Moonshine slushies? Dust Bowl Brewing Co. now offers Turlock customers more than beer
Not a beer lover? Dust Bowl Brewing Co. in Turlock has an answer for that.
Well, technically, Dust Bowl Distillery has — and is — the answer. The extension of the 15-year-old beer business at 3000 Fulkerth Road launched Thursday, June 6, with its Original Moonshine as a tribute to to the company’s brand roots dating back to Prohibition.
“We’re hoping to gather more consumers from (serving) spirits,” said Brett Tate, one of four owners of Dust Bowl. The others are Tate’s wife, Karen, her cousin, Brett Honore, and Honore’s wife, Camy.
Moonshine is generally considered to be a clear, un-aged whiskey, said brewmaster and distiller Don Oliver. Oliver has been a leader at Dust Bowl since it existed.
The liquor is made from 55% corn, 35% barley and 10% wheat and is packaged at 80 proof. Each 750 ml bottle is $33 and sold only at the Turlock location due to licensing restrictions.
“Our (moonshine) is a little more approachable than some of the stuff out there,” Oliver said. “It’s more of something you can use as a mixer — like vodka.”
And Dust Bowl does use its moonshine as a mixer. It’s served in the form of slushies in rotating flavors — also only at the Turlock location.
On the menu currently is a Pepsi and moonshine slushy at 7.2% ABV and a Starry soda, grenadine and moonshine slushy at 5.2% ABV. They are sold in 16-ounce cups for $10 each.
They are served when the Dust Bowl Beer Garden is open: Thursdays from 4 to 9 p.m., Fridays from 4 to 10 p.m., Saturdays from 11 a.m. to 9 p.m. and Sundays from 11 a.m. to 7 p.m.
Moonshine craft cocktails will be available soon, and other types of spirits will be distilled at the brewery down the road.
How is Dust Bowl’s moonshine made?
Distilling moonshine is a “labor of love,” Oliver said, which limits how many bottles are available for sale daily.
Through a brewery/distillery tour, Modesto Bee reporters witnessed the love and labor that goes into making just a dozen barrels of the spirit.
And it’s not a “set it and forget it” experience. After the fermentation process, somebody has to monitor the still until the moonshine is done distilling.
At their start, brewing beer and distilling moonshine are essentially the same process, Oliver said. The fermentation process is when things begin to change; moonshine doesn’t get hops added to it during fermentation like beer does.
“There’s less control over the temperatures that are really important in keeping beer flavor profiles,” he said. “We can run a little hotter and a little faster when it comes to the distilling side and maximizing on the alcohol we’re getting.”
Enzymes get added to the moonshine during the fermentation process to break down as much starch as possible, which results in a higher alcohol content.
When fermentation is done (less than seven days), the product — called wash — is at about 9.8% ABV.
The wash gets moved to the still, which holds 40 gallons in comparison to Dust Bowl’s brew house, which processes around 320 gallons of beer at a time.
It is concentrated during a stripping process until it reaches 60 to 90% ABV, and then reverse osmosis water is added until it’s brought back down to 50% ABV.
“Above that level it’s really explosive (to process),” Oliver said.
Then, it’s distilled again for a spirit run to get the finished product — which amounts to 10 to 12 gallons of 90% ABV moonshine that is diluted and packaged behind the glass for customers to see.
For more information, visit dustbowlbrewing.com/dust-bowl-distillery or @dustbowldistillery on Instagram.
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