London Letter: Home-distilled vodka evokes fond memories

I was in South Africa last month, burying a much-loved aunt, and my two sisters and I had to clear out her house.

There was 95-years-of living gathered there, and it was not a happy task. She had been a wonderfully stoic woman who never complained. In fact, whenever I think of her, the words of naturalist David Attenborough come to mind when he quipped that old age is no game for ninnies.

Anyway, one of the more unusual things we came across was a 50-year-old bottle of vodka. But this was not any old vodka; it was home-distilled by our next-door neighbour in Mozambique.

His name was Leo Kroeger, and to say he was an interesting character is like saying a tsunami is merely a wave. He was half Prussian, half Russian and grew up in Shanghai, so he thought – or so my mother said – like a Chinaman; inscrutable as all hell.

He and his German wife Hannah had been jailed by the Chinese communists after the war. Hannah was breastfeeding at the time, and it was only the toughness and resilience of this remarkable family that they all survived.

Anyway, the Kroegers came to Mozambique in the 1950s as Leo believed that was about as far away from the communists as he could get. The fact that he spent the winter years of his life under Frelimo was an irony that did not escape him, but Leo was someone who was always spiritually free.

When I was about nine, he gave me a pellet gun. It was a Walther and a work of engineering art; almost as powerful as a .22. It is one of my main regrets in life that I later sold it – almost as much as I regret the gratuitous damage I did to the bird population of Mozambique as I wandered in the bush sprawling down the cliffs to the bay in front of our house.

Leo was a top hunter, often stalking the wild koppies of Cahora Bassa. He was also a superb fisherman. We were a family of fisher-people as well, but nowhere approaching Leo’s league. For us fishing was a laid-back outing with beer and cold chicken cuts in a 12m cabin cruiser powered by twin multi-horsepower Johnsons. Leo fished bareboat in a 5m aluminium skiff, and it was no contest. He caught more and bigger fish than us every time.

Then one day my family saved his life when he collapsed from carbon-monoxide poisoning in his gas-heated bathroom. My folks pulled him out with perhaps seconds to spare. Leo told us it was a sacred Chinese belief that if someone saved your life, you would always be in their debt. So every time he brewed a batch of vodka, he gave us a bottle.

At first it was a joke, and the general consensus was that aviation fuel had a better nose. I was too young to drink, but I remember the jokes well. However, in retrospect it was more due to my folks’ philistine appreciation of genuine vodka rather than Leo’s distilling skills. Indeed, Leo was a master moonshiner, although you would not have known that from the crudely-drawn label on his bottles depicting an elephant doing a pooh.

And here I was, 50-years-later, holding a bottle of Leo’s finest. The label was moth-eaten, but you could still see the sketch of the elephant doing his business. I could even make out the words ‘triple distilled’ above the heap of dung.

I am not a spirits drinker. My tipple is a couple of brewskis followed by a robust red. In fact, I have only drunk the occasional vodka drowned with a dollop of coke and ice. But ladies and gentlemen, I can now tell you that triple-distilled elephant fertilizer is man’s best friend.

I killed half a bottle that night – on the rocks. It was a fitting toast to the memory of my aunt, a magnificent old lady – one of the finest – and even better, a toast distilled by a real fisherman.

Cheers Leo.