American citizen

Bourbon is a drink shrouded in myths and legends, which more often than not have nothing to do with the drink itself. For instance, many people associate bourbon with prohibition and the times of Al Capone; others think that it's a kind of ersatz whisky that is not worth separate study and refuse its entitlement to be considered as a drink in its own right. Errors of this kind are so common that they could fill a whole book.

Circumstances of birth

The most American of all alcoholic drinks, bourbon owes its appearance to the Irish and Scottish settlers. In the 18th century, these immigrants came to the New World in their thousands and settled down in the territories of what are today the states of Maryland and Pennsylvania. And since rye could grow abundantly in the new lands and there was plenty of pure water and forests for firewood, it was not long before whisky made its first appearance on the continent of America.

The first official law on farms and holdings offered land free of charge to all those who agreed to settle in the West. The proposal went down well with many of the Scots and the Irish who were only too ready to swap Pennsylvania for Kentucky and the State of Virginia.

At the time, Kentucky was considered virtually the most impoverished region in America. There was even a proverb to the effect that when Kentucky dogs bark, they have to lean against a fence so as not to faint with hunger. But it wasn't the starving dogs that bothered the Celtic pioneers, but the almost complete absence of rye – the basic raw material for the production of whisky, which formed an inalienable part of every family's ration. A fairly simple solution was found by replacing one cereal with another, and corn (which did grow in Kentucky) was used instead of rye. Corn whisky turned out to be sweeter and had a less harsh aroma than the traditional Scotch whisky. It was matured in oak casks, the insides of which for some unexplained reason had first been burned, and this had the effect of giving the drink an unusually beautiful golden appearance.
The man who is regarded as the inventor of bourbon, Elijah Craig, was a personage so mythical that there is even disagreement among the sources as to his specific gender with some claiming that the venerable preacher was male, while other historical allusions to 'him' seemingly refer to a person of female gender. True, the latter appears unlikely in the extreme: political correctness on the American prairies in the eighteenth century was not a practical possibility, and even today a woman priest who traded in hooch would be regarded as little less than subversive.

Pastor Craig is credited with being the first person to think of using corn instead of rye. He is also credited with maturing whisky in scorched casks, and it is furthermore claimed that the fact that the new drink was named 'bourbon' was due to him too.

Elijah Craig made his own oak casks for ageing the drink. The story goes that once when he was bending the barrel staves over a fire, he accidentally burnt a barrel. Reluctant to throw a good barrel away, the thrifty preacher made use of it. Another story has it that Craig deliberately burnt the insides of old barrels to get rid of extraneous smells. The full casks, which Craig sent by river to other towns, were marked with the wording: "Bourbon County, State of Kentucky". In time and for the sake of brevity, the word 'Bourbon' alone was used for any whisky made from corn and aged in burnt casks.

As with any legend, the historical facts here are mixed up with fiction, but what is a strong alcoholic drink without its myths and its heroes?

Incidentally, Pastor Elijah Craig was a real historical personage who did have his own whisky still. He was even fined $140 in 1795 for illegally distilling alcohol. On the other hand, he did not live in Bourbon, but in the neighbouring county of Fayette.

Bourbon County did not appear until 1792 (at which time the Venerable Craig's whisky production was already flourishing). The United States government named it in honour of the French royal family, the Bourbons, who had given America support in its war against England. Bourbon County at the time occupied far more land than it does today, and the local inhabitants out of habit called the lands that had once belonged to it 'Old Bourbon'. But those who knew nothing of these toponymic details assumed, when they saw the words Old Bourbon on the casks, that the term referred to a vintage drink. Thus by the mid 19th century, the name 'bourbon' had been settled on as the name for Kentucky whisky.

The Moonshiners

Prohibition in America was not invented by politicians in the early part of the 20th century. Banning alcohol went right back to the earliest settlements. The English puritans who settled in New England regarded alcohol as synonymous with sin and looked askance at the merry Scots and Irish, who distilled whisky en masse. But then the drinking culture in the 18th century was such that people not only drank in the saloons and the taverns, but also at home. Furthermore, their drinking knew no bounds whatsoever.

The puritans wasted no time, and the first action committee to fight the ‘demon drink’ was formed in the New England state of Connecticut in 1798. In 1828, the idea gained support in another state where the puritans were predominant, and in New York the Society for Moderation was set up.

But the most radical fighters for sobriety were not the puritans, but women. Most famous among these was a certain Carrie Nation, the widow of a doctor who drunk himself to death. She claimed that she had heard a voice telling her to “smash up all the saloons, wherever they might be”. In 1873, she began her crusade against drunkenness. Armed with the Holy Scriptures and wielding an axe, she smashed up casks of whisky and the bars it was drunk in. She was frequently imprisoned and threatened with lynching, but her cause carried on. To promote it, she earned money in a rather odd manner – by selling little souvenir axes. But she died a mere eight years before seeing the complete triumph of her ideas.

In October 1919, prohibition was introduced throughout the territory of the United States. From that time right up until December 1933, the law stated that the production, sale, export and transportation of any alcoholic drink was to be banned, and a whole army of federal agents and police were there to enforce the banning. The great era of moonshine and hooch had begun. It was the time of fast-moving clippers carrying contraband goods, underground speakeasies and smart bootleggers. It was also the time of Al Capone and a whole stream of infamous gangsters.

Bourbon is frequently associated with the Chicago mafia. There is a common belief that it was on bourbon that Al Capone made his enormous fortune, but in reality the drink lost much more from the introduction of prohibition than it gained. The bootleggers were basically interested in only two types of alcohol: the high-quality drinks and the stuff that could be made quickly. Under prohibition, the production of high-quality alcoholic beverages inside the United States was extremely difficult, so rum and Scotch whisky had to be brought in from abroad. Even the production of cheap hooch was transferred to Canada.

But bourbon (although made from a cheap cereal like corn) could not be made quickly: the casks had to be burned properly and the drink had to mature for at least two years. And at any moment, these processes could be interrupted by federal officers. Before prohibition was introduced, there were around fifty stills in Kentucky, but after the ‘October Revolution’ of 1919, there were no more than one or two left, and these were the ones that were officially permitted to produce alcohol for ‘medicinal purposes’.

But soon afterwards, a whole network of underground stills sprung up in Kentucky. These were worked by night so that the government agents would be less likely to notice the smoke. Once the whisky was made, it went immediately to the middlemen. To make real, aged bourbon was too noticeable and risky a business, and for almost ten years the Kentuckians forgot about their special beverage. Instead of bourbon, they gave Capone’s people freshly- distilled moonshine, which was known as ‘white lightening’ or ‘white dog’ – as an indication of the strength of its effect.

Universal formula

The pioneers of bourbon only came up with a general concept for America’s national drink; the details were left to be worked out by later generations.

It is a curious fact that bourbon is not a drink whose name is controlled by its origins. It can be made in any American state – or, indeed, in any part of Europe or Asia. Of course, there are the ‘secrets’ – that make it possible to tell Kentucky bourbon from its ‘foreign’ relatives – and these are held by those who created it. But the biggest secret of all lies hidden in the lime shelf beneath Kentucky’s soil. It is thanks to this lime that all water in the state is magnificently filtered and saturated with the calcium that is essential for a good growth of yeast.

Incidentally, the finest racehorses in America are thought to come from Kentucky – also as a result of the water.

There are two types of American whiskey: straight and blended. Straight whiskey is made from a blend of 51% of one type of cereal and 49% of any other types. It should be distilled at a strength of not more than 80% alcohol, matured in new scorched casks for a minimum of two years, bottled at a strength of 40% alcohol, and contain no neutral spirits. Any American whiskey that contains neutral spirits, dyes and flavourings is considered to be ‘blended’ whiskey.

Bourbons relate to the first category of American whiskeys. In the above-mentioned formula for straight whiskey, the 51% in the case of bourbons refers to corn, while the 49% can be rye, wheat (fairly rarely), or barley malt. In practice, it hardly ever happens that the corn content is exactly 51%; usually, the corn content can be as much as 70% (since the law actually states that the first cereal should be no less than 51%). But each producer keeps the precise ingredients of his ‘mashbill’ (or cereal content) a closely guarded secret.

The distillation of bourbon takes place in continuous cycle distillation towers. By 1933, most of the stills had been destroyed, so when they were rebuilt, it was decided to install new equipment. By the mid 1980s, the traditional copper stills had also been restored in many of the bourbon plants – they were used to give the beverage a second distillation (after the first distillation in the towers). The reason for this had nothing to do with respect for tradition, but was due to very pragmatic reasons: a second distillation removed unnecessary fractions without affecting the drink’s strength.

After distillation, the future bourbons are poured into new scorched oak barrels without any additional filtration, which is something the drink only undergoes before being bottled.

The full bottles are stored in well ventilated, multi-storey ‘wine houses’. Usually the bourbons are aged for at least four years, but not more than ten. Fluctuations in temperature (higher than thirty degrees in summer and below zero in winter) complete the process of maturing the bourbon. On each shelf, the drink develops its own unique taste and aroma, even if the cereal recipe is exactly the same (which it usually is), the distillation and bottling has taken place on one and the same day, and the maturing time has been identical. It turns out that bourbon is an arithmetical average of all the casks that were used in the blend.

Incidentally, bourbon is often divided into types according to the number of spirits that have been used in its production. If there are considerably more than fifty of these spirits, the drink is considered ‘standard bourbon’. If there are fewer than fifty, the drink is called ‘small bath bourbon’. But if the drink was bottled from one cask alone. It is called ‘single barrel bourbon’.

Cigar Clan 4'2006, vol.1. Yulia Zorina