Old Forge French Toast Moonshine

My many attempts at finding palatable moonshines has met with failures and successes. The ones that try to cover the inherent lighter fluid taste of the White Lightning base have been the best. I was told by a friend that the good mountain moonshine has a solid corn taste to it that is missing from the commercial stuff, but I suspect I may never know the difference.

The maple syrup colored beverage before me has an overwhelming maple syrup aroma that virtually explodes out of the jar as soon as it is cracked and aerating it by pouring just spreads the sweet maple scent all over the place. Sitting on the table next to me there is very little else I can smell.

First sip is a dangerous business. It seemed like it was going to be all White Lightning with a bit of maple added at first, but it very quickly became smoked maple with the syrupy sweetness. It results in not that bad of a beverage with the 30% ABV being a noticeable, but not focal point of the taste.

More sips show that the character of the shine is that almost flavorless alcohol right at the beginning, but the syrup just takes over. I'm not sure where the toast comes into the picture, though. There is all this syrup, but there is pretty much nothing that puts me in mind of toasted bread at all. So, I'm putting that down to fanciful marketing on an otherwise good beverage.

Bottom Line: Like the good apple pie moonshines, this is a flavor that divorces itself from moonshine into a simple flavored liquor.

3.0/5