In The Weeds

I

n this edition of In The Weeds we’re going to have a little history lesson. We are heading over to 110 and 112 Riberia Street, what used to be one address now is two. This was a necessity for what currently stands there to work at the time of opening. Let’s go back a few years, shall we?

Built in 1905 as Florida’s first power and ice complex, both being relatively new to be so readily available. Ice was an incredibly necessary commodity to the fleets of shrimp boats that worked these waters so that they could store and ship their fresh seafood, the demand was 125 tons of ice a day. Move forward a hundred years and you have this fabulous historic building that was just the right size to make a dream come true, the St. Augustine Distillery at one address and The Ice Plant bar and bottle shop next door. So here you have a bustling distillery, producing vodka, gin, rum, and Florida’s first legal bourbon since prohibition. Distillery tours run every half hour, it has been named the number one whisky distillery tour in the US. With tastings conducted on the bottle shop side and Saint Augustine’s most noteworthy craft cocktail bar upstairs. Then in the belly of the beast you find with every passing tour coming through, he has a quick wit and a welcoming personality, Saint Augustine’s own Bourbon Baron, Clark M. Gilmore. We caught up with Clark and asked our usual panel of interview questions.

LOF How did you get started in the business? Clark I started off in retail and did that for a while and wound up working at a liquor store. All of a sudden people started asking questions about the products that we sold and so that’s where I got a lot of my product knowledge and started making all kinds of different drinks. After building up a certain amount of knowledge the next thing that made sense was to work at the local distillery and I wound up at St. Augustine Distilling. LOF I think it was Albert Einstein that said "if you can't explain it simply, maybe you don't understand it well enough" Clark Exactly! One of the things that I learned from Dave Pickerel is the best way to bring someone to your level of understanding is to relate it to things that are familiar to the masses; baking, cooking, cocktails and distilling are not that much different. You connect the pieces, and go from there. No matter how good you are there are concepts that you relate to everyday life. LOF Well I would say that distilling is closer to baking, it is a science, you don't get all of the ingredients right, you run into trouble. Okay Clark, what is your go-to drink order? Clark It really depends more on the season than anything. In the winter time I really like my bitters heavy old fashioned, in the summer though I love a good gold rush. I’m not a big fan of running to the liquor sore for a half dozen ingredients. A gold rush is just super easy. I always have honey and lemon juice. I ALWAYS have bourbon (he chuckled). Other than that I love a good New York sour, the citrus and the dry red wine. When I am feeling a little bit fancier I like a boulevardier… I love those. LOF I’m more of a situational drinker. If I’m at a ballgame, I’m drinking beer. Okay so we just talked about some cocktail modifiers, so here is the question: Deserted island you get three bottles, unlimited supply of those three? Clark Three bottles of anything, lets see… I would have to say sweet vermouth, there is an Italian liquor that I really like called Bollini and probably a wheated bourbon. LOF Well, there you go, so you have boulevardier riffs and manhattan riffs Clark Plus some stuff to ease the tummy a little bit, that Bolliini

LOF Ok, how about your hangover cure? Clark My hangover usually focuses on my stomach more than my head, so I like some ginger tea, honey or even fresh ginger, honey and hot water almost like a cider and if it's really bad a little hair of the dog, a little bourbon added! Other than that, a shot of angostura bitters. LOF Morning beverage, do you drink coffee or tea? Clark It really depends on who is making the coffee, some coworkers like to really make it muddy and at that point it's fuel and I don't need that much fuel. In that case I do prefer tea, but if I make it myself I do like a good cup of coffee. LOF How about some of your favorite spots in town? Clark Well, of course there is the Ice Plant, it's right upstairs from the distillery, the bartenders there are fantastic… a really wide array of drinks that they make there. Next on the list is Prohibition Kitchen, especially what they do with their deviled eggs. One of my favorites was barbecue pork and green apple slices, which sounded completely bizarre, but it worked. I think I had three plates of that. The Taco Shop is great for late night food, great tacos and right next to Dos Gatos is Scarlett O'Haras, a great place as well. I mean you can throw a rock almost anywhere and hit a great place, they won't be happy about the rock but you know. LOF Well, the next one is just a spin on this one, what is your only in Saint Augustine day, you're showing off your town, where do you go? Clark I would say don't go too heavy in one place, you want to experience so many different places with different aesthetics and vibes, different experiences. I would tell someone to start at one end of town and work your way towards the other. Find out a bar that the locals enjoy, we talked about a few here. Each bar is going to have totally different cocktails of course, some that you are familiar with, some classic prohibition style. I encourage people to read the ingredients and see what the bartenders are coming up with. They’re not just throwing stuff together, they are using their senses to craft these cocktails with love. Some bartenders may even be willing to share some of their secrets. LOF What are some ingredients that you are excited about right now? It’s been a strange couple of years, a lot of things have been going on. There have been some breweries that when COVID19 hit and the tap rooms shut down they turned their beers over to distilleries to distill into whiskey… which those are aging now. Clark Yes there is one in particular, one up north called Sons of Liberty Brewing that has been doing this for awhile. They have a whiskey distilled from a stout beer that has some of the characteristics of a stout, very interesting. One of the things that I’m very excited about is what’s going on in the whiskey world, especially straight whiskey. There are a lot of restrictions in the standards of identity of what you can and cannot do with straight whiskey. But within the confines of those restrictions they are doing some really cool things. LOF Who do you look up to in the industry, you mentioned Dave Pickerel earlier, he has and always will be in the mix for my facebook cover photo. I have never met anyone quite like him! Clark I have thought long and hard on this one about someone that I could still talk to today and I don't think that I will ever find anyone even a portion as knowledgeable or as welcoming as Dave. LOF You are absolutely right, Dave was more than a legend, they say that he was a savant when it came to his craft, but his personality was the best part. He had a way of making everyone in the room know that they were his favorite person. LOF Final question, what makes the juice worth the squeeze? What makes it all worthwhile? What do you do for fun? Clark Family and friends honestly. The people that you meet in the industry, getting to share your passion with others and knowledge with strangers that you meet and that when they leave they are no longer strangers.

Well, we really enjoyed sitting down with St. Augustine Distillery’s own Bourbon Baron and highly suggest that you go and visit him at the distillery. Their ‘fill your own bottle’ program is a perfect personal gift for the upcoming holiday season.

I hope that you’ve enjoyed this issue’s In The Weeds, I look forward to sharing stories again with you soon.

Cheers! n