In my (admittedly very limited) experience, there are two kinds of moonshine: the hellish and the treacherous. The hellish, of course, is immediately recognizable by taste, like drinking (and usually eventually vomiting) liquid fire. In fact, I’d wager to say that, no matter the route, moonshine tends to exit the body with a trademark burn. The second kind, the treacherous, is sneaky. It’s deceptively smooth, sometimes even delicious, and you can drink way too much of it before you realize you’re in trouble.

Regardless of my own terrible experiences with moonshine, its production is fascinating, and its history largely misunderstood. This is the Last Dam Run of Likker I’ll Ever Make, later recut and renamed The Last One, captures the twilight of moonshine culture. Starring the infamous Marvin “Popcorn” Sutton, the documentary follows Sutton through the entire process, and records his reflections on a life of moonshining.

In 2009, the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives raided Sutton, and he was sentenced to eighteen months in federal prison for the operation of an illegal still and possession of a firearm as a felon. The the raid was actually led by Jim Cavanaugh, or “Waco Jim,” the negotiator during the siege on David Koresh and the Branch Davidians cult (yes, that guy is still doing raids). Sutton was 62 years old at the time, and had just been diagnosed with cancer. Knowing he may have had very little time left, he begged the judge to allow him to serve what may have been his final days on house arrest. In the infinite wisdom of our punitive judicial system, the judge refused an old moonshiner the right to die of cancer in his own home, and as a result, Sutton committed suicide by carbon monoxide poisoning.

To its credit, the documentary isn’t narrated. Neither celebrating nor condemning Sutton, it simply allows him to speak, sometimes with insight, sometimes in ignorance, but always to charming effect. He loves his cats, his “old lady,” his Model A Ford, and yes, his moonshining. Sutton self-published an autobiographical guide to moonshine in 1999, and after that he made a home video of the process, which he self-released on VHS. Truly committed to producing quality liquor and recording the specifics of the trade for future generations, the man had a sense of posterity, and of purpose.
 

 
A few years ago the BBC reported that young denizens of Brooklyn and other clusters of hipsters were making illegal moonshine in their tiny apartments. They managed, as usual, to take a relatively cheap hobby and spend thousands of dollars on gear for it, keeping entrepreneurs like Arkansas’ Colonel Vaughn Wilson in business.

The outlaw aspect of risking a $15,000 fine and five years in prison is likely part of the allure too. That and the possibility of the getting the temperature wrong during one point of the process and poisoning yourself and and anyone else dumb enough to imbibe your rancid artisanal hooch.

It didn’t take long for the safe and legal variants of moonshine to hit the market and for Bon Appetit to feature them.

Moonshine is now being served at trendy restaurants. That’s right, where there used to be a list of local microbrews or outrageously expensive tequilas or organic wines, there is a list of the flavored moonshines on offer. Hipsters have left behind those previous alcoholic obsessions, as well as absinthe, bastardizations of the martini, small-batch bourbon, and Pabst Blue Ribbon. Hooch is hip.

The safe, legally produced and distributed brands include NASCAR’s Junior Johnson’s Midnight Moon and Howling Moon Moonshine. You can buy Troy & Sons’ Platinum Moonshine and Oak Reserve Moonshine at, among other places throughout the Southeast, Walt Disney World’s Wilderness Lodge.

Distillers are as pleased as highly spiked punch, because moonshine provides an immediate profit, as opposed to other sour mash products like whiskey that require years of aging in wooden barrels.

The manager of Husk restaurant in South Carolina tried to describe the taste of different kinds of moonshine to Bon Appetit, obviously struggling not to fall into wankerish wine-speak:

Compared to other clear spirits, you can definitely taste the corn. Sometimes there’s that cereal profile, and sometimes, like with white whiskey from a Tennessee distillery called Prichard’s, it has a little bit more of a sweetness, and that kind of comes forth, like a corn cake or johnnycake.

On a side note, further appropriation of Appalachian culture by hipsters (besides the unemployed film school graduates walking the Appalachian Trail this summer and horrifying locals by showing up unwashed and funky at local eating establishments along the way) is Stewart Copeland’s (this one, not that one) new documentary on buck dancing, Let Your Feet Do The Talkin’.

The Moonshine Yoda, Mike Haney the CEO of Hillbilly Stills, below:

 
Previously seen on Dangerous Minds:
Dead Zones: New York City’s Hipster Heat Map