"This won't give you a hangover"

Hey Laowinners!

As you all probably know, me and Winston are big fans of the devils drink. While looking through the Conquering Southern and Northern China, episodes I thought back to the many promises made in China for an alcohol to "not give you a hangover", and "you won't get a headache from this". It seems like it's a Chinese tradition to convince your guest that your hometown, or homemade booze won't produce any ill effects. 

This may stem from the fact that China has a huge fake alcohol problem, where many dangerous chemicals are added to cheap forms of alcohol to produce counterfeit spirits, wine, and even beer. 

Or it might stem from the fact that homemade alcohol has produced many cases of the "brown bottle flu" in the past, and the hosts homemade distillation process is different, or cleaner than others.

In our travels to rural Guizhou, along hours of dirt roads, passing donkey pulled carts, and rolling fog, we found an old distillery which produces "baijiu" (traditional Chinese clear spirits) out of corn. We were told that this rancid stuff that was even consumed after the first batch (something you never do when distilling) would not give you a hangover, a headache, or even get you drunk very easily. Now at over 70% ABV, this was definitely not the case. Not only was it probably the worst smelling thing I've ever consumed, but it's effects were pretty clear. Our very gracious hosts said that children as young as 4 years old start drinking it, and the lesions and missing teeth on even the youngest people in the village showed the effects of drinking the stuff on the regular. Awesome experience overall, but yeah... not hangover free for sure.

In the Korean village in the picture, we consumed soybean paste booze, which had all kinds of different health effects. From promoting gut health, to extending your lifespan, this miracle booze was also said to not produce a hangover. Lies. 

While this one tasted much better than the corn baijiu, and after being duped by these claims more than 10 times now, I have learned that all alcohol will give you a hangover, and if someone tells you that it won't, it'll be the worst hangover you've ever had.

What kinds of alcohol give you the least unsavory results?