Aguadente

Aguadente is the local fire water. It's a form of grappa -- made with the grape skins left after extracting the juice for wine.

Everyone around here makes it, usually in a home still located in the garage or a storeroom. I helped our trusty neighbour Joao make his in mid October.

The mass of grapes skins and pulp left after draining the liquid (for wine) is left to ferment for some time. It becomes a dense, quite dry mass that smells strongly of alcohol. At the apppropriate time. it is loaded in batches into the boiler of a copper still.

This is Joao's still, or 'alembic'. It's set in a brick firebox, and here the main boiler has been crammed full of grapes. To stop them burning, a small quantity of aguadente is added; apart from that it is mostly solid material in there. Joao is putting on the top -- it has a long outlet spout (not visible in the photo) that sends the distillate through a tank of cold water to condense it. As soon as the top is in place, the fire is built up and the precious 60?? alcohol starts dripping from the condenser.

The result is a fiery but surprisingly tasty spirit. Some people age it in wooden barrels, so it gains a little colour like a whiskey. It is often used to steep fruit, producing a kind of fruit liqueur. In our village 'cafe', an order for a cup of coffee usually results in one espresso, a sachet of sugar, and a bottle of local aguadente coming to the table. The aquadente goes in the coffee (along with the sugar) creating what we like to call 'Portuguese Coffee' (a reference to Irish Coffee, which similarlly takes a shot of the national drink...)