This article written by Max Watman was originally published on AskMen.

Moonshine ain’t what it used to be.

It used to be illegal, for one thing, and there used to be no confusion about what it was. If you were standing in a field drinking out of a Mason jar or sitting in some illegal nip-joint bar paying a buck a shot for white-hot hooch, you were drinking moonshine.

These days, there’s a whole shelf of products at the liquor store with labels that read “moonshine” and “white whiskey” — and everyone from small-batch hipster distilleries to the big spirit brands is jumping on board.

Segments of the drinks world have sunk themselves into arguments over whether an item produced in a registered still — with a tax stamp — should call itself moonshine. “Moonshine” never implied anything about recipe or style, after all; only that it was illegal booze.

There’s an equally tough argument about whether or not there is even such a thing as “white” whiskey. Part of what defines whiskey as such is that it is stored in wood, which is what gives it that familiar amber hue and a suite of pleasing aromas. Since most white whiskey skips that step, many claim that it shouldn’t be called whiskey. It seems to me that these debates are rather pointless, what with all the bottles that have labels on them already.

“Up until recently,” said Fred Noe, the 7th Generation Master Distiller at Jim Beam, “moonshine and white whiskey had not received much attention in the whiskey world. But lately, as whiskey demand has increased and the folklore of ‘moonshining’ has entered the pop culture, there’s been a huge resurgence in white whiskeys and moonshines.”

It was just shy of a decade ago when a strange little wave of inspiration hit a small group of Americans. Suddenly, there was something about moonshine — the white, strong liquor typically associated with the South and Appalachia — which sure was interesting. Many started distilleries to make moonshine. I started the research that culminated in a book calledChasing the White Dog: An Amateur Outlaw’s Adventures in Moonshine. None of us could have known that we were onto a new segment of a booze industry, a whole new shelf in the liquor stores, rooted in American history, nostalgia — and bringing with it a whiff of outlawdom.

Joe Michalek is the founder of Piedmont Distillers, one of the first to put a bottle on the shelf that called itself moonshine. He was introduced to the stuffwhen he tried it at a party in the mid-aughts, after moving to North Carolina: “I didn’t know what it would do to you. So I let the other people go first, and I watched them. Nobody fell over, so I took a pull.” He liked it.

A few years later, Joe was partnering with NASCAR legend Junior Johnson to produce Midnight Moon, based upon Junior’s own family recipe from back when the money to run NASCAR teams came from bootlegging. I wrote at the time that it was flying off the shelves. In 2007, “flying off the shelves” meant that Piedmont Distillers sold about 15,000 cases a year. By 2013, that number was closer to 320,000 — most of it sold well outside the South. Midnight Moon has also expanded their line to include infusions — the way most illegal moonshine was consumed — and Apple Pie, Strawberry and Blueberry are their most popular flavors.

Success like that is hard to ignore; after all, it’s very rare that a whole new segment of an industry opens up — especially one as old as the trade in spirits. Recently, the major brands have entered the game, as well. Jim Beam saw a space to move in, releasing Jacob’s Ghost White Whiskey last spring.

“We’ve seen a lot of excitement around Jacob’s Ghost among bartenders and mixologists, who are attracted to the versatility and mixability of Jacob’s Ghost,” said Noe. “The product is full of character, but is also extremely approachable for people who don’t typically drink whiskey. That’s why we’re seeing vodka, rum and tequila drinkers enjoying Jacob’s Ghost.”

Jim Beam puts their white whiskey into barrels for a year and then filters it, but putting a little wood into white whiskey can happen closer to the consumer as well. New York’s Tuthilltown Spirits has seen the continued growth of their Hudson New York Corn, in part because they’ve been running a program in many markets where they’ll ship a 3-liter barrel with the purchase of two cases of moonshine. National accounts, such as Lowes and Mortons, have been using the light, sweet spirit in barrel-aged cocktail programs — where the mixed cocktail marries in the wood for a spell right behind the bar.

Many critics of the early white dog, moonshine and white whiskey products called the spirit out as a cynical way that small distilleries find revenue when they really want to sell aged. The growth of the segment, however, indicates that this is something that people want. As Gable Erenzo of Tuthilltown put it, “Consumers seem to love the idea of moonshine.” He explains that the Hudson New York Corn isn’t a stopgap, but rather “a true embodiment of the historic roots of the Tuthilltown Grist Mill, the setting of the distillery, the quality of local heirloom grains, and the craft of our distillers.”

“Additionally,” Gable wrote, “the growing infatuation with everything hillbilly, from NASCAR and its connection to moonshining, to the phenomenon of backwoods reality shows, has highlighted the important role white dog has played in the culture, both historically and now. From the rapid and almost universal shift to country music, to the fame of Moonshiners and Duck Dynasty, people are eager to gulp down the culture, one Mason jar at a time.”