Craft Spirits September/October 2024 by americancraftspirits

CRAFT SPIRITS

Fusion Glassworks specializes in glass bottle manufacturing and more, MAKING IT A ONE STOP SHOP FOR ALL YOUR PACKAGING NEEDS

• High Quality Custom Glass

• Decoration

• Caps/Corks and Tamper Evidence

• Custom Printed Case Boxes

• Low Mold Costs and MOQ’s

“Fusion Glassworks is unequivocally the best in the glassmaking industry. At Smokeye Hill, we uphold the highest standards of quality in everything we do, from our whiskey to our packaging, and beyond. Fusion not only met but exceeded these rigorous expectations. Time and time again, they continue to deliver exceptional products paired with outstanding customer service. Their reliability, and extensive expertise are indispensable to our success.”

Blake Johns, Founder/CEO of Smokeye Hill Whiskey

AMERICAN OWNED AND OPERATED FOR OVER 20 YEARS

Fusion-glassworks.com

sales@fusion-glassworks.com (855) 503-8746

DISTINGUISH YOUR BRAND. CUSTOMIZE YOUR BOTTLE.

oir

American craft amaro producers embrace a sense of place.

JEFF CIOLETTI

Six blenders share philosophies and insights on the art of blending whiskey.

MEMBER SPOTLIGHTS Getting

Profiles on Glacier Distilling, Clear Creek Distillery and Sagamore Spirit

Spirit of the North Craft spirits producers in Minnesota are pushing boundaries with local ingredients and bold flavors. BY JOHN

HOLL

RETAIL : ON - PREMISE

The Sipping Scene

Exploring the wide world of bars and tasting rooms

Tasting roomS

Crafting a Third Place

The role of tasting rooms in building community BY DEVON TREVATHAN

FOOD

Abbondanza!

Stir things up with martini-pasta pairings BY JEFF CIOLETTI

DISTILLING OPERATIONS 74

Understanding Proofing and Gauging

Navigating U.S. regulations and methods for determining alcoholic strength BY TYLER DERHEIM

TECHNOLOGY & E - COMMERCE

A World of Spirits in Your Hand

How spirits apps are connecting craft distillers with more consumers BY ANDREW KAPLAN

HR 82

Recruit Smarter

Innovative techniques from Paychex for finding your next great hire

Tales of the Cocktail

CRAFT SPIRITS MAGAZINE

CEO, AMERICAN CRAFT SPIRITS ASSOCIATION | Margie A.S. Lehrman, margie@americancraftspirits.org

EDITOR IN CHIEF | Jeff Cioletti, jeff@americancraftspirits.org

SENIOR EDITOR | Jon Page, jon@americancraftspirits.org

ART DIRECTOR | Michelle Villas

MEDIA SALES REPRESENTATIVE | Annette Schnur, sales@americancraftspirits.org

CONTRIBUTORS | Lew Bryson, Tyler Derheim, John Holl, Andrew Kaplan and Devon Trevathan

AMERICAN CRAFT SPIRITS ASSOCIATION

EDUCATION MANAGER | Kirstin Brooks, kirstin@americancraftspirits.org

DIRECTOR OF MARKETING & MEMBERSHIP | Anna Klainbaum, anna@americancraftspirits.org

ADMINISTRATIVE ASSISTANT | Albab Melaku, albab@americancraftspirits.org

DIRECTOR OF MEETINGS & EVENTS | Stephanie Sadri, stephanie@americancraftspirits.org

ACSA ADVISORS

STRATEGIC COMMUNICATIONS | Alexandra S. Clough, GATHER PR LEGAL | Ryan Malkin, Malkin Law, P.A.

PUBLIC POLICY | Jim Hyland, The Pennsylvania Avenue Group STATE POLICY | Michael Walker, The Walker Group, LLC

ACSA BOARD OF DIRECTORS, 2024-2025 PRESIDENT | Kelly Woodcock, Westward Whiskey (OR) VICE PRESIDENT | Amber Pollock, Backwards Distilling Co. (WY) SECRETARY/TREASURER | Jeff Kanof, Copperworks Distilling Co. (WA)

EAST

Jordan Cotton, Cotton & Reed (DC)

Greg Eidam, Sugarlands Distilling Co. (TN)

Becky Harris, Catoctin Creek Distilling Co. (VA)

Adam Polonski, Lost Lantern Whiskey (VT)

Colin Spoelman, Kings County Distillery (NY)

Jaime Windon, Windon Distilling Co. (MD)

EX OFFICIO

Jessica J. Lemmon, Cart/Horse Distilling (PA)

CENTRAL & MOUNTAIN

Tom Bard, The Bard Distillery (KY)

Amber Pollock, Backwards Distilling Co. (WY)

Phil Steger, Brother Justus Whiskey Co. (MN)

Olivia Stewart, Oxbow Rum Distillery (LA)

Mark A. Vierthaler, Whiskey Del Bac (AZ)

Thomas Williams, Delta Dirt Distillery (AR)

ACSA PAST PRESIDENTS

CRAFT SPIRITS MAGAZINE EDITORIAL BOARD

PACIFIC

Lucy Farber, St. George Spirits (CA)

Jeff Kanof, Copperworks Distilling Co. (WA)

Kelly Woodcock, Westward Whiskey (OR)

ACSA PAC

Jordan Cotton, Cotton & Reed (DC)

Lew Bryson, Alexandra S. Clough, Sly Cosmopoulos, Kamilah Mahon, Prof. Dawn Maskell, Adam Polonski and Teri Quimby

For advertising inquiries, please contact sales@americancraftspirits.org For editorial inquiries or to send a news release, contact news@americancraftspirits.org

FALL STEAM AHEAD

Well, that was a blink-and-you’ll-miss-it summer if there ever was one. Blink again and we’ll be knee-deep in holiday cheer and blasting into 2025. So, try not to blink quite yet because there’s a lot coming up this fall that you all need to know about.

On Oct. 1, we’re opening registration for the fifth annual Craft Spirits Packaging Awards. Once again we’ll be celebrating excellence and creativity in the design of craft spirits labels and packaging and offering an early-bird rate to enter sooner rather than later. ACSA members who enter by Oct. 21 will pay only $35 and non-members will pay $50 per single entry. For portfolio entries, the early-bird rates are $90 for members and $135 for non-members. On Oct. 22, the single-entry price goes up to $45 for ACSA members and $60 for non-members, while portfolio entries go up to $105 for members and $145 for non-members. Be sure to take advantage of those early-bird rates and enter for the lowest prices in the history of the Craft Spirits Packaging Awards.

Our independent panel of expert judges will be awarding gold, silver and bronze medals, as well as Best of Category, for brandy, gin, RTD, rum, specialty spirits (which includes things like liqueurs, amari, aquavit, agave spirits, shochu, soju, etc.), vodka and whiskey. And, for the first time, we’ll be accepting entries for best zero-proof spirits packaging to reflect the rapid growth of the alcohol-free segment.

October is also your last chance to book a table to pour your spirits at ACSA’s second annual American Craft Spirits Festival at Binny’s Beverage Depot in Chicago. The event, scheduled for Wednesday, Nov. 13, offers an amazing preholiday opportunity to showcase up to three of your finest craft spirits to both consumers and members of the trade. The cost to secure a table is only $250 for ACSA members and $350 for non-members. Please book your spot at ameri-

cancraftspirits.org/American-craft-spirits-festival no later than Oct. 11. We’ll also be producing our second cocktail book with recipes from distilleries participating in the festival, which all ticket holders will receive with their admission.

If you don’t wish to pour or don’t have a product ready for the event, you can still attend as a member of the public to get a rare opportunity to check out what many of your peers from across the country are up to.

We also have a number of advertising and sponsorship opportunities available for the American Craft Spirits Festival. Advertising space is available in the cocktail book, as are Gold, Silver and Bronze Circle sponsorships for the book. For more details on advertising and sponsorship opportunities for the ACSA Cocktail Book, please contact media sales representative Annette Schnur at sales@americancraftspirits.org to discuss rates.

Whether you plan to book a table to pour your spirits, advertise in/sponsor the cocktail book or attend as a consumer, it’s the perfect way to celebrate our dynamic industry and support ACSA’s efforts to educate and advocate for small craft spirits producers. ■

Jeff Cioletti Editor in Chief

Lew Bryson has been writing about beer and spirits full-time since 1995. He was the managing editor of Whisky Advocate from 1996 through 2015, where he also wrote the American Spirits column, and reviewed whiskeys. He is currently a Senior Drinks Writer for the Daily Beast, and also writes for WhiskeyWash.com, American Whiskey and Bourbon+. He is the author of “Tasting Whiskey” (Storey Publishing, 2014), a broad survey of the whiskeys of the world, their history and manufacture. He has also written four regional brewery guidebooks.

John Holl is a journalist covering the beer industry. He’s the author of several books including “Drink Beer, Think Beer: Getting to the Bottom of Every Pint” and “The American Craft Beer Cookbook.” He is the co-host of the podcast Steal This Beer, and his work has appeared in The New York Times, The Washington Post, Wine Enthusiast and more. John has lectured on the culture and history of beer and judged beer competitions around the world.

Devon Trevathan is a spirits writer and entrepreneur. She has been covering the distilling industry for eight years, with a particular focus on process and the stories of individuals who make up the independent side of the business. She is the co-founder and co-owner of Liba Spirits, a nomadic distilling company, as well as the co-founder, executive blender and executive sales manager of Trovador Inspirado Rum. Though she is based in Nashville, Devon travels as often as she can, distilling in faraway places, speaking on panels, and drinking in the world around her.

Tyler Derheim is FIVE x 5’s in-house consultant and self-described compliance nerd, leveraging his diverse expertise to help distilleries of all sizes make it easier to make great things. Tyler worked at a winery in Europe in the 2010s before returning home to California in 2017. There, he joined a DSP and led formulation, production, compliance, lab services and more through a 50-times volume increase before moving to freelance consulting. Tyler joined Fx5 in 2022.

art director with more than 25 years experience in publication design. After spending her career in New York, where she was the art director for Beverage World, and California, she now calls New Mexico home. She is the creative director on a range of lifestyle publications for The Golden State Company and also serves as the art director for BeachLife magazine.

Kaplan is a freelance writer based in New York City. He was managing editor of Beverage World magazine for 17 years and has worked for a variety of other food and beverage-related publications, and also newspapers. Follow him on Twitter @andrewkap.

Michelle Villas

Andrew

Thank You , Sponsors !

The American Craft Spirits Association would like to thank all of our annual sponsors and our key supporters of education. We are grateful for all of your support throughout the year. Interested in becoming a sponsor? Visit americancraftspirits.org/sponsors or contact membership@americancraftspirits.org.

Cask Strength Sponsors

Single Barrel Sponsors

Kansas City, Missouri-based J. Rieger & Co. launched the new 90-proof Rieger Straight Bourbon Whiskey, representing the next chapter in the J. Rieger & Co. story, and introducing an affordable luxury bourbon from the heart of America to the world. Rieger Straight Bourbon Whiskey is flavorful and complex, sure to impress experienced bourbon drinkers, while bringing new enthusiasts into the fold.

Fort Collins, Colorado-based Old Elk Distillery is proud to announce Cognac Cask Finish Straight Wheat Whiskey. The 95-proof spirit is the distillery’s first straight wheat whiskey finished in French limousine Cognac casks. The Cask Finish Series is based on Old Elk’s core products, including its award-winning HighMalt Bourbon, Straight Rye Whiskey and now Straight Wheat Whiskey, offering creative and innovative flavor profiles for whiskey enthusiasts nationwide.

FEW Spirits of Evanston, Illinois, announced the release of FEW Chicago Smokeworks Whiskey

The release is an homage to the rebirth of FEW’s home city after the Great Chicago Fire of 1871.

The 93-proof whiskey is made from cherrywood smoked malted barley and rye grain for a rich and complex whiskey bursting with flavor.

Widow Jane of Brooklyn, New York announced the release of The Vaults 2024, the latest in the brand’s annual exploration of wood finishes on select barrels from its old and rare whiskey collection.

The 99-proof, 15-year-old blend, which is finished in Amburana wood casks, will hit shelves in October.

Seattle-based Copperworks Distilling Co. is commemorating September’s Craft Malt Month, presented by the Craft Maltsters Guild, with a new single cask release, Single Cask No. 145 and a pledge to donate $10 for every bottle sold to the Craft Maltsters Guild to support its mission to promote and sustain the tradition of craft malting in North America. The spirit is 120.7 proof.

Garrison Brothers Distillery of Hye, Texas, released its 10th anniversary edition of Cowboy Bourbon. Each bottle of the 2024 Cowboy Bourbon is hand-selected by master distiller Donnis Todd and aged for at least eight years. There are 10,000 bottles of the 140.2-proof bourbon. The 2023 release captured Best in Show at ACSA’s American Craft Spirits Competition.

In celebration of 10 years in business, Detroit City Distillery released a 100-proof bourbon from its archives: Ten Year Anniversary Birthday Blend Straight Bourbon

“Over 10 years ago, when we distilled our first batches of bourbon, we knew we had to make something special for everyone who believes in Detroit, that Midwest manufacturing is still the best in the world and that hard work can create great things,” says JP Jerome, master distiller and coowner. “This small batch celebrates our whiskey making journey with a blend of 10 of our favorite bourbon barrels.”

Virginia Distillery Co. of Lovingston, Virginia, debuted The Brewer’s Coalition, a limited-edition series of American single malt whiskies finished in beer casks from preeminent breweries across the United States. The distillery is kicking off this new range of whiskies with Goose Island Bourbon County Stout Cask Finish American Single Malt and Hardywood Gingerbread Stout Cask Finish American Single Malt. Both of the fall releases are 100 proof.

Tamworth, New Hampshire-based Tamworth Distilling announced that its Graverobber Unholy Rye will pivot to a year-round release in a 750-mL bottle. The whiskey is crafted with maple syrup tapped from trees grown amid graves of human remains on Great Hill Farm in New Hampshire. It is then laid to rest for a three years and comes to life at 80 proof.

Los Angeles-based Filmland Spirits announces the world premiere of its latest release— QUADRAFORCE—a 94-proof straight bourbon whiskey, blended from four different bourbons, originally distilled in four separate states, from four different grains—each aged at least four years in charred new American white oak barrels. This single bourbon is available in four different label editions, each featuring one of the QUADRAFORCE heroes and representing one of the four states of distillation.

Hidden Barn Bourbon is releasing Organic Wheated Straight Bourbon. Hidden Barn’s first organic bourbon was aged for six years and bottled at 106.2 proof. It was distilled in Michigan, selected, batched and proofed by master blender Jackie Zykan, and aged and bottled at the now certified organic Neeley Family Distillery in Sparta, Kentucky.

Kirby, Wyoming-based Wyoming Whiskey announced the launch of 98-proof National Parks No. 4 Straight Bourbon Whiskey and 108-proof Old Faithful Straight Bourbon Whisey. The Wyoming Whiskey National Parks No. 4 Straight Bourbon Whiskey – Mammoth Hot Springs, Yellowstone National Park bottle is the fourth collectible, limitededition release in the brand’s annual National Park Series. Old Faithful is a limitededition whiskey that honors Yellowstone National Park, the iconic Old Faithful geyser and legendary photographer F. Jay Haynes with the latest installment in Wyoming Whiskey’s WideOpen Spaces series.

Seattle-based OOLA Distillery is rolling out a special-edition, 94-proof Left Coast Gin in collaboration with muralist Sarah Robbins in select markets. Back in April, master distiller and co-owner Kirby Kallas-Lewis, was inspired to create a gin that spoke to the land that he has called home for the past 20 years. Using a 13-botanical “mother ship” gin as the base, he went on a quest to handforage ingredients (some from his own backyard) to weave a story of what makes the West Coast so incredibly special.

Asheville, North Carolina-based Devil’s Foot Beverage Co. introduced its latest addition to the Zero Proof Series: Paloma Craft Soda. This launch, in collaboration with Hi-Wire Brewing, marks the ninth release in Devil’s Foot’s collection of non-alcoholic drinks, reflecting the company’s commitment to crafting beverages with locally sourced organic ingredients for those seeking alcohol-free options.

Maggie’s Farm Distillery in Pittsburgh’s Strip District and Hidden Harbor tiki bar, located in Squirrel Hill, Pennsylvania, are releasing a limited edition of their collaboration Hidden Harbor rum that’s been aged for over two-and-a-half years in ex-Maggie’s Farm rum casks. Designed by Hidden Harbor primarily for its own behind-the-bar cocktail usage, the underlying rum is composed of 60% Maggie’s Farm white, a rum that’s distilled from the fermentation of raw cane rather than molasses. The spirit is 100 proof.

Culinary icon Rachael Ray has introduced Staple Gin, a new recipe-driven spirit crafted in the heart of New York’s Catskills region by the team at Do Good Spirits Ray conceived of Staple Gin as a botanical ode to New York State. A chance meeting with Do Good Spirits cofounder Brian Facquet turned into a business plan after the two hit it off and bonded over their shared passion for the region’s natural bounty. A portion of the proceeds from sales of the 94-proof gin will go to Third Option Foundation.

Nashville Cocktails

Author: Delia Jo Ramsey

Publisher: Cider Mill Press

Release Date: Sept. 10

These signature drink recipes from Nashville hotspots pay homage to this lively city. With more than 100 recipes and dozens of bartender profiles, you can drink like a local whether you’re just visiting or entertaining at home. From honky-tonks to cozy speakeasies, locals and tourists alike will discover new watering holes that are sure to satisfy all tastes. With the best signature creations by prominent mixologists in the area, this book offers a detailed rundown of the best locations Nashville has to offer.

Shake It Up: Delicious cocktails inspired by the music of Taylor Swift

Publisher: Welbeck

Release Date: Sept. 17

Take a trip into the Taylor-verse with this collection of delicious cocktail recipes inspired by the songs of Taylor Swift. Featuring 65 cocktail recipes alongside top tips and stunning Taylor-inspired illustrations, this is a celebration of pop music’s finest songbook and the perfect collection for the Swiftie in your life. Cocktails include: I Knew You Were Double, We Are Never Getting Back Tequila and many more.

The Cocktail Atlas

Author: Chris Vola

Publisher: Union Square & Co.

Release Date: Oct. 22

This book takes readers around the world, through the lens of a cocktail glass, exploring the links between people, place and taste. Organized by continent, each country covered has a thorough (and often rollicking) description of its customs, indigenous food and drink, topography, distilling traditions and cocktail scene. These are followed by at least one cocktail recipe, which is either an iconic beverage of the land or an original interpretation inspired by local ingredients, as well as nuggets and tidbits of knowledge guaranteed to come in handy at the next pub quiz.

The Finger Lakes Drinking Guide

Author: Michael Turback

Publisher: North Country Books

Release Date: Oct. 15

“The Finger Lakes Drinking Guide” is a comprehensive guidebook to every major winery, brewery, cidery and distillery in New York State’s Finger Lakes region. At the heart of this book are true pioneers—friends and neighbors, many of whom author Michael Turback has come to know during his nearly three decades as a restaurateur in Ithaca, New York. The book features almost 200 establishments, including detailed maps and photos, lively profiles on purveyors, addresses and contract information for each location.

WINEMAKER ACQUIRES MAJORITY STAKE IN DRY FLY DISTILLING

A Napa Valley winemaker who has been collaborating with Dry Fly Distilling for more than a decade has purchased a majority interest in the Spokane, Washington-based distillery. Charlie Wagner and his team from Caymus Vineyards and Wagner Family of Wine bring decades of experience in the wine industry to the craft distillery.

“While my primary focus is making wine, it’s been thrilling over the past decade to work with Dry Fly on one of my favorite projects— creating a wheat-based whiskey aged in our wine barrels that reflects fine craftsmanship and the highest standards of quality and taste,” said Wagner. “Now we are taking our collaboration to the next level. Assuming a bigger stake in the company speaks to my excitement over Dry Fly’s vision, passion and expertise, and its ability to make products that truly stand out in the market. I look forward to working more with the whole Dry Fly team.”

“We started working with the Wagner Family more than a decade ago and have loved growing and nurturing this partnership,” said Dry Fly founder Don Poffenroth. “The Wagner family is one of true honor. We share the same vision and we are thrilled to put Dry Fly and its future growth in their hands. I have no doubt this will be a great partnership. Also, as I approach retirement, I hope it will free me up to do a little more fishing.”

Over the past 10 years, Dry Fly and the Wagners have been working together on various projects. One such project—which

will be released next year—includes a whiskey finished in wine barrels previously used to make Caymus Special Selection Cabernet Sauvignon. Through this work together, these two organizations realized they had a great synergy and wanted to make the relationship official. Charlie Wagner and Mike Carlson, VP and general counsel at Caymus Vineyards, have joined the company’s board of directors.

Along with this new partnership comes other changes at Dry Fly. Patrick Donovan will move into the role of president of the com-

pany. Donovan was Dry Fly’s first employee and has extensive knowledge and deep love of the brands and products. The company also recently conducted a nationwide search for a new national vice president of sales and marketing. After talking to many qualified candidates, they are looking to Donald Kidd to head up their global sales and marketing. Kidd is an industry veteran with 30 years of experience. Most recently, he held the position of VP of sales for Southern Champion/ BuzzBallz.

USBG ANNOUNCES NEW EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR

The United States Bartenders’ Guild (USBG) announces that Robert “Bo” Shuff will become its second-ever executive director.

Shuff joins the USBG after serving close to 25 years in campaign and nonprofit management. His leadership over the past seven years at DC Vote resulted in an increase in national support for equality for the people of Washington, D.C. Shuff served as D.C. Mayor Muriel Bowser’s campaign manager, chief of staff to the Congressional Progressive Caucus Foundation and worked on behalf of the LGBTQIA+ and immigrant communities during his nonprofit tenure.

While advocacy and political strategy have been his most recent occupation, Shuff is a hospitalitarian at heart. Shuff spent a decade in bars and restaurants early in his career,

where he initially learned the art of service, before moving into the campaign realm and he developed the skills to navigate matrixed organizations, and the balance of empowering diverse community groups while keeping overall community goals in mind. His broad experience will serve him well as the USBG’s new executive director and will greatly benefit the USBG as the organization continues its evolution and ongoing commitment to education, advocacy, and membership development.

“Bartending and service are micro-level politics,” he said. “This community means a lot to me personally, and I want the USBG to move the general public’s perception of bartending as a career undertaken by creative people with a high degree of professionalism who are serious about their craft.”

Robert “Bo” Shuff

Michael Carlson, Cheryl Poffenroth, Don Poffenroth, Charlie Wagner, Patrick Donovan and McGraw Donovan

ROAMING ROAD SPIRITS DEBUTS AS INDEPENDENT BOTTLER

Roaming Road Spirits, a purveyor of unique and rare single barrel selections, has launched with its mission of “We Go Where The Spirit Takes Us,” debuting with a carefully curated mix of rums from different corners of the world, with other global spirits category offerings to follow. Founder/curator Mike Gilmore helms this endeavor as he seeks the unusual and exotic hidden in out-of-the-way distilleries and rack houses.

The concept of single-barrel selections is familiar in the spirits industry. However, Roaming Road stands out due to its founder’s focus. Gilmore’s journey in the spirits world began 17 years ago when he acquired a remote Wyoming liquor store. His relentless curiosity and desire to provide his clientele with special bottles led him to the world of singlebarrel selections, with a focus on Kentucky whiskey. One particular selection—a rare and highly sought-after Four Roses barrel—caught the attention of those who appreciate unique expressions, transforming Gilmore’s store, Country Lane Liquor, in Pinedale, Wyoming, into a mecca for single cask enthusiasts.

With the American whiskey market saturated with single barrel selections in recent years, the idea of what Roaming Road would become took root as Gilmore explored alternate categories of rare and exotic spirits, aiming to offer to those tired of the elusive bourbon chase an alluring migration—a voyage across seas and into the oak-rich embraces of single cask spirits from around the world. A knack for developing insider relationships opened doors for him in places far and wide, exposing him to the finest barrel-aged, single-cask rums, Armagnacs, Cognacs, Irish whiskies, and whatever else grabs his trained eye.

“Quality and curation act as my compass as I seek rare and remarkable single-cask spirits,” says Gilmore. “Over the past 16 years, I’ve explored countless distilleries—building relationships, trust and a shared passion along the way. I founded Roaming Road to make sure that these unique finds don’t get lost in a major producer’s blend.”

The initial debut of Roaming Road is bringing to market a truly global roster of the rarest

rums, including expressions from Venezuela, Jamaica, Belize, Guyana, Australia, Barbados and Panama that range in age from eight to 20 years old. Each cask strength offering has a unique story behind its origin, varying in still styles, types of casks and more. These reflect the varied nature of what Gilmore goes after, as his goal is not to highlight every barrel pick out there but to truly identify those of the highest quality that he feels will appeal to those who love what he does.

ARTISTS BEHIND ‘THE BEST MAN’ INTRODUCE SABLE BOURBON

Harold Perrineau, Malcolm D. Lee, Morris Chestnut and Taye Diggs, who joined together for the 1999 film “The Best Man,” are back with a new collaboration that captures the rich taste of brotherhood that the film, and their lasting friendship, so ideally celebrate.

The quartet announced Sable, a bourbon crafted to be enjoyed by those who mean the most. Perrineau, Lee, Chestnut and Diggs knew what they wanted and ultimately achieved it in the barrel, bottle and glass: a beautifully rich bourbon, full with unmistakable notes of brown sugar and dense chocolate. The name ‘Sable,’ meaning ‘black,’ symbolizes the depth, richness and beauty of connection that mark the profoundly lasting bonds that this bourbon was made to embody.

“Creating Sable has been a journey and celebration of our longlasting friendship,” said Diggs. “Each bottle tells a story, and we can’t wait for people to share in those stories as they enjoy our bourbon.”

“We want every sip of Sable to feel like our friendship,” added Perrineau. “We’ve spent 25 years crafting an unbreakable bond, and now, with Sable, we get to share that feeling with others.”

The four artists joined with Bespoken Spirits, a craft whiskey producer, to create Sable. Renowned for its innovative approach to aging and flavor profile creation, and winner of 200 awards within just three years, the Bespoken team worked hands-on with the quartet over the span of years to get the liquid just right.

“Collaborating with Taye, Morris, Malcolm and Harold has been an inspiring journey,” said Scott Savage, CEO of Bespoken Spirits. “Sable Bourbon embodies the essence of their camaraderie, blending our innovative techniques with traditional whiskey-making and the timelessness of their friendship. It’s a distinctive and exceptional bourbon that we cannot wait to share with the world.”

Harold Perrineau, Malcolm D. Lee, Taye Diggs and Morris Chestnut

POP-UP Case

Displays

PACKERS NAME LA CROSSE DISTILLING’S FIELDNOTES THE HOUSE VODKA OF LAMBEAU FIELD

La Crosse Distilling Co. of Green Bay, Wisconsin, is proud to announce that Fieldnotes

make a connection between fans and the products available within the stadium. The decision by the Packers organization to designate Fieldnotes Vodka as the house vodka reflects their ongoing commitment to not only elevate, but also localize the fan experience by connecting fans with Wisconsin-made, and sustainable products.

“People typically associate rail spirits with low-tier liquor because traditionally, bars will designate low-cost spirits to the rail to increase profits,” said Nick Weber, CEO and founder of La Crosse Distilling Co. “But with evolving consumption patterns, we know that people have a preference for craft, and local products. When applying these trends to the Packers gameday experience, we began to think differently about the designation of Fieldnotes Vodka as a rail spirit.”

Weber added, “We have put an emphasis on making our organic products accessible to people. Although Fieldnotes Vodka is a premium handcrafted product, it is produced at a price point that still makes business sense to be placed on the rail. But more importantly, we are happy to make a Wisconsin-made organic product broadly available to fellow Packers fans.”

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“We’re excited to continue and evolve our partnership with La Crosse Distilling Co. as we remain focused on elevating the gameday experience at Lambeau Field,” said Justin Wolf, Packers director of corporate partnerships sales & activations. “Being a local Wisconsin company, La Crosse Distilling Co. has given fans one more reason to cheer and will allow Packers fans to responsibly celebrate the success of the Packers all season long at Lambeau Field and beyond.”

La Crosse Distilling Co. is pleased to embark on their third year in partnership with the Green Bay Packers. The expanded distribution of Fieldnotes Organic Vodka within Lambeau Field and across the state of Wisconsin is part of La Crosse Distilling Co.’s commitment to delivering sustainable and locally-crafted products at an affordable cost while deepening connections with Wisconsin communities and beyond.

NFL STAR JASON KELCE PARTNERS WITH OLE SMOKY DISTILLERY

Ole Smoky Distillery of Gatlinburg, Tennessee, is teaming up with Super Bowl Champion, seven-time Pro Bowl selection and Ole Smoky investor, Jason Kelce for the 2024 “C’mon Raise The Jar” 360 marketing campaign. Kelce joins the team as the “self-appointed team captain” and will spotlight his methods and humorous approach to his new role while showcasing Ole Smoky’s suite of creative and flavorful moonshine products. The focus of the campaign will be on video content filmed at the brand’s distillery in downtown Nashville and will include extensions across the marketing mix including, in-store point-of-sale, social media and print executions.

After officially retiring from the National Football League after 13 seasons with the Philadelphia Eagles, Kelce is returning to the game by appointing himself as Ole Smoky’s team captain. Kelce’s approachable and fun-loving nature paired with his hardworking image as an NFL player, particularly as a center, align well with the authentic, creative branding of Ole Smoky. This campaign partnership creates endless opportunities for flavorful and fun tailgate experiences for sports-lovers across the nation. Through the “C’mon Raise The Jar” campaign, named after a play on the phrase “raise the bar” incorporating Ole Smoky’s iconic mason jar packaging, consumers are encouraged to incorporate Ole Smoky products in their tailgating cocktail recipes while celebrating the return of one of football’s most beloved players.

“After my departure from the NFL, I am grateful to be welcomed with open arms as Ole Smoky’s official team captain for the 2024 football season,” says Kelce. “I look forward to bringing our team to victory, in addition to having some fun and raising awareness of Ole Smoky’s creative and delicious products.”

In celebration of the return of fall and tailgating season, fans can visit one of Ole Smoky’s four distillery locations, participating bars and restaurants across the country or the campaign microsite for an Ole Smoky tailgate cocktail recipe list inspired by Kelce and the tailgate experience. The Tailgate Cocktail recipes include the Apple Ginger Tailgate featuring Ole Smoky Apple Pie Moonshine and ginger ale, Gameday Punch with Ole Smoky Hunch Punch Lightnin’ Moonshine, lemonade, lemon-lime soda, and cranberry juice, Blackberry Kickoff Lemonade with Ole Smoky Blackberry Moonshine mixed with lemonade, Lightnin’ Lemonade featuring Ole Smoky White Lightnin’ Moonshine mixed with lemonade, and more.

GRAIN NEUTRAL SPIRITS

Jason Kelce

HOLIDAY COCKTAIL POP-UP BARS MIRACLE AND SIPPIN’ SANTA

The festive magic of the holiday season is just around the corner, and with it Miracle and Sippin’ Santa holiday pop-up bars excitedly announce their return with festive cocktails in signature holiday glassware, over-the-top decor and enough holiday spirits to melt the heart of even the frostiest Grinch. Ringing in a decade of merriment, this 2024 season is even more special as Miracle celebrates a milestone year since it opened the doors of the first location. Nearly 250 participating Miracle and Sippin’ Santa locations, new and returning, are coming together this holiday season to light up bustling metropolises and cozy towns across the country and around the globe. Doors are set to open from early to mid-November for guests to toast to the holiday season.

In 2014, Miracle began as a spontaneous holiday cocktail pop-up during the construction of founder Greg Boehm’s future bar. It has since evolved into a global sensation, spreading yuletide joy by transforming everyday bars into hubs of holiday happiness. Its sister concept, Sippin’ Santa, was

developed as a tropical twist to the snowy festivities, featuring Santa on surfboards wearing festive leis and drinking out of coconuts. Both Miracle and Sippin’ Santa serve up one-of-a-kind cocktails, found nowhere else around the world, and only during the holidays.

“I am thrilled to welcome back the holiday season with open arms,” said Boehm. “What started as a humble idea to transform an unfinished bar into a holiday pop-up has blossomed beyond my wildest dreams. As we celebrate Miracle’s 10th year, I am proud to stand alongside my peers and welcome our beloved guests once again.”

At the heart of Miracle and Sippin’ Santa are the holiday mug collections that blend tradition with innovation, allowing visitors to take home a tangible piece of holiday spirit. Each year, Miracle and Sippin’ Santa unveil a lineup of beloved holiday mugs, featuring nostalgic designs like Santa’s Head, SanTaRex and the Christmas Carol Barrel. In addition to the treasured classics, this year will feature new limited-edition designs.

SAVERGLASS DEBUTS NEW BOTTLE, ANNOUNCES

Leading premium bottle maker Saverglass proudly announces the addition of the MALTY glass bottle to its spirits portfolio, its further expansion in the North American market via a new warehouse location in Houston, and the appointment of Matt Wilson as senior vice president of Americas.

Designed specifically for whiskey and brown spirits, the new bottle design is set to enhance product presentation while meeting the latest demands of eco-design. Created to address the premium whiskey segment, the MALTY bottle, with its spherical neck shape, is a unique and stylistic glass bottle that lends itself perfectly for the precious nectars within the spirit itself to be selected by consumers, even before the first sip.

“With Malty, our customers’ opportunity for their spirits to be enjoyed for the first time is greatly enhanced,” said Bruno De Botton, head of marketing at Saverglass. “Our commitment to innovation and excellence is reflected in every detail of this bottle, from its elegant silhouette to its versatile color options.”

By adding a new warehouse in Texas,

NEW WAREHOUSE AND APPOINTS SVP

Saverglass aims to better serve wine and spirits brands by providing more accessible purchasing options and reducing shipping costs across the United States.

Wineries and distilleries can now purchase from selected wine and spirit bottles, which will be delivery-ready. Saverglass anticipates expanding the options based on customer demand.

“We are thrilled to announce our new offering in Houston, Texas, marking another significant step in Saverglass’ commitment to enhancing accessibility and reducing logistical barriers for our valued wine and spirits customers across the United States,” said Wilson. “This expansion allows us to offer a select range of our premium glass bottles more conveniently.”

Matt Wilson

TAKE A LOOK AROUND

BY LEW BRYSON

The best way to engage new visitors to your facility is to greet them and make them feel welcome as soon as they come in the door.

Um … hold on, maybe the best way is to show them something really cool, like your three-chamber still, or your grain smoker, or your on-site greenhouse-grown botanicals.

Hey, wait, maybe you need to teach them something about distilling, a basic explanation of what you actually do

Oh, come on, the best way is to let them sample your excellent products in your barroom!

Why not do all of that, and give them a tour?

Tours! Jeez, in five years, have I REALLY not written about this? We’ve talked about merchandise, customer education, and we’ve talked about upping your tasting room cocktail program.

But a good tour program really brings all that together, giving each part context. Merchandise? Someone’s going to want a particular product’s shirt because they tasted it or saw it made. Tasting? “I want to taste that stuff they were making today!” Onsite education? Hear it, see it, smell it and it all makes more sense; I can confirm that after smelling raw barley in the mixed mash at Midleton for the first time.

Think about the normal run of tours. A summer part-time hire either reading a script or riffing ‘That’s corn, that’s grapes, this is where they put the yeast in’, take a look at a couple barrels or a banged-up Carter head, maybe a look in a warehouse or—wow! the bottling line! You’re not helping yourself at all if that’s your tour.

Now, think of the best tours you’ve been on. You might be thinking, ‘Oh, you mean like the special backdoor tours that writers get, we can’t do them for everyone.’ Sure, no distillery has time for that … except Buffalo Trace does. Its ‘hardhat tour’ is famous, and takes over an

hour, and it’s fantastic. You can make your tour that immersive too, if you want to. But you’ll probably want to make it for small groups, by appointment, like Buffalo Trace.

Or step down just a bit. I take ‘regular’ tours too, it’s part of my job to see what the public sees. I’ve been on some great tours, and almost all of them involved a tour guide who did tours as their full job, and was hired because of their abilities and experience with that job. You need a good teacher, or an actor, or a comedian, ideally one who understands the material because they’ve worked the jobs involved for at least a day or two. (And if you’re not big enough for full-time tour guides, I’ll bet there’s already someone on your team who can do a great job: who’s the funny one? The talker? Get them.)

Take a look at your physical layout and think about where you can have a tour come through. Will you only do tours while operations are down for the day, the weekend? Will you have tours that watch operations from behind safety glass? (“Please do not tap the glass, the distillers are subtle and quick to anger.”)

Maybe you have a mock-up of part of your operation; hand-filling a bottle, or a model still with cutaways to show what’s happening? Will you do what a lot of European breweries do and have a multimedia presentation, a theater of distilling with music and motion?

Is there a regional association of distillers, a “tasting trail” of some sort? If there isn’t, think about starting one. If there is, work on coordination, and go take all the tours to share ideas (share, copy, steal, whatever …). Always, always think about what your tour is doing: What’s the point, what’s the reason? Is it education, creating smarter customers? Is it branding, building your identity with customers? Is it recruitment, bringing bored tourists and sampling drinkers into your regular orbit? Or is it straight-up sales,

You need a good teacher, or an actor, or a comedian, ideally one who understands the material because they’ve worked the jobs involved for at least a day or two.

charging for a tour and samples to keep some cash flow going, and hey, that’s not all bad … but maybe multi-task on that one.

Most of all, are you engaging customers with your tour, making their visit welcoming and fun? Or are you going to aim higher and create amateur brand ambassadors, people who will go out and tell friends about the great people down at your distillery, and gosh you ought to go see them and here, have a drink of this marvelous stuff!

If you’re not doing tours, you should be; if you’re not doing the best tours, it’s time to workshop this stuff. Time to show off and take a bow! ■

Bryson has been writing about beer and spirits full-time since 1995. He is the author of “Tasting Whiskey” and “Whiskey Master Class.”

Lew

Todd Leopold of Leopold Bros. gives a tour during ACSA’s 2024 Convention & Expo in Denver.

CRAFT SPIRITS PRODUCERS RETURN TO WASHINGTON AMID

At a time when a number of market headwinds are impacting small distillers’ ability to operate and thrive, more than 40 craft spirits producers from across the country headed to Washington, D.C. in September to advocate for the industry’s top federal legislative and regulatory priorities..

Craft producers met with their U.S. Senators, Representatives and regulators at the American Craft Spirits Association’s 2024 Legislative Fly-In to address a number of issues, including:

• Helping American craft distillers by ensuring regulations are not overly burdensome to small business manufacturers

Maintaining and expanding tax incentives for America’s small craft distillers to remain competitive

Enhancing market access by allowing spirits to be shipped through the U.S. Postal Service in states in which DtC is allowed

Ensuring that the Alcohol and Tobacco Tax and Trade Bureau (TTB) remains open and has adequate funding to provide vital services to craft distillers

• Ensuring that the federal agencies tasked with updating the U.S. Dietary Guidelines have appropriate authority, are transparent and use clear preponderance of current scientific evidence

“We’re beyond pleased with the reception we received from the Congressional offices,” says ACSA CEO Margie A.S. Lehrman. “We remain steadfast in our desire to fight on behalf of American craft spirits. We have lots of things to change and today continues our steps forward.”

Some notable guests were on-hand to greet the group of craft spirits producers before they kicked off their Capitol Hill visits. Among those were Sen. Jon Tester (D-MT); Sen. Jeff Merkley (D-OR); William McBride, senior VP for tax and economic policy at the Tax Foundation; Andrew Desiderio, senior Congressional reporter at Punch Bowl News; and Michelle Korsmo, president and CEO of the National Restaurant Association.

But before that, the group convened at TTB’s offices for a dialogue with the regulatory agency’s top officials on key issues for small spirits producers.

Attendees gathered at Cotton & Reed, a D.C.-based rum distillery, for a Welcome Reception and the following evening many attending distillers poured their spirits for Congressional staffers and elected officials at the Rayburn House Office Building.

Regulatory Relief for Small Business Manufacturers—The SIPS Act

TTB currently lacks the explicit authority to promulgate rules and regulations based on size to help small

INDUSTRY HEADWINDS

businesses. ACSA is urging support for pending regulatory relief for craft distillers—dubbed the SIPS (Supporting Independent Producers of Spirits) Act— which would authorize the TTB to develop rules and regulations based on a distillery’s size. The bill would also provide the opportunity for distillers to change their ownership structures, which would reduce the risks of small producers losing their federal permit and/or paying higher excise taxes. It would also require TTB to develop a single reporting form for craft distillers similar to what is required of small wineries and breweries. Additionally, the bill would finalize new standards of fill for popular RTD distilled spirits formats, including 250mL, as well as create a new 18L container. It also would create a small business advocate within TTB and orders TTB to finalize a new spirits category, “American Single Malt.”

Expanding Tax Incentives for America’s Small Craft Distillers to Remain Competitive

Distillers currently pay $2.70 per proof gallon on the first 100,000 gallons produced in a calendar year, thanks to the passage of the Craft Beverage Modernization and Tax Reform Act at the end of 2020. ACSA is calling for legislators to maintain or expand reduced excise tax rates for craft distillers producing under 100,000 proof gallons, as well as a 20% deduction for pass-through entities—as many craft distilleries are pass-through entities.

Enhancing Market Access by Allowing Spirits to be Shipped Through USPS

Current federal law prohibits spirits, as well as wine and beer, from being shipped through the USPS. Spirits must be shipped by common carriers like

UPS or FedEx, which often don’t provide adequate service to addresses in rural areas. The USPS is required to deliver to all addresses in the country and, with close to 32,000 USPS centers, the Postal Service would be able to greatly ease the burden placed on small businesses. The bipartisan USPS Shipping Equity Act (HR 3721 in the House and S. 5069 in the Senate) would authorize USPS to ship alcohol beverages. It would require beverage alcohol suppliers to register with USPS and direct USPS to establish rules so that people 21 and over and authorized agents can receive shipments. HR 3721 and S. 5069 also would prohibit the resale of alcohol beverages delivered via USPS and require entities utilizing USPS to certify that they are not violating applicable laws. The bill does not pre-empt state shipping laws and does not allow shipping into jurisdictions that do not already legally allow it. Additionally, it provides that the U.S. District Courts have jurisdiction over any claims made by state, local or Tribal governments over violations regarding sale, mailing and transportation of beverage alcohol. Rep. Dan Newhouse introduced HR 3721 in May 2023 and Sen. Merkley and Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand (D-NY) just introduced S. 5069 on Wednesday, Sept. 18.

“All American businesses have for most of their products, the same access to the Postal Service,” Merkley told Legislative Fly-in participants. “That’s not true for spirits and that’s what we’re trying to fix. Here’s a win-win opportunity [to get] more revenue for the Postal Service.”

READ THE FULL REPORT

ACSA Board President Kelly Woodcock (Westward Whiskey), ACSA CEO Margie A.S. Lehrman, U.S. Sen. Jon Tester (D-MT) and Gabe Spencer of Montana’s Whistling Andy Distillery

ROUNDUP: MARKET ACCESS AND DTC IN THE NEWS

In August, ACSA applauded legislation in two states that aims to help modernize the craft spirits marketplace.

On Aug. 20, ACSA joined the New York Distillers Guild in applauding Gov. Kathy Hochul for signing Senate bill 2852-A, which makes New York the latest state to allow certain distilled spirits manufacturers to ship their products via direct-to-consumer (DtC) shipping.

Later that month, ACSA welcomed the final rules to implement Alaska Senate Bill 9, enacted in 2022, to provide additional market access for craft distillers in and out of the state.

“The Alaska rules becoming effective this week along with enactment of New York’s DtC legislation certainly gives the craft distiller community a reason to celebrate and offers a ray of hope in a challenging marketplace,” says ACSA CEO Margie A.S. Lehrman. “And while there is certainly momentum behind this movement, there is still so much work to be done to increase the number of tools that can be used by craft distillers to engage and continue to build relationships with customers. We will continue the fight to modernize the spirits industry in a responsible way.” Much of that work to be done was highlighted in a Food & Wine story titled “U.S. Craft Distilleries Are in Crisis” by Jake Emen., which laid bare significant challenges facing craft spirits producers, including economic and legislative headwinds. While some critics of the story assert that market conditions today are challenging, ACSA argues that with inflation, rising living costs and market uncertainty plaguing the entire landscape, we cannot afford to overlook the need for new tools for craft distillers—particularly those that allow them to sell in the way today’s consumer demands.

CRAFT SPIRITS SALES IN DECLINE FOR FIRST TIME IN RECENT HISTORY

AMERICAN CRAFT SPIRITS FESTIVAL RETURNS TO CHICAGO THIS NOVEMBER

The country’s top craft spirits producers will pour for consumers and select members of the trade during ACSA’s second annual American Craft Spirits Festival at Binny’s Beverage Depot in Chicago ... and you’re invited! ACSA will be hosting the event to get consumers and the trade excited about American craft spirits. Be part of the excitement by signing up for a table, including a recipe in the festival cocktail book or attending as a consumer.

STEPUP FOUNDATION APPLICATIONS TO CLOSE SEPT. 30

The STEPUP Foundation is now accepting applications until Sept. 30 for its 2025 class of interns, mentors and distilleries.

Uniquely created to foster diversity in our industry, STEPUP offers underrepresented individuals hands-on training to learn our trade from scratch.

Distilleries:

• Are you seeking to open new doors of opportunity and innovation for your distillery?

• Do you want to help foster real change—not just check off a box? Do you desire to help advance the careers of underrepresented professionals within the industry?

Host distilleries provide the venue in which to teach. The commitment could be as short as four weeks at zero cost to the distillery. A curriculum is also provided.

Mentors:

Are you a hospitality or spirits industry professional with a knack for listening and lending support?

ACSA and Park Street recently presented highlights from the 2024 Craft Spirits Data Project (CSDP) at the Annual Craft Spirits Economic Briefing. Margie A.S. Lehrman (CEO, ACSA), Kelly Woodcock (president, ACSA and partner, Westward Whiskey) and Emily Pennington (head of content, Park Street) shared key sales data and insights from the 2023 calendar year, while Becky Harris (past president, ACSA and founder, Catoctin Creek Distilling) highlighted the urgent market access improvements needed to provide a lifeline to these distilleries in decline. CSDP, introduced in 2016, is a first-of-its-kind research initiative that seeks to quantify the number, size, and impact of craft spirits producers in the U.S.

• Do you want to share your passion and knowledge of craft spirits with others?

Mentors provide support and guidance and share their passion for the industry with interns. Mentors can operate remotely with a flexible schedule.

Join us in shaping a more inclusive future for our industry by participating in the STEPUP Foundation’s 2025 program.

LEARN MORE ABOUT THE FESTIVAL

Amar-oir

American craft amaro producers embrace a sense of place.

BY JEFF CIOLETTI

Brandon Conley knows how to paint a vivid picture when describing his company’s latest product.

“We’re really inspired by Northern California, and that’s what we put in the bottle,” he says. “We want people to taste the sagebrush, the salinity of the sea when they’re out by the coast, the smell of the wood when they’re walking in the redwoods, the bay leaves, vanilla. Also the fruit orchards here— the apricots we use come from an orchard that’s 45 minutes to an hour away.”

It’s not that uncommon for a spirits producer to wax rhapsodic about “terroir” and “local” and you might be forgiven for thinking that Conley might be describing something within the gin family. But, his résumé reads “director of operations, Brucato Amaro,” whose mission is to infuse the category with nuances that are unique to that West Coast geography. Brucato Chaparral is the sagebrush-y offering, whose dominant ingredients include a native California herb called yerba santa, spearmint and cardamom. Then there’s Orchards, which boasts the aforementioned apricots, as well as walnuts, Meyer lemon, orange and cinnamon, concocted to evoke the Golden State’s abundance of orchards stretching from the Central Valley to the Coastal Range. And Woodlands is Brucato’s ode to the live oak forests that line the California Coast, with elderberry, cocoa nibs, black fig and citrus doing much of the heavy lifting in the recipe.

Capturing a sense of place has played a significant role in many American amaro producers looking to distinguish themselves from the market-dominating European originals, as well as from each other. And that market is growing fairly rapidly. From 2021 through 2023, the amaro segment jumped 143%, according to NIQ.

Flavors from the Pacific Northwest and Beyond

“The more people who are making [amaro] and experimenting, the better,” says Mhairi Voelsgen, founder and CEO of BroVo Spirits in Woodinville, Washington, which has produced 24 different amari since 2012, all in partnership with an array of bartenders from around the country. “A lot of people are exploring the terroirs of different places. The same movement that happened on the food side is really happening in the beverage alcohol world. [Consumers] care about the way things are made, and where they come from—and they’re interested in flavor.”

BroVo now markets three national flagships,

Brandon Conley

each credited to a different bartender: Amaro #1 by John Ueding, Amaro #4 by Patrick Haight and Amaro #14 by Mike Ryan. The company has also developed some regionspecific amari tailored to the tastes of individual cities. Those, too, are developed in partnership with bartenders based in each of those locations. “It’s a nice little expression of an area,” Voelsgen says. “Every city has a style, every area has a style or palate. Four such products are in ongoing production: Amaro Kim in Chicago (with Peter Kim and designed specifically to mix with Japanese whiskies), Amaro Macquarrie in Atlanta (with Miles MacQuarrie), JK Amaro in Boston (with JK Restaurant Group) and Amaro 5 (with Sara Fisher) in Seattle.

That last city is certainly no surprise, as Seattle—and the Pacific Northwest in

general—has become an epicenter of local expression, and that’s no less true for amaro.

Take Seattle’s Fast Penny Spirits, which is betting big on the category with an amaroonly portfolio—Amaricano and Amaricano Bianca, to be precise, using many traditional Italian components with a decidedly American spin. Founder and CEO Jamie Hunt tries to incorporate local and regional terroir as much as possible, even when it drives up the cost of production considerably. “I took the time to go to different amaro distilleries in Italy to learn what they do, to be able to apply that to how we want to produce our amaro and leverage local ingredients where I could and organic and sustainable ingredients elsewhere,” she says.

To offer a true taste of the Pacific Northwest, Amaricano’s recipe includes regional staples

“I compare amaro to single malt whiskey—it’s the same thing made in different locations. The terroir really comes through in single malt whiskey and the terroir comes through with amaro.”

—Steffen Rasile of Gulch Distillers

like Yakima hops and Rainier cherries. Locally foraged truffles add further complexity.

“[The truffles] do increase the cost, but what it does for flavor and body is pretty spectacular, and it really balances [the spirit],” Hunt reveals. “There are different ingredients that will meld flavors together but [truffle] is one that does a great job of that.”

Anyone who’s eaten or prepared a dish with truffles knows that their flavor often can overpower the other elements in the recipe. Fast Penny avoids that and maintains harmony among the other components by dehydrating the truffles, which curtails their more pungent qualities.

“[Dehydrating] can provide more of the chocolatey, fruity notes than the pure funk of a truffle,” she explains. “It leaves out that funk piece, which I love in a fresh truffle, but I don’t think it would work as well in the amaro. Once I let people smell the amaro, they can pick [truffle] out, but if you don’t know it’s there it’s harder because you’re expecting that really funky flavor and that funky smell that just goes away.”

Truffles play particularly well with the Rainier cherries and cocoa nibs, she says, but it took a great deal of experimentation to determine the precise proportions.

“I [created the recipe] tincture by tincture, so I knew how to balance, I knew what was causing my flavors,” she says. “It took me two and a half years to make these recipes, using micropipettes in tinctures.”

There was even a moment she considered removing truffles altogether from the recipe, for efficiency’s sake. “I tried to take it out because of the cost, later in the process,” she says. “But it makes such a huge difference that I kept it in.”

There’s certainly branding value in keeping such a revered culinary ingredient in the spirit, but that’s not Hunt’s motivation. “I’m not doing it for the marketing,” she points out. “If it helps to sell it, great, but I do it because I like what it does to the flavor and the body. It’s my single most expensive ingredient—and I have saffron in there, so that tells you something.”

The saffron brings its own desirable, herbaceous elements—“but in a different way, not a ‘green’ herbaceousness,” Hunt asserts. Italy was once again an inspiration for that spice’s inclusion, as it often appears in many traditional Italian amari. It also has a major influence on the color of the liqueur. And, like many of Amaricano’s other ingredients, Fast Penny sources its saffron from Washington. Beyond the flavoring botanicals, Amaricano

“I

think having the coffee in there lends to the approachability of the amaro. People do know what coffee is so when they try it, even though it’s not Kahlúa—it’s not an overly sweet, coffeesingle-note flavor, it’s coffee with complexity.”

—Jon

O’Connor of Long Road Distillers on Amaro Pazzo

Jamie Hunt

continues to adhere to its regional ethos with a base of distilled West Coast grapes.

Crafting a Montana Fernet

When there’s an iconic—or notorious, depending on whom you ask—brand that sucks up all of the oxygen within a particular segment, it’s often a challenge to establish your own product in that specific space. The amaro subsegment of fernet has gained something of a cult following over the past couple of decades, driven, in part, by hospitality and foodservice professionals’ affinity for it as an after-work drink. And when we say “subsegment,” we’re really talking about one brand: Fernet Branca. But even with that relative behemoth looming over the category, the team at Gulch Distillers in Helena, Montana, saw an opportunity to create their own interpretation of the herbal digestif and educate consumers in the process.

“Fernet Branca is a very polarizing spirit—I think fernet in general is very polarizing,” says Gulch co-founder Steffen Rasile, “We feel lucky having to educate people who have

never had amaro before, to teach them what it is and why it exists. People who are very familiar with it either love it or had a bad experience with it. When they try another fernet, whether it’s ours or another domestic fernet off the shelf, they can see the breadth of the category.”

And there are few that can claim to capture the Northwestern terroir like Gulch’s Burrone Fernet can. The distillery has been growing a fair amount of the spearmint and peppermint that find their way into Burrone, which took Best in Show honors at ACSA’s 2019 Craft Spirits Competition. Some of the chamomile in the fernet’s botanical bill has been sourced locally as well. Additionally, Gulch sources wild ginger from right across the border in Canada’s Prairie provinces.

“I compare amaro to single malt whiskey— it’s the same thing made in different locations,” says Rasile. “The terroir really comes through in single malt whiskey and the terroir comes through with amaro.”

Rasile recalls one of his favorite experiences in promoting the brand.

“I was on a trade mission to Tokyo with the state of Montana,” he remembers. “At a food and beverage show, we were watching Japanese consumers taste fernet for the first time. It was so different from what they were used to and we just watched their expressions as this flavor explosion took over their mouths.”

Caribbean Roots, Wisconsin Craft

When Milwaukee-based bartender Brandon Reyes, research and development manager at Bittercube and part owner of Heirloom Liqueurs, was developing an amaro under the Heirloom label, he had a considerably different climate in mind. He wanted to harness his Caribbean heritage in a tropical-islandinspired spirit.

“When my parents moved from Puerto Rico to Wisconsin, they would make herbal remedies very frequently, specifically something like a tea-based sort of thing, and of course as a kid I was grossed out by it, these bitter and herbal flavors—not the most kid-friendly, I guess” Reyes recalls. “But I had this a-ha moment where I was like, ‘okay,

Capturing a sense of place has played a significant role in many American amaro producers looking to distinguish themselves from the marketdominating European originals, as well as from each other.

that’s what amari are—herbal medicine.’ I started experimenting with this idea of doing a Caribbean-influenced amaro that took cues from flavors that I was familiar with that are native to the Caribbean.”

For starters, the product is called Heirloom Pineapple Amaro, so it’s quite obvious what the signature fruit flavor is there—one that’s not very common in the amaro space. The recipe also includes Jamaican Quassia bark and part of the spirit base is a blend of rums from the region. “We’re using a Jamaican rum to complement it and add some of those funky, ester-y tropical fruit notes that really enhance the pineapple flavor and aroma.”

The recipe combines the Jamaican rums with some from the French West Indies to impart some of the grassy, herbaceous notes that are characteristic of Agricole-style products.

Wollersheim Winery & Distillery in Prairie du Sac, Wisconsin, which produces Heirloom Liqueurs under contract, used its brandymaking expertise to develop a proprietary pineapple distillate that forms part of the base as well.

The pineapple brandy has helped keep costs manageable. Previously, Heirloom incorporated the tropical fruit primarily by proofing the botanical maceration with pineapple juice. But the fresh, bright and juicy character of the fruit would eventually start to disappear.

“As that oxidized over time, we would end up with the final product leaning into a baked pineapple profile, more of a caramelized fruit,” Reyes notes.

Macerating fresh pineapple and redistilling it would preserve some of the fresher components, but that proved unsustainable as the type of pineapple Heirloom was using— the Caribbean Queen Victoria variety—is relatively rare and expensive.

“But doing the brandy really, really drives [the flavor] to another level,” Reyes raves.

Although Heirloom Pineapple Amaro primarily showcases tropical components, it doesn’t neglect its Upper Midwestern home base—most notably with the inclusion of Wisconsin ginseng.

Overall, the amaro exhibits aromas of cinnamon, caramel, vanilla and cherry cola and a woodsy, earthy finish.

A Bold Blend of Coffee and Amaro

While we’re in the Midwest, many outside the region may not be aware that Grand Rapids, Michigan, has quite a robust coffee scene. So it wouldn’t be too much of a surprise when a nearby distillery releases a coffee liqueur. But Long Road Distillers took the concept a bit further when it created Amaro Pazzo in partnership with local roaster Madcap Coffee Co. In addition to Madcap’s specially selected beans, the botanical bill features wormwood, gentian, chicory, orange peel, myrrh and other herbs, roots and spices familiar to anyone who has sipped their way through the amaro category.

“My friends own the coffee roaster and I feel that we share a lot of brand values, with our [focus on] sourcing and ingredients and trying to be ethical in our business practices,” says Long Road owner and cofounder Jon O’Connor. “We did this as a way to try something cool together. Both brands recognized that coffee and spirit paired well together and we were both fans of amaro. We thought about the flavors that go into producing amaro and they also pair well with coffee.”

The coffee imparts some of the expected bitterness, but it also delivers some fruity notes as a counterpoint.

“The flavor of how the beans are treated and how they’re roasted really impacts what notes you get from the coffee,” O’Connor says. “They use this Ethiopian wash coffee, which is very bright and citrus-forward. They’re very intentional about their roast, they don’t really do dark roast. They do a lot of light-roasted stuff because they want the essence of the bean to come out. So we got the idea, ‘let’s use coffee as the base of our amaro, rather than trying to add a coffee flavor back in.’”

As for the amaro botanicals, Long Road employs a fairly traditional and straightforward maceration process. The distillery proofs the spirit down with an additional concentration of coffee, before it dilutes the product with water.

“I think having the coffee in there lends to the approachability of the amaro,” O’Connor suggests. “People do know what coffee is so when they try it, even though it’s not Kahlúa— it’s not an overly sweet, coffee-single-note flavor, it’s coffee with complexity.”

In addition to Pazzo, Long Road makes Amaro Red, more in the vein of the category’s classic products. Amaro Red was born as much a necessity as it was a creative endeavor, since Michigan is one of those states that requires any distillery that operates a cocktail bar to only sell what’s produced in house. “So, that’s sort of forced our hand in a lot of capacities,” O’Connor admits. “We’ve prided ourselves on being the best cocktail bar in town since we opened nine years ago, but we’ve also had to learn how to make things on our own.”

That means there’s really no avoiding a certain scarlet-hued bitter liqueur that rhymes with “amari.”

“As you go down the cocktail rabbit hole, you know that a red amaro of some variety—whether it’s Aperol or Campari—is such a critical component in a lot of classic cocktails, as well as being really versatile in creating some of your own unique cocktails,” O’Connor explains.

He notes that Amaro Red occupies a sweet spot between Aperol and Campari, where it’s quite citrus-forward, but not as bitter as the latter. It’s designed to work in a Spritz, but also has enough backbone to shine in a drink within the Negroni family.

The amari are also becoming key elements within Long Road’s RTD line. Early this year, the distillery launched Nitro Espresso Martini, combining Amaro Pazzo and Madcap coffee with the distillery’s vodka in 6.8-ounce cans. The company also is poised to unveil Red Amaro Spritz, its riff on the aperitif that Aperol made famous, in 12-ounce cans.

Leaning into Canadian Roots

Aperol and the Campari Group’s namesake spirit might be the two biggest household names in the Italian drinks conglomerate’s portfolio, but a certain artichoke liqueur that it makes is an icon in its own right, especially among bar industry pros. It was Cynar—or, more broadly amaro’s carciofo subsegment— that partially inspired Festif Choux, one of the two products in Los Angeles-based Festif Society’s portfolio. But instead of artichokes, the signature vegetable in Festif Choux is the Brussels sprout, incorporated in both raw and dehydrated forms.

And even though it’s produced in the City

of Angels (under contract with local vodka maker Loft & Bear), the terroir that founder and longtime bartender David Bly wanted to showcase was more northeastern Canadian than Southern Californian. Bly, who’s lived in the States for about two decades, originally hails from Montreal and has been intent on using as many ingredients from Quebec and surrounding provinces as possible. Brussels sprouts, or choux de Bruxelles in French, are quite popular there. In addition to those little cabbages, Choux’s recipe includes balsam fir and spruce tips from northern Quebec, as well as white cedar from northern Ontario. Its base spirit is distilled from Canadian winter wheat. Marketed as a Canadian fernet, Choux also includes components common in traditional fernets, like rhubarb root and mint.

“Choux is very much a work in progress,” says Bly. “Right now, Choux’s predominantly from Canada, but I still want to swap out the [ingredients] that aren’t from there to come from Canadian farms.”

In Choux’s early development days, some Canadian colleagues whose feedback Bly respects expressed hesitation around his highlighting the brand’s Canadian-ness. They worried that it might have too much of a “cutesy” feel. “I think this stems from a prevailing Canadian identity of an underdog that I felt deeply growing up, that although we love and are immensely proud of what we do and who we are, American audiences don’t always adopt what’s popular in Canada,” he says. “And there’s this notion that, because we’re direct neighbors with a major global force, everything in Canada has to somehow ‘make it’ across the border in order to be deemed successful.”

He’s glad, however, that he stuck to his guns and leaned into its Canadian roots. “Since launching Festif and sharing the spirits with American consumers,” he says, “ my instinct about including the Canadian history has been validated.”

Savoring the Future of Amaro

Bly’s instinct to create an amaro with savoryforward ingredients also seems to be paying dividends, as that is among the flavor experiences that are trending and is likely to play a prominent role in the category’s future.

“You’re certainly starting to see [savory] more in cocktail bars,” says Brucato Amaro’s Conley. “You’re seeing saline solutions being added to products, you’re seeing a lot of olive—martinis are really having a moment.

… With cocktails dominated by sweet and sour ingredients and spirit-forward

ingredients, people are just looking for something different.”

Conley hinted that an upcoming Brucato release will play in that space. “It’s more on the savory side, that’s all I’ll say about that,” Conley offers. “It’s sort of Cynar-inspired, in that world.”

Bly also points to the increasing prevalence of mushrooms in cocktails, not unlike Fast Penny’s work with truffles. An earlier iteration of Festif included chaga mushrooms, but the U.S. Alcohol and Tobacco Tax and Trade Bureau rejected the recipe on the grounds that they’d never been used in an alcohol beverage before.

Bly hopes to soon be dipping deeper into the savory world as he plans to develop an

amaro with a flavor profile based on the sandwiches at Montreal’s famous Schwartz’s Deli, incorporating items like fennel and the flavor elements of smoked meats.

As out-there as something like that may sound, it’s that sort of experimental spirit that is likely to put amari on more mainstream consumers’ radar. Sometimes the Wild Westy-ness of it all is the most hospitable environment for innovation.

“It’s really cool to see that a lot of distilleries have really taken on amaro and done their own unique twists on things, coming up with their own styles and flavors,” notes Long Road’s O’Connor. “It’s a growing category that might not be the biggest category, but as a spirit and cocktail nerd, it’s really fun.” ■

Masters of the Blend

Six blenders share philosophies and insights on the art of blending whiskey.

Blending whiskey is often viewed as a mysterious, almost magical craft. Or, at least, a delicate balance of art, science and personal taste. But behind every complex and beloved blend lies a series of careful decisions, learned lessons and, occasionally, happy accidents. In the following pages, we aim to demystify the process of whiskey blending via Q&As with blenders from six craft spirits companies (five distilleries plus Lost Lantern, an independent bottling company). These artisans share their personal philosophies, challenges and successes. From the intricate steps of creating a signature flavor profile to the twists that occur during aging, these conversations offer an inside look at what it truly takes to create a memorable whiskey blend.—Jon Page

Cedar Ridge Distillery | Swisher, Iowa

Murphy Quint | Master Distiller & Director of Operations

When did you first start blending whiskey and what were some of the biggest lessons you learned early on?

Murphy Quint: I’ve been working in this industry since 2005 but didn’t start blending whiskey until 2017. Looking back on it, even though I’m proud of many of my early blends, I realize how much I didn’t know back then. Hopefully, 10 years from now I’ll say the same thing about my current blends.

What is your philosophy when it comes to the art of blending whiskey? And, generally speaking, what does the process look like at Cedar Ridge when you blend whiskey? When I’m creating a blend, I begin the process with a very narrow target that I’m trying to hit. I’ll aim for a flavor profile that is so specific that I can almost taste it in my head. However, once I get going, that very narrow target often evolves into a broader direction that I’m trying to head in. This way I go into it with a very specific vision, but I’m willing to adjust my vision if an unexpected opportunity presents itself. I do all of the blending myself. As I’ve climbed the ladder throughout my career, it seems like every year I get a little further removed from the actual production process, and more involved with overseeing and managing it all. As a business person, this is great because it means I’m growing and our company is growing. As a whiskey enthusiast, it can be very difficult. Like a lot of people in this industry, I got into this business because I like making whiskey. The blending is where I draw the line and will continue to be hands on myself.

Are there any specific techniques or tools you use during the blending process? When it comes to tools, I’m kind of a minimalist. I don’t have a blending lab or use much equipment. Give me a whiskey thief, a couple of Erlenmeyer flasks, a pen and paper. I like to start the process by seeking inspiration. For this part of the process, I’ll go into our rickhouses, pull a bunch of samples, and slowly taste through them. While I’m tasting them, I’m jotting notes. Then I’ll start blending the samples together. I’ll eventually taste one of these “micro blends” that gives me some sort of inspiration, or it creates some sort of spark inside me. And then I’ll sit down

and put pen to paper to build a concept. This is how I establish my initial vision.

Once I have my vision—the flavor profile that I’m trying to hit—I’ll pull barrels and start adding them to the blending vat one at a time. My goal in the beginning is to build a solid base. The “base” represents about 80% of the whiskey in the blend. It needs to be balanced, complex and delicious. I’m basically building a safe foundation to work off of. Once I have achieved that, the remaining 20% is all about modifying the base. This is where I pull the flavor profile of the blend in a certain direction. I want it to remain balanced, but I also want it to stand out and be different from what’s already on the market.

How much consideration do you give to proofing when considering a blend? I’ll break from the norm here. I give very little consideration to proofing when I’m blending. Most of the blends I create are released at natural cask strength, which eliminates a lot of this concern. However, even when I am blending whiskey that will eventually get proofed down, my goal is still to create the best product I can at natural cask strength. I’m mainly focusing on creating a balanced whiskey. While water addition will absolutely modify the flavor profile, it will very rarely throw it off balance.

What are the biggest challenges you face when blending whiskey? Do you ever have any happy accidents?

The biggest challenge in blending whiskey is the two-week period after blending the whiskeys together. The more experience you have, the better you can predict how this part of the process will go. But you can never be certain that it will work out. Once you blend the whiskeys together, for the first couple of weeks it can taste very muddled and awkward. About two weeks later it settles down into its new flavor profile. It’s almost like a newly married couple—it takes a while to figure out how you’re going to operate together rather than independently.

I’ve had blends that initially tasted amazing but eventually took a weird turn during this part of the process. I’ve also had it happen in the opposite direction.

Please take us through the process of blending for a specific recent or upcoming release.

My most recent blend, and probably one that I’m proudest of, is The Untitled Cigar Malt Project. It’s a blend of American single malt finished in first-fill Amontillado sherry, American-style Madeira, virgin French oak, American Oak char No. 3, and peated malt finished in ruby port casks. My goal was to build a single malt that provides an experience similar to smoking a cigar: bold, smokey and sophisticated, with a finish that lasts forever long. The hard part was accomplishing this while maintaining balance, which I’d argue is the most crucial element of creating a successful blend.

I spent several months working on this blend. I’d modify it, let it rest, and then modify it again. To be completely transparent, there were times along the way when I absolutely hated this whiskey. On multiple occasions I considered giving up on it and starting over. But I powered through it and eventually found the path to the final destination. And I’m glad that I stayed the course because now it’s a whiskey that I’m extremely proud of.

What’s your biggest piece of advice about blending whiskey?

Constantly experiment. The only way to learn how to blend good whiskey is to start by blending bad whiskey. Start small. Pour yourself a dram of whiskey, and simply add one drop of another whiskey to it. Make note of how it impacts the flavor profile. Then do it again.

“The biggest challenge in blending whiskey is the twoweek period after blending the whiskeys together. The more experience you have, the better you can predict how this part of the process will go.”

—Murphy

Quint

Milam & Greene Whiskey | Blanco, Texas

Heather Greene | Master Blender and CEO

When did you first start blending whiskey and what were some of the biggest lessons you learned early on?

Heather Greene: Expertise in blending comes after years of understanding what, and how, to make a fabulous cask of whiskey in the first place. This includes extrapolating how a whiskey cask will age five years down the road. In fact, I have been involved with the full lifecycle of thousands of casks of whiskey aging in different climates, inside various barrel sizes, with mash bills, and coming off of various types of stills to make exciting products. Blending, then, starts with the first step: Caring for individual casks. And before that, I tasted, wrote about, studied, collected and judged some of the best whiskeys in the world so that I could really intimately know what makes a great product. Blending is icing on the cake. I didn’t call myself a blender until after 15 years of working in the business, and I believe I only truly earned the title of “Master Blender” in the past year after almost 20 in the whiskey industry. I’m very strict on myself and even stricter with how that title is used. “Master” is thrown a bit carelessly around these days if I’m being honest.

What is your philosophy when it comes to the art of blending whiskey? And, generally speaking, what does the process look like at Milam & Greene when you blend whiskey? Begin with the end in mind, and that “end” is the consumer. After that, go out and make something great that will please their palate, and yours too. But as I mentioned, it must begin with great aged casks. A good blender knows how to fill, age, and harvest them. A master blender knows how to work with a team to build a whiskey architecture and lay down some killer whiskey with them. At Milam & Greene, we already know what’s going into bottles in 2035, and our team is actively making them and caring for them. We have control of the whole process, right from the whiskey barrel’s first day. That’s the true magic, whether we distill in Hill Country or in Kentucky. It’s making it “ours” from the beginning as much as possible. Once we have all those beautiful whiskeys, we can get into the aspects of blending them for nuance. When we source an already-made product

to blend, it is to give depth that only a very old tannic whiskey can add to a profile. This is the case with our Triple Cask Bourbon. Currently, there is a good amount of 15-yearold whiskey in each bottle. I also work with outside rye makers, but we’re on top of how climate affects those port barrels in Texas to create something unique.

Are there any specific techniques or tools you use during the blending process?

The team, our noses and a few simple measuring devices. It’s organic, collaborative, human and old-fashioned.

How do you ensure consistency across different batches of blended whiskey? Consistency comes from experience, knowing how to age and procure filled casks from before the blending process starts. If you age and take care of your whiskey barrels over time, consistency happens. Inconsistencies creep up along the way, not in the final blending process—at least it shouldn’t.

How much consideration do you give to proofing when considering a blend?

We give a ton of thought into proofing, and we do it blindly for our products. Proofing doesn’t “weaken” a whiskey, it changes the chemical dance and what you perceive in your glass. It’s so important.

What are the biggest challenges you face when blending whiskey? Do you ever have any happy accidents?

Our biggest challenge today is wrangling with the Hill Country climate and how to use the climate to create fascinating, tasty whiskey. It’s our secret weapon! We found that within Texas, Hill Country specifically can make incredible bourbon. So, we asked many questions around that: What char level and what entry proof works best in our warehouses? What size barrel works? Should we sometimes move our barrels from Kentucky or Tennessee to our home? Should we distill some in Kentucky and age in Hill Country? What mash bill will enrich this blend eventually? What yeast will yield a specific profile that is uniquely ours? These are the challenges, and things we have discussed for many years

before a Milam & Greene Whiskey bottle even hits the shelves.

Please take us through the process of blending for a specific recent or upcoming release.

Our limited-edition, Unabridged Whiskey Volume 3 is our latest release. It’s our only cask-strength whiskey and is a blend of straight bourbon whiskeys chosen from casks aged across our warehouses. This was the biggest team effort we’ve had to date. In fact, the Milam & Greene whiskey team in Blanco, headed by Rikk Munroe, blended this batch after tasting different casks samples. The “draft” was sent to me while I was on the road with an exciting message, “This is our favorite Unabridged release yet!” And indeed, it is truly incredible. I had no changes to it. It’s rich, high-proof and luxurious. We all wanted something high-proof, yet drinkable—and the team nailed it. The Unabridged sold out at the Kentucky Bourbon Festival in two days.

What’s your biggest piece of advice about blending whiskey?

Focus on crafting exceptional barrels from the start! Imagine yourself as the gardener tending to a rose garden. Plant quality seeds, nurture them with water, prune as needed, provide sunlight, and show them love. Observe them closely and learn from their growth. The beautiful bouquet you will eventually create will not only reflect the quality of care you’ve invested over time, but also the creativity that shines through in the arrangement you make of them.

“Begin with the end in mind, and that “end” is the consumer. After that, go out and make something great that will please their palate, and yours too.”

—Heather Greene

Triple Eight Distillery | Nantucket, Massachusetts

Randy Hudson | Co-founder and Head Blender

When did you first start blending whisky and what were some of the biggest lessons you learned early on?

Randy Hudson: I first started blending whisky around 2010 or 2011, I think. John Ramsay, the retired master blender from Glenrothes, Macallan and The Famous Grouse, came to Nantucket to help us understand better how to assess our barrel inventory and shape blends from it. He came to work with my partner, Dean [Long], but I ended up glued to his side much of his visit.

What is your philosophy when it comes to the art of blending whisky? And, generally speaking, what does the process look like at Triple Eight when you blend whisky?

I am usually working in my own bubble for a while getting to know the barrels, getting a sense of their potential and listening to them as far as where the proposed blend should go—usually! Sometimes though I have a particular vision and work towards that. Once I begin honing in on a range of targeted tastes, I might put together several iterations of the blend. To the previous question, I try not to make assumptions about how any one barrel will affect the blend and end up making many variations with different barrels to get a good sense of how each can affect the final product.

Then I can bring in Bryan [Jennings], Dean, and others to get a bit of feedback on where it’s going.

Philosophically, I am approaching blending as if working on a painting. We mix various colors on the palette in order to have an array of effects to work with. Bryan might employ different yeasts, a variety of complimentary grains mixed in with the usual Maris Otter, and use our two different stills to make different new-make styles. We then enter into differing barrel styles using both old and brand new barrels.

Are there any specific techniques or tools you use during the blending process?

The most important tool is a healthy supply of good glasses! The Stortz & Son bung extractor is key, as well.

How do you ensure consistency across different batches of blended whisky?

We utilize on some level a “sistema de madré” that is an old winemaking technique. When I put a blend together it is usually much bigger than we can bottle (or need to bottle with such slow sales...) so a portion of the tank will get re-entered into either a few of the dumped barrels or some different barrels. That can then be incorporated in future blends to help with consistency but is not something I rely heavily upon. We simply want to be consistently good—differences will happen with an agricultural product from year to year!

How much consideration do you give to proofing when considering a blend?

Proof is obviously important for stability and we are starting to pay a little more attention to proof of the final blend, though there is still a lot more we can do to shape the whiskies with bottling proof! I tend to enjoy a whisky that isn’t too easily cozied up to—a bit higher proof can force people to be cautious and conscientious about drinking a dram. But if you mean the proof-down rate, I imagine you won’t find a distillery that moves that needle slower than we do! Proof-down regimen can be as long as a year or more.

What are the biggest challenges you face when blending whisky? Do you ever have any happy accidents?

Sometimes finding the mental fortitude to have a leap of faith and take some wild swings at a blend can be a challenge. It requires getting out of your own way, to not adhere strictly to one’s biases, and taking the time to explore alternatives. And, yes, we have been fortuitously surprised by some results!

Please take us through the process of blending for a specific recent or upcoming release.

For an upcoming 25th anniversary blend, I wanted to utilize whisky from every year of production from 2000-2020. That’s a lot of barrels to take samples from! So I targeted styles (new barrels, used bourbon, STR wine, peated malts) and tried to get a cross-section of them to assess for the blend. I also wanted to use a barrel or two of Chevalier malt so I

sampled barrels from a range of ages to taste and integrate. This was a particularly complex blend, I must admit. Literally hundreds of barrels were eligible for consideration, but it had to be simplified, so this example is an alternative to what I said earlier was an imperative to my blending routine—I had to bracket the styles and get a representative sample from each and choose a few for final consideration. Fun and exhausting! For this blend, the integration of peated notes was what most of my focus was on; how much impact did the peat make on the final whisky, what particular peated malts (we use Simpsons, Crisp and some Hugh Baird peated malts) played best with the overall blend … and to be quite honest, the whisky you tasted in the barn will probably be tweaked just a bit further later this year. I have several barrels that I plan to do bench trials with to get my final taste just right!

What’s your biggest piece of advice about blending whisky?

Be patient, be thorough and be a bit bold, but always let the whisky have the final say in a blend. I have had unsatisfactory experiences working with others who tried to find compromise in the final whisky. I can’t do that again.

“Be patient, be thorough and be a bit bold, but always let the whisky have the final say in a blend.”

—Randy Hudson

Virginia Distillery Co. | Lovingston, Virginia

Amanda Beckwith | Lead Blender & Education Manager

When did you first start blending whisky and what were some of the biggest lessons you learned early on?

Amanda Beckwith: I lucked out by building a foundation in sensory analysis a good few years before I began blending. In 2015 I took my WSET, which gave me an initial framework for grading spirits and then I followed it up with a personalized nosing for faults course with my mentor, Nancy Fraley. My sense of curiosity drove me to go down all sorts of rabbit holes to better understand the why behind specific aromas and flavors, so I spent the next half decade reading and researching into the chemistry behind specific compounds. Knowing the why behind the what has been one of the biggest gifts (and neverending lessons) in my career.

What is your philosophy when it comes to the art of blending whisky? And, generally speaking, what does the process look like at Virginia Distillery Co. when you blend whisky?

The two wings of my personal blending philosophy are consistency and quality. I also believe in maintaining the core DNA of a distillery’s whisky. For me, this means making sure that a balance is struck between the distillate and the oak influence. I don’t believe in cutting corners, and this often means taking a great deal of time to dial in on the final version of a blend. I’ve created a sensory panel where I will share my final rounds of a new product to guarantee that I’m creating a whisky that will speak to a range of palates beyond my own. While different whiskies will showcase different flavors and even drinking experiences, I believe there should always be a consistent through-line that makes sense and tells the right story for the style of whisky being made.

Are there any specific techniques or tools you use during the blending process? Over the past near decade of maturing here in Virginia, I’ve had to develop several techniques that embrace our increasingly dynamic climate. I initially expected our ABV to increase alongside our angel’s share, but found the opposite to be true for the majority of our casks, thanks to the humid conditions in our metal-clad and dunnage

style warehouses. That discovery drove me to experiment and collect data from higher entry proofs. Learning to adapt and embrace the climate led to an exciting partnership with Barrel Sense. We’d been using sensors to track things like temperature, humidity and air pressure since the early days of our distillery, but when Barrel Sense approached us to partner up for a pioneering foray into more in-depth data collection, we jumped at the opportunity. Today, I routinely review data on all casks and areas within the warehouses, allowing me to be far more predictive on how casks will perform than ever before.

How do you ensure consistency across different batches of blended whisky?

Back in 2021, I had a long-held blender’s dream come true with the addition of our vatting house. Before then, I’d routinely take over as many as six of our washbacks (fermentation tanks) to use as reduction and blending tanks for the whiskies. I was inspired by sherry’s solera system and wanted to create a system of blending and final product holding tanks. I always hold a portion of a blend back from bottling to match and blend into my next round in order to maintain consistency.

How much consideration do you give to proofing when considering a blend?

Thanks to Nancy Fraley and my time studying French blending techniques, slow water reduction has become a key part of blending for me. At Virginia Distillery Co. we often talk about reductions as “landing the plane” and I’ve been known to take in excess of a year to blend and slowly reduce a batch of whisky down to bottling strength.

What are the biggest challenges you face when blending whisky? Do you ever have any happy accidents?

Time is typically my biggest challenge, although blending space, and the neverending game of whisky musical chairs is often a hurdle as well. Unexpected deadlines have occasionally led to creative innovations and there have been some surprising results from experimenting with cask movements to replicate seasonality and dry vs. humid warehousing.

Please take us through the process of blending for a specific recent or upcoming release.

A recent project in our VDC line that I’ve been working on is a toasted oak finished single malt we’ve named Blue Ridge. The inspiration rose from my desire to showcase Virginia Oak and to work alongside a phenomenal nearby cooperage that really understood quality and was willing to work with my desire to experiment. I began with a small scale experiment focused around different toast levels and from there it became a time game, waiting through the seasons to see how the whisky and the barrels would integrate. I had ideas of where the flavor profile would go, and a target for when the whisky would be ready, but for the first stages of this product it was really about data collection. I ultimately decided that the best foundation for this release would be to begin with whisky that had already matured for four to six years in ex-bourbon casks. This delivered an already-developed spirit with the soft vanillins, citrus and orchard fruit notes I wanted and then allowed me to bring in the additional lactones and spice character that I wanted.

What’s your biggest piece of advice about blending whisky?

Stay adaptable and never stop learning. The tools at your command, timing and even the components available may change, so staying curious and always building your repertoire of techniques will be key for problem solving and continuous improvement in your blends. I’m a voracious reader, but I also love taking inspiration from the blending traditions of non-whisky spirits. The world of spirits is a rich one and the merging of historical techniques and modern innovations is there for all of us to tap into.

“Today, I routinely review data on all casks and areas within the warehouses, allowing me to be far more predictive on how casks will perform than ever before.”

—Amanda Beckwith

Westward Whiskey | Portland, Oregon

Miles Munroe | Master Blender

When did you first start blending whiskey and what were some of the biggest lessons you learned early on?

Miles Munroe: At Westward, we started blending in 2015, after years of releasing the whiskey as single barrels because of inventory. We’ve always made the single malt ourselves and matured in ASBs (American standard barrels), so it took time before we had enough stock to begin blending casks. I created the flavor profile and blending practices for our lineup so there was a lot to figure out; it also left plenty of room for experimentation so there weren’t too many limitations. The biggest lesson I took away from that was trusting my palate and my instincts. A blender really needs to have confidence in their approach and about their own ideas around flavor creation.

What is your philosophy when it comes to the art of blending whiskey? And, generally speaking, what does the process look like at Westward when you blend whiskey? I look at blending whiskey like I would with writing a song. There’s an overall theme (tonic) but you’ve got multiple components that add distinct points and others that are there for support that will give subtle, refined aspects. And even others that may go unnoticed but are essential to the overall feel which lead you to an end result; I think “implied harmony” is an incredible effect in music and whiskey as well. We have a blending team that collaborates on the blend and have set ideas about where we take the flavor to a certain point, but after that we let flavor guide us. In that way we keep Westward expressions very dynamic and even slowly evolving.

Are there any specific techniques or tools you use during the blending process? Definitely, I’m an indefatigable champion of the blender’s pyramid. It’s something I first came across when studying scent building and saw that perfumers use this method for structuring blends. It’s broken down into three elements— base notes, heart notes and top notes. At the base you should have long lasting notes, flavors that are anchoring and present at various levels throughout the blend. Top notes are accents, first impressions. These can be pretty exotic if you want but they should also lead into the rest of the story. And heart notes are

the substance, the essence of the blend. This helps bind everything together while showcasing your core intention with the release. And also, music. If you’re not listening to music while you’re blending, you might be doing it wrong. I create playlists specifically for blending and we have favorite artists at Westward we think are conducive to the process.

How do you ensure consistency across different batches of blended whiskey? There are flavor profiles I’ve designed for our core range that have the general elements broken down into percentages, which leads to individual sensory for many casks so we can find the right ones we need. We taste every single cask that goes into every bottling of Westward every single time. I’m working on a blend for whiskey that won’t be released for a couple years because we take our time to build them out. Once we have a blend that we’re all happy with, we taste it against past releases of that expression to get a sense of where we’ve landed. Sometimes we go back to blending if it doesn’t pass QC/QA but other times we send it along for bottling because we love how it’s showing even if it isn’t dead on.

How much consideration do you give to proofing when considering a blend?

ABV is almost an entire other ingredient when it comes to spirits, or a seasoning like salt. It can give structure but stay out of the way at low levels, enhance flavors and character at higher levels and then completely overwhelm everything if it’s overdone. It’s important to consider what casks the whiskey has been in and what they’re adding in terms of sweetness, astringency, mouthfeel, etc. I blend our Rum Cask at 50% rather than our common 45% because the added alcohol balances out the tropical sweetness withdrawn from the used rum barrels so the single malt isn’t cloying. I’m making a cider cask finish for the Australian market and have landed at 52% after trying the blend at 12 different ABV [levels], because that’s where it expresses exactly what I want in the glass.

What are the biggest challenges you face when blending whiskey? Do you ever have any happy accidents?

Blending can seem esoteric at times, but nothing can replace constant tasting

exercises and sensory training. No one is a born blender and we all have preferences, blind spots and different sensitivities. For me it’s been building a set of flavor profiles for new whiskies in an entirely new whiskey category which means no references. As for happy accidents, someone accidentally mixed freshly distilled Aviation Gin with a few barrels of mature whiskey that were blended in a tank over eight years ago. Not really a blending table mistake but we’re all happy with how it’s been developing. Stay tuned.

Please take us through the process of blending for a specific recent or upcoming release.

We’ve just recently released a Bottled-in-Bond through our whiskey club and it’s fantastic. It’s a term that has certain rules to abide by when putting the casks together. Typically, blending involves different ages of whiskey to add depth, complexity and a range of characters. Bottledin-bond whiskey presents a challenge because it all must come from the same season and highlights the talents of that blender. I chose casks from March of 2017 so they were also from sequential distillation batches. The casks themselves were made with three-year aged wood, with No. 3 char staves and medium toast heads so it’s an incredibly approachable single malt that gives a nod to American whiskey heritage.

What’s your biggest piece of advice about blending whiskey?

Stay creative. It’s totally understandable that folks can get rigid and dogmatic in their approach to blending because it’s so important to consistency. But blending is also where the science of distilling transfigures into the art of flavor combination and that should remain personal. Listen to your intuition, learn from others and share ideas. And really, do not leave out music. Ask me to share an excellent country playlist called Murder Ballads for Blending if you see me.

“If you’re not listening to music while you’re blending, you might be doing it wrong.”

—Miles Munroe

Lost Lantern Whiskey |

Vergennes, Vermont

Nora Ganley-Roper | Co-founder and General Manager

When did you first start blending whiskey and what were some of the biggest lessons you learned early on?

Nora Ganley-Roper: My co-founder Adam Polonski and I both have professionally trained whiskey palates (Adam from his time at Whisky Advocate, me from working for Astor Wines & Spirits in New York and tasting everything), but our formal experience with blending began when we started Lost Lantern. We blend in multiple ways: we often blend multiple barrels of whiskey from a single distillery together, and we also blend whiskey from multiple distilleries. For me, the hardest thing to learn (and I’m honestly still learning it) is when it’s time to stop tinkering. I could keep improving the whiskey incrementally endlessly but there is always a point when the whiskey is already great and ready to put out.

What is your philosophy when it comes to the art of blending whiskey? And, generally speaking, what does the process look like at Lost Lantern when you blend whiskey? Usually when we’re blending for our Single Distillery Series, which are small blends we make from a single distillery, we’re looking to highlight a particular aspect of a distillery. In the past that aspect has ranged from general ideas of delicacy and elegance to specific flavor notes like baking spice. For our Blend Series, which are blends that we make from multiple distilleries’ whiskey, it’s more about where the whiskey in our warehouse takes us. In general when we blend, we appoint what we call a “blend captain.” That person drives the blending process and the direction that we go flavor-wise. As we iterate through our process, the blend captain is the guiding hand, but not the final voice. Ultimately, both Adam and I have to say yes to every whiskey and that goes for the final blends as well.

Are there any specific techniques or tools you use during the blending process?

A very basic pipette is our favorite blending tool! We blend iteratively and make mini versions of potential blends as we move through our process. We are certainly more on the “art” side of the blending process and primarily rely on Adam’s and my palates to assess where we are in the process. That said, we also use a lot of spreadsheets to determine

exactly how much of each whiskey to put in those miniature test blends.

How do you ensure consistency across different batches of blended whiskey?

We don’t! We explicitly do a batch process that highlights different parts each time. For something like our Far-Flung Bourbon (a blend that we make with bourbon from all over the country), each batch is a new exploration of how great bourbon is made all across the U.S. We want there to be a consistent and highquality level across all our blends, but the flavor profile varies from batch to batch.

How much consideration do you give to proofing when considering a blend?

So far, relatively little! 99% of what we do is at cask strength. Sometimes we’ll add a tiny bit of water to help the component parts come together. In those cases, we approach proofing in a similar way to how we blend … we’ll make versions of the blend at a range of proofs and taste them next to each other. The best option generally rises to the top quickly.

What are the biggest challenges you face when blending whiskey?

The blessing AND curse of what we do at Lost Lantern is that we blend with a very wide array of component parts. We’ve worked with almost 40 distilleries from two dozen states. So, when we go to build a blend, it’s sometimes hard to have any intuitive sense of how things will play together … especially because most of these distilleries have never been blended before. You can make hypotheses all you want ahead of time but more often than not, you’re dead wrong! That’s why we work in an iterative way. We start with some initial blends that we think will work and then decide what direction we want to go in from there!

Please take us through the process of blending for a specific recent or upcoming release.

We’ve been working on our third batch of Far-Flung Bourbon. We tasted through the 25 barrel samples that we had pulled to play with. One of the most important things for this type of blend is that it showcases a wide array of states and styles of distilleries.

From a logistical perspective, with all of my

blends, I start thinking about what the “base” blend is going to be. For our blends, the base is usually one-half to two-thirds of the blend. It sets the overall flavor profile and perspective of the blend. This time we built four mini blends (using our trusty pipette) and left them to integrate for two days. Luckily when Adam and I tasted the options, we liked two of them and we decided to combine them into one larger base blend. From there, we went through multiple rounds of flights of blend prototypes (this always means building a flight, letting it integrate for a few days, then tasting and ranking them blind).

Finally, we decided that we had reached our quality threshold and could potentially have finished blending. Before we finalize it goes through two additional steps. First, we taste it against previous releases—in that case FarFlung Bourbon I and II—to ensure it is another chapter in the story we’re telling through the blend (here, that great bourbon comes from all across the country). We want some continuity even if we’re not looking for consistency in the specific flavor profile. Second, we test to see if that whiskey tastes good under normal drinking conditions—not just in the blending lab, but the way we expect people will actually enjoy it. That means bringing the sample home, and not only trying it neat but also sipping it slowly over ice or letting it sit out in a glass for a prolonged amount of time. If it holds together and is still delicious, we’ve got our blend. If not, we keep tinkering. Luckily this time, it was ready to go.

What’s your biggest piece of advice about blending whiskey?

Taste a lot of other people’s whiskey! Take the time to understand why their blend works or why you think it doesn’t. And then play with your own whiskey. Learn what works together and even more importantly what doesn’t! That will help you know how to fix a problem that is developing in your blends. ■

Listen to a conversation with Nora Ganley-Roper and Adam Polonski on The Craft Spirits Podcast

“We want there to be a consistent and very high quality level across all our blends, but the actual flavor profile varies from batch to batch.”

—Nora Ganley-Roper

POT STILL MALT

Malteurop’s Pot Still Malt is produced with Zero Glycosidic Nitrile barley varieties. This malt is crafted for all-malt or high-malt distillation whiskeys to deliver consistent performance and exceptional results for today’s generation of distillers.

• Crafted from 100% Odyssey, a GN Zero Barley Variety

• Made specifically for your next American Single Malt Whiskey creation

• American grown and malted

• More than 60 years of malting experience for the distilling industry

WHO’S WHO IN CRAFT SPIRITS

Getting to know ACSA member producers in their own words

Glacier Distilling

Located a stone’s throw away from Glacier National Park in Coram, Montana, Glacier Distilling specializes in small-batch whiskeys that reflect the rugged beauty of the surrounding landscape. But there’s much more to the distillery than whiskey. Founder Nic Lee shines a light on Glacier’s array of spirits and more.

Distilled Down: Born from the mountains, in the foothills of Glacier National Park, our craft distillery draws inspiration from the expansive landscapes, alpine peaks and wild rivers that surround us, and the mountain culture that connects us. We are also a practical lot—the distillery was founded in 2010 after an apocalyptic snowstorm made it clear that a reasonable amount of prepping and more importantly having our own stockpile of whiskey was only prudent.

Vibe: The distillery is a craftsman’s workshop full of stills, pumps, tanks, cutting boards, infusion jars, cocktail tools and a tortoiseshell cat named Ryelee. It’s an environment where we can share ideas, hang out, but still get some serious work done and bottles filled!

Playlist: We’ve got everything from hard-charging bluegrass mixed with a classic Rolling Stones playlist to some Whiskey Myers and classics like “Tennessee Whiskey” and some fun summer songs like “Too Sweet” by Hozier. Bartenders get to choose the playlist so the variety is great!

Inspiration: We were inspired by pioneers in the craft distilling world that were doing unique things. Clear Creek Distillery brandies; Charbay Distillery whiskeys created from beer fermentations; Catoctin Creek Distilling Co. rye whiskeys distilled on the same style Kothe still we were using initially; Westland Distillery single malts; the awesome vibe at McMenamins Edgefield Distillery; and other mountain town distilleries like High West Distillery.

Notable Spirits: We produce more than 30 different products from our Absinthe to Walnut Liqueur (in alphabetical order) and everything in between. Our North Fork Rye Whiskey has been a staple since the first distillation in 2010 and we have been able to release a limited number of 10-year-old bottles of that spirit. Bearproof Huckleberry Whiskey is our local specialty. And our new passion and biggest commitment to distillation capacity is an American single malt called Logan Pass, distilled from 100% Montana-grown barley.

Buzzworthy: We have just partnered with Flathead Lake Brewing Co. to increase the production capacity of our American single malt whiskey and will be installing a new Vendome still dedicated to the production of single malt. We hope to be up and running by mid 2025.

In the Near Future: The newest release which will be filtering into the marketplace is our Red Meadow Amaro. A classic Italian style bitter-sweet liqueur made with the addition of locally grown hops. We will also be releasing a rum-barrel-finished version of the North Fork Rye Whiskey.

The Distant Future: In many ways I hope the distillery will look the same. We will still continue to experiment and bring new products and twists to traditional products to the tasting room. In 10 years I hope Montana will be a destination for single malt whiskey and Glacier Distilling will be a must-stop on that single malt trail!

Advice for Anyone Thinking About Starting a Distillery: Be prepared for decades of learning, a lot of frustrations and even more satisfaction in the journey!

Learn more at glacierdistilling.com

Clear Creek Distillery

Founded in 1985 by the late Steve McCarthy, Hood River, Oregon-based Clear Creek Distillery has been making fruit brandies and liqueurs from the bounty of the Pacific Northwest for nearly 40 years. The company has been owned by Hood River Distillers since 2014. Caitlin Bartlemay, who was recently promoted to master distiller, brings 14 years of experience and a degree in food science to her new role.

Distilled Down: What started as one man, two stills and a dream, has turned into a legacy brand exemplifying the pioneering spirit of craft distilling in the U.S. Starting with Pear Brandy, we’ve since expanded the portfolio with both aged and unaged fruit brandies, a Douglas Fir brandy, and a line of whole fruit liqueurs. Clear Creek Distillery is also the home of McCarthy’s Oregon Single Malt. First released in 1998, McCarthy’s is the first American single malt to hit consumer

shelves post-Prohibition. With McCarthy’s retirement and the sale of Clear Creek to Hood River Distillers in 2014, the distillery continues to churn out its award-winning spirits while also producing several independent brands that share the Clear Creek ethos of exceptional quality.

Vibe: As a crew, it is important for both guests and coworkers that this place feels welcoming—a place where you can learn a whole lot, and be yourself while you do it.

Playlist: A little bit of just about anything will be playing at any given moment. If we were to paint with broad strokes, we’d say it’s a mix of metal, synthwave, and lo-fi, with a sprinkle of pop and emo.

Inspiration: We feel most inspired by the community itself. As we get the opportunity to meet both new and veteran producers in

the industry, it is inspiring to see the kinship and the shared passion for the history and art of craft distilling.

Flagship Spirit: It’s a tie between Pear Brandy and our McCarthy’s Oregon Single Malt.

Additional Notable Spirits: I wouldn’t sleep on our Aged Apple brandies, both two and eight years old. The Douglas Fir brandy is a big hit and we would be remiss not to mention one of the independent brands, Timberline Vodka, as a spirit to keep your eyes on.

In the Near Future: We have a special single barrel release of a 6-year-old McCarthy’s aged exclusively in a Magdelena rum cask that was picked by The Whiskey Lodge and is for sale on our website.

The Distant Future: There is so much potential and possibility out there for new

perspectives on what goes in one’s glass. We would love to see brandy be as common as whiskey or tequila on menus and in liquor cabinets. We also hope that we will be a decade into the ratification of the American single malt category and can see where 10 more years of passion and excitement take an already inspiring tipple.

Advice for Anyone Thinking About Starting a Distillery: Consumer expectations of quality and transparency is so much higher than it was 10-plus years ago. If you’re just starting out, make sure you take extra time on all of the details; from crafting your brand and story, through education and execution of your final spirit.

Learn more at hrdspirits.com/ clear-creek-distillery.

Everett Rubin and Caitlin Bartlemay

Garrett Trotter-Ramos

Sagamore Spirit

Baltimore-based Sagamore Spirit is reawakening Maryland’s historic role in rye whiskey distilling and drawing thousands of visitors annually for tours, tastings and more. Founded by Kevin Plank, the distillery became an alumni member of the American Craft Spirits Association after Illva Saronno acquired a majority stake in the company in 2023. Ryan Norwood, Sagamore Spirit’s vice president of operations, shared more about the distillery’s present and future.

Distilled Down: Our distillery is located on a five-acre waterfront and the view is beautiful. Located in the Baltimore Peninsula, our award-winning waterfront distillery welcomes approximately 40,000 visitors annually. Through our work at the distillery, we are reasserting the city’s historic role in American whiskey, where distillers crafted rye whiskey for decades before Kentucky’s rise. People come from all over to experience what we have built here, and it’s so nice to see. Our team is incredibly passionate and high energy, and you feel that when you walk through our doors. We are open five days a week for hour-long guided tours and tastings, various seasonal and themed cocktail classes, and shopping. We also have a bar at the

distillery called Nineteen O’ Nine. Throughout the year, we host a multitude of events from a monthly summer concert series, to Whiskey on the Waterfront, to a Christmas tree lighting event.

Vibe: Vibrant and electrifying—especially when we have events! The vibe is very inviting, with a strong sense of community. Playlist: This totally depends on who is working at the time. In any event, you can hear anything from hip hop, to punk rock, to bluegrass, and even death metal.

Inspiration: We are inspired by the rich history of rye whiskey distilling in Maryland. There are a lot of people that had to pave the way for Sagamore Spirit to exist today, most notably Larry Ebersold and Jim Morehead. We cannot thank them enough for all of their guidance.

Flagship Spirit: Sagamore Small Batch Rye Additional Notable Spirits: Sagamore Double Oak, Sagamore Cask Strength and our Reserve Series limited offerings.

Buzzworthy: Yes, our flagship expression, Small Batch rye, just transitioned over to

being 100% distilled by us in Baltimore. This was previously a blend of straight whiskies from Sagamore Spirit and MGP. It is now available globally, as well, which is a first for us.

In the Near Future: We are excited to release a 9-year-old straight rye whiskey this fall. This is part of a vertical series release that includes a previously released 8-year-old rye whiskey as well as a future 10-year-old rye.

The Distant Future: In 10 years, we hope to have achieved our mission of putting Maryland back on the map for distilling rye whiskey and continued growth in our local community and beyond globally.

Advice for Anyone Thinking About Starting a Distillery: Starting a distillery is harder than you can ever imagine. Though if you are passionate and believe in what you are doing you can be successful. Never be afraid to ask for help, no one does it alone. Make sure that you are transparent and focus on making an excellent product. The consumer is more educated than they have ever been, so be authentic.

Learn more at sagamorespirit.com.

Spirits of the North

Craft spirits producers in Minnesota are pushing boundaries with local ingredients and bold flavors.

BY JOHN HOLL

Minnesota has a tradition that combines stubborn independence with intense local pride, devotion to mastering craft, and mutual support, says Phil Steger, the founder and CEO of Minneapolisbased Brother Justus Whiskey Co.

“[Minnesota] regularly produces icons in art, music, brands and businesses that far outpunch their weight classes,” he says. “Often this is the result of mastering timeless traditions to move beyond tired conventions. Think Bob Dylan and Prince.”

Prince, Steger points out, attributed it in part to its cold winters, and who’s going to argue with Prince?

Put all that together and combine it with the fact that the state is the sole home to the limestone-rich Mississippi Headwaters, and “Minnesota distillers are privileged to have world-class spirits ingredients suppliers as neighbors, all within our borders,” he says.

Another important aspect that non-locals might not know is that the state is where three of North America’s biomes—prairie grasslands, the deciduous forest and the boreal forest—meet.

“Minnesota has all the natural elements to make great tasting spirits, specifically whiskey,” says Adam Weber of Obbink Distilling in St. Joseph.

From prairies and farmland to river bluffs and small lakes, to the north woods and the wild north shore of Lake Superior, the state is diverse. On those shores is where Vikre Distillery is located and Emily Vikre, the co-founder and CEO of the company, which also includes Frenchie and Friends Canned Cocktails, says “all these regions and their cultures and resources are reflected in Minnesota’s different distilleries. You see lots of different grains, fruits, botanicals and styles celebrating the state and the various heritages [of] people who live here.”

Steger, who also serves on the American Craft Spirits Association’s Board of Directors, lays out the case that the state’s craft distillers are “endlessly creative and hardworking” and that as a whole they are

“In short, the farming makes the whiskey better.”

—Michael Swanson of Far North Spirits

Michael Swanson and Cheri Reese

constantly challenging conventions that he believes hold the industry back.

“[Chris Montana’s] Du Nord Social Spirits in Minneapolis was one of [the first] Black-owned distilleries in the country. Michael Swanson and Cheri Reese of Far North Spirits in remote Hallock have been engaged in a systematic, decades-long study of the effect of terroir on rye varietals in whiskey. Emily and Joel Vikre of Vikre Distilling in Duluth have been making gins and liqueurs with botanicals foraged from the boreal forest. War veteran and farmer Christian Myrah [of RockFilter Distillery] has been making bourbons with heirloom and heritage corn. O’Shaughnessy Distilling in Minneapolis brought in Irish whiskey legend Brian Nation to put together the country’s first bourbon-Irish whiskey blend.”

The state has one of the healthiest distillers guilds in the country, he says and on the national level he points to Chris Montana and Gina Holman, of Waconiabased J. Carver Distillery, who have both served as ACSA presidents.

There is also a sense among the distillers that they can serve as inspirations for each other, and work toward everyone elevating their business and products, while also raising awareness to needed changes.

“This environment encourages experimentation leading to distinctive flavors that reflect the state’s culture and environment,” says Kyle Kettering the CEO and master distiller at Copperwing Distillery in St. Louis Park. Additionally, he says the state’s distilleries are “in a unique but challenging position” due to the state being in the top five for restrictive alcohol regulations.

“Existing at all is a testament to our dedication and passion for spirits,” he says. “Our drive to thrive is tenacious, hoping to contribute to the state’s reputation for quality and craftsmanship in the spirits industry.”

Montana says that a majority of the state’s distilleries were founded after the shift from distribution dominance to cocktail room culture, so many of them hit the ground running with a wide array of offerings designed to boost the cocktail room experience. Listen to a conversation with Phil

Kyle Kettering and Christopher (Toph) Heubach

“Those of us who predate the cocktail room have had to adapt over the years and thus probably stand out most for our resilience through change,” he says.

Others are focused truly on local flavor.

Swanson of Far North Spirits says that over the years of operation they have learned that not only does grain matter for the flavor profile of whiskey, but that the agricultural techniques they employ, coupled with keeping the soil healthy, matter even more.

“In short, the farming makes the whiskey better,” he says.

At Black Frost Distilling in New Ulm, one of the distillery partners grows all the corn, rye, wheat and barley on a family farm that is used in the spirits. Black Frost has also worked with four of the state’s malt houses to process the grains. The company ages its whiskeys exclusively in Minnesota-grown oak barrels from local cooperages.

“We’re doing a lot of things differently, with intention,” says co-founder Jace Marti. “My hope is that all of these things we are doing differently does make a difference, and people can recognize that when they taste our whiskey.”

Still there are challenges. While the “Minnesota Nice” vibe is alive and well among the distilleries and customers, John Martens, president of Iron Street Distillery in St. Cloud, says the state still needs to catch up.

“Minnesota is known as a high-tax state as well as a highly regulated state. There are many laws still on the books from Prohibition that make it a challenging business environment,” he says.

There is promise of a strong future, distillers say. All acknowledge that embracing local consumers helps create a strong community and base.

“We’re a distiller of whiskeys that aren’t just made in Minnesota, but are made from Minnesota, too. We won’t be a success unless we are embraced by Minnesotans,” says Steger. “Local is important to local Minnesota customers because it’s a way they can support their community and express their love for their home. But it’s essential that we never take that for granted or abuse it.” ■

DRINKS TO SAVOR FROM ACSA MEMBERS

The Taconite Cowboy

Taconite, the low-grade iron ore that is mined in Northern Minnesota and shipped out through the port on Lake Superior where Duluth, Minnesotabased Vikre Distillery is located is such a “Duluth-y” thing, says the distillery owners, that they have often joked about putting a taconite pellet in the bottom of their bottles like the “worm” in mezcal (is that even a thing anymore?). In lieu of a gimmick that was likely to break someone’s tooth, they decided to name one of their favorite cocktails after the pellets.

Ingredients

1 1/2 ounces Vikre Voyageur Aquavit 3/4 ounce Vikre Amaro Superiore 1 ounce sweet vermouth

Directions

Combine all of the ingredients in a mixing glass and fill it half full with ice. Stir smoothly with a long handled spoon until diluted and chilled, about 10 seconds. Strain into a low glass with a large ice cube. Cut a coin-shaped piece of grapefruit peel and squeeze the peel over the cocktail to express the citrus oils onto the cocktail.

Tropical Goth

Calling upon the old adage, “what grows together goes together,” this cocktail from Duluth, Minnesota-based Vikre Distillery explores the idea of pairing tropical fruit—pineapple in this case— with coffee. The distillery’s favorite spirit to work with in pineapple drinks—or coffee drinks for that matter—is aquavit. The aromatic coolness of the caraway in the aquavit buddies up with sweetness of pineapple in a lovely demonstration of opposites attracting. A touch of hazelnut in the coffee syrup adds to the rich, nutty roast while lime brightens it.

Cocktail Ingredients

1 1/2 ounces Vikre Øvrevann Aquavit (or Voyageur)

1 1/2 ounces pineapple juice

1 ounce coffee-hazelnut syrup

1/2 ounce lime juice

Cocktail Directions

Combine all ingredients in a shaker and fill halfway with ice. Shake vigorously for about 10-12 seconds. Strain into a cocktail coupe. If desired, garnish with a lime peel twist, a couple espresso beans or both!

Coffee-Hazelnut Syrup Ingredients

1 cup water

1/2 cup sugar

1/2 cup brown sugar

1 tablespoon chopped, toasted hazelnuts

2 tablespoons ground espresso beans

Coffee-Hazelnut Syrup Directions

Combine all of the ingredients in a saucepan and bring to a simmer, stirring to dissolve the sugar. Remove from the heat and steep overnight. Strain through a fine mesh strainer lined with cheesecloth. This recipe makes about 1 cup, and the syrup keeps in the fridge in a sealed container for up to three weeks.

Sage Brush

This take on a classic whiskey sour from Brush Creek Distillery uses lime instead of lemon. The use of rye makes this one a spicy and flavorful cocktail.

Ingredients

2 ounces Brush Creek Rye Whiskey

1/2 ounce fresh lime juice

1/2 ounce simple syrup

3-5 sage leaves

Directions

Add all ingredients into a cocktail shaker, add ice, and shake until well-chilled. Strain into a rocks glass over a large ice cube and garnish with sage.

Walnut Manhattan

When the days start getting shorter and the evenings start getting cooler, it’s time to put a seasonal twist on a classic Manhattan. Walnut Liqueur from Coram, Montana-based Glacier Distilling Co. adds the perfect autumn substitute for vermouth. The warm baking spice flavors of the walnut are brightened by the orange bitters. It pairs perfectly with a deck chair and a wool blanket.

Ingredients

1 1/2 ounce Glacier North Fork Rye Whiskey

1/2 ounce Glacier Walnut Liqueur

3 dashes orange bitters

Directions

Stir all ingredients with ice. Strain over an ice block in a rocks glass and garnish with orange peel.

Saddle Leather

Brush Creek Distillery sits on a 30,000 acre working cattle ranch in South Central Wyoming. The distillery team handcrafts its innovative spirits using natural resources found on the land and each batch is inspired by the compelling stories and sagas born from the pioneers before us. In this cocktail, the beef jerky garnish is a fitting touch to celebrate the true spirit of the American West.

Ingredients

2 ounces Brush Creek Bourbon

1 ounce amaro

3 dashes rhubarb bitters Beef jerky for garnish

Directions

Add all ingredients into a mixing glass, add ice, and stir until well-chilled. Strain into a rocks glass and garnish with beef jerky on a horseshoe nai

THE SIPPING SCENE: U.K. EDITION

Exploring the wide world of bars and tasting rooms

Blinker Manchester, U.K.

The Tip: Sit at the bar and put yourself in the center of the action

Two One Four (aka 214 Bermondsey)

Bermondsey, London

The Tip: Have a gin tasting flight

The Scene: Even though it’s located beneath Italian eatery and wine bar Flour & Grape, calling this a speakeasy wouldn’t be entirely accurate. (And anyway, when the name of the bar is its address, it’s not like it’s trying too hard to hide.)

However, its windowless subterranean digs enable the guest to completely leave the outside world behind as they embark on an epic botanical adventure. Gin is the main attraction here, with somewhere in the neighborhood of 150 different bottles from around the globe at any given time. The list is helpfully divided by style or dominant flavor profile, as well: traditional dry, citrus, floral, spice, navy strength, fruity, umami/herbal and genever. The menu also offers quite a few zero-proof gin alternatives for teetotalers, the sober-curious or those looking for a low-ABV kind of evening. The selection of whiskeys, brandies and other spirits styles is pretty diverse as well, and lovingly crafted signature and classic cocktails round out the experience. But I’d highly recommend trying one of the specially curated gin flights, like The Great British Gin-Off or the Tour of London. The bar gamifies the sipping session by serving each three-pour flight blindly. The drinker is tasked with guessing which glass is which, with the correct answers on a card in a sealed envelope.

The Scene: Taking its name from a mostly forgotten, three-ingredient classic (rye, grapefruit and raspberry), Blinker is living proof that the Mancunian craft cocktail scene can hold its own against the great mixology cities around the world. The signature drinks list changes with each flip of the wall calendar—the September 2024 collection included Blackberry Sour, Frozen Bramble, the pisco, port and Champagne-based Vineyard, the Mirabelle (gin, plum, cherry blossom and pineapple), Rum & Plum (Agricole, Aperol, plum, bergamot and lime) and many others. Blinker also really shines with its interpretations of classics—particularly martinis and Old Fashoneds, with five variations of each available on the menu. My eyes were drawn to the House Gin Martini in particular, mainly because it offered a choice of olive or onion. It still amazes me how hard it is to sometimes find a proper Gibson at a cocktail bar because, more often than not, they’re out of the little pickled pearl onions. So on the very rare occasion that it’s right there in print, I’m in. And I’m happy to reveal that it did not disappoint.

The venue is stately and spacious, with plenty of room for communal gatherings. But if you’re in a group of three or fewer, make a beeline for the bar stools, the best seats in the house with a front-row view of the cocktail-making action.

—Jeff Cioletti

An internship experience that is a STEP above the rest.

Partnering with member distilleries and wholesalers throughout the United States, we provide a comprehensive training program and provide job exposure for those of different races, color, national origins, genders, and sexual orientations.

CRAFTING A THIRD PLACE

The role of tasting rooms in building community

BY DEVON TREVATHAN

Back in 2016, I would clock in four times a week for my shift in the tasting room of a local distillery, where I unwittingly played my part in a “third place.” I’d be pouring my regular’s orders before they even sank into the plush seats of our bar stools, and our conversations would pick up from where we’d left them the week before.

The concept of third places, coined by urban sociologist Ray Oldenburg in the 1980s, was neither new nor revolutionary back then, though it feels even more important and elusive now. Third places are local places other than the home, which is first, or the workplace, second, where individuals feel comfortable spending time. Defining examples include British locals, French cafes or Chinese teahouses, though this concept is universal and can be tracked throughout human history.

In the last century, America has eliminated many of our third places. People moved out to the suburbs, and businesses were shuffled into the center of the city or ever-expanding strip malls before ultimately scattering across the map, wherever they could find rent cheap.

“What suburbia cries for are the means for people to gather easily, inexpensively, regularly, and pleasurably,” Oldenburg wrote for the Planning Commissioners Journal in 1996.

“A ‘place on the corner,’ real life alternatives to television, easy escapes from the cabin fever of marriage and family life that do not

necessitate getting into an automobile.”

The third place can be many things— coffee shop, taphouse, tasting room, cafe, community center—but an establishment that’s part of a chain is not often a true third place, since the money is usually whisked away from the community where it’s located.

“The big mistake is thinking that a place where you work can also be a third place,” said author Karen Christensen, a longtime collaborator with the late Oldenburg, who is writing the new edition of “The Great Good Place,” Oldenburg’s book in which the phrase first appeared. “It can be pleasant and sociable, but a third place is where you aren’t on the clock and don’t have responsibilities.”

Christensen listed the seven key characteristics of third places: they are neutral ground; open and unstructured so guests can come and go as they please; they aren’t expensive; they’re a place to talk; they’re convenient, ideally walkable; they have regulars, though strangers aren’t out of place; and they’re a fun, happy place to be.

These characteristics come together to define a place that is at the heart of its community, aiding in social vitality and the foundation of functioning democracy. Despite its crucial importance, a third place is comfortable and inviting above all else. Most restaurants can’t really be third places for that reason—each table in a dining establishment,

especially fine dining, tends to be tracked and accounted for, so as a visitor you’re not encouraged to come and go as you please, or stay at your leisure.

There is a recorded history of drinking establishments acting as prime examples of a third place. In Colonial America, taverns were plentiful, and group discussions were part of their tradition. Viewpoints flowed as freely as ale within these neighborhood public houses, and it wasn’t unusual to find politicians going where large crowds had gathered as a way of securing necessary public attention. As John Adams said in 1761, the taverns “are in many places the nurseries of our legislators…”

A more modern example of communitycentered spaces would be lesbian and queer bars, which have waned of late, whittling down from 206 in 1987 to just 20 across the country in 2021, though that number is trending up again. Writer Krista Burton spent a year traveling around the country to visit every remaining lesbian bar for her novel “Moby Dyke: An Obsessive Quest To Track Down The Last Remaining Lesbian Bars In America.”

“They were always very community organized, they always sponsored sports teams or they were always doing some kind of drive for somebody, like the Women’s Prison Book Project,” Burton said. “All of the lesbian bars, these spaces were more than just bars.

Distillery owners are often looking to stand out in a crowded market, and one way that they can engender success is by connecting to their community.

Creating a third place does just that.

Sure they had alcohol, but rarely was I going just for the alcohol.”

The queer bar likely cannot and should not be pointed to as an example of a universal third place since it serves the queer community by design, though all are welcome if they respect that basic tenet. But anyone looking to connect their drinking establishment to the community could learn from lesbian and queer bars. They are all about community, so beyond sponsoring sports teams or hosting book clubs, they offer regular events on their calendar. As Burton writes in her book, the five staples of a queer bar’s calendar—drag shows, dance parties, karaoke, bingo nights and trivia—offer something for everyone, whether you want to come in and tune out to music for hours or you want to have a more interactive night of answering trivia questions.

The owners and operators of these bars are often making a sacrifice for the sake of community, perhaps eschewing a more “marketable” concept so that they can maintain a space that is inviting. “You have to be willing to make a gamble that the reason people are coming to you is because it’s more fun to come to you than to stay home, and what makes a place fun? Your friends are there, there’s an activity going on that you want to do,” explained Burton. “The conversation is the main thing that you’re doing. You’re not going necessarily to drink, you’re going to do all those other things and drink.”

Modern distillery tasting rooms are, in many ways, fertile ground for Oldenburg’s third place. The very existence of a tasting room is itself usually an offshoot of the primary business of the company, the production of spirits, so they are rarely designed like a

restaurant. Conversation is in the very marrow of the tasting room: distillery employees invite people there to talk about and share in the spirit they’ve made.

There are functions of a standard bar that a distillery just can’t compete with: legally, certain states don’t allow distilleries to pour anything in their tasting room that wasn’t made in-house, limiting variety. These are not late-night spots, either—most tasting rooms close by 10 pm.

Providing a space where visitors feel comfortable, one that encourages socializing and regular interactions: that is one area where distillery tasting rooms might have the upper hand, just by the very nature of their setup.

If a manager wants to encourage that development, Christensen offers certain pieces of advice. “Third places do not have

to be free—that’s a misconception—but they do need to be accessible and welcoming,” she said. “Greet people when they come in. Make it easy to move around, and don’t just have tables for two. Pay staff enough that they aren’t desperately hustling for tips, and hire people who enjoy being with people and will remember the names of regulars.”

Distillery owners are often looking to stand out in a crowded market, and one way that they can engender success is by connecting to their community. Creating a third place does just that. “We all need warm, regular connections with other people, and especially with people who aren’t just like us—they light up our lives, make things more interesting,” Christensen said. “When you walk in, you feel your spirits rise, and when you leave you’re happy and restored.” ■

ABBONDANZA!

Stir things up with martini-pasta pairings

You’ve likely been to an Italian (or, at least an Italian-American) restaurant at some point in your life, probably in the past six to 12 months. And it’s just as likely that a server asked if you wanted a cocktail *before* dinner. And if you said yes, you’d better finish it before the first course arrived because they’re really going to want you to choose something from the wine list to get you through the rest of the meal. Why? Because tradition.

Well, sometimes tradition is a good thing. And others, you can follow Tormund Giantsbane’s advice about tradition in the Season 8 “Game of Thrones” episode, “A Knight of the Seven Kingdoms.” (Look it up.) This is one of those times.

After an event titled “Red Sauce Responsibly”—held in New Orleans during Tales of the Cocktail in late July—it’s clear that the undisputed champion for pasta pairings is the classic martini. And the brinier the better.

The event, sponsored by the team behind Italicus bergamot aperitivo, featured a pair of pasta dishes prepared by Miami’s Macchialina and Brooklyn’s Café Spaghetti, as well as charcuterie, oysters cannoli and other Italianinspired delights—matched with martini variations, spritzes and some other cocktails. The pastas in question were a spicy crab spaghetti and cavatelli with baby meatballs, while the martinis were the playfully named Tell Michael Not to Let the Sauce Stick (rewatch “Goodfellas” for that reference) and Ay Bay Bay.

The Tell Michael featured gin, salt and, the star attraction: tomato-infused Lillet Blanc. Ay Bay Bay took its name from its key flavor element: bay-leaf-infused gin (combined with extra dry vermouth and onion brine.) The pairings worked beyond anyone’s wildest imagination and, if there’s any justice in the world, bright, gin-based classics that tilt toward the savory should become standard accompaniments for these Italian-American comfort foods. Whether you’re running your own kitchen, hosting food trucks, partnering with local restaurants or featuring take-out menus from the local pizza-and-red-sauce joints, be sure to up your tasting room’s martini game.

Jeff Cioletti

UNDERSTANDING PROOFING AND GAUGING

Navigating U.S. regulations and methods for determining alcoholic strength

BY TYLER DERHEIM

Before we dive into the topic of proofing and gauging, it’s useful to establish some background and definitions; while they may be familiar to you as experienced distillers, these will form the vocabulary for this article. These definitions and regulations primarily apply to United States-based producers, though there are comparable terms and guidelines in most jurisdictions.

Determining Proof

Proofing is the act of determining the alcoholic strength of spirits. Proof is expressed in degrees (e.g. 100°pf, which is equivalent to 50% ABV). “Proofing down” is the act of adding water to spirits to reach a target alcoholic strength. “Proofing” and “proofing down” are sometimes used interchangeably, which can lead to confusion. “Determining proof” is the language used in the regulations and is a clearer way of putting it. You must use proofing devices and methods approved by the U.S. Alcohol and Tobacco Tax and Trade Bureau (TTB) when your proof measurement is used for tax determination (e.g. when measuring proof in the bottling tank prior to bottling).

Determining Volume

Weighing is one of the legally-mandated methods to determine the quantity of liquid in a tank or container for most craft producers. It’s helpful to record the empty (tare) weights of all containers you use for spirits so that you can subtract it from your observed (total) weight to determine the net weight of spirit, and therefore tank content. However, the regulations do require you to ‘zero’ or ‘tare’ your scale prior to measuring spirit weight. Weight must be measured in pounds and then

converted to volume (gallons) using the TTB Gauging Manual, Table 4.

Alternatively, for fixed tanks, you may use the volumetric method. This involves using a sight glass fitted to a tank whose internal geometry has been computed such that you can measure liquid height in inches and convert it to gallons.

Gauging—Determine Proof + Determine Volume

Gauging is the act of determining the total alcohol quantity in a tank or container. A gauge is expressed in proof gallon terms. You must have a measure of the proof and the volume to compute your gauge. In simple terms, Determine Proof + Determine Volume = Gauge. Because proof gallons measure the absolute alcohol quantity in your batch, adding water to a batch of spirit does not change its proof gallonage—only its wine gallonage.

Real-world Example

Let’s say that you receive a tote of grain neutral spirit and the seals are not intact. Therefore, you must gauge it, as required by 27 CFR 19.407.

First, measurements. You weigh it on a floor scale and observe a weight of 1,951 pounds. The paperwork accompanying the spirit indicates that the tare weight of the tote is 125 pounds, so the net weight is 1,826 pounds. Now, you can grab a sample of product from the tote and determine the proof using one of the approved methods (e.g. hydrometer and thermometer). In this example, your proofing results indicate 190.3°pf at 60 F.

These two values are all that you need to compute your gauge. To determine the proof

gallons in your 1,826 pounds of 190.3°pf spirit, refer to Gauging Manual Table 4 and look up your proof to find proof gallons per pound. Here, you can see that 190.3°pf spirit has 0.28029 proof gallons per pound. Then it’s just simple multiplication: 0.28029 x 1,826 pounds = 511.81 proof gallons. For extra credit, you can also determine the wine gallons (ordinary gallons) of product using the conversion factor for 190.3°pf (0.14729 gal/lb): 0.14729 x 1,826 pounds = 268.95 wine gallons. Wine gallons may also be inferred based on the proof gallons and proof: 511.81 PG / 190.3° x 100 = 268.95 wine gallons. Using this simple equation, you can rearrange the factors and solve for any of the three, if you know two of them. The three factors are: wine gallons, proof gallons and proof.

Allowable Gauging Methods for Tax Determination—Determining Proof

Regulations in the gauging manual (27 CFR 30) call out specific hardware requirements and procedures for determining proof and volume.

For spirits with under 4g/liter of dissolved solids, your allowable proofing methods include the precision hydrometer/ thermometer method, or an approved benchtop density meter. Hydrometers and thermometers must be frequently tested to ensure their accuracy, per 27 CFR 19.188. Regulations are silent on precisely what “frequently” means; I typically recommend at least annually if not more frequently, particularly for instruments that are used often.

When you use a hydrometer and thermometer, you must always apply and record any correction factors used, even if the

A major upside to determining volume by weight is that you do not need to worry about the effect of temperature on spirit volume: a given liquid quantity of spirit will have the same weight at any temperature.

factors are 0. You must also account for the effect of temperature on proof readings using TTB Table 1. This means managing up to three “offsets”—hydrometer, thermometer and temperature correction.

Additionally, it can be challenging to test a hydrometer’s accuracy—you’ll need another hydrometer/thermometer to compare against, which themselves must be calibrated/tested. Alternatively, you can test hydrometers against a benchtop density meter. But if you have a benchtop density meter, you no longer need hydrometers!

You can see why I typically recommend for distilleries to simply re-buy their hydrometer and thermometer, with traceable calibration/correction factors, once per year. It winds up being cheaper and simpler than trying to re-test your existing equipment. Density meters, while expensive, can have their measurements validated simply by testing pure distilled water in them, and they can last years or even decades with proper care.

Finally, if you are working with spirits that have dissolved solids above 4g/liter, you must account for the effect of the dissolved solids on your proof measurement. For solids loads up to 6g/liter, this can be accomplished using one of the three methods outlined in 27 CFR 30.32: Evaporation method, distillation method or pycnometer method. For solid loads exceeding 6g/Liter, your primary option is to use the distillation method, which involves a small laboratory still and a specific protocol. The alternative to the distillation method is to petition TTB to allow you to use a different method, if you can prove its equivalence or superiority to the distillation method.

Accounting for obscuration loads under 4g/liter is optional; doing so allows you to squeeze a little bit more water into your bottling tank, allowing you to yield slightly more bottles out of the same starting base spirit. This extra effort can be worthwhile for high value spirits.

Allowable Gauging Methods for Tax Determination Determining the volume in a tank can be achieved in

Table No. 4*

Gallons Per Pound

*From the TTB Gauging Manual

two ways: by weight or by volume.

When using the weight method, you place a vessel on a scale and press “tare” to zero the reading. Or, if using load cells, you simply ‘zero’ the reading while the tank is empty. Then, you flow your spirit into the tank and observe the reading on the scale in pounds. Care should be taken to ensure your reading is timely and correct: load cell readings are temperature-sensitive and tend to drift over time. Readings should not be taken if many hours or days have elapsed since the scale was zeroed or tared.

A major upside to determining volume by weight is that you do not need to worry about the effect of temperature on spirit volume: a given liquid quantity of spirit will have the same weight at any temperature.

Scales must be tested (and recalibrated if necessary) every six months, per 27 CFR 19.186.

If your spirit is under 6g/liter of dissolved solids, converting weight to volume simply involves looking up the weight per gallon in Table 4, as shown in the example. Once you’ve hit 6g/liter of solids, though, you must employ an alternative method for determining volume based on weight. This alternative method is covered in 27 CFR 30.41 and requires you to measure both apparent proof and true proof; or if your spirit is denser than water, you will have to measure specific gravity and true proof

When using the sight glass method of determining volume, you use a predetermined “gallons per inch” factor to convert a liquid height to a “gallon” reading. You must then adjust the volume of the spirit to account for the effect of temperature using TTB Table 7, unless your spirit happens to be 60 F at time of measurement. Luckily, the volumetric method is valid for spirits with any dissolved solids content.

One final note on the volumetric method. I often see IBC Totes, drums, dump buckets and other vessels that have “gallon” or “liter” markings on them. Observing the liquid level based on these markings does not qualify as a valid gauge—regulations in 27 CFR 30.51 require that “Volumetric measurements in tanks shall be made only in accurately calibrated tanks equipped with suitable measuring devices, whereby the actual contents can be correctly ascertained.” Plastic vessels, due to their varying composition and bulging when loaded, usually cannot be accurately gauged by volume and should instead be weighed on a suitable scale.

Historical background

Up until 1980—when deregulation hit the industry—gauging was only performed by U.S. government agents. Spirit collection tanks had locks, with keys held only by agents. Proprietors couldn’t even touch their own

distillate until unlocked and gauged by the resident agent. But, with the stroke of a pen, gauging responsibility shifted from federal agents to DSP proprietors (Distilled Spirits Tax Revision Act of 1979). This would have been a great moment for the U.S. government to harmonize with the rest of the world and begin measuring proof at 20 C instead of 60 F. Instead, legislators left the Gauging Manual essentially unchanged from its original publication by government chemists in 1938. If you’re ever wondering why the manual and methods seem obtuse, this might help explain it! ■

for FIVE x 5. If you’re looking for help with these requirements, or indeed with most any of your regulatory requirements, FIVE x 5 offers ACSA members a free 20-minute consultation, with no strings attached. For more information, visit Fx5.com/distillery-consulting

Tyler Derheim is a professional services consultant

A WORLD OF SPIRITS IN YOUR HAND

How spirits apps are connecting craft distillers with more consumers.

BY ANDREW KAPLAN

Marc Christensen, of Dented Brick Distillery in Salt Lake City, found himself in a situation faced by many new distillers after opening in 2016: how to get his spirits to stand out in an increasingly crowded market.

He soon found out about plans for a website and app called Crafted Pour designed to connect craft cocktail professionals, enthusiasts and producers. Through its Tastemaker program, the app links craft distillers like Christensen to social media influencers who create new cocktails using its spirits, which are then featured on both the platform and the distillery’s website.

Currently, there are 1,000 cocktail creators on Crafted Pour with 58,000 visitors to the Crafted Pour website during the second quarter of 2024. The app itself was launched in the first half of 2023.

“A lot of people are posting their cocktail creations on Instagram, that’s kind of the main place people were doing it other than Crafted Pour,” says Jason Knapp, one of Crafted Pour’s founders. “But the problem there is there’s no

Jason Knapp

discoverability, there’s no indexing of them and there’s no recommendations. It’s just not an intelligent way to organize cocktails. So, we wanted to give them that as well as easier ways to collect tips and commissions on products in their recipes.”

And Crafted Pour is not alone. As the craft spirits market has boomed, so has the number of spirits-related apps.

For example, another popular app, Distiller, launched in 2013. co-founder & CEO Mikael Mossberg says the idea came to him while he was sitting—where else?—at a bar in front of an array of whiskey choices. The usual go-to sources (the bartender, Googling) just didn’t allow him to make a truly educated choice. So, he made it his mission to change that.

“We wanted to make the information about spirits more accessible, especially when people are in a bar or at a store trying to make a purchase,” Mossberg says. “We felt like people shouldn’t have to do a bunch of research to make an informed decision. They should be able to open their phone, compare some products easily, and make their decision from there. Somebody said early on our goal is to let you know what’s in the bottle before you spend a cent.”

Today, Distiller provides information on all spirits categories, has just over 51,000 unique spirits in its system, and gets an average 3.5 million users each year.

Helping Build Spirits Demand

Sam and Stacy Greene, owners of Twist & Bitters, a mobile bar company based in Southern California, are two of the people who have helped Crafted Pour formulate relationships with some of its cocktail creators. Today, there are 4,000 recipes on the platform.

The Greenes help to curate the information being posted to the app and also help run the platform’s Tastemaker program—finding new creators (bartenders, micro influencers, etc.) on social media to send product samples to from spirits producers like Christensen who subscribe to the service. These creators then come up with cocktail recipes using the samples that they post to Crafted Pour and social media. A special plugin subscribers to Tastemaker get creates a space on their own websites with a constantly updated feed of recipes from Crafted Pour that use their spirits.

“There are 200 cocktails on our website now that are actually from Crafted Pour,” Christensen says. “It’s so awesome. And the cost to do that was very minimal. I thought it was a really great value.” The regular price

Marc Christensen

for the Tastemaker program is $500/month. However, Knapp says discounts are offered for craft distillers.

The plugin/widget is also available separately from the Tastemaker program, starting at $50/month. Knapp says e-commerce pages with the plugin have seen 57% higher sales than those without because consumers immediately see others using the product in beautiful cocktails they can make themselves. Brands can also recruit their larger community to input cocktails and reviews that appear on their plugin to drive interest in their products among bar owners, retailers and consumers.

While any distiller can create a free profile on Crafted Pour, currently some 19, like Dented Brick, are paying partners and part of the Tastemaker program. Knapp says the brands have experienced overall sales increases of 25% to 92%, and so far the program has a 100% renewal rate.

For the Greenes, as mixologists who greatly value the creativity of craft distillers, publicizing smaller companies like Christensen’s is a big part of what motivates them in their work for Crafted Pour.

“It’s really hard for small distilleries to get into bars or restaurants or really get much attention at all because even though they might have a distributor, all of the sales reps are just pushing the big brands because that’s where their bonus and incentives are, right?” says Sam. “So, that was one of the things we were definitely drawn to—helping the smaller distillery which we find are making some incredible stuff.”

Adds Christensen, “When a distributor goes into an on-premise account, he can just basically click the recipe on Crafted Pour on his phone and show it to a mixologist or bartender. So, it’s a really good sales tool.”

While recipes are Crafted Pour’s ‘special sauce,’ what sets Distiller apart is the vast database of spirits product information it has created over the past decade. And all of that information is carefully overseen by a team of full-time editors.

“We’ve created everything ourselves,” Mossberg says. “It’s painstaking, it’s really, really difficult to do. So, I think one way that we just differ from some of those other applications is that we’ve been around for so long and have created this rich database community. We have over a million and a half tasting notes created just by our users. You don’t find that in the other applications. They haven’t been downloaded millions of times like we have. I think that’s one of the most exciting

things about us.”

Each product page on the Distiller app shows a photo of the spirit; a rating based on reviews app users give it; a detailed description of the product; expert notes by one of the professionals who are part of the Distiller platform’s Tasting Table, which is made up of spirits writers, judges and buyers for retailers; additional flavor information in the form of a Flavor Profile graph; other product details such as age, ABV, country and cost; a link to reviews that can be written by any user of the app; and a recommendation for other products the app’s algorithm thinks the user might also enjoy.

Fulfilling Mossberg’s original goal of making spirits information easily accessible to users, Distiller finds innovative ways to break down information in easily digestible ways for users. For example, click on a particular spirit, and the first thing you see are “Top Flavor Tags”— the most common flavors chosen by Distiller’s community of users to describe it.

Mossberg says Distiller is also useful for craft distillers looking to follow what consumers think about their products. “We see a lot of producers comparing their products to others and seeing how folks are responding to what they’re putting out there,” he says.

He also sees distillers creating a rapport with consumers. “A distiller can create an

account and go into the comments of every single tasting note that has been left publicly and comment back and forth with those people. So, you can have discussions with the people who are [leaving] tasting notes on the products that you offer,” he says.

What the Future Holds

Knapp hopes to soon also include the ability for Crafted Pour users to also purchase the spirits in the recipes directly through the app. He’d like to be able to give the app’s cocktail creators a commission on the sales of the products used by their recipes.

And then of course there’s artificial intelligence (AI) and its potential uses for spirits apps.

Distiller recently launched an app called Flasky, an AI chatbot that draws on the platform’s proprietary database of spirits information to teach users about virtually anything related to spirits, from different spirit types, to production processes, to recommendations, or even help finding local distillers or events. The app is meant to be fun and user-friendly, a non-intimidating way to learn for both beginners and those with more advanced knowledge of spirits, too.

And another app Mossberg recently launched, Glasseye, allows users to take a photo of any ingredients lying around and Glasseye comes up with cocktail recipe ideas

for them.

Flasky is available for a one-time purchase of $3.99 and Glasseye costs $2.99, both currently available for iPhone. Within Flasky there is an available in-app purchase for an additional 99 cents which will unlock the ability to search using images. So you could, for instance, take a picture of a bottle and then ask Flasky “tell me about this bottle” and Flasky will detect what the bottle is, and then give you corresponding information, including taste elements and scores.

And lastly, there’s one more app that some mixologists and bartenders also find quite useful and has been around in one form or another for longer than most.

“I think one of the most important apps a lot of bartenders use is just the standard Notes app,” says Alex Barbatsis, co-founder of Bees and Bats Beverages, a cocktail consultation company. “I think every bartender I know has a list of just like potential cocktail names or ideas for drinks. I have a note named ‘Drinks’ that I just keep going back to.”

So, whether they are the latest AI-powered chatbots, or apps containing thousands of recipes or tasting notes, or the unassuming Notes app that comes free on every smartphone, they are all examples of how technology continues to help propel the spirits industry forward. ■

RECRUIT SMARTER

Innovative techniques from Paychex for finding your next great hire

Editor’s Note: The following is an excerpt from a June 2023 article on the Paychex WORX Blog titled “How To Recruit Employees: Creative Employee Recruitment Strategies.”

As you build your recruitment plan, you may need to expand on your current activities and find new and creative ways to reach job candidates. Here are some suggestions to augment your current recruitment efforts, as well as find ways to leverage existing strategies to help your business grow.

Expand Your Sourcing Strategies

Where did your employees originally hear about your business? Chances are, they aren’t knocking on your door, asking for a job interview. Take a look at your existing leads and consider possibly branching out to new sources that you haven’t used in the past.

• Use existing data to determine where your most successful employees came from and look for commonalities. For example, certain professional associations or academic programs might be critical partners and sources of leads. Follow the adage, “Go fishing where the fish are.” Determine where your ideal candidates spend time. Can generalized sourcing pools like job boards or LinkedIn yield the specific candidates that you need? Hone in on specialized professional groups, academic programs, job boards, or other hot spots where marketers, developers, executive assistants, or whatever type of employee you’re trying to hire congregate.

• Explore whether new technologies and platforms can improve your sourcing. For example, can social recruiting or mobile-first recruiting add dimension to your strategy?

Ramp Up Your Social Media Activity

Social media platforms and mobile devices have become pervasive for recruiters to advertise positions and source applicants. Candidates are increasingly looking for jobs online and are demanding the ability to browse job postings and apply for positions from their mobile devices. Job seekers may

frequent social media platforms even before they are officially on the job market, so this is a great opportunity to catch quality candidates’ attention early.

To maximize your efficiency with this strategy, do your homework on which social platforms are best for reaching your target audience. Survey your employees and other connections in the industry to identify which sites are most often used by job seekers in your market. Familiarize yourself with these platforms, then use them to spread the word that you’re looking to hire. At the same time, use your company website, blog, Facebook, and X (formerly Twitter) pages to feature your business in the best light and encourage your current employees to do the same.

Write Compelling Job Descriptions

With so much of the job search process online, you’ll need a written job description that stands out. When it comes to strategic talent acquisition, you need to communicate with potential applicants clearly and show them what your company can offer. Some must-haves include:

Informative job titles that will attract candidates with matching skill sets.

A clear list of core responsibilities to further define job requirements. Company information that highlights the most unique or most prestigious characteristics of your organization. A description of requested skills or background knowledge that will encourage a range of qualified candidates to apply.

• An overall tone that reflects the level of formality in the work environment and matches your company’s culture.

• Depending on where you’re located and any local or state requirements around pay transparency, a pay range. You may want to consider including this even if no applicable law requires you to do so.

Spread the Word at Trade Shows and Industry Events

Conferences and trade shows can be more than just a promotional venue for your company. You can also trade ideas with other

business owners on the creative recruitment techniques they favor, or even connect with potential candidates. You’ll already have plenty of business cards and promotional materials on hand and a room full of people who are already interested in your industry. Use this to your advantage and connect with as many people as possible—you may be rubbing elbows with someone who could lead you to your next star employee.

Offer an Onsite Job Fair/Open House

You can control when, where, and what steps to take to make a good hire and get it done quickly when you host an onsite job fair or open house. Be sure to place an attractive notice of the open house date and time at your business entrance — choose a morning (9 a.m. to noon) or afternoon (1 p.m. to 4 p.m.). Be prepared with job descriptions, applications, and interviewing questions, and you can screen at the job fair for either direct hires or setup for follow-up interviews.

Work With Your State Employment Office or Employment Commission

Check with your local employment office/ employment commission about their services. This office is focused on partnering with local businesses to employ those who may currently be receiving unemployment benefits but are searching for employment. This can be a great online resource as well—most offices have online job boards and allow employers to post positions. Plus, some offices provide onsite space to conduct interviews.

Contact College Placement Offices

Contact the placement offices at your local community colleges and universities to submit job postings. Considering there are a lot of people returning to college, you have the possibility of finding candidates with a wide range of work experience and education.

Consider Creative Ways To

Recruit

Employees Using Online Job Posting and Searches

Online job posting can be done on your business website, state employment office (or employment commission) website, and

other industry networking websites. In the job description, be sure to list specific qualifications and required education/experience—this can help cut down on unqualified applicant submissions.

To leverage online websites to recruit employees, the hiring supervisor and/or human resources staff can perform investigative searches to check online for qualified and skilled candidates. An expanded search may reveal new sources such as industry-specific or non-industry-specific websites, simple job boards, or even more in-depth sites that require account setups for use. Once you have found a few good sites for your industry, make sure you bookmark them for future use.

For jobs requiring increased visibility, consider sponsored job postings. These paid listings can reach a greater number of matching candidates over a longer period of time.

Initiate Employee Referral and Boomerang Hire Programs

Many companies have established employee referral programs that reward employees

with a cash bonus (or some other reward) for tapping into their personal and online networks for promising candidates. Existing employees often understand the company and the industry, and know what it takes to succeed in specific roles, so this is a valuable resource that shouldn’t be overlooked. If you haven’t yet initiated a referral program, consider implementation on a trial basis for targeted positions before branching out to the entire workforce.

Boomerang hires are another potential source of successful recruiting for larger companies. These individuals were employed by the company at one time and left. Enticing select employees back may in some cases yield a double benefit of someone who understands your business, while also bringing a fresh perspective from their most recent position.

Revamp Your Careers Page

Many businesses devote little attention to their careers page and often rely on stock images and generic content to greet visitors to the site. Instead, consider revamping a “Join

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Us” page with a focus on added excitement and enthusiasm.

Consider incorporating lively photographs of the workplace and surrounding area. Include a compelling vision of employee career growth opportunities, a view of the collaborative workplace environment, and other examples of business culture that job seekers could be looking for in their search.

Think Outside the Box When Interviewing Candidates

You can infuse a fresh perspective into your recruiting by inviting some of your best employees to join in interviewing candidates. This approach offers unique perspectives and feedback on whether the interviewee is a good fit for your business. Your veteran employees are often more familiar with the specifics of the available position(s) and can help to identify potential issues before you’ve committed to an under qualified candidate.

Running a craft spirits business is complex. Let Paychex help.

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Plus, if one of these candidates is hired, there’s already an established connection with others on the team.

Invite Some Industry Connections To Lunch

Formal job interviews can achieve certain objectives, such as determining how well a candidate reacts to the pressure of being questioned by one or more team members. But what about a candidate’s less formal side? Taking individuals to lunch offers the

opportunity to interact in a more informal setting, possibly even before a candidate has officially expressed interest in a position. This strategy also gives you the opportunity for further discussions with potential connections about why they should consider applying for open positions within your company. You can also take advantage of the opportunity to communicate your ideal hiring needs to others who may be able to send potential candidates to you directly.

Nurture and Invest in Candidates

While the term “candidate experience” was a key buzzword over the past few years, the idea of fostering meaningful relationships with potential talent is sound. At a high level, having a clearly defined pipeline of needs allows your team to open a dialogue with potential candidates even if you’re not hiring immediately. When a position does open up, interested candidates may be engaged and put into the process within days. At the same time, it’s critical that individuals who do apply for jobs have positive encounters. Investing in this

area may include:

Using an applicant tracking system to make it easier to apply for jobs, see the status, and manage communications. Applicant tracking systems streamline the process for applicants and hiring managers alike; candidates can easily submit all their materials online, and hiring managers and HR personnel can access all the information they need from a single interface.

• Prioritizing candidate communication with automated messaging and a focus on shortening the cycle of communications after applications, interviews, and other milestones.

• Assessing and refining the most impactful parts of your hiring process by soliciting feedback from candidates and recent hires to better understand their experience.

• These are only a few of the many affordable recruitment strategies at your disposal. Using the right mix can help you find your next quality employee. ■

Quench your thirst for knowledge in ACSA’s Craft Spirits Classroom. For more information or to register, visit our website at americancraftspirits.org/education/webinars.

TALES ’24

We couldn’t say goodbye to summer without giving a shoutout to Tales of the Cocktail. The latest edition of the New Orleans tradition wrapped up at the end of July, with many craft brands taking center stage in the tasting rooms—particularly during the annual Indie Spirits that Rock, from the team behind the Indie Spirits Expo. Another highlight was the panel of American single malt whiskey makers (pictured, right), who offered their insights on the latest trends in the fastest-growing whiskey category.