What we asked of these three was just damn near impossible.
[narrator] Few experts can taste an unknown spirit...
Mimic that recipe.
...and reverse engineer the recipe to make it.
So I happen to be the holder of the original mash bill.
[narrator] For the first time, three experienced distillers...
Let the games begin.
...take on the challenge.
I just ruined my two best jars.
Ooh.
[narrator] But only one will be crowned...
This is hard.
...Master Distiller.
Bagdag, I think he's got it.
All right, guys. Welcome to Master Distiller.
You all are about to participate in
in the toughest challenge to date.
Reverse engineering.
By the time it's over with, we're gonna know
which one of you all is the next Master Distiller.
[Mark] Me and old Digger know firsthand
how difficult this reverse engineering is.
We had to reverse engineer a recipe of Popcorn Sutton's.
Tempt your palate with that.
Wow, that's some of the best liquor
I've ever drank in my life.
[Digger] I wanna make some of this.
Dude, we can deconstruct this liquor
and reverse engineer it.
We're gonna make the money off it.
We were successful at it.
But just know it takes a lot of work.
First, you gotta do the tasting.
So you wanna come up, get two jars each.
One of 'em is your spirit. One of 'em is your mash.
[Dalton] Trying the mash,
it tastes like it has more of a sugar wash base.
It's a much more delicate flavor profile.
A lot of nuance to it.
I'm pretty confident in my palate ability.
It's tasty.
I feel like there's some layers to it.
I'm getting some floral notes, a little fruit.
And I think the proof is somewhere around 90%.
[Jelani] Tasting the spirit and the mash,
I definitely got a lot of orange,
maybe some peach, apple.
There's definitely a fruit medley going on there.
You got your good solid game plan.
You got everything figured out in your head.
If you make it to the end,
you're gonna find out the original recipe.
But, for now, y'all are going with Tim
and pick out some stuff.
Get what you need to reproduce that mash
and that spirit.
You tasted the mash. You tasted the spirit.
You figured it out. You got it in your head, right?
Next test is get over there and get some ingredients
to make what you tasted.
Crash, you ready?
Born ready.
All right, your time starts now.
I'm Renee Newton, AKA Crash Nasty.
I'm 39 and I currently live in Tamarindo, Costa Rica.
I got the name Crash Nasty from playing roller derby.
I am extremely competitive.
I grew up playing sports.
When I started playing roller derby,
I really got to see that competitive side of me
just go up a couple notches.
I've been distilling rum for about 10 years.
I'm gonna go with some of the dark rum I made.
So I was trained on making high-altitude rum,
uh, Louisiana sugar cane and molasses.
I started doing that in Crested Butte, Colorado.
At the distillery in Colorado,
I alone was averaging about two full 55-gallon barrels a week.
Rum itself has a very advanced palate.
I'm really hoping that that's gonna help me excel
at this challenge.
[Tim] Now that's what I'm talking about.
Get stuff in a jar.
I'm tryin', Tim. I tryin'.
I picked up a lot of sugar and a lot of peaches,
um, in our initial tasting.
So I'm grabbing peaches, I'm grabbing honey,
I'm grabbing a different couple kinds of sugar,
a little bit of other fruit.
Five, four, three, two, one seconds.
You're done.
Now you gotta figure out how to get that over there.
So, Dalton, you got five minutes.
Your time starts now. Go.
My name is Dalton Holm. I'm 26 years old.
And I'm from Paris, Illinois.
I'm a brake press operator.
I bend sheet metal for like grain bins
and agricultural equipment.
So I started distilling moonshine,
uh, when I was 15 years old.
My first setup, I had a 5-gallon stainless steel stock pot.
I just welded the lid onto it.
That would sit, I had a wood fire underneath it.
Hence, why it's all black.
And then I had this sittin' over far enough away
so it wouldn't get hot.
And I'd just fill it up from the creek.
So the first spirit I ever made
was just straight corn liquor...
using cane sugar and cornmeal.
It was not good.
It was liquor,
but it needed some improvement.
And it started a life-long journey
to work on making better liquor each time.
Bready, malty, sweet.
There, you can smell the sugar in it.
I want to start my own distillery one of these days
and I wanna make sure it's a product that people like.
[Tim] You got one minute left.
[Dalton] It won't be lacking ingredients.
So going to the farmstand,
I might have tasted a stone fruit, like peach.
Tasted a little bit of citrus,
so I ended up getting some oranges,
picked up peaches.
I knew there was some corn.
I knew I needed some extra sugar
'cause it was definitely a sugar wash.
And that's about all I could think of.
Jelani, guess what.
You up next, boss.
Time to clean up.
Your time starts now.
These guys left me with next to nothing though, huh.
My name's Jelani Johnson.
I'm 32 years old and I'm from Brooklyn, New York.
I've been working as a distiller
for the past six years.
I started off as a bartender in the craft cocktail scene
and then pivoted over to production side,
making bourbon at the first legal whiskey distillery
in Manhattan since prohibition.
I started making beer actually when I was just a teenager
'cause I figured it was the easiest way for me to get beer
was to make it myself.
I'd say my favorite spirit to make is rye.
It's easier to work with than corn.
I love the way it tastes and smells.
I'm a big fan of rye whiskey,
even though rum really is my, uh... my spirit spirit.
'Cause of my background in craft cocktails,
I've had to taste a million things
and train my palate to discern what things are.
So I'll be pretty well poised to know what I'm tasting.
Hopefully that'll aid me in this challenge
where we have to reverse engineer a spirit from scratch.
[Tim] You picking up bags of brown sugar.
-You're making rum. -I'm supposed to be makin'...
Yeah. That's all the sugar that's left.
I'm definitely lookin' to grab some fruit for my mash,
apples, oranges and peaches, predominantly.
I'm goin' with what my palate's tellin' me.
Do you know what's in them cans?
I do now.
And then I'm gonna grab enough sugar
to make it a nice high-alcohol mash.
I think I got everything I need.
All right, guys, follow me.
We gotta go back through the woods.
Gotta get up here what we can mash in.
All right, guys, you got a lot of ingredients.
I just hope you got the right ingredients.
[Digger] Once you get your mash in your barrel,
you've got five days to ferment.
We'll get in here
and we'll see how close you've got
to the mash that we're shootin' you for.
What we're gonna test for is your taste
and your potential alcohol by volume.
Everybody clear on that part?
We're makin' it harder on you, guys.
It's time to get with it.
Your one hour starts now.
Good luck and get with it.
Oh, there we go.
[Digger] Everybody's off and runnin'.
Dalton, is that amylase?
Yeah, I gotta get those starches converted.
What else is your game plan here?
I see peaches, of course.
There's a lot of sugar in peach
and that's the main flavor I was gettin' out of it.
A lot of flavor in 'em too.
[Dalton] Yes, there is.
Crash, what do I see in that little jar
next to the honey? I can't read that label.
This one is lemon peel.
-Ooh. -I don't know about that.
I grabbed it at the time.
Sometimes it can be really harsh in spirits.
Yeah, I just kind of grabbed some things
that maybe I picked up on.
I'm not sure if they're gonna go in there though.
You've got 26 minutes left, folks.
You've worked in a kitchen before, haven't you, Jelani?
Uh, it's my bartending background.
You know what that white pit does for flavor, don't you?
Especially in a distillate.
Yeah, it just blows up out of proportion.
Oh, it gets horrible.
[Jelani] Based off the mash that I tasted,
I'm looking for a nice high ABV mash.
[Crash] Ooh, that's gonna be good.
-[Jelani chuckles] -That smells good.
I figure I might as well mash it up
and get all that juice out of there
'cause the solids will really take.
Six minutes, guys.
That's pretty right there.
That's gonna make a good rich mash.
[Jelani] I'm going for the dump.
It's my workout for the day.
[grunts]
None of us have a solid grasp of what is in this.
-Ready? -One, two, three.
[Dalton] We all have to speculate.
But none of us truly know what we are dealing with.
-[Digger] Five, four, three... -[Crash] Whoo!
...two, one.
Guys, step away. You're done.
Whoo!
We'll monitor the temperature of your mash.
If y'all wanna pitch your yeast, that's up to you.
Or we'll pitch it for you.
Y'all head on out,
get you a little cooling off time.
We'll come get you when that mash comes down.
We'll see you in five days.
-All right, thanks, guys. -All righty. Thank you.
-Good luck, guys. -Good luck to every one of you.
[Mark] You're gonna need it.
All right, lady and gentlemen, welcome back.
We gave you a mash and a spirit
and asked you to reverse engineer it
with the ingredients you picked from the farmstand.
We wanna see how close you get
to the flavor notes and the aroma notes
of that original mash.
Then we're gonna use a specific gravity hydrometer
to compare your mash now
to what it was when you first made it.
And that is gonna tell us how much alcohol by volume
you can make when you distill it.
Whoever comes up with the highest potential ABV
gets first pick for still parts for the run.
[Digger] What we need you to do
is bring us a clean jar of your mash.
Get with it, guys.
[Crash] I'm nervous.
[Jelani] Whoo.
Ooh!
So I'm opening my fermenter
and the first thing I smell is peaches.
Oh, it's alive.
So I feel really good.
She's bubbly.
I can tell some of my yeast is still active
'cause I'm seeing some bubbling,
I'm smelling a bit of that CO2.
[Jelani] She's alive.
[Crash] How is it?
It's good.
I'm really happy with how my fermentation looks.
Uh, it definitely smells alcoholic.
It's still a little bubbly.
But in terms of the smell and taste,
I think it might be pretty similar to the original,
which is peachy.
Originally, I was going for an ABV of around 10 to 12.
And based off of how it smells and looks,
I think I might be right on the mark to get 10% alcohol.
[Crash] How's yours taste?
[Dalton] It's all right. It'll make liquor.
Now, I feel confident that my mash was pretty close to zero.
There was a little bit of residual sweetness,
but not much.
Smells good.
Ooh. That's not bad.
Jelani's comin' up.
All right, Jelani. You feel good about what you got here?
I'm feeling good about it, yeah.
Good-lookin' jar of mash, Dalton.
-Good luck. -Thank you.
Bring it on in here, Crash.
Gentlemen.
[Digger] All right.
Let's go, men.
This is what they've reverse engineered.
Right.
[Tim] They had to figure out what is this.
They'll find out later what the actual recipe was.
But, for now, let's see how close it tastes.
-All right? -Let's get with it.
Start with Crash.
We have white sugar, brown sugar, fresh peaches,
green apple, oats, cornmeal, honey.
All right. I'm looking at total different colors.
Doesn't have the alcohol that the control does.
No, it's a little different.
-This is a much sweeter back. -Real sweet.
-Yeah. -Yeah.
Like it didn't completely ferment out.
[Tim] Well, it tastes good.
You could drink it.
[Digger] And she started off at 1.050.
And she is right around 5 ABV right now.
All right, who are we moving on to now?
[Tim] Jelani.
Okay, y'all got a good look at that?
Looks like a peach or a corn mash.
-[Tim] Yeah. -Well, now, he does have 10 pounds of cornmeal,
sugar, honey, peaches, oranges and apples.
Thank you.
Nowhere near alike in color.
No. Not even the ballpark.
-It's got a good smell. -I am telling it.
-[Mark] It's real close. -Close.
[Mark] Jelani's beginning gravity
is 1.080.
[Digger] All right, let's see what Jelani's looking at.
He's got potential at 10 ABV.
But that's a good job. That's a good mash.
-I don't know what that means, but-- -That's Dalton's.
Same problem.
[Mark] Yeah.
The color's really, really light
compared to the control.
Here is Dalton's ingredients.
Corn, oats, brown sugar, white sugar, peaches,
two oranges, one lime, and apples.
It don't taste like it finished out neither.
I think it...
Dalton's matches the taste of the control jar.
[Digger] Or it's close.
[Mark] Beginning gravity is 1.060.
[Digger] So you're right smack-dab...
on 8 ABV, it looks like.
Look, guys. You know how hard this is.
-[Mark] Oh, yeah. -To reverse engineer,
to go back and taste something...
-Yeah. -...and then try to figure out how they made it,
what they made it from.
But the number's not gonna lie.
-Right. -Put 'em in order,
one, two, three.
-And that's where they're gonna go into the still kit. -And it's fire.
-It's fire. -Yeah. Yeah.
Let's go tell 'em where they're at.
[Crash] Thank you.
You're very welcome.
All right, guys, all three of those mashes
are really, really close
to the control that we gave you all to match.
[Mark] We simply had to rely on the numbers
to see how close you got to the sample that we gave you.
Crash, your potential ABV...
5%.
Jelani, your potential ABV is 10%.
Dalton, so your potential ABV is 8%.
That being said,
Jelani, you're in the still house first.
Dalton, you're second.
Crash, you're third.
Tickle!
And there he is.
How's it goin' there, fellers?
We've been doing great.
So, these guys was reverse engineering.
And these guys has made some good mash.
-All right. -The problem is
they need enough parts to build a still
to run their mash.
It just so happens I know where we can
get them still parts
and we can remedy this situation.
Y'all drop your jars off at your tables,
follow me
and we'll get us some still parts.
[Tim] Outstanding.
Wear your seatbelt.
[Tickle] All right, this right here,
this should be the easy part.
You're gonna have three minutes in the still house.
Jelani, you're up first.
And your time starts now.
All right, timing three minutes
goes a whole lot faster than you think it does.
All right. All right, well, Jelani's got a pot.
All right, that's a good start.
Uh, because I had the highest ABV,
I get to go first,
and there's only two thumpers available.
I'm definitely gonna take one of those.
I'm gonna add some more peach flavor in the middle
and try to get as close to that flavor profile as possible
of the original spirit.
Two and a half minutes. 30 seconds has you left.
[Jelani] My mash came in a little dry.
So I think maybe I might have to reincorporate
a little bit of flavor in the thumper
to make sure that my finished spirit
comes out as fruity as I want it to be.
All right, five seconds to spare.
-I took the thumper. -[Crash] You took my thumper.
-[Tickle laughing] -All right, leave me something.
Leave me something.
-All right, Dalton, you've got three minutes. -All right.
And your time starts now.
Let's get us a still together, Dalton.
All right.
In the still house, I end up getting a thump,
a lyne arm.
Just regular still setup with a thumper.
I'm hoping the thumper will pay off
if I can cut up some peaches and throw in there
and give it more of that peach flavor they're looking for.
All right, perfect tie with Jelani.
Five seconds left.
-Ooh, he took all the-- -Yeah, did y'all leave me anything?
[Dalton] Thread.
-[Tickle laughing] -Really? Okay.
All right, Crash,
I know there's plenty of stuff in there to build you a still.
All right, your three minutes starts now.
All right, Crash, come on.
-Let's see what you can do. -[Crash] Ooh, ooh, ooh.
Dalton and Jelani both took the thumpers,
so I'm feeling a little bit stressed out.
So I'm really hoping to pick up a little column
to get that alcohol percentage up
to get close to the proof I'm reverse engineering.
All right, we have got a pot.
I'm telling you,
you're gonna have to be moving faster than that.
I'm just grabbing everything.
Jelani, Dalton and I have really been getting along
and bonding,
so I'm hoping that if I'm missing a piece,
that we can do a little bit of bartering
and work something out.
All right, you've got a neck.
I see it right there.
All right, well, let's get in there
and see if we can't reverse engineer up some moonshine.
[Mark] Guys, you know what we asked of these three
was just damn near impossible.
I happen to be the holder of the original mash bill.
You all finally get to figure out
what you were trying to emulate.
Finally.
Well, now, I know they can reverse engineer some liquor.
Let's, uh, see if they can actually engineer a still.
I'm gonna leave them in y'all's
so-called capable hands.
-See ya, boss. -[Digger] All right,
here's what you gotta do from this point.
Put all those parts together,
then we're gonna move right into running the liquor.
You got one hour.
Your time starts now.
[Jelani] Building a still is actually a little easier than I thought.
I understand the basic principles of it,
so I guess it really paid off to go first.
[Dalton] We're setting up the still.
I'm pretty confident in it.
I mean, it's like putting together a puzzle.
All the pieces just fit together.
[Mark] Crash was third in the still house,
so she's grabbed everything that she possibly could.
[Crash] I'm pretty nervous.
The pieces are a lot different than
what I'm used to working with.
No thumper, I'm not sure I got everything I needed.
I think she's got a nice setup
if she puts it all together.
Even though I didn't get a thumper in the still house,
I did manage to pick up a column.
I saw some places I could hang a little fruit
if I wanna add some back.
So I feel really good about the still I put together.
It's looking like everybody's where they're needed to be.
Now, you've built that reverse engineered mash.
Now we want that reverse engineered liquor
out of that mash.
And at the end of this run,
somebody will go.
[Mark] Then you will have one final challenge,
final flavoring.
I suggest you bring us as close to the sample
as we gave you.
You got four hours.
That time starts now.
Good luck and get with it, guys.
Should we see what we're reverse engineering?
[Jelani] Let's take another look.
[Dalton] The judges were saying this is the toughest challenge to date
and I can definitely see that.
It's not gonna be easy.
There's a lot of nuance to it.
There's a lot to pick up.
[Mark] Things change when you put it in the still.
Especially with this outfit to Crash's run.
I mean, you know, that's a whole nother ball game.
My big goal is gonna be to keep my flavors
close to the spirit we had to sample.
So in my still pot, I put my mash
and then I just put one or two peaches
into the little column
to add a little bit of flavor to that vapor.
My first column ever.
-Wow. -I've never used a column.
[Tim] She had to get what she could get,
and she did a great job in connecting it all together.
She took what she had and made it work.
I'm filling my thumper with mostly mash,
a can of peaches, a little bit of orange
and an apple that I sliced up,
trying to get as close to that original spirit.
Yeah, I'm seeing Dalton put a ton of peaches in there,
and it looks like he's getting another can of peaches with syrup.
That'll really bring the flavor.
[Dalton] I'm throwing some peach in a thump
and a lot of the fruit out of my cap,
thinking that, you know, that should be right on task
for that reverse engineered spirit.
[Jelani] I'm feeling pretty good about my still setup.
My plan is to just run it slow and low
and try to get as much alcohol as I can out of this.
[Crash] How are you doin' over there, Dalton?
[Jelani] Putting a little zest in there, huh?
[Dalton] Yeah, a little bit.
That charcoal and that copper will scrub flavor out of this.
So that's why I'm trying to make sure
all my flavor's in my thumper past that,
so that way, it still comes through.
I'm just being careful not to get any pit.
You know what that white pit does for flavor, don't you?
[Dalton] Yup. It'll add undesirable flavors.
Orange is very tricky to do.
But, when done right, it can be good.
Guys, you burned two hours of your time.
You got two more left.
[Crash gasps] So exciting!
I start getting some liquor out.
I can smell some of the peach flavors,
which makes me really happy.
[Jelani] Oh, there we go.
[Crash] Oh, look at you.
[Dalton] That's what you get with high alcohol.
He did get 10% ABV on his.
[Jelani] As soon as it starts coming over,
I'm immediately smelling all that fruit flavor.
I mean, it's a little headsy,
-but it's the peach flavor I think I'm gonna wanna add... -It's headsy, but, yeah.
...to the finished product.
I know I'm about to have some really good liquor.
[Crash] Dalton, got some alcohol?
Yeah.
That's a face.
-Yeah. -What's goin' on?
Getting quite a bit of orange, which, I mean,
I put orange in it, but...
a little more than I was thinking.
What do you think?
Orange heavy.
I'm realizing that I had gotten orange on my finger from this morning.
And when I was tasting the sample jar,
all I was doing was smelling the orange on my hand.
So I decided to put orange in the still
and it just-- I overdid it.
[Crash] You're going for it?
[Dalton] Yeah, I'm going for it.
I'm going to open up my thump,
which I'll have to cool the still down,
which is a huge risk. It's gonna take time.
But I'm hoping it'll pay off
if I can cut up some peaches and throw in there
and maybe, you know, counteract some of that orange
and give it more of that peach flavor they're looking for.
[Crash] How'd it go, Dalton?
[Dalton] I got 'em in there.
Didn't lose too much heat,
but don't have it runnin' just yet again.
All right, lady and gentlemen,
time's a-gettin' slight. 30 minutes.
[Dalton] How's yours comin' along?
-[Crash] Good. -Good?
Yeah. I'm getting a lot of peach.
So I think the sample they gave us
that we were reverse engineering
was somewhere around 90%.
Read the bead.
So I was shooting for my jar to be in that range.
This is hard.
[Dalton] I mean, you got how many jars already?
[Crash] I'm doing okay.
Not as many as Jelani.
[Jelani] Yeah, I'm pumping it out over here.
The spirit that's coming off the still is really light and neutral,
so I'm adding flavors on the back end.
I took a little bit of cinnamon.
I took a little bit of orange peel and some sugar
to kind of round out the flavors
and add a little bit more fruit and spice components to this.
But it's a little worrisome that it's not clear.
I think I'm gonna try this charcoal.
Hey, Crash, is it okay if I steal one more peach?
Help yourself, Dalton.
[Dalton] So I'm feeling that I'm definitely
in the back of the group
with the amount of citrus I've got in there.
I decide there, last-minute, to cut up another peach...
[Crash] You gonna put it in the final product?
[Dalton] I'm just gonna rinse it.
...and wash it with spirit.
Dalton is cutting peaches.
Jelani has a full bar set up.
But I'm not doing anything extra to my jars.
I'm already getting that flavor.
So I'm feeling good about it.
That's my jar.
[Crash] Y'all ready?
It's gonna be what it's gonna be.
Gentlemen.
Just remember, guys, when we come back in...
one of youse is goin' home.
Well, gentlemen, we've got our control,
which was the original spirit.
I think it's time that we all take our little jars--
So we have something to compare 'em to.
Yeah.
Well, tastes pretty good so far.
[Digger] Well...
Where do you wanna start at, whiskey pusher?
This one closest to me here.
Crash. Nice clean jar.
And full as it can be.
It's excellent, as far as looks.
Ruh-roh, Houston, we have a problem.
I'm feeling like reverse engineering was a tough challenge.
But I feel like I got some good booze.
My "read the beads" needs some work.
[Mark] The flavor, I think, is good.
She definitely has the flavor.
-Definitely has the smell. -Yeah, she does. She does.
But there is not any alcohol in it.
You know, the control spirit was about 90 proof.
But I think she's about 40 proof short.
[Digger] When you're reverse engineering,
I mean, you can't just hit this one and this one
and skip that one.
You've gotta hit the nose. You've gotta hit the palate.
You've gotta hit the proof.
[Mark] What have we got here?
-We've got Dalton's. -[Mark] That says "Dalton."
And he's got little things floating around in it.
[Digger] He's got a lot in particular there.
He got a lot of stuff on the bottom too.
He's got a lot of cloudy.
[Tim] Mmm-hmm.
[Digger] He's gettin' a little closer to what we're looking for.
He may be a little high on it,
but he's closer than the other one was.
[Dalton] I was feeling real good
until I was just walking up there
and realized that I didn't filter
as well as I thought I did.
I should have used a coffee filter.
-A little cloudy? -Yeah.
I don't know why,
but I'm gettin' a lot of orange.
[Digger] I'm gonna tell you why.
There was an orange. It hadn't been cut,
but it had all the zest scraped off to it--
-Yeah, he scraped all that off. -...down to the pit.
He don't have any taste or flavor profile
to match the control.
He was not really satisfied with his flavor.
And he tried to adjust that flavor
as he was making the run.
Now I know what he was talking about.
Right.
Jelani.
I mean, he's got a color profile that's not clear.
I'm thinking he's 85.
I had too much time at the end.
My run only lasted three hours.
And then for that last hour, I was just sittin' there
blending and overthinking it.
It smells really good.
[Tim] It has a good nose.
Now we'll go and see what it looks like
on your tongue.
Bagdag, I think he's got it.
It don't look right, but it tastes right.
His flavor, his nose...
it's pretty good. He's a little low on proof.
He's low on proof, but he's got flavor.
[Mark] Guys, you know, what we asked of these three...
was just damn near impossible.
To reverse engineer somethin', it's really hard.
But two of 'em have come really, really close,
and one of 'em's come kind of close.
-We know where we are. -Oh, yeah.
All right, let's go deliver some news.
All right, guys, what you all did
was really remarkable.
You were given a taste of liquor
that you've never seen before in your lives.
And you dissected it with your palates
and did your very best to come up with something
that would match that.
It was a fine job on each and every one of you.
Dalton.
Your flavor was good. You had a little bit of particulate in it.
I think you were filtering over some peaches.
You got your proof, you know, pretty good.
-Yeah. -Well, Dalton, I think the peach is great.
But, uh, the way you put the orange peel in that
somewhere along the line,
that kind of adjusted things a little bit
to not in your favor.
But, uh, you've come really close.
Crash.
You fell real short on your proof.
No doubt you got the lowest jar there.
You know, we're looking at 90 proof.
Uh, you're a long ways from 90 proof.
Somewhere over there in your jars,
you got a little more proof.
But, flavor, you're the mayor of flavor town to that point.
Thank you.
Jelani.
You got a floor full of liquor sittin' over there,
probably 25 jars.
I don't really know how you can come up with one
out of that many.
But, you know, good job.
Didn't really like the color you put in there.
But, you know, that's not a deal-killer at all.
For the challenge you were presented,
this old judge is extremely proud of you,
all of you.
Now, that being said,
one of you is going home.
Two of you are gonna go on
and learn what that liquor really was made out of.
And, Dalton, unfortunately,
that jar bought you a ticket home.
I'm sorry about this.
Coming down here, this experience,
I mean, it's-- I wouldn't trade it for nothin'.
I always distill by myself.
Good job, Dalton.
I've learned so much from you.
Thanks.
So it's wonderful that I have two new people
that I can talk to and nerd out about this
and really just, you know,
I feel like I've found my people.
All right, guys, final flavoring.
Whatever went wrong before,
now is your chance to fix it.
Pay attention to your proof and your flavor.
That's what we're looking for.
Mimic that recipe we gave you a sample of.
[Mark] This challenge was almost impossible.
I think it's pretty outstanding for you two
to be standing here with the jars that you had.
But in the end, there can be just one of you
named Master Distiller.
Thirty minutes, that's all you've got
to bring us your perfect reverse engineered spirit
on this table.
Your time starts now.
Good luck and get with it, guys.
[Jelani] I didn't love the discoloration of
the final jar that I gave them.
So my game plan here in this challenge
is to hand in something that tastes as similar
to the last jar I handed in
and just clean it up and make it as clear as possible.
[Digger] Jelani,
what it is that you muddled up and put into that filter?
[Jelani] That's charcoal.
I'm going for clarity.
I know that charcoal filtering
can really render a spirit clear
and I'm hoping that'll work for me.
The initial notes the judges had given me
was that my proof was too low
but I had a lot of the right flavors.
Hey, Crash, what's your plan?
I'm just trying to make sure the proof of my jar today
is similar to the proof of the sample jar.
I think that's a solid plan.
And then I had a bunch of good flavor.
So I'm just trying to do a little nose blending.
I don't think I'm gonna add any additives
or sugar or anything.
I think I'm just gonna stick with my spirit.
I'm picking jars that I like the flavor
and the smell profile...
Whoo!
...putting them into my bucket,
rinsing them around,
trying not to taste too much of the spirit
so I didn't burn my tongue.
The charcoal isn't working.
Oh, that's not taking too much color out, huh.
I just ruined my two best jars.
[Jelani] I'm not gonna lie.
I've never done the shake test and the bubble test.
I'm gonna do it off taste
-'cause that's how I know how to do it. -Yeah, I love it.
Dalton's getting ready to light up something over there.
Look at this. Watch this.
[Crash] What are you doin'?
[Dalton] The fire test.
-It just lights off immediately, so-- -Oh, yeah, look at that.
That helps tell you how high a proof it is.
The orange is showing that it's got a little bit of heads in it still.
Okay.
Yeah, that says about 160
about how much that burned off there.
All right. Man, Dalton's just hittin' us with the knowledge.
I just ruined my two best jars.
Yeah, we was observing you crushing it up there
and I was wondering why you was doing that.
What I tried to do was clean up my original jar.
But crushing it up only made it black.
-So-- -And what's your plan here?
Uh, so instead, I'm going from...
my collection of jars
and I'm gonna try to approximate the flavor
just based off of what I distilled
without adding too many additives
and changing the color again.
Jelani, it sounds like you're just starting over.
I am.
All right, guys, you're down to five minutes.
You better be polishing those jars up.
No pressure.
-You got your jar? -I think so.
[Crash] I got a lot of the same flavors
from the sample jar.
My proof, it's not 100% by any means,
but it's pretty close.
And there's a lot of peach there
and that's the note I was really trying to bring forward.
I think I'm done.
I'm really proud about the jar I'm handing in.
But I took a little bit of cinnamon and orange peel and some sugar
to add a little bit more fruit and spice components.
So, it's a little worrisome that it's not clear.
But I think that everything that I added
has brought it really close to the original flavor.
So I'm proud of how it tastes,
but I wonder how they're gonna think
how it looks.
-You got it. -Yeah.
One of you guys is one step closer
to being Master Distiller.
Reverse engineering.
We gave 'em a very difficult challenge.
Even if they hit the ingredients exactly,
every one, they didn't know the quantities.
That's what I'm saying. There's a list of...
-this, variables... -Variables. Yeah.
...that has to go into play in that.
Well, let's go with Jelani first.
[Mark] Jelani's cleaned that jar up a lot.
-[Tim] Mmm-hmm. -It looks good
and a pretty decent beads.
Good proof, yeah.
What do you think? How'd you do?
-I don't know. Your jar looked so much clearer than mine. -Yeah.
And I'm relying on all these flavors I've got
for extras,
and I hope I was able to approximate the spirit
that we were given.
Well, you know, we've gotta base everything
-on this control. -[Mark] Right.
-It smells pretty good. -It's similar on the nose.
[Mark] Yes, it is.
Honestly, I think Jelani's is better than the control.
I would have to say that.
[Mark] Jelani's working something there.
I mean, really, that's a fine drink, ain't it?
-And it's very, very similar. -It is. It is.
-It is very similar. -I'd say 99.9.
[Mark] The flavor's outstanding.
I mean, Jelani, you know,
he has experience as a bartender.
He's got plenty experience at replicating things.
And I think that's what we're seeing here.
Well, let's move along.
All right. Crash.
One thing about it, it's clean.
It looks way clearer than Jelani's.
It is. Much clearer jar than Jelani's.
How do you feel about yours?
I didn't wanna be low.
I figured I'd rather be high.
But I'm...
I'm nervous that now it's too high.
I mean, she's close on the nose.
Yup.
-[Mark] Not bad. -Not bad.
I mean, she's in the 80-85 range.
[Mark] It's really good.
Flavor-wise, I think we're looking at a tie.
[Mark] She's opened up her proof
and maintained the flavor.
She came a long way from where she was.
And really clean, that's the thing.
-That's the thing about it. -Yeah, it really stands out.
[Digger] There's your marketability.
I mean, put that in a clear bottle on a shelf,
it's gonna catch somebody's eye.
You know, guys, we grade it on the control.
You know, we need proof, nose, flavor
and we need clarity.
-Mmm. -And one of the contestants
just fell this much short on one of those.
It's splitting hairs, boys. That's what we've done.
Gentlemen, let's go do our job.
-Let's do it. -Let's go, men.
[Digger] Come up and get your jars.
Thank you.
[Crash chuckles]
All right, first and foremost,
I happen to be the holder
of the original mash bill.
You all finally get to figure out
what you were trying to emulate.
You're looking at 20 gallons of water,
18 pounds of white sugar,
10 pounds of brown sugar,
peach nectar, one quart.
Fresh peaches, there were 85 pounds of those rascals
that were pulverized.
And, uh, basic old distiller's yeast,
about 30 grams.
So there you have it.
That's what you were looking to mimic.
It was all peach.
It was incredible for you guys to just taste something
and you recreated it all the way from the mash bill
all the way to the finished jar.
An outstanding job.
Thank you.
Crash, we told you to start with
it did not have the alcohol it needed.
So I think you've corrected that pretty good.
Yeah, your proof of scale was a little bit off.
But outstanding bringing an extra-clean jar.
Crash, you made a steep 180 from your first run.
This is as good an improvement as we've seen in a while.
Now that brings me to you, Jelani.
You brought the flavor from the beginning.
Your palate is extraordinary.
And there's no doubt in my mind
that you could emulate everything you've done.
You could repeat this again with no problem whatsoever.
Now, when it was time to clean it up
with this last charcoal round,
things went a little bit south on you there.
But you didn't grumble about it.
You jumped up and you fixed it.
That's what you do. But you bounced back.
You recovered.
And all in all,
for such a difficult challenge,
you guys really need to be proud of yourself
and you need to be proud of each other
because y'all some outstanding distillers.
We had to split hairs to come up with a winner on this.
And all that leads up to the fact that...
Crash, you're the next Master Distiller.
Congratulations, ma'am.
Thank you!
I feel extremely validated
just winning the title Master Distiller.
These judges have such extensive knowledge.
To have them acknowledge that I made a good clean spirit
that they enjoyed drinking
just is kind of breathtaking.
Congratulations to both of you.
I'm looking at two winners,
one just happened to be going away with the title.
All right, thanks guys.
-Good job, guys. -[Jelani] Thank you, guys.
Good job.