Well, any commercial moonshine is not moonshine... The stuff in stores is just straight corn whiskey, filtered and repackaged as a gimmick. The reason I suggest it is that, since it is a gimmick, it's generally of lower quality and price than the rather hard-to-find straight white corn whiskey (Good bottles are 25-30 bucks), but either sort is generally very smooth and mild-flavored whiskey, in contrast to the common or homemade varieties which can often be either awful to drink, or completely overwhelm the flavor of whatever herbs are being used (IE: Bourbon).

It's about as comparable to moonshine as LSA is to LSD, but that's the name it's sold under. My point wasn't to recommend one over the other (though I would), but rather to point out that they are very, very different things, and you will definitely not get a nice straight white corn whiskey similar to a commercially available one from a home still without a lot of practice. It's very much its own recipe... and the aging process for those liquors are a unique sort that most folks would not take up the challenge of attempting. Definitely not a weekend-warrior DIY project.

Okay guys ... Thanks for all the information on moonshine, I guess I won't be making my own (yet), but I definitely want to in the future.
@frozenthunderbolt, let us know if you succeeded!

Talking about Thujone:
I have semi-succeeded at making my thujone hash.
I filtered out the ethanol 2 times. AT first time, when I squeezed the remaining ethanol out of the leaves, I noticed that there's still some ethanol in there, so I added some water and squeezed the leaves again. I did that 3 times, until the liqud became really light in color. I was left with 2 liquids.


The first one was really dark, but it was dark green. I'm not sure if you can see that on the image. The second one was of course brighter.

I also filtered the liquids through some paper towels.

I decided to evaporate the water and ethanol from the second liquid. I have succeded and I was left with a little more than 1g of sticky, brown-green-black hash.

Today, I have decided to do the same with the darker liquid. I unfortunately burned the hash, and all that was left was black dust


The hash on the picture is about 1cm long.

Anyway, all I have to do now is smoke it, and report. I'm really not sure about the dose tho ...

I did this too - evapped my forshots pulls (3 of) onto the 1 gm of leaf and dried it on the heat pad with a fan going - ended up sticky - putting it out in the sun and breeze helped with this a bit and it ended up fully dry.
Tried some in a simple lil bong and damn the smoak is harsh (I'm not a regular smoker though . . . )
No immediate and amazing effects - I had found some old Salvia tincture i had made (like a year+) and had about 2T of that + the 10X Wormwood leaf.
I would say i got a definite change of headspace (fairly temporary, and possible that the Wormwood chased out the Salvia effects) some traces of OEV (I get simple CEV *anytime* i close my eyes; always have, so can't measure against that) But nothign dramatic.
Biggest effect was a strong desire to get outside into my garden; i ended up planting over 25 different kinds of seeds over 2 hours - completely absorbed by the task.

If you can stand the bitter taste, i would suggest trying to dissolve the Thujone hash back into pure (clean) ethanol and use it as a tincture rather than making an enhanced leaf for smoking.

That's interesting ...
I'm planning on eperimenting a little more with smoking it. I kinda know the taste already, but I gained no effects yet. How much did you smoke, if you can tell?

Perhaps 1/5 of a gram of enhanced leaf?

Well I tried to smoke an amount closer to yours, but I still got no effects whatsoever, or at least I didn't notice them

Hey Cufko...sorry to bail on the conversation...haven't been online so much recently...

An example of how to prepare a nice thujone-rich beverage would be as such:

A) Few handfuls of Wormwood, Mugwort, and Sage along with some of the traditional Absinthe ingredients (such as Anise, Corriander etc.) to create and infusion.

B) Before cooling completely, strain, add 25% honey..

C) Pour contents into a carboy and add your favorite variety of yeast, (i recommend a champangne yeast)...secure with airlock

D)***very important** once the fermentation is underway add a few more handfuls of the wormwood, sage and mugwort and *allow plants to infuse during the fermentation*....i've said this b4, that i have no idea why, but having the plants infused during fermentation seems to make a *huge* difference in the psychoactive quality of the brew.

E) Allow six weeks fermentation....if mold begins to accumulate on the plant material (and it probably will)..go ahead and rack to a new carboy....once fermentation is complete, bottle and enjoy.

Side notes to this thread@ Quicksilver.... Moonshine properly made with a column still is pretty much pure alcohol and is my favorite in term of effects due to lack of cogeners and other by-products of fermentation...it's also a relatively easy process...this can be watered down or flavored to taste. Old school high-quality whiskey is a totally different art.

Also a quick warning about "following your nose" to harvest wild mint....you may end up havesting pennyroyal...a wonderful healing herb, but with very strong stimulating effects...a strong dose can keep you up all night or abort and unborn child.

Thank you!!
This will probably be the next thing I'll do with thujone.
About wild mint, I asked my mom about that. Turns out, she has some dried leaves at home. I will probably make some tea out of it. Maybe I'll make some out of pennyroyal too, I believe I've seen that herb somewhere in nature.
I will be careful though ...
Thank you again for all the information, hints and warnings

My water kefir grains are finaly showing signs of life, i estimate another week and i will be able to start playing with them to activate things, starting with wormwood

It hasn't been confirmed that thujone is the active in absinthe. There are multiple theories about what produces the lucidity of absinthe. I was under the impression that wormwood adds a bite to the flavor, and adds the green color. Thujone is definitely a neurotoxin - I wouldn't smoke it.

Many people smoked it before, there are some reports about that. If used in small amounts, it can cause some non-deadly effects.