Another Round of Distillery Tours

Thanks to the magic of Groupon, I was able to redeem a terrible experience with a tour vendor in New Orleans last summer for three fantastic local distillery tours. My really good friend (that’s Bea this time) and her crew joined me one Saturday earlier in the summer to explore these three distilleries; however, we had to raincheck the third distillery until the day after the Summer Solstice Party.

Thanks to the state distillery guide that we received at the second distillery, we discovered another local distillery that was very close to both Bea and me. In fact, it was so close that Bea accidentally discovered the building on her normal weekly rounds. So we decided to add that to our post-Summer Solstice adventure. With a plan in place, we decided to meet at Bea’s house and go as a group to the two distilleries.

The Liquor Distillery

We started the adventure with brunch at the diner in town. Unfortunately, during brunch, Bea’s sister checked the state distillery guide and discovered that the local distillery was only open on Saturdays. Seeing it was a Sunday, we redid our plan to only include the distillery for which I had a Groupon. We would raincheck the local distillery to another time.

The liquor distillery was north near the airport, so it wasn’t too bad of a drive. Shortly after we turned off the interstate, I recognized the back road we were on: it was the route that I take back from the brewery where I get the growlers filled for family holidays. Sure enough, we could see the brewery from the intersection with the main road. The brewery was a left turn and the distillery was a right turn. There was another left turn off the main road, but, all said and done, the distillery was very easy to find.

When we got to the distillery, we checked in with the bartender for the tour of the operation. She offered us the choice of two cocktails to sip on while we were waiting: a version of a hard Arnold Palmer and a rum punch. Two of us got the Arnold Palmer and two of us got the rum punch. The Arnold Palmer tasted like spiked lemonade, which was okay by me. The rum punch tasted like apple cider with cinnamon in it. We all were expecting it to taste more like the Hurricane that Bea’s sister mixed for my party the night before.

However, we weren’t there for the cocktails. We were there to see the operations and taste their various liquors. The operations were pretty impressive. Unlike the other two distilleries we had visited, they had two gigantic stainless steel pot stills, three stainless steel fermentation tanks, and another tank whose purpose I forget. Their operations started with local winter wheat, which they ground onsite before putting into the pot stills for their first run. Tony, our tour guide, was very knowledgeable and explained things in such depth that it was impossible for me to remember anything without taking notes (which I didn’t do because I didn’t want to embarrass my friends). What struck me as most interesting was how they made their coffee liquor. All they did to make that was to lower the proof of their vodka with cold brew coffee instead of spring water. So it wasn’t a liqueur because there was no sugar added. I thought that was pretty cool! Based on my experience with the tea liqueur tasting panel, I had to ask Tony what experiments were they working on. When he mentioned that they had been working on a maple bacon whiskey, there was a collective groan among our crew. They love all three items separately, so the three together would have been heavenly!

While at the distillery, we tasted a total of eight different products: vodka, gin, spiced rum, honey jalapeño whiskey, maple bacon whiskey, Special Batch Whiskey, Spicy XIII vodka, coffee liquor. That wasn’t too overwhelming because we had a few before the distillery tour, and some afterward. Also, the samples were just a scant amount in a small plastic thimble glass. And Bea was driving rather than sampling, which we love her for. Surprisingly, the honey jalapeño whiskey was preferred to the maple bacon whiskey, despite what may have been a bit of giddiness when the bartender announced that the maple bacon whiskey was being poured as a sample. Of course, the ladies did have to reminisce about the time when I won Battle Bacon with my Bacon Baileys liqueur.

I did walk out of the distillery with a bottle of their coffee liquor for someone who enjoys espresso martinis. I though this might be a superior alternative to the Van Gogh Double Espresso Vodka that she currently uses in her espresso martinis because of how simply it is made. I don’t know what the Van Gogh tastes like, but the sample that I had at the distillery really smelled and tasted like good coffee.

Since the distillery is on the same road as the brewery, I could easily see myself adding a visit there to my growler missions. I think my sister could really enjoy using the Spicy XIII vodka in the Bloody Marys that she makes for holiday brunch.

The Liqueur Distillery

I was in the mood for an adventure the following Saturday, so I set my sights on doing a mini tour by myself. I figured that if I hit some fun spots I could go back again with Bea and her crew.

Although I had a really good plan for my tour, it failed almost immediately. Because my house was cleaned for the Summer Solstice Party, I had put the distillery trail brochure in a really good place. Of course, I couldn’t remember where that place was! I tried to find the information about the tasting room at the local liqueur distillery online. Despite all the creative searches that I put into Google and Siri, there was nothing coming up. So I left the house blind, with just the memory of where Bea had pointed out the industrial park as we passed it on the highway above.

Thanks to a very visual memory, I was able to find the industrial park that Bea had pointed to. It was pretty massive and very industrial! It wasn’t obvious where in the park the distillery was, so I drove super slow on the road (there was no one behind me) in order to examine the signage. When I reached the end of the road, I hadn’t seen anything. So I turned into the industrial park at the end, figuring that I could ask the guard in the shack when he stopped me. But the shack was unattended. I drove into and all around that end of the industrial park to no avail. However, when I pulled into a parking spot to do a k-turn out of there, I saw a little blue sign for “The Blue Room” on the road. It had a martini glass on it, so I figured I would get out of that section of the industrial park and see where the signs took me. They pointed into an earlier area of the industrial park, which looked like the parking lot for a bindery. No luck there either. Until I stopped at the edge of the parking lot, which lead steeply down hill. At the bottom of the hill, I could just about make out another blue sign with a martini glass. This time it was over a door! I gingerly drove downhill and parked next to another vehicle. That seemed to be a good sign. Alas, when I tried the door, it was locked!

I fully intended to head to a cider works after I left the industrial park, but I forgot to put the address into my navigation system. Just as I was about to turn onto the highway access road and fake the directions, I saw a sign for Liquor Depot. An idea struck: I could go in there, see if they had a bottle of the liqueur, and then ask the cashier if he or she knew where in town was the distillery. I was pretty pleased with myself for thinking of that.

Alas, the cashier was not as cooperative as I had hoped. He didn’t even know that the liqueur was made in town, and suggested that I check the internet. After I told him that it didn’t work, a more helpful employee took it upon herself to run a Google search on her cell phone. We stepped aside to let Mr. Grumpy Pants do his thing. She looked at the bottle I had just bought and confirmed that it was indeed made in town. We chatted a bit about the different craft distilleries in the state. She educated me that they all reached the liquor stores and restaurants through distributors, and that the only way they could sell alcohol to the public was through an on premises tasting room. Unfortunately, all of her Google searches led to the same dead ends that I had encountered, so I thanked her profusely and walked to my car. This time I made sure to set the navigation system before I took the vehicle out of park.

The Cider Works

Completely by accident, Bea discovered the existence of the cider works near me. While she was at work, she was stopped by a woman who asked her whether she had been at a very specific bar the week before. She had been, and the two fell into conversation about the bar. The conversation progressed until the woman disclosed that she and her husband operated a cider works in the same town. They chatted a bit more about the cider works and went their separate ways. Shortly after the conversation, Bea dashed off a very excited email to me and the crew informing us of her awesome discovery.

I did do a bit of online research on the cider works before I left the house on my adventure. It too was in an industrial park, but it sounded like that industrial park had long since been repurposed as there were also two breweries located in it. I knew roughly where the industrial park was relative to Main Street, so I could definitely stay downtown for dinner if the timing worked out right. They seemed to have a lengthy list of ciders on tap, including a Spanish sidra and some interesting fruit infusions. They all seemed so good, that it would be difficult for me to choose one when (if?) I got there after the liqueur distillery.

Using my navigation system didn’t save me from making a wrong turn downtown and going over the river to the next town. Fortunately, the U-turn for the bridge was very simple and I made the turn with no problem on my second pass. At the end of the road, I had a bit of a panic: my navigation system said that the destination was on my right and there was nothing but a parking lot with a few tractor trailers in it. Two disappointments in one day!!!

However, I needed some place to turn around and head back up the road. I continued straight, crossed over a set of railroad tracks, and on my right was an old industrial building! When I turned into the parking lot, I could see a food truck all the way at the end of the building. About midway, there was a “Open” flag and a sandwich board out on the front step. As I drove by the flag, I could see the logo of the cider works on the door. I parked by the food truck, which was outside of one brewery, and then walked down to the flag, which was outside another brewery. Sure enough, inside, there was another sandwich board pointing down the hall to the cider works.

The cider works was very quiet when I walked in; there were two customers on their way out, and two folks behind the bar. Naturally, I struck up a conversation with the woman, who turned out to be the same woman who met Bea in the hallway at work. The gentleman asked me if I had a favorite cider, and I said that it was hard to know because I’ve only had commercial ciders, which pretty much all tasted alike. All the ciders were made in house, behind the bar that had been set up in the space. Aside from the pineapple and the ingredients in their two Spanish style offerings, they only used local fruit in their ciders. Local, of course, being defined as a forty mile radius of the cider works.

Eventually, I got around to ordering. Kim, the woman behind the bar, recommended that I try a flight of either four or six varieties. That took me a moment to figure out because I did have to drive somewhere after here, and I wasn’t sure whether there would be enough at the cider works to entertain me for more than an hour. I did have a book on copyrights in my purse, but I really wasn’t in the mood to read that. So I decided on four tastings. Kim poured me a small taste of the Spanish sidra - made from apples imported from Spain - to see if I wanted that added to my flight. It was definitely a bit funky! I liked it, but I was interested in trying something a little more middle of the road. So Kim skipped that in my flight and went for the Spanish pera instead.

In the end, I ended up with tastings of Tepache Mode, Somewhat Dry, Love Shouldn’t Hurt, and Pera. They were all phenomenal in their own way. Tepache Mode was wild fermented pineapple and apples with spices, but the flavors blended so nicely that I didn’t really get the strong sweetness that I might have expected from the pineapple. The Somewhat Dry was a single varietal cider made from local Northern Spy apples. That was a bit too crisp for me to want to drink an entire pint of it, but it was still very enjoyable as a tasting. The Love Shouldn’t Hurt was perhaps my favorite of the apple ciders. It was mildly sweet - even though the placard said it would be dry - and I didn’t really taste the strawberry and the rhubarb. The Pera was my favorite of the batch because it was also on the sweeter, and very different.

When I was about halfway done with my tastings, the gentleman walked over to me and presented me with a tasting of their Middle of the Blueberry cider, which was a semisweet cider with blueberries. I really liked that one for its mild sweetness. It didn’t really taste of blueberry to me, but it was definitely an enjoyable pour. The best part about that, though, was that the gentleman stayed to talk with me for a bit about the cider works.

The building that the cider works was located was formerly a motorcycle factory, and then it was a bicycle factory, so the name was a nod to the history of the building. They also favor Northern Spy apples, which provides the other half of the name. The gentleman discovered cider while living in London as a college student and, when he came back to the United States, was disappointed by the ciders that he found. He studied cider making in New York (at Cornell) and in Washington State (I forget where). Before opening the cider works, he wrote for newspapers, magazines, and trade publications about cider. In fact, the cider works was going to be closed the Saturday after Independence Day because he was going to give a talk on cider in Washington, DC.

As I was leaving the cider works, I noticed how busy it had gotten. All the seats, except the two near me, had been filled with others standing at the bar. I’d definitely be back to the cider works again - if only to buy growlers for family holidays - but I’d have to be careful about when I go to avoid the crowds!

The Verdict

The second round of distillery tours with Bea and her crew was a lot of fun. The tour was informative and the operation was impressive, but the group bonding overshadowed all of that. The adventure I went on by myself was also a lot of fun; I can only imagine how much the ladies are going to laugh when they hear about my misadventures in their local industrial park! And now that I know how to get to the cider works, I’ll definitely be back with the crew and back again to fill growlers for the holidays.