Author: Camper English

  • DonQ Rum Visit to Puerto Rico

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    Camper English
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    This summer I visited the Destileria Serralles Puerto Rico, the home of DonQ Rum. DonQ is distilled in the southern part of Puerto Rico, in Ponce. The distillery has been on the same site since 1865. As with most rum distilleries, it was once the site of a sugar refinery and the distillery was a…

  • Hunting Bison in Poland with ZU Vodka

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    Camper English
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    No bison were harmed in the writing of this blog post. This summer I flew to Warsaw with ZU vodka, known in the rest of the world as Zubrowka. Zubrowka is bison grass vodka; vodka flavored with grass. The stuff tastes like caramel and jasmine and hay, and makes apple juice taste like apple pie.…

  • Solid Liquids: Dehydrating Other Liqueurs Part Two

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    Camper English
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    In yesterday's post in the Solid Liquids Project (project index here) I had expanded beyond dehydrating Campari into dehydrating other liqueurs, namely X-Rated Fusion Liqueur, Wild Turkey American Honey, Irish Mist, and Midori. These are all part of the Skyy Spirits portfolio. Of these four, only Midori crystallized like Campari had. I tried several methods…

  • Solid Liquids: Dehydrating Other Liqueurs: Problems

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    Camper English
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    So far in the Solid Liquids Project (project index here) I've been experimenting with the best way to get liqueurs into a solid/powder/sugar form. I have performed all of these experiments with Campari so far, but now it's time to try some other liqueurs. Since Skyy Spirits is sponsoring this project, I began with other…

  • Making Sugar from Cane and Beets

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    Camper English
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    In the continuing study of sugar, today we'll look at how sugar is made today.  According to Sugar.org, this is how sugar is made from either beets or cane.  For sugar cane: ❧ Grinding the cane to extract the juice;❧ Boiling the juice until the syrup thickens and crystallizes;❧ Spinning the crystals in a centrifuge…

  • Sugar Production in Modern Times

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    Camper English
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    In the Sugar Spirit Project we've looked at the history of sugarcane and sugar production (project index here). In this post we'll look at sugar production today. Some of this information may be out of date due to the date of my reference books/websites, so please take it all with a grain of salt. Nowadays,…

  • An Amusingly Disgusting Way to Drink Vodka in Sweden

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    Camper English
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    While I was in Sweden with Karlsson's Gold vodka, we learned a traditional way to drink vodka. It is called Kaffegök, and it is gross. You take a cup and put a coin in the bottom. Then you fill it with coffee until you can't see the coin anymore. Then you add vodka until you…

  • Karlsson’s Vodka: It’s In The Blend

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    Camper English
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    Months ago I started to talk about my trip to Sweden with Karlsson's vodka. I only covered how to pick potatoes so far. The potatoes for this vodka all come from Cape Bjare in Sweden.To get there, we drove from Copenhagen, over the relatively new bridge that connects Denmark to Sweden with Malmo on the…

  • Solid Liquids: Campari Fruit Roll-Ups

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    Camper English
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    In the Solid Liquids Project (project index here) we are experimenting with the best methods to dehydrate liqueurs, and then putting the dehydrated liqueur to good use. This is one of those uses. I've been using a food dehydrator as one method of dehydrating liqueurs. It works well enough, though other methods are faster. In…

  • Sugarcane and the Environment

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    For the most part rum is made from molasses, the byproduct of sugar production. So when we study the issue of the environmental impact of sugarcane production we need to keep in mind that molasses is the waste product of sugar production. Rum is recycling! That said, we're studying not just sugar but sugarcane production…