 Two kinds of arrack fromSri Lanka | |
| Type | Alcoholic drink |
|---|---|
| Origin | Indian subcontinent andSoutheast Asia |
| Alcohol by volume | 33–50% |
| Proof (US) | 66–100° |
| Color | Golden brown |
| Ingredients | Fermentedcoconut sugar orsugarcane |
Arrack is adistilledalcoholic drink typically produced inIndia,Sri Lanka andSoutheast Asia, made from thefermented sap of coconut flowers orsugarcane, and also with grain (e.g. red rice) orfruit depending upon the country of origin. It is sometimes spelledarak,[1] or simply referred to as 'rack or 'rak.[2] In many parts of India arrack is colloquially known as "desi daru".
There are two primary styles of arrack that are very different from one another:[3]Batavia arrack is often clear in color but has a flavor profile more similar to dark rum, with a distinctive "funk" or "hogo" imparted to it from fermented red rice. Sri Lankan (Ceylon) arrack, by contrast, is a more refined and subtle spirit. It has hints of cognac and rum character and a wealth of delicate floral notes. Both styles are also made "in house" by local citizenry and can be more akin tomoonshine in their presentation.
Strabo reports Indians made a beverage from rice which is known as arak.[4] Arrack predates all "New World" spirits, as it is a parent tocachaça (which was, in turn, the parent ofrum, rhum agricole, and ron).[3] Genoese merchants made the spirit as a byproduct of their sugar cane production in the Canary Islands. Besides making sugar, they produced arrack instead of importing it for their growing list of customers. Other early arrack was distilled from molasses and water, using dried cakes of red rice and botanicals that contain yeast and other fungi to trigger the fermentation process (this technique can be traced back thousands of years to China and even predates the birth of distillation).[3] It is also claimed to have been distilled in India in 800 BC, but whilepalm wine and fermented sugar-cane drinks were being made around this time period not all believe that formal distillation was taking place.[5]
Outside Asia, the spirit was a common ingredient in the proliferation of Indian alcoholicpunch, and was particularly popular in Holland and Sweden. It was the first distilled spirit consumed in the continental US, in the colonies of New Sweden and New Netherland,[6] but is now mostly confused with the more common and similar spelled anise-flavored spiritarak.
Regardless of the exact origin, arrack has come to symbolize a multitude of largely unrelated, distilled alcohols produced throughoutAsia and the eastern Mediterranean. This is largely due to the proliferation of distillation knowledge throughout the Middle East during the 14th century. Each country named its own alcohol by using variousLatin alphabet forms of the same word which was synonymous with distillation at the time (arak, araka, araki, ariki, arrack, arack, raki, raque, racque, rac, rak).[7] 1864English and Australian Cookery Book described arrack as "a spirituous liquor from the East Indies. This term, or its corruption, rack, is applied to any spirituous liquor in the East. The true arrack is said to be distilled fromtoddy, the fermented juice of the coconut flower. It is however, frequently distilled from rice and sugar, fermented with the cocoa-nut juice."[2]
Arrack was banned in the states ofKerala in 1996,[8] andKarnataka on 1 July 2007.[9][10]
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Within Indonesia itself, the termarak is still widely used to describe arrack. Arak (or rice wine) was a popular alcoholic beverage during the colonial era.[11] It is considered the "rum" of Indonesia because, like rum, it is distilled from sugarcane. It is apot still distillation. To start the fermentation, local fermentedred rice is combined with localyeast to give a uniqueflavor andsmell of the distillate. It is distilled to approx. 70% ABV. Like rum, Batavia-arrack is often a blend of different original parcels.
One of the longest established arrack companies in Indonesia is the Batavia Arak Company (DutchBatavia-Arak Maatschappij), which was already in business by 1872, became a limited liability company in 1901, and was still operating in the early 1950s. The Batavia Arak Company also exported arack to the Netherlands and had an office in Amsterdam. Some of the arrack brand produced by Batavia Arak Company were KWT (produced in the Bandengan (Kampung Baru) area ofold Jakarta) and OGL.[11] Still commonly available in Northern Europe and Southern Asia, Batavia-arrack can be difficult to find in the United States.Batavia-Arrack van Oosten is a more recently available brand.[12]
Batavia-arrack is said to enhance flavor when used as a component in other products, such aspastries (like theFinnishRuneberg torte or theDresdner Stollen), or in theconfectionery and flavor industries. It is used in herbal and bitter liqueurs, and as a component in alcoholic punches (such aspunsch, regent punch,[13] royal punch,[14] and black tea-port milk punch[15]).
Its use in punch was noted by early American bartender Jerry Thomas: "Most of the arrack imported into this country is distilled from rice, and comes from Batavia. It is but little used in America, except to flavor punch; the taste of it is very agreeable in this mixture. Arrack improves very much with age. It is much used in some parts of India, where it is distilled from toddy, the juice of the coconut tree".[16]
In Indonesia, arrack is often created as a form ofmoonshine.
Indonesian arak containing methanol has caused both local and tourist deaths frommethanol toxicity.[17][18][19][20] Arak plays a socially and culturally important role in Balinese society, where it is often diluted with water, shared with friends, or drunk in small quantities during religious ceremonies. However, with the growth of tourism, the need for cheap alcohol, and increases in alcohol import taxes and regulations, arak became the spirit of choice for many mixed drinks in bars. With the growth in arak production and popularity, more deaths from methanol poisoning were reported. Arak is usually sold on the black market, without regulation, where methanol is sometimes added for economic reasons, or out of the assumption that it will be more potent.[21]
AFilipino term for distilled and undistilled alcoholic drinks in general isalak, derived from theArabic wordʿaraq. The termarak, though, is specifically used inIlocano. They can be derived from palm sap (notablycoconut,nipa palm, orkaong palm), sugarcane, or rice. Native alcohol that are traditionally distilled includelambanóg andlaksoy, which are made from the sap of palm flowers. The sap is harvested into bamboo receptacles similar torubber tapping, then cooked or fermented to produce a mildly-alcoholiccoconut toddy calledtubâ. Thetubà, which by itself is also a popular beverage, is further distilled to producelambanóg (orlaksoy, if made from nipa palm sap).[22][23][24]
The Italian explorerAntonio Pigafetta stated that the arrack that he drank inPalawan and nearby islands in 1521 was made from distilled rice wine.[25] However, he was likely referring topangasi, a rice wine which is not distilled.[24]
Sri Lanka is the largest producer of coconut arrack and up until 1992 the government played a significant role in its production.[26][27]
Other than water, the entire manufacturing process revolves around the fermentation and distillation of a single ingredient, the sap of unopened flowers from a coconut palm(Cocos nucifera).[28] Each morning at dawn, men known astoddy tappers move among the tops of coconut trees using connecting ropes not unlike tightropes. A single tree may contribute up to two litres per day.
Due to its concentrated sugar andyeast content, the captured liquid naturally and immediately ferments into a mildly alcoholic drink called "toddy",tuak, or occasionally "palm wine". Within a few hours after collection, the toddy is poured into large wooden vats, called "wash backs", made from the wood ofteak orBerrya cordifolia. The natural fermentation process is allowed to continue in the washbacks until the alcohol content reaches 5-7% and deemed ready for distillation.
Distillation is generally a two-step process involving eitherpot stills,continuous stills, or a combination of both. The first step results in "low wine", a liquid with an alcohol content between 20 and 40%.[29] The second step results in the final distillate with an alcohol content of 60 to 90%. It is generally diluted to between 33% and 50% alcohol by volume (ABV) or 66 to 100proof. The entire distillation process is completed within 24 hours. Various blends of coconut arrack diverge in processing, yet the extracted spirit may also be sold raw, repeatedly distilled or filtered, or transferred back into halmilla vats for maturing up to fifteen years, depending on flavour, colour and fragrance requirements.
Premium blends of arrack add no other ingredients, while the inexpensive and common blends are mixed withneutral spirits before bottling. Most people describe the taste as resembling "...a blend betweenwhiskey andrum", similar, but distinctively different at the same time.
Coconut arrack is traditionally consumed by itself or withginger beer, a popular soda in Sri Lanka. It also may be mixed incocktails as a substitute for the required portions of either rum or whiskey. Arrack is often combined with popular mixers such ascola,soda water, and lime juice.
According to the Alcohol and Drug Information Centre's 2008 report on alcohol in Sri Lanka, the types of arrack are:[30]
Sri Lanka's largest manufacturers, listed in order based on their 2019 annual production of arrack,[30] are:
Ceylon Arrack, a brand of Sri Lankan coconut arrack, was recently launched in the UK in 2010. It is also available in France and Germany.[31] White Lion VSOA entered the American market soon after.[32]
Historically arrack has been a common beverage on the island ofSt Helena, distilled from potatoes.[33] This is likely due to influences of theEast India Company, which controlled St Helena and used it as a halfway point between India and England.[34]
In Sweden and Finland, Batavia-arrack has historically been mixed with other ingredients in order to make Swedishpunsch (now available in prepackaged bottles). The alcohol content is normally not over 25%, although it has a high sugar content of nearly 30%. The original recipe was a mixture of arrack with water, sugar, lemon, and tea and/or spices (chiefly nutmeg).[3] Today punsch is drunk warm (in Sweden) or cold (in Finland) as an accompaniment to yellow split pea soup (in Sweden) or green split pea soup (in Finland), or chilled as an after dinner drink accompanied with coffee (especially duringdinner parties atstudent nations). It is used as a flavouring in several types of pastries and sweets as well. The name arrak is still retained for some pastries, for examplearraksboll, whereas punsch is used for things likepunschrulle. In Finland, arrack (orrum) usually serves as one of the ingredients in the making one of the Finnish traditionalpastries,Runeberg tortes.
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The word derived from theArabic wordarak (عرق,ʿaraq), meaning 'distillate'. In theEastern Mediterranean, the termarak is usually used for liquor distilled fromgrapes and flavored withanise.
The word "arrack" has been considered by some experts to be derived fromareca nut, a palm seed originating inIndia from theareca tree and used as the basis for many varieties of arrack. In 1838, Samuel Morewood's work on the histories of liquors was published. On the topic of arrack, he said:
The word arrack is decided by philologers to be ofIndian origin; and should the conjecture be correct, that it is derived from the areca-nut, or the arrack-tree, asKaempfer calls it, it is clear, that as a spirit was extracted from that fruit, the name was given to all liquors having similar intoxicating effects. The term arrack being common in eastern countries where the arts of civilized life have been so early cultivated, it is more reasonable to suppose that the Tartars received this word through their eastern connections with the Chinese, or other oriental nations, than to attribute it to a derivation foreign to their language, or as a generic term of their own. The great source of all Indian literature, and the parent of almost every oriental dialect, is the Sanskrit, a language of the most venerable and unfathomable antiquity, though now confined to the libraries of the Brahmins, and solely appropriated to religious laws and records. Mr. Halhed, in the preface to his Grammar of the Bengal language, says, that he was astonished to find a strong similitude between the Persian, Arabian, and even the Latin and Greek languages, not merely in technical and metaphorical terms, which the mutation of refined arts or improved manners might have incidentally introduced, but in the very groundwork of language in monosyllables in the names of numbers, and the appellations which would be first employed on the immediate dawn of civilisation. Telinga is a dialect of theSanskrit, in which the wordareca is found, it is used by theBrahmins in writing Sanskrit, and since to the latter all the other tongues of India are more or less indebted, the term areca, or arrack, may be fairly traced through the different languages of the East, so that the general use and application of this word in Asiatic countries cannot appear strange. To these considerations may be added, that in Malabar the tree which yields the material from which this oriental beverage is produced is termedareca, and, among theTungusians,Calmucks,Kirghizes, and other hordes, koumiss, in its ardent state, is known by the general term, "Arrack or Rak." Klaproth says that theOssetians, (anciently Alans,) a Caucasian people, applied the word " Arak" to denote all distilled liquors, a decided confirmation of the foregoing observations and opinions.[35]
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