-Smells like yeast. -It is yeast from Brazil.
[narrator] This time on Moonshiners...
They make their liquor in less than 16 hours with that.
[Henry] Easy, Josh, easy.
[Josh] If this works like I hope it's going to,
this is gonna be a game changer.
-Whoa. -Looks like dinosaur... [bleep]
[Joe] If we can sell this whole lot of moonshine
-how happy do you think he's gonna be? -If we don't get caught.
-Dude. -[Joe] Pittsburgh, here we go.
[Joe] We got to take this shine
to one of the best cultural hubs, the barbershop.
-It's strong... [bleep] -[all laughing]
[Mike] Ice friggin' damn cold.
We can't afford not to keep making liquor all winter long
thanks to Richard and Craig.
Holy... [bleep]
There's Richard and Craig right there, Jerry.
I see their truck. They got a damn trailer full of mash barrels.
[man] This is how we make the moonshine.
[Josh] It's a long way up here to check a mailbox.
Supposed to be having a package from Brazil.
It should have been here already.
Looks like we got a package.
I was recently down in Brazil
on a mission to find out about
making some coffee-infused moonshine,
but while I was down there I learned so much more.
I've been really excited to get this package right here,
if this is what I think it is, and it is.
Hell yeah, look there.
This is a jar of some frickin' goodness right here.
God, I can't wait to show Henry this.
This package I've been waiting on from South America
is gonna totally change the way we make liquor here in Appalachia.
Hey, hey.
What's happening?
-What's up, Joshua? -Finally showed up then.
Man, have I got a surprise for you.
Christmas present has been running a little late here.
What we got? Pizza?
It looks like a Brazilian return address to me.
I've been waiting on this for a month, man. It's a game changer.
[speaking other language] What is that?
We got a milkshake mixed up or what?
Tell you what, it smells like yeast.
That is a strain of very, very special wild yeast
from my buddy, Sabola, down in dang Brazil
that they make out of sugarcane.
[exhales] Ooh-ee.
-Smell good, don't it? -Yeah, it got a strong smell.
What we supposed to do with this?
[Josh] They make their liquor
in less than 16 hours with that,
and that's what they use.
They heat the sugarcane juice
to convert it from sugar into alcohol.
-[Kenny] Damn. -16 hours.
-You seen it do that to it? -I did it with 'em.
We got cane-cut, mash-made, mash-ready, mash-cooked-off alcohol
in two damn days.
That's amazing.
Oh, my God.
You could make seven runs a week.
Think about it.
[Josh] Here in the United States,
it's unheard of for alcohol to work off that fast.
And they use that same yeast...
-for six months. -...over and over?
Six months.
[Kenny] Right there would save a lot of money.
It's gonna cut out on the time
and it's gonna turn up the profits.
All right, so how we gonna get sugarcane?
We don't have sugarcane growing around here.
But one thing that does grow around here is sorghum.
Is sorghum. We've seen it in the fields.
Back in the day, man, that's what pioneers used for sweetener.
They didn't have the sugarcane here, they didn't have it available.
-When they was out of sugar what are they gonna do? -Yeah, use whatever they got.
I wanna test this out on sorghum molasses
just to see if it'll work off and how fast it works off.
[narrator] Sorghum is a type of grass
that contains high levels of sugar.
Originating in Africa, it was introduced to America by Benjamin Franklin
who saw its potential for broom making and roof thatch.
Farmers quickly discovered it was an alternative source of sugar,
both cheaper and easier to grow than sugarcane.
Liquor makers turned to sorghum during the Civil War
when Union blockades on southern ports prevented goods,
including Louisiana-grown sugar, from leaving the docks.
During prohibition,
sorghum once again became the choice for moonshiners
who knew government revenuers were keeping close tabs on sugar sales.
Bolstered by the fact
that it's an abundant and environmentally friendly crop,
rums and whiskeys made from sorghum are gaining in popularity.
If it works it'll be a game changer.
I think it's well worth trying.
-Okay. -I really thought you was gonna talk [bleep]
when I come in here
because every time I come up with something
you're like, "Son, if it ain't broke don't fix it."
The [bleep] talking will come if it don't work...
-Yeah, that's right. -...and how it taste.
-Well, how, I mean, we don't know if... I... -[chuckles softly]
We're not so sure the sorghum molasses is gonna work
but if it does it's gonna be a life-changing thing,
so it's worth a shot.
-Let's mash it in. -I've been waiting to do this for a while.
Well, you know it's gonna fall on you if it don't work.
[Josh] It always does.
[Richard] Why that stupid ass didn't tell his wife something?
He would have made some good money here.
All he had to do was be honest and tell his damn wife,
"Hey, I got some guys in the garage. We don't use it."
[Craig] Nothing is ever that easy.
[narrator] In Haywood County, North Carolina,
after getting kicked out of a heated garage,
Richard and Craig are scrambling to find a place warm enough
for their 1,000 gallons of mash to ferment.
[Richard] We got a farmer friend named Jeremy.
This is a really good customer.
He loves our liquor and he's got a big farm.
He's got a lot of land,
and it might not be a big deal to Jeremy
to just store these barrels for us
somewhere around here for a few days.
How's it going, man?
Good to see y'all again.
-You been all right? -Oh, yes, sir.
I've been better since I got that shine from you.
-What can I do for y'all? -Well...
...we got to find somewhere to stash some mash.
[inhales] Phew.
Hopefully I can help y'all out.
I mean, I'm not too sure. I mean...
-Let me show you what we got, man. -All right.
[Richard] Yeah, I mean, it's really cold out here right now.
Each minute that passes by it gets this mash colder and colder,
and, I mean, it might just stall out.
[Craig] 1,000 gallons, 20 barrels.
-We have six of 'em on the trailer right now. -Mmm-hmm.
-We have another 14 more. -Oh, yeah, that's a lot.
[Richard] We need about three or four more days on this right here.
Jeremy's our only option right now.
There's no plan B in this one.
[Richard] After this works off we'll be out of ya hair.
Whatever you want to charge us for that,
I mean, you got three cases from us the last time, right?
How about we double it and make it six?
I'm sure we could work that out. Six sounds like a good deal.
-Thank you, my man. -Yes, sir.
-Thank you. -Absolutely.
-All right. -Absolutely.
Well, I guess, yeah, if you want to,
we can walk on down and check out the barn I was thinking about.
[Richard] Six cases of shine is a really, really small price to pay.
That's pennies on the dollar.
All right, let's get these unloaded.
[Richard] So, we're gonna make a moonshine bunker.
Gonna be insulated from the bottom to the top.
-All right. -Big monster.
Let me tell ya.
[Craig] After we finish,
all me and Richard have to do
is get the rest of our 20 barrels here, get 'em in place,
and finish our fermentation process.
Once I get all those hay bales packed in there
it'll be a nice little cozy spot for it.
I didn't think I was gonna have to work this hard today.
[Jeremy] Me, either. [sighs wearily]
[Joe] Oh, here they come.
May the power of the mash compel you.
-Invaded me would be more like it. -[laughs]
You know, usually, when winter starts setting in
we start closing up the shop, buttoning everything up...
-There we go. You got it? -Yes, sir.
[Digger] But this triple malted grain recipe,
I want to get at least three or four more runs in
before we close up shop for the season,
and I brought Joe Jackson into the mix to help us out.
-[Joe] Whoa. -You gonna take a bath in that?
-Looks like dinosaur... [bleep] -[laughs]
If we can stand making liquor all winter long,
I mean, we can really be in dandy shape come spring.
All right, guys, I'll take my jitney wagon and go to the top.
Oh, yeah, you go ahead and just, you know,
just take it easy, pops.
-I'm trying to. -[Joe laughs]
-Don't threaten me with a lot of fun. -[Joe chuckles]
[Digger] All right, off I go.
I just built a new metal building.
We've got these three stills.
We've got a three barrel,
a six barrel, and a one barrel.
-Don't get him over anything he can trip on. -You got it.
Get 'em all inside, get 'em setup, and get 'em oriented,
and get 'em as level as possible,
and then get ready to start building some mash.
One thing we're desperately gonna have to have is light.
[Digger] Oh, Beaz already tore the tailgate up.
That's gonna come out of your pay, Beaz.
[Joe laughs]
[Digger] You know, as it stands right now,
this new garage here will keep us safe and warm,
it'll keep the mash a-workin' round the clock.
It won't cool off, we won't have to worry about heating it up,
we'll control the temperature in there.
But the best part about this garage,
I'm several counties away from Detective David Robertson,
so I don't have to worry about any surprise visits from him.
Well, men, that just about got it.
-[groans] -Good, good.
-We got a little bit more stuff to do, but... -I might have to have...
-...somebody fiddle with the old... -Lay down there...
-...I'll walk on it. -[laughs]
-[Beaz] That was a ton of work. -[Digger] Just a tiny bit.
[Digger] So, that being said, get this mashed in.
-I'm fixin' to take a little road trip... -Okay.
...so that means you and you are in charge of this run.
Mark and I have got, kind of,
what we're dubbing a top secret operation that we need to get underway,
but Joe and Beaz, they are more than able,
and I'm gonna leave them with it.
-We'll do it by the book. -By the book, brother.
I wouldn't expect anything otherwise.
-All right. -Heck yeah.
I got us fixed up, Big Dog.
-You got the sorghum? -You got it, buddy.
[Josh] With Sabola's wild yeast and sugarcane molasses,
down in Brazil it only took 16 hours for the mash to work off.
-Let's keep on going here. -It's heavy, man.
We really don't have an abundance of sugarcane here in frickin' Virginia,
but one thing we do have an abundance of is sorghum.
This sorghum molasses, it's over 50% sugar content.
I just hope it works half as good here.
-That's on the jar you got sent to us. -[Josh] Yeah.
[Josh] We got one shot at it.
Don't want to kill it, for sure.
I want to try to keep some of it and keep it alive,
so when we're done with this we still got some.
It would be a big time money saving damn deal
-right there. -Yeah, I like that idea.
The cool thing about yeast is it's alive.
All you got to do is keep feeding it.
If this works out, the last thing I want to do is let something happen
to this precious strain of yeast that I have.
All right, Hen-ro,
how we gonna do this without getting sticky
-everywhere? -Carefully.
The sorghum molasses is way thicker than the sugarcane juice
that we were using in Brazil.
We're gonna have to heat it up to be able to break it down.
Whoa, whoa, let's go half on the time. Hold it.
[bleep] Looks like motor oil.
-It does, don't it? -Hell yeah.
I'm telling you what, that smells like rum, baby, rum.
I'm hoping this works. You ready to dump her?
Let the liquid go... Easy, Josh, easy.
Oh, yeah, it's all good. That warm water did it.
Man, that's gonna make some excellent whiskey.
[Henry] All right, I'm gonna go get a bucket of water,
and we'll put some of this mash over in it,
and then we'll throw the yeast into it.
Hell yeah, that's good. I want to save some to culture.
It'll kick off much quicker if you get it started in a smaller container.
Let this get raging and we'll pinch it,
and we'll wait, and let it work off.
Let's see what happens.
Now, we got to check our sugar content.
[Josh] Well, we're at about 20%, Henry.
-We need to get 17. -Just add a little water to it.
If you put too much sugar in a mash barrel
it actually kills off your yeast.
-That's it right there. -A 17% sugar content.
-That's right on the money, son. -That's perfect.
-That's damn good. Damn good job, Josh. -Yeah, that's perfect.
-The whole... -Let's make a run here.
Now we're just ready to put the yeast in it...
-...aren't we? -[Josh] Yep, let's rip.
This is a super yeast.
This stuff sure took off fast in the bucket.
[Josh] Man, I cannot believe Sabola finally sent me this yeast
all the way from Brazil.
If this works in America like it does in South America,
we are gonna be in business.
This is gonna be a game changer for our business, man,
think about it.
-It sounds like it's sizzling. -It is.
You can hear it?
[Henry] You might be on to something, son.
[Josh] I can't wait to see what happens here.
[Jeremy] Oh, my God.
You guys don't play around do you?
I was having a lazy day, pretty much,
until you guys called. [laughs]
-This ain't no lazy day right now. -No, it's not.
[Richard] We got 20 barrels.
This is a lot of mash, so we're gonna make a moonshine bunker.
It's gonna be totally surrounded and covered with hay.
This one right in the front right here.
Gonna be insulated from the bottom to the top.
These are heat lamps.
Put 'em in a chicken coop, it keeps chickens warm.
It's gonna do the same thing here.
Heat lamps are used from food to agriculture.
They're used to keep pipes from freezing,
they're used to keep chickens warm.
They're gonna be really good for what we got going on here.
Let there be light.
[Richard] And if we put a good barrier around these barrels,
and put a nice layer of insulation over it...
[Richard] That's perfect.
It's gonna hold the heat in.
The heat is not gonna have anywhere to be able to go.
Got a real barrier here, man.
Now, we're gonna build, like, a toothpick roof,
except it's gonna be with some heavy boards.
We need to keep this mash over 60 degrees.
All this needs to go dormant.
[Craig] Let's see what we can do in the way of putting a tarp.
Put the final insulation on it.
We're gonna lay our tarp across,
and we're gonna put some hay on top of the tarp,
and that should insulate our mash barrels
to the highest point right there.
Just evening up the edges.
Make sure that back there is sealed though.
This is a damn good idea, man. This should work.
It's definitely gonna work.
That's like putting a layer of insulation on your house.
Covering these mash barrels with hay
is like throwing a blanket over the top of 'em.
I want to make sure that every single spot is covered,
that there's no heat leaking out of here.
We want to insulate this thing as good as we possibly can.
-It just look like a bunch of bales of hay. -It does.
Craig and I are just gonna sit back for a few days,
and we're gonna cross our fingers.
Hopefully when we come back this mash will all be worked off,
and we can get straight to running.
♪ Come away this morning ♪
♪ Ain't got time to die ♪
-[banging] -[Beaz] Here, man, let's take this off
and get a whiff of it.
Joe Jackson, Digger, and I have mashed in 550 gallons
of the triple grain legacy liquor.
-[chuckling] I can smell it from over here. -Ooh.
That is definitely worked off.
-Wow. -That is good.
[Beaz] Digger says he's got stuff to take care of,
so, by default, I am the foreman here
-at the still site. -[exhales]
-[Joe laughing] So good. -Can you see my glasses fog up?
-[laughing] Definitely worked off, man. -Wow.
We are ready to run. We're firing this place up.
Let's light up this triple malt, Big Dog.
Legacy lighting.
Got fire, baby, we got fire.
So, normally, I use an all-electric element
on the stills that I work on at home.
You get that side, I'll get this side.
That's completely different than what we're doing here today.
We've got these stills that have gas cores in the middle of 'em,
so there's very little chance of scorching that liquor.
You got this one kept up?
-[Beaz] This is cooking pretty hard, this... -Yeah, we got steam
coming out of the twin.
Let me get this lined up for you here.
[Joe] This is a really big deal for me,
and I feel like getting it right
is gonna be of the utmost importance to not only myself and Beaz
but definitely to Digger.
-Joe Jackson... -Mr. Beaz.
We have the potential to make some huge cash
if we work this thing right.
Now, all we got to do is figure out how we do it...
-...where we sell it. -Well...
Nashville's been good for me, but, man, I just did a sale there,
and I try not to stick 'em real close to back to back, you know?
You know, I should probably take this liquor home,
and by "home" I mean we should sell it in Pittsburgh.
Pittsburgh.
Joe hasn't sold volumes of liquor on his own.
He's a distiller and I'm kind of nervous.
If we can sell this whole lot of moonshine
in one untapped market place,
for a higher dollar than what we were asking for in Nashville,
before Digger gets back...
And we hand him that wad of cash,
how happy do you think he's gonna be?
Yeah, if we don't get caught.
But isn't that the fun part?
Pittsburgh can be our next Nashville.
-Cap the big sloppy? -Yeah, let's do that.
The only downside is the fear and the anxiety that comes with a new market.
[Joe] I hear mine thumping over here.
[Beaz] The twin over there will be online soon.
-He's pretty close. -We're about there.
Thump post heating up, too?
Half way up is all.
-[Joe] Oh, snap! -[Beaz] Yeah!
-Woo! -Oh, let me grab a jar.
Whoa, baby, whoa.
[Beaz] All right, now, we're gonna have to toss that one.
-Go ahead and swap it out. -I'll catch this.
[Beaz] We are full steam ahead. We are running.
This one's gonna be running soon over here, brother.
There we go.
[Beaz] Well, I am pumped up.
-Beaz, you're running over here. -Nice.
[Joe] Big sloppy.
[Beaz] It is absolutely an amazing feat
to have these three stills up.
[Joe] You know, you can mash in perfect,
but you don't know what a liquor taste like
until you get into the hearts of those cuts coming off the still.
[Joe] You smell that malt?
-Yeah, big time. -And there's, like, that chocolate, like, finish?
Hold on, let me taste it.
-Oh, man. -And the rye is on top of that.
Every single time I taste this [chuckling] triple malt legacy liquor,
it's almost like the first time.
I am re-amazed at how good it tastes.
-That was some hard work, but... [chuckles] -60 gallons.
[laughing] I know, man.
I say let's cap these up,
and, Mr. Beaz, are we doing this?
Are we gonna go to Pittsburgh? I'm ready, brother.
-Let's do it, man. -Let's do it.
-Let's do it.
In order to sell this liquor in Pittsburgh,
we're gonna have to demand a higher price
because we're driving across several state lines,
but I'm gonna give it a shot.
I'm gonna trust Joe.
Two, one. [groans]
Well, Jerry, I hope this damn thing's working, man.
I know, man, it's been four or five days.
We need to get this mash and get ready to go.
[Mike] Me and Jerry created a system
to keep our mash warm through the winter
while we're not at the still site.
[Jerry] Well, we know this thing's making, like, 14, 16 volts of power.
-Let's see what we got. -Moment of truth.
-There it is, baby. Woo! -There.
Look at the flame.
[Mike] We can't afford not to keep making liquor all winter long
thanks to Richard and Craig,
so we need to get the ball rolling
to try to catch up,
and put some money in our pocket.
Jerry, I hear water.
Tell you one thing, it sounds good, don't it?
Thank God the wheels are spinning, ain't it?
-Plugging right along. -Let's look at here.
I'd say you couldn't ask for no more than right there.
I wonder just how many gallons of water that thing has dumped
-since we've been gone? -I don't know.
Ooh!
I'm fixin' to check this mash out. [groans softly]
Get off there.
[Jerry] Moment of truth.
[Mike] Wait a minute.
[Jerry] What is it?
That... [sighs]
The gauge is on 50-something damn degrees,
that's what's wrong with it.
-Flat as a floater, man. -Ice friggin' damn cold.
I mean, that's... It shouldn't be that way. It should be over 60.
[spits] Pure friggin' sugar, Jerry.
[sighs in exasperation]
[Jerry] I don't know what the hell's going on here.
It's callin' for it.
[sighs in exasperation]
This whole situation just got me down, man.
Nothing seems to be going right this season
for me and Jerry.
[sighs] I mean, it just seems like we can't catch a break.
Working fine the other day, and it worked fine in the shop.
Give me a second. I'll figure this out.
[Mike] Look, Jerry, man, I'm sorry, dude.
I got to have a break.
I'm done with this for right now.
I'll get back with you later.
[Mike] Jerry can figure this thing out.
If I stay here much longer all it's gonna do is just frustrate me.
-[Josh] You ready? -[Kenny] Yep.
[engine starts]
Cranked the first pull.
We've got a sorghum mash made now.
Just waiting on Henry to come back.
Hopefully, this mash is gonna be ready to go.
Trying to get the old stuff changed and that?
Fired up first pull.
-It did. -It's good.
Yep. I'd say she's ready to go.
-That's good news but I got some bad news. -What?
Had a buddy of mine hit me up a few minutes ago.
He found this picture
that the guy had on social media...
I promise I didn't do nothin'.
Of a still.
And sure enough, it's ours.
[Kenny] Damn, man.
[Henry] My buddy saw it,
and he knows the area that the guy was hunting in,
and he knows that we worked that area, and he just shot it to me.
You know what that means?
-That means we need to go and bust our still site apart. -It ain't gonna be easy.
-It don't matter. -A heavy thing.
1,000 gallon still.
The longer it's sitting there... It's on social media.
Social media travels like wildfire. It's instantaneous.
-We need to go get that out immediately. -Let's get it out of there.
Man, this site here, we worked our butt off
trying to get everything camoed in.
We did everything we could possibly do to keep from getting found.
When you're in Franklin County,
if you run up on a still site
you turn your butt around and you leave.
It had to be somebody from out of town
or some young punk wanting to brag about he saw this still site.
You know what he's doing? He's costing us a pile of money.
Just keep your mouth shut, and you damn sure don't put it on social media.
-There ain't nothing in it is there? -Yeah.
[Kenny] How much is in it, Josh?
15 gallons, probably.
-[Henry] 15 gallons? That's a lot of weight. -[chuckling] Yeah.
The 1,000 gallon pot was a son of a gun to get loaded in the truck,
and that was before we put mash in it.
Oh, my God.
And we had Tickle, Page, Henry, Kenny, and me.
Told you we needed Page.
[Josh] I knew that thing was heavier than I thought it was.
Our only hope is those boards that come along on there.
Hook it to a tree right here and then pull it up the board.
All right, let's give it a shot.
Come on, let's get this unloaded. We got to do that first.
Well, one thing's for sure about me, Henry, and Kenny,
when we're together I don't think there's really too many jobs
that we can't get done.
But this thing is big, it's huge, it's heavy, it's waterlogged.
-Oh, whoa, whoa! -Whoa, whoa!
We're just gonna have to get it done,
and get it the hell out of here.
[Josh] All right, fellas,
you ready to rock?
-[Henry] Right. -[Kenny] Ready when you are.
It's pulling it.
Looking good.
[Kenny] That's good there now.
Come on, a little bit more.
[groans]
Looking good.
Come on, a little bit more.
[Henry] Whoa.
That's all we got.
Told you.
Did I not tell you?
It's got to have three men around.
[Josh] Let's go back and check on that mash.
-Wow, look at this. -Yeah, it opens up like a big Pittsburgh present.
-Dude, how crazy is that? -[laughs]
Digger is out of town, so Joe and I have come to freakin' Pittsburgh.
Look at this city.
We're here to sell 60 gallons of triple malt moonshine.
So, where are we going first?
So, I was nervous about it while we were driving up here,
but I made a few phone calls,
and if we really want to hit the ground running
the first place, in my opinion, we got to take this shine to
is to the barbershop, man.
-To a barbershop? -Yeah.
And the guy, Big Tom, that owns the joint, I mean, he knows everybody.
One of the best cultural hubs in the city of Pittsburgh is the Hill District,
-and that's where his barber shop is. -[Beaz] Okay.
So many famous musicians used to come through
-to the speakeasies here in town... -Okay, got you.
and, like, play jazz music
because there's a huge history of jazz in speakeasies in Pittsburgh.
-So it's like Music Row in Nashville? -Yeah.
-So, we're moving from hoedown to hip hop. -[chuckles]
[narrator] Once known as Little Harlem,
Pittsburgh's Hill District was a hotspot
for speakeasies and a burgeoning jazz scene in the 1920s.
Legends like Earl Hines got a start there,
followed by everyone from Ella Fitzgerald to Miles Davis.
With an estimated 10,000 stills
churning out liquor across the city,
and a large working class population
that liked to drink and listen to live jazz,
illegal clubs flourished across Pittsburgh during prohibition.
A century later,
due to the combination of high liquor taxes and arcane liquor laws,
speakeasies and illegal nightclubs
continue to thrive in Pittsburgh.
And, for those who know where to look,
bootleg liquor from Appalachia can still be found in The City of Bridges.
Where am I going?
-[Joe] Going straight. -Okay.
Having the ability to get our feelers out from the Hill District
is gonna be paramount to our further success in Pittsburgh.
-Joe, what's up? -Doing all right, man, doing all right.
-Good to see you, man. -It's good to see you too, man.
-Good to see you, for real. -Yeah.
-Hey, man, I'm Beaz. -What's up, Beaz?
-Nice to meet ya. -How you doin', man?
Big Tom's Barbershop,
we walk into the place, guy's sitting around getting their haircuts,
talking about their community, talking smack.
Next time I'm in, I'm gonna get my little lines.
-Yeah. [laughs] -All right, I hear you.
I think that Joe was absolutely on point with this suggestion,
so I'm very hopeful.
So, I know we talked on the phone, bro,
and, you know, we brought a sample.
This is a triple malted grain legacy liquor.
Let me take a sip.
[slurps]
[smacks lips] That's pretty good, man.
-It's strong as...[bleep] -[both laugh]
[Tom] That was pretty good.
-Well, it hits you right where it's supposed to hit you. -That's pretty good.
-It's got some horsepower. -I like that.
Nobody up here has tasted anything like it...
-I like that. -...and I think we're gonna be able to sell all of it
up here, hopefully.
I know some people.
My nephew, he got a little speakeasy.
His people would probably
-would want to grab a bunch of that. -That's why I came...
-That's... Yeah. -You leave that with me.
You gonna leave that one with me or something, Joe?
Leave this one with me.
-I'll leave it with you. -I'm gonna let me nephew taste this.
So, I'm gonna leave this sample behind for Big Tom.
Take a shot of that, man.
You got it, brother?
When you drop the water in the bucket at a barbershop,
it spreads.
-Hmm. -[chuckles]
He can put out enough feelers in his circles
to make sure that we can offload all of this shine.
-Big Tom. -All right.
Love you, man. Glad to meet you, my friend.
Good to meet you too, man.
-Glad to have a Pittsburgh buddy. -There you go. [laughs]
[Big Tom] No doubt, man.
Will it be or will it be not?
♪ Da, da, da, da, da ♪
[Josh] Today's really amazing
because we're coming back to check on that mash.
Down in Brazil, I myself made moonshine in less than 24 hours.
We cut the sugarcane, made the mash, made the run,
drank the moonshine in less than 24 hours.
I really got my fingers crossed
that this mash is gonna be done, working off, and ready to go.
This is gonna tell its story.
[Henry] This is gonna tell its story.
[smacks lips] It is better.
-Damn right it's better. Expect anything less? -[chuckles softly]
-[Kenny] She's ready. -[Henry] 16 hours. I can't believe it.
[laughs smugly]
I told you.
Obviously, sorghum and sugarcane
are close enough to each other.
I can't believe it.
And the yeast, it works.
Well, I'll tell you what, South America comes to Virginia.
Gold mine.
[Josh] I just hope it taste good when we round off.
[Henry] I got a small still already set up down at creek.
Let's get this stuff loaded.
Just because this stuff worked off...
Don't mean it's gonna taste good.
We only made a small amount of mash...
Because we didn't know if this was gonna work.
So we're gonna use the small submarine still.
I'm burning up. I got to shed this... [bleep]
It's warm on... [sighs]
Take some beans and put 'em in a thumper.
-Put some in the thumper? -[Josh] Yeah, just to give it that essence...
...you know what I'm saying?
I brought some coffee beans back from Brazil.
Right now, caffeinated alcoholic beverages are a big craze,
and I want to be on the top of that market.
[Kenny] Get your stuff running.
-[Josh] Light it up, Henry. -[Henry] All right.
[Henry] Sorghum, baby.
Tell you what, Josh, that mash was pretty darn warm.
It won't take long for this to boil.
-Sure smells good though. -[Henry] Does smell good, don't it?
[Josh] Henry, what do you think?
Shall we try some of that coffee?
Well, you better throw 'em in there. Give me the hoe.
-Yeah. -Going for a minute,
this is gonna be a ball in a minute.
[Josh] Muy close.
I went all the way to Brazil to get these coffee beans.
These beans here come from Fabiola.
Her, and her husband, and her kids live on this
farm,
and they've had it for, like, hundreds of years.
[Kenny] I hope we don't lose it.
What was it? Like, a pound bag?
I'm gonna run my thumper and my worm and all that crap.
-Oh, give me a break. -I'm serious.
Well, it's gonna smell like coffee
-from now on. -Yeah.
[Kenny] Oh, my goodness.
All right, let's get the cap on there, Ken.
Ooh.
Damn, this thing hot, eh, bro?
Hold up.
We in business.
No, we're not even just yet.
-It's just one burrow, you know? -Ow.
Charge this thumper...
with beans.
You know what? I don't know what my father would think,
and my grandfather.
They probably would disown me.
If you don't get outside the box, Henry,
you'll be stuck in it with everybody else.
I've been stuck in it for 50 years...
-[Josh] Exactly. -...and made a killing.
-That's for sure. -[Josh] Ow!
Damn, that thing is scalding hot.
We gonna be making liquor any second.
-Hell, we already making liquor. -Hot dog!
Man, you can actually smell the coffee aroma.
[Henry] Yeah, if you had donuts to go with it, you'd be set.
[Josh] Ha, no [bleep].
[Henry] Let me get a smell of it now.
It smells good, don't it?
And clear, ain't it?
-[Henry] Not bad. -[Josh] No. Put a little bit in here.
-All right, big dog, what we got? -What you got?
Look at that.
-It's about perfect, is all. -You can't beat that.
The smell. Man, you smell that sorghum in there?
And that stuff was thick as molasses.
[Josh] That's good stuff right there, man.
You can totally taste those sweet notes from the sorghum,
and you could totally pick up on that coffee aroma.
It transfers through from the thump keg
right into the jar.
You know what the best part about all this is,
is that fire made it overnight.
That's gonna be the kicker right there.
That's gonna be the money maker.
'Cause 16 hours, I'd have never believed it.
I tried to tell you, man.
The trip to Brazil was worth its weight in gold.
This is the first time we've ever made this stuff.
You just wait. I'm gonna perfect this.
Mmm.
It burns blue, Ken, see?
If we can keep that yeast alive like you're talking about,
we're talking about the money, man.
We'll be the only moonshiners in America
running off alcohol much faster than anybody else,
and we'll be the only ones
cornering the market like this.
This will revolutionize our business.
See you, big boy.
Hell yeah, that's what I'm talking about.
I love it when a plan comes together.
-[Joe] Pull up to the right. -[Beaz] Yeah.
Big time, he got the word out on the street,
and his buddy Zayn is really interested in buying
the whole load of liquor off of us.
-[Beaz] Here we go. -[Joe] Okay, let's go.
I'm coming around the front. You go around the back.
He's involved in a speakeasy
in and around the Hill District,
so he has the credentials to be a buyer for us
and a supplier to the people.
What's going on, man? How you doing, bro?
-[Zayn] Good to see you. -Yeah, good to see you too, yeah.
I want you to give it a taste,
make sure it's what you all wanted.
[Zayn] Amazing stuff right there.
[Joe] All right, we're gonna need to see the money first.
-Got all $10,000 here. -All right.
-This is my boy Beaz. -[Zayn] Sup, Beaz?
-We're good? -Yeah, we're good.
All right.
We are so excited.
We have a new market on our hands.
We're moving our business forward.
We're gonna go back to Tennessee,
pay Digger his cut,
and tell him that we scored big in Pittsburgh.
Wow.
That's why we came up here.
[Richard] Man, I hope this mash worked off.
-It should be ready now. -It should be.
So, we got 1,000 gallons of mash we got sitting on the farm.
I mean, this is a huge investment,
and it's part of a really, really major plan.
Let me get up there and help you.
All...
Let's just check it. Yeah.
[Craig] You feel that heat?
It's coming back out here hitting us.
Oh, look at that.
-We in business. -She finished.
We in business.
-Is it good? -Hell yeah.
Taste like some fine corn wine?
Hell yeah.
Gonna make some good corn liquor,
premium, for a cheap price.
We gonna get the pump, the empty barrel,
I'm gonna back the trailer in,
and we gonna start pumping this stuff out, man.
[Craig] Come on. Come back. You got it.
All right, hold it right there.
There ain't no way Craig and I are gonna move
these barrels by ourselves.
So we're gonna pump this mash from barrel to barrel
till we get 10 of them on the truck, then we gonna
get the hell out of here and go run the mash.
[Craig] Just wanna drink it all.
Smells so good.
This is the largest scale that me and Richard have ever mashed in,
and it's great.
But now the work is ahead of us.
We have to move all of this to our still site.
This is gonna be the hardest we ever worked.
Capped off number 10.
10 barrels. That's about as good
as it could get for that trailer.
We don't wanna overweight it
and have some real trouble going down the road.
So we're gonna take these 10 barrels
and we're gonna get them into the woods.
[cell phone ringing]
Hey. Well, I got it working. Just a bad fuse.
[Mike] Hey, thanks for taking care of it, Jerry.
Without you, dude, we couldn't have got this thing fixed.
[Jerry on phone] With this system we got in place,
just let it sit up here and do its thing,
you know, heat everything up,
and we'll get back in there, make sure we can run 'em.
Yeah, we'll wait for one of them 60-degree days
to go back in there, by God.
-[on phone] Hell yeah. -[laughs]
Oh, hell. Holy [bleep].
There's Richard and Craig right there, Jerry.
I see their truck.
They got a damn trailer full of mash barrels.
[Beaz] Well, I'm pumped up on this stuff.
And been meaning to ask you, do I get a company vehicle?
You're making a joke, I hope.
Some kind of a truck.
Like, big truck that it's hard to climb up in.
I don't have a company truck.
-No company truck? -No company truck, sorry.
You don't get a W-2 or a 1099 from this job either.
There's no profit sharing.
No 401K.
You gotta do it on your own, like a 401W.
Vacation? Insurance?
The only insurance you're gonna get
is that I'm gonna make sure you got 60 gallons of liquor going down the road.
[both laugh]
Holy [bleep]. There's Richard and Craig
right there, Jerry.
I see their truck.
They got a damn trailer full of mash barrels.
I'm turning my eyes around right now.
[Jerry on phone] Holy... They real plastic barrels?
[Mike] Plastic barrels.
Look like they're full of something.
[Jerry] You can tell they're not even.
No, those sons of bitches ain't even. That trailer's squat.
They flying, dude.
[Jerry] Probably making their own barrels in the woods.
I wanna see.
I'm going to go see where they're taking this crap.
[Jerry] Get into the woods
and see what they're gonna do with it.
I'm gonna follow them and see where the hell they're at.
I'm gonna just stay way behind them
so they don't spot me, you know what I mean?
[Jerry] You gotta stay close enough.
You don't wanna lose them, Mike.
Holy [bleep].
I'm turning down through here and following them right now,
to go up through here.
[Jerry] They got a trailer full of barrels.
Man, they are taking it into the woods on a run.
Let them carry it to the woods. Let them run.
It's the damn middle of hunting season right now,
and just so be it I've got a game camera on me.
I'll follow them.
I'll hook up a game camera.
I'll let the camera catch their asses.
[Jerry] Is that one of them cellular kind that'll ping your phone?
[Mike] Yeah, it'll ping my phone.
[Jerry] Well, that's perfect, man.
Do that. We'll keep an eye on them.
Hopefully we'll keep an eye on
when they're going in, when they're coming out.
[Mike] This is a damn no-outlet road right here, Jerry.
[Jerry] Well, that's even better, man.
There's no outlet.
They gotta come in one way or out one way.
That's exactly right. They on a damn dead-end road.
[Jerry] Just pick a good spot and set your thing up
so we can see them coming in and out,
and, yeah, we'll intercept them from there.
All right. See ya.
[Jerry] See ya.
This road is like a damn pig trail.
If they had to come this way...
This is the only way in here, that's for sure.
You know, I was keeping
Richard and Craig in my sights,
but right now, I don't know which one
of these little turn-offs they've turned up,
which is okay with me
because I know they're in here somewhere
and they gotta come back out the main way.
So I'm gonna set a camera up here
and get the hell out of dodge.
A pretty damn good spot.
I can get way off of this road,
set my camera up.
They will never see it,
and they have to come past it regardless.
Let me see here.
There's the son of a B right there.
You know, I'm sick and damn tired of Richard and Craig
running round Maggie Valley like they own the damn place.
Running liquor, selling to our customers,
taking money off of mine and Jerry's table.
This crap stops tonight.
This game camera is gonna catch video of them
as soon as something flashes by.
I'm gonna be able to know
exactly what time they're leaving
so I can get set up and get on their trail
and follow them where they're going.
That don't catch their ass, nothing will.
They gotta come out of here at some damn point.
And when they do,
put an end to this mess once and for all.
-[car horn honks] -All right.
-I know, I know. -We're here.
There he is! [laughs]
Damn, guys, I thought y'all run off the planet.
-What's going on? -We kinda did.
Waiting on y'all to get back. Where you been?
Mmm, you know...
Well, to answer your questions,
first of all, there's that.
Damn, what you paying with? Fives?
Yeah, we moved some of that legacy liquor.
[Digger] Damn, how much did you sell this liquor for?
We sold it for $160 a gallon.
That's your share.
-$3,000 a cut? -Correct.
-Dr. Greedy. -First trip.
Well, it worked great.
You're liking this side of it, ain't you, brother?
Yes, sir! Those guys ate it up up there,
and they are ready for a second helping.
How far? Let's get busy
-and make a rider truck full. -[laughs]
This triple-grain legacy liquor, I mean,
they've never seen anything like it,
I can promise you, 'cause the state of Tennessee
ain't never seen nothing like it.
And as long as they wanna roll it up there,
I'm willing to roll it out the still.
It's looking more and more to me
like we need to be scaling up.
Getting some totes in there and building some more mash,
-and get to rolling. -Yes, sir.
There's the old cliche that says
a man's worth his weight in gold.
Well, right now, to me,
Joe Jackson's worth his weight in platinum.
Let's go up here and talk about this.
Celebrate a little bit
-over a nice little drink... -Yeah. Yes, sir. Yes, sir.
...and have a little bit of that liquor left over.
I can't wait to find Mark and tell him about this.
He's bound to love the idea of this new market opening up.
[Beaz] Joe, you hit a home run.
It's not a school bus, it's a still bus.
We'll throw these heads out.
I knew it was gonna be a good idea
to have a mobile still site,
because I'm always on the road.
[bleep]
I got blue lights, I got blue lights.
[sirens blaring]
Oh, my God.
[Mike] See what's going on up here.
Holy [bleep].
Son of a bitch is slammed full of liquor, ain't it?
Adios, Richard and Craig.
[man on phone] Is there a way you could double the order?
Double the order?
That's a 20-grand day.
How are we gonna pull that off?
He won't tell me.
-Hey, puss. -Oh, my God.
-Here I am. -That's Mark Ramsey.