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Though out recorded history there has always been alchohol in of some varity, when you are sitting on a friday nite with your vodka and coke or pernod and lemonade, does it ever cross your how exactly the drink came about.
Below is a history of some of the more popular drinks that are enjoyed today such as vodka, gin, pernod and whiskey.

Pernod
Pernod is an aniseed-based distilled spirit that has been enjoyed in France for nearly 200 years as an aperitif and a zesty cooking ingredient.
During the Babylonian era and Middle Ages, aniseed drinks were known as elixirs with therapeutic qualities to cure stomach and digestive problems. A combination of aniseed and wormwood plant has long been recognized for its healing powers and mood-altering effects.

In the late 1700s, a French physician named Pierra Ordinaire was working on a medicine he called 'Absinthe Elixier" in Switzerland. After he died in 1797, Major Dubied purchased this recipe and set up the first absinthe distillery in Switzerland according to Pernod. In 1805, Major Dubied's son-in-law, Henri-Louis Pernod founded the Pernod-Fils Company and distillery in Pontarlier, France. There, using the same formula of fragrant green anise, fennuel, hyssop, mint, coriander and wormwood, Henri-Louis Pernod created absinthe Pernod. Absinthe took on a new identity as Pernod liqueur started to become more refind.

In 1872, Pernod Pere et Fils Company was created in Avignon. By this time, Pernod was popular during happy hours known as "Green Hour".but the huge popularity of the Green Hour was about to be halted by prohibitionist movement largely led by the local winemakers eager to regain lost sales. A massive press campaign blamed on 'Absinthism' as a cause of socially unacceptable behavior, insanity, tuberculosis and murder. Their effort was successful enough, in 1910, Absinthe production was banned in Switzerland. It became illegal in the United States two years later, followed by France two years after that.
By 1920, anise-based drinks were legalized again allowing Pernod to produce a refined blends of herbs.

How Pernod is made
Fully monitored by modern techology, star anise and fennel are crushed and blended to produce fragrant anehol. And a select combination of mint and coriander are distilled to concentrate their flavors.

The anethol (A substance obtained from the volatile oils of anise, fennel etc) it is then combined with the distilled herbs and purified water. Then sugar and naturally produced neutral alcohol are added to this base. Before bottling, the liquid is stabilized and filtered to eliminate any particles, giving Pernod its brilliance and clarity.

STAR ANISE The distinctive star-shaped spice is characterized by a hot yet sugary taste and pervasive aniseed aroma. Enjoyed by the Chinese for centuries, star anise is burned in pagodas (a religious building of the Far East) for its enticing fragrance and erved at the end of meals for its revitalizing taste.

FENNEL grows wild in the south of France with beautiful yellow flowers and a yellowy-green fruit. A widely-used herb and vegetable, it has a sweet and mellow fragrance and distinctive sugary taste, similar in flavor to a combination of star anise and celery. Fennel is used as an aphrodisiac in the Arab world, where the name and flower are synonymous with strength.

CORIANDER with its distinctive jagged green leaves, tiny white flowers, and yellow, perfumed fruit, has been used as a delicate spice for centuries. The subtly fragrant flavor is widely found in Chinese and Thai dishes, and the spice is believed to hold mysterious powers.

MINT, among the oldest and best known of all the aromatic herbs, is enjoyed for its lingering, cool, fresh taste and aroma. Mint is appreciated for its digestive properties and is reputed to be a symbol of wisdom,
pernod became available worldwide in 1959. Today the drink is distributed in nearly 170 countries worldwide.

Cachaca
Cachaça is made from sugar cane plant like rum. The major difference is that rum is usually made from molasses, (A thick syrup produced in refining raw sugar and ranging from light to dark brown in color) a by-product from refineries that boil the cane juice to extract as much sugar crystals as possible. It is made from fresh sugarcane juice that is fermented and distilled.

History
Cachaça is the national spirit of Brazil and the key ingredient in the caipirinha, a traditional cocktail.

History of Cachaça goes back to 400 years ago when plantation owners began serving the liquid to their slaves after noticing that the drive would increase vigor. Over the years better distilled Cachaças were developed and soon people started to drink it on dinner tables in colonial Brazil. Shortly after slavery was banned in 1888, the monarchy was ousted and progressive leaders decleared Brazil a modern Republic.

By the 1920s, Cachaça had become a symbol of Brazilian identity, produced and consumed throughout the nation by diverse ethic and social groups.
Caipirinhas and other tropical cocktails are usually made with un-aged Cachaça. Until now, the only Cachaça available in the US were some of Brazil's most ordinary.

Beleza Pura Cachaça is Cachaça of a different caliber altogether: made with no additives and using a specialized column-distillation process to remove impurities, it offers Cachaça and Caipirinha lovers the purest spirit available in the US market today.

Aged cachaca

Aged cachaca come in shades ranging from gold to amber and deserve to be sipped, like a fine tequila or single malt Scotch. In Brazil, artesian Cachaça can sell anywhere between $15 to $400 per bottle. Excalibur Enterprise produces handcrafted, artisan Cachaças and they are available in the U.S. market. These Cachaças are wood-aged for 2-16 years, with earthy flavors similar to tequila and aromas of balsam, cinnamon and oak.


Scotch Whisky

The term 'whisky' derives originally from the Gaelic 'uisge beatha,' or 'usquebaugh,' meaning "water of life." Gaelic is the branch of Celtic spoken in the Scottish Highlands. It's believed that whisky was produced in Scotland long before 1400s. Until the 19th century, there was no clear distinction between brewer and distiller in the understanding we have today.

The first evidence of Scotch whisky making is in 1614. The will of John Denoon, merchant of Tain recorded his possession of a spirit stand and give glasses valued at 4 pounds. Some historians may say whisky production arrived in Scotland from Ireland in the 16th century.

The popularity of whisky had increased to the level where the local production in Tain could not keep up with the demand. In 1663 the council had gone so far as to ban the purchase by burgesses of malt used in the production of whiskey.

From the period after 1725, there is an increasing amount of evidence for action against individuals brewing and malting without notice as the authorities attempted to enforce the Malt Tax. In early 1742, eleven individuals in Tain were cited for illegal distilling, having attempted to conceal their stills in garrets, bed-chambers and closets. Later in the same year a further 31 dwellers in the burgh were convicted on the same charge, stills having been found in cellars, lofts, byres and bed-chambers. Despite this action individuals continued to distill illicitly in order to avoid the tax. It was not simply poor burgesses and county-folk who were involved in the law-breaking.

In 1779, Malt tax rates were increased, and again in 1780. In the spring of 1802, it went even higher as the government of the day sought to raise the revenues available in order to finance the wars against Napoleon and his allies. However major commercial distillers had seen a loophole in the act and were importing higher quality English barley to Scotland, malting it but only paying the reduced Scottish rate of duty. At the same time as agitation was growing over the levying of the Malt Tax.
In the early 1900s, Lloyd George failed in discouraging drunkness among munition workers and doubled tax on whisky instead.
During the prohibition in the United States, whisky distillers made deals with bootleggers, over 100 distilleries were back in business by 1920s. However the General Strike of 1926 hit the whisky sales in Britain. After the repeal of Prohibition, distillers still struggled in business due to the high taxation raised by the government for the military funding.
Today there are more than 2,500 Scotch whisky brands sold to more than 200 countries worldwide.

Gin
The first confirmed date for the production of gin is the early 17th century in Holland, although claims have been made that it was produced prior to this in Italy. In Holland it was produced as a medicine and sold in chemist shops to treat stomach complains, gout and gallstones. To make it more palatable, the Dutch started to flavour it with juniper, which has medicinal properties of its own.

British troops fighting in the Low Countries during the Thirty Years' War were given 'Dutch Courage' during the long campaigns in the damp weather through the warming properties of gin. Eventually they started brining it back home with them, where already it was often sold in chemists' shops. Distillation was taking place in a small way in England, but it began on a greater scale, though the quality was often very dubious. The new drink became a firm favourite with the poor.

Members of the formation by King Charles I of the Worshipful Company of Distillers hold the right to distill spirits in London and Westminster. It improved both the quality of gin and its image, it also helped English agriculture by using surplus corn and barley.

When King William III, better known as William of Orange came to the English throne in 1689, he made a series of statues actively encouraging the distillation of English spirits. Anyone could now distill by simply posting a notice in public and just waiting 10 days. Sometimes gin was distributed to workers as part of their wages and soon the volume sold daily exceeded that of beer and ale, which was more expensive.

In 1729 an excise license of £20 was introduced and two shillings per gallon duty was levied. Retailers also required a license. This almost suppressed good gin, but the quantity consumed of bad spirits continued to rise.
In 1730 London had over 7,000 shops that sold only spirits. Abuse of alcohol by the poor became a major problem, which was tackled by introducing The Gin Act at midnight on 29 September 1739, making gin prohibitively expensive. The Prime Minister, Sir Robert Walpole and Dr. Samuel Johnson were among those who opposed the Act since they considered it could not be enforced against the will of the common people. They were right. Riots broke out and the law was widely and openly broken. About this time, 11 million gallons of gin were distilled in London which was over 20 times the 1690 figure and has been estimated to be the equivalent of 14 gallons for each adult male. During 6 years of the Gin Act, only two distillers took out licenses, yet production rose by almost 50%.

The Gin Act was finally repealed (To revoke or rescind) in 1742 and a new policy was introduced with the help of distillers: reasonably high prices, reasonable excise duties and licensed retailers under the supervision of magistrates. In essence this is the situation which exists today. Since then many companies established themselves as well-to-do manufacturers and the gin became the drink of high quality.

Gin has been known as Mother's Milk from the 1820s but later in the century it became known as Mother's Ruin, a description perhaps originating from the earlier Blue Ruin of the prohibition era in the previous century.

Gin triumphed in the 1920s, the first Cocktail Age, after having been scarce during the 1914 - 1918 World War. Gin became the darling of the famous Cunard cruises. During the 90s and 30s the newly popular idea of the cocktail party crossed the Atlantic from the USA to Britain via an American hostess who wanted to fill in for her friends the blank time between teatime and dinner. By 1951 the Bartenders' Guild had registered 7,000 cocktails on its files.

Vodka
Vodka is a drink which originated in Eastern Europe. The name stemming from the Russian word 'voda' meaning water or, as the Poles would say 'woda.' The first documented production of vodka in Russia was the end of the 9th century, but the first known distillery at Khylnovsk was about two hundreds years later as reported in the Vyatka Chronicle of 1174. Poland lays claims to having distilled vodka even earlier in the 8th century, but as this was a distillation of wine it might be more appropriate to consider it a crude brandy. The first identifiable Polish vodkas appeared in the 11th century when they were called 'gorzalka' originally used as medicines.

During the Middle Ages, distilled liquor was used mainly for medicinal purposes, as well as being an ingredient in the production of gunpowder. In the 14th century a British Ambassador to Moscow first described vodka as the Russian national drink and in the mid 16th century it was established as the national drink in Poland and Finland.

In these ancient times Russia produced several kinds of vodka or 'hot wine' as it was then called. There was 'plain wine' (standard), 'good wine' (improved) and 'boyar wine' (high quality). In addition stronger types existed, distilled twice or more.

Since early production methods were crude, vodka often contained impurities, so to mask these the distillers flavoured their spirits with fruit, herbs or spices.

The mid 15th century saw the first appearance of pot distillation in Russia. Prior to that, seasoning, aging and freezing were all used to remove impurities, as was precipitiation using isinglass from the air bladders of sturgeons. Distillation became the first step in producing vodka, with the product being improved by precipitation using isinglass, milk or egg white.

Around this time (1450) vodka started to be produced in large quantities and the first recorded exports of Russian vodka were to Sweden in 1505. Polish 'woda' exports started a century later, from major production centres in Posnan and Krakow.

In 1716, owning distilleries became the exclusive right of the nobility, who were granted further special rights in 1751. In the following 50 or so years there was a proliferation of types of aromatised vodka, but no attempt was made to standardise the basic product.

Types produced included;acorn, anisette, birch, calamus root, calendula, cherry, chicory, dill, ginger hazelnut, horseradish, juniper, lemon, mastic, mint, mountain ash, oak, pepper, peppermint, raspberry, sage, sorrel, wort and water melon.

A typical production process was to distill alcohol twice, dilute it with milk and distill it again, adding water to bring it to the required strength and then flavouring it, prior to a fourth and final distillation. It was not a cheap product and it still had not attained really large-scale production. It did not seek to compete commercially with the major producers in Lithuania, Poland and Prussia.

In the 18th century a professor in St. Petersburg discovered a method of purifying alcohol using charcoal filtration. Felt and river sand had already been used for some time in Russia for filtration.

The spread of awareness of vodka continued throughout the 19th century, helped by the presence in many parts of Europe and Russian soldiers involved in the Napoleonic Wars. Increasing popularity led to escalating demand and to meet this demand, lower grade products were produced based largely on distilled potato mash.

Earlier attempts to control production by reducing the number of distilleries from 5,000 to 2,050 between the years 1860 and 1890 having failed, a law was enacted in 1894 to make the production and distribution of vodka in Russia a state monopoly. This was both for fiscal reasons and to control the epidemic of drunkenness which the availability of the cheap, mass-produced 'vodkas' imported and home-produced, had brought about.

It is only at the end of the 19th century, with all state distilleries adopting a standard production technique and hence a guarantee of quality, that the name vodka was officially and formally recognised.

After the Russian Revolution, the Bolsheviks confiscated all private distilleries in Moscow. As a result, a number of Russian vodka-makers emigrated, taking their skills and recipes with them. One such exile revived his brand in Paris, using the French version of his family name - Smirnoff. Thence, having met a Russian ŽmigrŽ from the USA, they set up the first vodka distillery there in 1934. This was subsequently sold to a US drinks company. From this small start, vodka began in the 1940s to achieve its wide popularity in the Western World.

Following the Russian Revolution in 1917, a number of Russian refugees took their skills and their love of vodka to many parts of the world.

In the 1930s one such exile emigrated from Russia via France to the United States briningg with him the formula to one of the leading Russian makes of vodka. Through his dealings with another Russian emigre the first vodka distillery in the U.S. was set up in the 1930s. Although not particularly successful at first, this enterprise was sold on again to an entrepreneur who eventually made a hit in the 1950s with a vodka-based cocktail - the Moscow Mule.

Vodka did not see a great boom in popularity in the West until the 1960s and 1970s when many more brands were launched in the USA and the UK. The timing coincided with the cultural revolution in these countries - the 'swinging 60s.' With a more affluent younger generation and a generally more relaxed lifestyle and the emphasis on adventure and experimentation - vodka's mixability led to its huge and ever rising popularity. Vodka cocktails are almost as numerous as those of gin and are seen in the same exclusive circles and stylish bars the world over.