distilleries Checking in with in Southern Minnesota

By TOM NELSON Guest Contributor

After a slight downturn during the COVID crisis, the craft distilling industry has seen robust growth recently, with almost 2,700 craft distilleries in the United States as of August 2022.

This marked an annual increase of over 17% from the year’s previous total of 2,290 craft distilleries. The interest and growth of cocktail rooms and craft distilleries has not been overlooked by the southern Minnesota area as several local businesses have grown into favorite destinations for those looking to enjoy creative and locally produced cocktails and spirits.

The list includes Northfield’s Loon Liquors, Faribault’s 10,000 Drops Craft Distillers and Kasota’s Chankaska Creek Ranch Winery and Distillery. All three produce a wide range of liquors that are available at their on-site cocktail rooms and also for purchase at retail outlets around the state of Minnesota.

Here is a look at the area’s three craft distilleries including a bit of their background, products they offer, their cocktail room experience and new things on the horizon.

Chankaska Creek Ranch Winery and Distillery, Kasota

A longtime favorite for wine aficionados in

Minnesota, Chankaska Creek Ranch Winery added its spirits production component in 2016 with the arrival of its Carl still from Germany.

“We decided to expand into spirits production for a few reasons, such as it would allow us to use idle production equipment year-round,” Chankaska Creek marketing director Kelsey Long said. “There has been an increasing interest in spirits and we created the

North Forest Kreme product line, which has brandy as a base spirit.”

In addition to the North Forest Kreme liqueurs, Chankaska has also created a line of Ranch Road products including whiskey, gin, rum and vodka. All of the grains in the products are sourced from a local farmer near Mapleton, Minn.

“Small-batch liquors have gained interest in popularity over the years, many in part due to the high-quality standards and hand-crafted nature of small-batch liquors. Our products stand out because they are made from local sources and we have provided our production team with the most advanced tools to produce only high-quality products,” Long said.

The Chankaska products are available throughout the state at liquors stores and you can purchase them at the winery, which also features a cocktail room to enjoy the drinks on site.

“We have seen an increase in the popularity of craft cocktail drinks in our distillery. We make each handcrafted cocktail using our own liquor and local, fresh, ingredients,” Long said. “There has been a focus on the quality of products used that has really elevated the craft cocktail scene. A local favorite on our cocktail menu is the Orchid You Not cocktail, featuring our Ranch Road Rum, or our Old Fashioned cocktail, featuring our Ranch Road Straight Bourbon Whiskey.”

The cocktail room menus has drinks featuring each of the Ranch Road products and a recent favorite are the Bloody Mary flights featuring different spirits in each flight.

Upcoming events to watch for at Chankaska include Breakfast Pizza and Bloody Mary Flights from 11 a.m. to 2 p.m. on Fridays through Sundays and free live music every Friday and Saturday night from 6 p.m. to 9 p.m. The unWined by the Creek Wine Circle Pickup Event is set for Saturday, July 15, Paint Your Paint is on July 20 and Drag Me with a Spoon presents 80s Night on Aug. 4.

For more details, check out the Chankaska Creek website at chankaskawines.com or call 507-931-0089.

Loon Liquors, Northfield

Located just west of downtown Northfield, Loon Liquors was one of the original craft distillers in the area when they began operation 10 years ago behind the vision of co-founders and current owners Mark Schiller and Simeon Rossi. Since that time, Loon Liquors’ offerings include vodka, gin, whiskey, rum, liqueurs and aquavit

“When we started there were no distilleries in southern Minnesota and we started one of the first legal distilleries in southern Minnesota in about 100 years,” Schiller said.

“We originally were potentially looking at Minneapolis but at the time you couldn’t have a cocktail room, so we were looking for an affordable industrial space and we decided to go back to our hometown where we graduated high school from.”

As Northfield natives, Schiller and Rossi found their current location in an industrial area near the Post/Malt-o-Meal factory to house the Loon Liquors stills and other production equipment. Thanks to a change in Minnesota and local laws allowing for on-site consumption the facility grew to include a cocktail room, which has been serving a tasty selection of cocktails and non-alcoholic beverages for eight years now.

After attending college at the University of Minnesota, Schiller was interested in possibly starting his own business and ended up connecting with Rossi at a social gathering back in their hometown of Northfield.

“I knew that I wanted to start up some kind of business. Simeon was making this amazing coffee liqueur in college and had a White Russian party in Northfield…I was at said White Russian party and I told him ‘this coffee liqueur is amazing, I would love to sell this for you and would allow me to look into it’…I went to the state of Minnesota and they said it is the same permit to distill as it is to just mix vodka.”

He added, “So, I told that to Simeon and he said, “Well, if it is the same permit to distill it as it is to mix it, we can distill it, we can make vodka, we can make gin, we can make whiskey. I told him you make it and I will sell it, and that’s pretty much where we are at after 12 years of having that conversation originally.”

Loon Liquors has since grown into a favorite destination for both locals and tourists looking to experience a variety of outstanding craft cocktails. A Twin Cities distributor, and most

The recently College City Beverage out of Dundas, have been instrumental in getting Loon Liquors products in over stores around the state.

“We are in about over 400 locations in the state of Minnesota, so they’ve seen our brand and they’ve seen us in liquors stores,” Schiller said. “People want to come out to the cocktail room and they see that we are making it from scratch, which I think is a huge component to what Simeon has built out over time.”

Rossi and Schiller are both excited about the new partnership with College City Beverage.

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“This will help us get into some of those southeastern Minnesota towns and cities. Our other distributor has that large view of the state but this (the new partnership with College City) will be more focused our our backyard,” Rossi said.

Over the years since Loon Liquors opened, Rossi has been instrumental in creating products that are truly sourced locally thanks to wheat and barley grown nearby.

“Now we get to make the claim that over 90 percent of our ingredients, by weight, come from within 10 miles of the distillery. Almost entirely due to a relationship we have with two amazing farmers Bryan and Tammy Lips near Nerstrand,” Schiller said. “We have a great working relationship with them and we’ve expanded that over time. We started working with them directly about 7-8 years ago.”

Even the barley grown in Nerstrand is taken up to a malting facility in Detroit Lakes to be processed before it returns home to Northfield for use in the Loon Liquors products. The process is full circle as the grain by-product left over after the distilling process goes back to the farm for livestock feed.

“People are attracted from a local component that we use so much local agriculture and that we support so many local farmers. We have great relationships with Little Hill Berry Farm,

Fireside Orchard, Lorence’s (Berry Farm), Open Hands Farms, etc. Simeon has created all these great relationships and that really attracts people,” Schiller said.

The local aspect helped during COVID as those incoming supplies remained stable since they were sourced locally. Glass bottles on the other hand were a different story.

“Where we did see a big hiccup in the supply chain was glass. That was painful but it seems to have caught up with itself,” Schiller said. He added that due to the growth of distilleries, the supply of wood barrels are becoming an issue but there are two cooperages in Minnesota that use oak to make barrels.

In addition to the attraction of locally created product, Loon Liquors has built a reputation of creating unique and flavorful cocktails and nonalcoholic beverages. The quality of service and the cocktail room atmosphere are also features that bring in customers.

“Within the cocktail room, we are really service focused. Our staff really enjoys building relationships with folks who are coming in. It is something that we put a lot of focus on,” Rossi said. “It is a place where people feel comfortable to spend several hours with family and friends.

Over the years, we’ve continued to build within our cocktail room a space that is both visually stimulating and comfortable on top of always putting the focus on quality for all of our spirits and cocktails….our drinks are meant to be contemplated not gulped.”

Schiller said the concept at Loon Liquors was to build a family friendly and welcoming environment and for that reason non-alcoholic drink options have been a staple on the Loon Liquors menu for the past eight years. A unique favorite are the craft soda flights available on the menu.

“Simeon has put a lot of time into our nonalcoholic menu and one of the main reasons is that we wanted to show that everyone is welcome here - whether you drink or not drink,” Schiller said.

A recent addition in the cocktail room has been the introduction of Heggie’s Pizza from Milaca, Minn. as a food option.

“They are a dive bar staple, but when you do the research, Heggie’s is one of the best tasting frozen pizzas gin the state,” Schiller said.

On the topic of food, Scotty’s Whole Hog Barbecue also offers food truck events on selected days and entertainment options under the direction of cocktail room lead Ashlyn

May at Loon Liquors include Thursday Trivia Nights, live music on the first Friday of each month and an open microphone night on the third Thursday of each month. Happy hour dates featuring special prices on cocktails are another highlight on the Loon Liquor calendar.

Northfield’s collection of three craft breweries (Imminent, Tanzenwald and Chapel) along with Keepsake Cider and Loon Liquors also makes for an attractive destination for those looking to sample a variety of beverages. The area beverage creators have also helped create the new Third Thursday events in downtown Northfield this summer.

“Once they are here they start exploring the others, which is really fun. It’s great that we have this partnership with these other drink makers in the area, our ‘Fermentation Friends’ as we like to call our little group,” Rossi said.

In the recent weeks, Loon Liquors has been most excited about the release of its bottled Old Fashioned. They started selling it about four weeks ago with a “silent launch” but from early reports sales have been brisk for this upper midwest supper club standard.

“This is probably our best product launch yet of any spirit that we’ve put out in the market,” Schiller said. “t has also been our top selling drink in the cocktail room for the past eight years because it is absolutely delicious. It is super well balanced…the whiskey balances with the simple syrup, which balances with the aromatic bitters.”

The Loon Liquors Old Fashioned could very well be the world’s first certified organic bottled Old Fashioned in the world according to Schiller.

“The bitters are from scratch, the whiskey is from scratch and the simple syrup is completely from scratch,” Schiller said. “We are really, really excited about this and it’s going really well.”

Growth has been a positive for Loon Liquors and it has also created a situation where Schiller and Rossi are looking to possibly move into a large facility that would help increase production and provide more square footage for the cocktail room area.

“We are busting at the gills right now with not much space to expand at our current location,” Schiller said. “We are looking at potential expansion and looking at another location in Northfield and hopefully we will know in a next few months about that. Our primary focus is to increase production capacity and our second focus would be tourism and visibility…to help bring people into town who are passionate about delicious spirits.”

For more details, check out the Loon Liquors website at loonliquors.com or call 507-5817527.

10,000 Drops Craft Distillery, Faribault

The 10,000 Drops Craft Distillers opened up shop in downtown Faribault five years ago in the historic four-story Peterson Art Furniture building. Childhood friends Jake Hvistendahl, Pat Jacobs and Rob Kruchoski spent three years renovating location and started producing spirits and operating the 10,000 Drops cocktail room in 2018.

“My dad bought this building complex back in the 1990s,” Hvistendahl said. Having this building available to do the built out and knowing it super well, it made sense to be down here. The city of Faribault has been very easy to work with in terms of helping us get open and making sure we got all the laws changed that needed to because craft distilleries were new. We wanted to create a place that is very comfortable and I think it has been received that way.”

The welcoming cocktail room offer a unique and comfortable vibe that incorporates an industrial feel thanks to the use of repurposed materials from the building’s past. Old windows were used to make a two-story wall and floor joists helped build the room’s bar. In the warmer months, a patio connects with the popular Corks and Pints Wine Bar and Tap House.

Live music is on the schedule on Fridays and Saturdays on the patio during the summer months and during the winter, the music moves inside to Corks and Pints. Food trucks are another 10,000 Drops staple and are typically available most days.

The drink menu at 10,000 Drops features a variety of unique cocktails and non-alcoholic options for customers. The drink menu changes on a regular basis and this includes two slushy type of drinks that rotate every other week to help beat the summer heat.

“There are at least two cocktails on the menu for every spirit we have that we rotate through, and we can also do NA variations of those too,” Hvistendahl said. “We also can pretty much do any type of cocktail but we have to be make all of the liquor or anything alcoholic that is behind the bar…so we can’t do something like a Manhattan because we don’t make vermouth.”

The variety and creativity offered by 10,000 Drops is one of the attractions for customers to the craft distillery experience.

“The big national brands are not bringing anything new to the market,” Hvistendahl said. “So people that are into cocktails and spirits know that we have to be creative and keep our menu changing. People come here because they want new stuff and want to try something new, or maybe they are into a certain spirit category and they want to try something out.”

The size of the operation at 10,000 Drops allows for this type of production flexibility and creativity, as opposed to larger companies that may be hampered by the size of their production line.

“We can basically switch up what we are making every week. We can do a lot of different things with our batch system,” Hvistendahl said.

10,000 Drops offers a full line of liquors created at their location in Faribault, which includes their Local Vodka, gin, rum and whiskey. At the recent American Distilling Institute spirts competitors in 2023, 10,000 Drops won a gold medal for its single barrel bourbon along with bronze medals for its barrel aged Navy gin and its barrel aged rum.

Aged for four years in barrels stored on the fourth floor of the Peterson Art Furniture building, the award winner bourbon was recently released by 10,000 Drops last fall.

“In October, we started releasing our bourbon and our aged rum after four years in a barrel. We have single barrel bourbon and that is probably our most sought after product right now,” Hvistendahl said. “We chose to wait a full four years before releasing. Every single release of it will be a different barrel and most likely will be a different proof, and there will be different flavors that will pop just based on it being a single barrel product.”

He added, “Bourbon itself is the most in demand category for high-end spirits in the market. It is something that people know well and can easily connect with.” coming online after the four-year aging process. With the exception of cane sugar used to make the rum, 10,000 Drops strives to use locally sourced ingredients in its products.

“Crosswinds (farm) is just about five miles away from here and they grow our corn and wheat that we use in the bourbon,” Hvistendahl said. “They also take back all of our spent grain and rum wash to use for fertilizer. We work closely with them.”

Aside from having a drink at the cocktail room in Faribault, 10,000 Drops created products are available at liquors stores across the state. 10,000 Drops has recently added College City Beverage out of Dundas as one of its distributors, which will help place the product in stores in southern Minnesota.

Not So Far Away

With the continued interest in craft distillery products and the comfortable cocktail room experience, Hvistendahl sees a positive future for 10,000 Drops in downtown Faribault.

Other distillery options near the area include Harmony Spirits in Harmony, Minn. and RockFilter Distillery in Spring Grove, Minn. There are over 20 distilleries in the Twin Cities metro area including Flying Dutchman Spirits in Eden Prairie and J. Carver Distillery in Waconia.

10,000 Drops is one of the few distilleries that offers a four year bottled and bond aged rum, and that is another product that is now just

“Since we opened five years ago, we made it through a pandemic, so I think we will be around for awhile. It just figuring out how to scale smartly and keep expanding the business and distribution,” Hvistendahl said. For more details, check out the 10,000 Drops website at 10000drops.com or call 507838-0383. 

Tom Nelson is a freelance writer. Reach the editor at editor@ apgsomn.com.