distil
/dɪˈstɪl
/- The mine later built a condensing plant and distilled the water pumped from the shafts.
- If they said distilled water won't boil, they are incorrect.
- Touted by some as water's purest form, distilled water is produced by condensing steam from boiled water back into its liquid state.
Synonyms
- A spirit is distilled from the stalks thus prepared, by first fermenting them with water and either mingling bilberries with them or not.
- Spirit labelled ‘brandy’ must be distilled from wine made from the fermentation of grapes.
- They also introduced tombo beer which is brewed from sorghum, and kashipembes which is distilled from a variety of wild fruits and berries.
Synonyms
- Organic oils are distilled or extracted from plants that are grown without pesticides.
- The hairs were treated in special containers to distill amino acid, the most common substance contained in soybean sauce.
- As the steam condenses, the essential oil is distilled from the water.
Synonyms
- Krill oil, and most fish oil concentrates, are molecularly distilled to remove heavy metals.
- To aid purification, TiO 2 has to be transformed into its corresponding tetrachloride, which is volatile and therefore easier to distil.
- About one third of the smoke constituents, including nicotine, distil out of tobacco in this region.
Synonyms
- The humpback weatherfront now hauls slow tarps of rain across our hills, but what is the pool where praise distils?
- I don't write messy realism; I write philosophically-driven, distilled, and consciously framed fiction.
- The strawberries smothered in zabaglione which I had for dessert are summer itself distilled in a bowl.
Synonyms
- The singing itself distills the essence of American popular music in Charles's patented style.
- Yet how does one distill the Orphic essence from its various and utterly distinctive incarnations?
- By this time, results from years of research and analysis had been distilled.
Derivatives
distillatory
- An aliquot of the ethanol-soluble fraction was used to distill ethanol with a small distillatory apparatus.
- Julian turned to view the progress of the distillatory furnace before he answered her.
- A useful distillatory apparatus has been contrived by Joseph P. Remington for recovering alcohol from weak percolates.
Origin
Late Middle English: from Latin distillare, variant of destillare, from de- 'down, away' + stillare (from stilla 'a drop').
still from Old English:
In the sense ‘not moving’ still is Old English. The kind of still used to make whisky and other spirits is a different word, from distil (Late Middle English), which itself is based on Latin stilla ‘a drop’. The still small voice for a person's conscience, is biblical in origin. The prophet Elijah hid in a cave but was told to come out and hear the word of God. A great wind come first, then an earthquake, and finally a fire: ‘And after the earthquake a fire; but the Lord was not in the fire: and after the fire a still small voice.’ Going back at least to the 15th century is the expression still waters run deep, suggesting that a quiet or placid manner may conceal a passionate or subtle nature. A 1616 version is ‘Where rivers run most stilly, they are the deepest.’