Post #502467 by Unga Bunga on Tue, Jan 5, 2010 12:49 PM

From Wickpedia:

The real or original okolehao can best be described as tasting like medium bodied neutral rum with a tinge of tequila flavor, and a nose of rum, sake and pineapple. Therefore, it does not resemble any other familiar spirit flavor profile.

Another scource of info:

Ti root drinks have been around for many, many years. It was in the 1780's when Captain Nathaniel Portlock first instructed the locals how to make a mildly intoxicating brew from the roots of these plants. In 1790 it took an escaped Australian convict, William Stevenson, to teach them how to distill a mash of fermented ti roots in the iron 'try-pots' used by whalers to boil blubber. The pots and the beverage took the name okolehao or "Iron bottom." Perhaps from the effects that the beverage produced! King Kalakuau, the Merrie Monarch who was known to occasionally imbibe, once granted a full royal pardon to a man imprisoned for making illegal okolehao. This infamous Hawaiian moonshine even earned a bronze medal at the 1898 Paris World Exposition and in 1915 took 1 st place at a San Francisco spirits competition!

Since the 1970's the now defunct Hawaiian Distillers produced and bottled a product under the same name that was loosely based on the original Hawaiian moonshine (some of which can still be found in certain stores if you look hard enough!) It is rumored that there is someone who wants to produce a commercial 100 percent Hawaiian okolehao using a formula that calls for a mash that is 25 percent ti root, 20 percent rice and 55 percent cane sugar, all grown in Hawaii . It has yet come to market.

[ Edited by: Unga Bunga 2010-01-05 13:42 ]