Moonshine ingredients/ Malt Corn

Art’s Way to Get Malt Corn

By Tony Smith

Art was not gone long and when he came back, he had a long pillow case full of something. He held the pillow case up in one hand looked at me and said, “Now this right here is what will it twist it's tail.” He reached in to the sack and got a hand full. He showed it to me and as I looked at it I said to him, “Why Art, it just looks like corn to me.” He said, “This here is my malt corn, this is what makes it work off good.”

He put about half of his malt corn in to the barrel and with a stick he stirred it up into the mix that was already in the barrel. I looked at Art and said, “So that’s what makes it all work.” . Art stopped stirring for a minute and as he looked into the barrel he said, “Some people likes to use yeast instead of malt corn but I don’t like to use yeast. ‘I asked him, “Why not?” Once again Art looked at me and said, “Well that old yeast, it will leave a bad taste in your mouth and it will cause you to have a bad headache and that’s why I don’t like yeast.”

I asked Art how he got malt corn. He took a long breath and, “Well Tony, I get me a five gallon bucket and I fill it up with white hickory cane corn and then I pour warm water in on the corn until the water is about one inch over the top it. Then I will let it set over night. That will let the corn swell up some.”

“The next day I get me two big cloth sacks and I put half of the corn in one sack and half of the corn in the other sack. Th en I’ll take it down to the barn and I’ll get in one of the barn stalls. I dig me two holes about one foot deep and I lay a sack of corn down in one of the holes. Then I cover up the sack of corn with old dirt, straw and cow manure. I do the other sack the same way.

Every day I will go back to the barn and I rake back the old dirt and straw and I pour a half a bucket of the warm water on one of the sacks of corn and the other half of the bucket of warm water on top of the other sack of corn. I’ll do that every day for five or six days. When the corn gets sprouts on it about a inch or so long, I’ll go lay the sacks of corn on a big fl at rock. Then I’ll beat the corn up with a round rock or a sledge hammer. I don’t hit it too hard, just hard enough to bust up the corn. After I get all the corn busted up good, I lay a bed sheet down on my back porch and spread the corn out on the sheet. I let it dry out good. And that’s get my malt corn.”