Originally Posted by
Lee Chiang Po
To answer that question, there is really no difference. Alchohol is alchohol. Bourbon is made from corn, but allows up to 20% malted barley. Regular corn squeezings might have other malted grains, but is going to be mostly corn based. Vodka is made from lots of different grains, and in Poland potatoes were commonly used. Russian vodka was usually made from all grains.
Whisky is usually made from beers, brandy is made from fruit wines. Distilled to concentrate the alchohol. Rums are made from sugars and residue left from making sugars.
In order to make wines we simply extract the juices from fruit or berries since they usually contain high sugar contents. Grain on the other hand doesn't. It has starch. So, some if not all the grains will be sprouted as if to plant it. This creates enzymes that break the starch strands into sugars that can be fermented into alchohol. Once it is converted to alchohol, you simply extract it by distilling it.
You can distill the product several times and get a really pure alchohol, or you can use a special still that extracts all the alchohol at one pass. Either way it is alchohol. And of course, you can not drink 195 proof alchohol, so you break it back down with a clear, pure form of water. Between 80 and 90 proof seems to be the range of good taste. Now that makes Vodka. If you only distill it down with a pot still until you get 80 proof, it will not be Vodka. It will be some form of whisky, depending on the base. That is the difference between shine and vodka. Shine usually retains some of the beer base that gives it a measure of flavor. All that is cooked out of vodka and then replaced with clean, clear water.
Back many years ago, when alchohol was prohibited, the local bootleggers would not make their own, but would pay the local people to do it for them. They would provide a small pot still and sugar or corn, then give them a quick crash course in making Bathtub Gin. The amount that they were able to make would vary and sometimes they would have a bathtub leak and end up with less than called for. So that they would get paid, they would sometimes add stuff to it to make it kick harder. Lye, acids, rubbing alchohol, anti freeze. They would add it before they distilled it. When enough people did that and the entire collection was in one vat, it sometimes caused serious poisonings. The bootleggers would kill you if they caught you juicing your alchohol. Bad for business. There is really no way of poisoning yourself making booze unless you do it on purpose.
Making vodka from potatoes can be sketchy. The eyes that sprout have enough enzyme to convert a bunch of potato starch to sugar, but they are toxic. Most of that toxicity is removed on distillation however. The Polls used grain malt as well as potato eyes, but the finished product can only be drank by a Poll. Destinctive taste and is definately an acquired taste. You can't taste the vodka, but you can definately taste the process in which it is made.