9 minute read
Eddie Brook
RAINFOREST RE-GIN-ERATION
Most of us head to Byron Bay for its kaleidoscope of breath-taking beaches, organic-chic cafés and colourful locals. Cradled in rolling hinterland, you could be forgiven for thinking this playground for the rich and famous already has everything to offer. But on a recent trip (and in search of a solution to the familiar drizzle!) we were pleased to discover a quiet achiever in the Cape Byron Distillery. So pleased, in fact, we just might be ready to move there for good!
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NICE AND SLOE…OR IS IT SLOW?
Approximately 20 minutes’ drive from Byron Bay proper, Cape Byron Distillery sits nestled amongst sweeping macadamia orchards and lush rainforest. Established in November 2016 by the Brook family, the distillery seems an inevitable evolution of a 30-year legacy, which already lends its name to a thriving natural goods business, built on the mission of rainforest regeneration.
We say inevitable, because experiencing Cape Byron Distillery – already making a mark with those in the know with its Brookie’s Gin – is a complete sensory delight, borne of the family’s decades of rainforest regeneration. Botanicals such as wild raspberries, native lilly pilly and native ginger, given life through years of regeneration efforts, flavour both the gin and the winding paths about the distillery, growing freely to sample on the guided tour. Davidson plums, odd, furry and sour on first approach, delight in the distillery’s awarding winning Brookie’s Slow Gin, a take on the traditional English sloe gin. Australia’s only gin safe is a further nod to tradition, requiring attention to detail to get the portion of bottled distillate just so. But there’s no pretense here, just a subtle savoir-faire that comes from delicately, carefully, planning and balancing the needs of a commercial enterprise with an enduring legacy of preservation.
Day-to-day I’m not a gin drinker per se, but having tasted the connection to the landscape that characterises Brookie’s Gin, we must recommend Cape Byron Distillery as a quintessentially Byron experience.
Read on as we chat with Eddie Brook, co-founder and distiller at Cape Byron Distillery.
Davidson Plums, weeks away from harvest
Davidson plums in preperation for Brookie’s Slow Gin
explore DRINKS: First of all, share with us your history in the alcohol industry.
Eddie Brook: My working life started after university when I got the opportunity to work as an ambassador in Brisbane, looking after brands such as Bruichladdich and The Botanist Gin. After many years, I was given the opportunity to go to Sydney and work in the head office at SouthTrade. I was there for about three years and worked as everything, from marketing assistant, to sales and brand management. So my whole working life has been in the spirits industry.
It was during that period that I met Jim McEwan and this idea came about - to create an amazing business right in my backyard, crafting spirits.
eD: You’ve left the corporate world to start up your own gin brand, was this always a long-term goal of yours?
EB: I always knew one day I’d be back here in Byron, but I’d probably be lying if I told you I knew it would be this early on in my career. I come from a family that is very passionate about our product and what we produce, so the idea of being able to create something with my family has always been there. Living in Byron Bay with this as my backdrop, I’m very humbled.
eD: What do you think is fundamental when building a brand?
EB: I think what’s fundamental is knowing what you stand for. For me, our brand is about family. What really drives us is our work with the rainforest. It’s important to tell people about what we’ve done for the rainforest (the 35,000 trees that we’ve replanted) and about where we pull a lot of our flavours from. But we’re not just stopping there. We give a percentage of our profits to the Big Scrub Foundation and we also have a few projects in mind for the future. Our brand is a medium for us to educate people about the rainforest, the importance of regeneration and what Australia used to be like. It’s about the connection to the land and strong family values, plus a bit of fun and craziness along the way.
eD: In building the brand and company, what’s been harder than you initially thought?
EB: I suppose from being in the industry, I had a good idea/sense of how long things would take. Everything we’re doing is from the ground up. We’re not here to go huge overnight. We don’t want to be available through the biggest retailers in Australia; we want to tell our story and to tell it right. It’s about working hard every day to grow our brand. The time it takes to establish a brand I knew about, but it would be good to be able to hit that fast- forward button.
As well as that, it’s investing time and dollars, and doing it in the right way. If you’ve got a dollar value in mind for expenditures, add at least 20 per cent on to it. Know your dollars, know your costs and know where your breakevens are. Even though we’re growing slowly, we’re on track to where we want to be.
Eddie Brook, co-founder and distiller at Cape Byron Distillery
eD: Out of all the spirits, why did you choose gin?
EB: It’s a bit of a no-brainer. All you need to do is spend 20 minutes with me walking through the rainforest, and I’ll show you. I’m very passionate about the rainforest, but also my upbringing has been with the flavours of this area.
I’ve tried to provide a snapshot of my upbringing in the rainforest in the flavour by using 26 different botanicals, 18 of which are unique and native to the Northern Rivers, many coming straight from our rainforest. It’s a real snapshot of what we’re about here, showcasing all those flavours in one product.
eD: Your family are involved in the distillery, have there been any challenges working together?
EB: You all have to share that passion for what you do. Ever since I was eight years old, when my parents started Brook Farm, we’ve been a family business. That’s created a drive in us to continue as a generational family business. That’s our plan, to be here for the long haul. We don’t want to, nor will we ever, sell to any large businesses. I get a kick out of the idea that by four generations time, we could build a really strong brand that could hopefully travel around the world. EB: I wear many hats - from marketing, to looking after sales, to distilling and production. From the marketing side of things, I’ve been doing a bit of work with a Crowdfunding campaign to get some dollars in the door, as well as get our story out there. One of the beautiful things about making gin is that I can distill and make the product, but then also get out there on the road and ‘beat our drum.’ I get to do this with the most amazing team. We all share the roles and responsibilities. I could never do this alone; it would just crumble. It’s a beautiful thing, working with like-minded, passionate people. We’re building a strong team and, hopefully, it will grow and grow.
eD: How long was Jim with you for?
EB: When I first met Jim we did a four-week tour of Australia. That’s where the idea for
the distillery came about, and two years from that day, Jim flew back to Australia and worked with us for a few months. He arrived as the still was getting installed, and we immediately got down to business. He created The Botanist Gin, so he might know a thing or two about making spirits. He’d never worked with, or tasted, or touched any native Australian flavours, so it was really a bringing together of two worlds. It took a little while to get that right, but we started with some pretty strong foundations in terms of our knowledge of Aussie flavours and how we could potentially balance those flavours to create a world-class gin.
eD: You’ve said before you have a spirit safe? What exactly is this?
EB: I do! I can guarantee you could walk into any distillery in Australia and you won’t see one. For me, it’s one of our most important parts of machinery, or kit, because it grounds us in tradition. A spirit safe is used throughout distilleries in the UK and the world, the idea being that the spirit is under lock and key. There is a padlock on each side, with the customs officer having the key to one padlock and the master distiller having the key to the other. This was so the government could monitor and manage the amount of spirit produced, to ensure that the workers in the distillery weren’t pinching any. It was purely a control method put in place to monitor the amount of alcohol produced, so they could then tax accordingly. For us, even though it’s not really in use in Australia, having a spirits safe grounds us in traditional methods. It’s a symbol of what we do here, employing some of the best of the old world traditions and marrying them with new world flavours that haven’t been used before.
Brookie’s Gin & Tonic
eD: Are there any new expressions from the ‘Dry and Slow’ range coming out soon?
Spirit Safe
EB: There certainly will be! Hopefully it will be out locally, in the Northern Rivers region, by the end of the year. Fingers crossed! It will be a macadamia nut liqueur made from the nuts of the macadamia trees that surround us now. We’re macadamia farmers, that’s what we do, and there’s so much flavour from the nut itself that we’re exploring and are excited to showcase. We’re also planning on the release of a few other products, including a limoncello based off native citrus fruits to the area. We’re also thinking of dipping our toes in the water and doing a bit of whisky next year.
eD: And finally, what would you like your enduring legacy to be?
EB: I’d like people to come to the distillery, learn about gin and get excited about it. But the most important message, the one I’d get the biggest kick out of them taking away, is the importance of working with the rainforest and regenerating the once abundant vegetation we had in this area. It’s achievable and it doesn’t take a lifetime. Hopefully, we can get that across with our spirits, through people enjoying what we make and talking about it. It’s pretty exciting that we can educate people about the rainforests but through a medium that is enjoyed in bars around the world. I think if we can achieve that, then that would give me the ultimate satisfaction.
