vodka-like” to “oh my God is this lighter fluid I think I’m dying!?” Hell, in India they have feni, made from cashew (the “false” fruit part not the nut) or coconut. Many of these aren’t distinct styles just because we haven’t made them such.
Whiskey (or “whisky”) covers a pretty broad category. Bourbon is from corn, and made in Kentucky. (Whiskeys from Virginia and Tennessee don’t use the name “Bourbon,” unless by special arrangement; Virginia Gentleman re-distills Kentucky whiskey and calls itself bourbon. They all taste distinctly similar). Scotch, made in Scotland, is from malted barley. Within Scotland, and on surrounding islands like Islay, there are single-malt whiskeys with kind of a medicine-y taste, and there are many blended whiskeys. Japanese distilleries are similar in taste and style to Scotch. Canadian whiskey is usually made from rye. Wheat whiskeys are apparently a big deal among American microdistilleries, and some bourbons (like Maker’s Mark) use a wheat/corn mixture. I think most German whiskeys are wheaten. Irish whiskey is a little hard to pin down. I imagine they use barley, but won’t swear to it. Jameson is owned by the French Pernod company and Bushmill’s (which I hear is export-only) is owned by Jose Cuervo.
I’d like to pretend that whiskey makers are bound by traditions as strict as the laws of Kosher, but I suspect most of them will tinker with the formula here and there to get something with a distinctive flavor or profitability. My local bar in China has many unsold bottles of Jack Daniel’s Honey Whiskey. It doesn’t make me proud to be a former Tennesseean.
The worst drunken behavior I have personally witnessed usually involved Soju. It tastes like watered-down vodka, but it sneaks up on you. I watched one poor bastard curl up and go to sleep in front of an in-service bus in Korea. Soju was involved. (He survived, at the bus driver’s commendable discretion.)
I have heard that some people don’t consider Tequila/Mescal to be liquor so much as an hallucinogen. Old-school Absinthe has the same reputation.
Slight nitpicks: usually it is a mix of grains, but e.g. bourbon has to be at least 51% corn, while rye whiskey is at least 51% rye. Canadian whisky often uses the term “rye” for historical reasons, even if it is made from 0% rye. I think most don’t use much rye anyway nor the term. Still a valid causus belli if America wants to expand north.
Bourbon can be from any state, though KY has the most distilleries. Tennessee must be from TN, and has more specific requirements to make it
I don’t believe Scotch and Irish whisk(e)y specify one single grain required. Scotch is traditionally malted barley, but now can have other stuff added. Single malt is all barley I think.
Okay. Each hard liquor is traditionally associated with a particular source ingredient (Potato for vodka, agave for tequila, molasses for rum, etc) and I’m giving a shorthand for how the various whiskeys do the same. But yeah, a 51% mix of the dominant grain is typical.
Noted. My confusion came from the story (also in Wikipedia) about Virginia Gentleman using distillate shipped in from Kentucky, but that’s evidently not a requirement.