Bookshelf: Micro-Distilleries in the US and Canada

In 2011, more than 250 craft distilleries dotted the American distilling landscape. Fewer than half of these are listed in David J. Reimer’s 2011 purported guidebook on the same.

Oh, sure, you’ll find profiles on distilleries familiar to modern American drinkers. There’s Tuthilltown, St. George Spirits, Piedmont Distillers, and Celebration Distillation (makers of Old New Orleans Rum). But where are the magisterial brandies of Osocalis? The award-winning peach and pear brandies of Peach Street Distillers? Want to know more about Salvatore Cimino’s game-changing poitin? Look elsewhere. They aren’t here. Clear Creek Distillery, perhaps the original modern American craft distillery, is on page...oh, wait. No. Nevermind. It’s not included. How about the 2012 edition? Nope. Not there, either.

Profiles of distilleries that did make the cut include the name of each, the owners’ names, contact information, websites, social media accounts where applicable, the types of spirits produced, awards, and other details that help to flesh out our understanding of each.

To say that the guide is incomplete — while true — misses the larger point: the book’s value is marginal at best. Missing punctuation, inconsistent layout, and phantom words that appear as if vestiges of earlier versions of the same sentence collude to make it seem as if the manuscript had not been proofread.

The photos and logos are of such low resolution that they give the impression of merely having been lifted from websites. Many very clearly have been. In fact — and here is its most grievous flaw — the feel of the entire book is of one that’s been cobbled together from press releases, newspaper articles, and sell sheets. Readers are treated to chestnuts like this: “Pear Brandy is made from the freshest pears grown in the Hudson Valley.” Why does that seem so familiar? Oh, yeah: it’s lifted nearly verbatim from the website of Harvest Spirits, maker of the brandy in question.

This begs the question: what makes a pear “fresh?” Further, of what value is a fresh pear compared to one that’s less “fresh” (whatever that means)? Here’s a great opportunity to educate readers — just a brief sidebar — on the aging or curing of fruits that some distilleries do before pressing. Apples can be stored before pressing; pears tend not to be. Why?

Don’t look here for the answer (or even the question). Instead, we get uncritical regurgitation of advertising copy.

While I don't know this to be true, there's no sense at all that the author has actually tasted any of the spirits. Yes, there are tasting notes, but they are generic and once more feel culled from others rather than experienced. Recipes for mixed drinks using the spirits are included at many points, but we are given ounces, oz, cups, “parts,” “shots,” and other diverse measurements. This suggests that they were taken at face value from other sources, sometimes credited, sometimes not.

Clip. Paste. Repeat.

A guidebook for American craft distilleries is a fantastic idea, but we don’t have one yet. While I deeply admire many of the companies and distillers profiled in Reimer’s book, my advice to readers interested in the American craft distilling scene is to save your money and download the American Distilling Institute’s far more complete directory (for free; PDF is here) then visit the websites of each distilling company that interests you. I’ll wager you find a lot of the same copy, anyway.

David J. Reimer, Sr. (2011)
Micro-Distilleries in the US and Canada
301 pages (paperback)
Sunbury Press
ISBN-13: 9781934597439
$24.95

Stick to the Cratur

It's no secret I'm fond of the cratur. The what? You might recognize it as the creature, short for one of the good creatures of the Lord. Still not ringing any bells? Oh, ok. Whiskey. Irish whiskey and specifically poitin, the homemade liquor still made in the west of Ireland, despite the common notion in both Dublin and Belfast that the stuff is no longer made.

Unless your ears are tuned to Irish dialects, cratur is an odd word. Here with just such a say-what? Irish accent is singer Tom Lenihan from 1967. The lyrics as posted on YouTube are not quite what he's singing, so I corrected them below. I think.



Let your quacks and newspapers be quotin’ their capers
About curing the vapors, the scratch, and the gout.
With their powders and potions, their serums and lotions
Upholding their notions, they're mighty put out.

We don’t know the true physic of all things prophetic
And pitch to the divil, cramp, colic, and spleen.
You'll find it I think if you take a big drink
With your mouth to the brink of a jug of poteen.

Then stick to the cratur the best thing in nature
For sinking your sorrows and raising your joys.
Oh what moderation or dose in the nation
Can give consolation like whiskey, me boys?

Come guess me this riddle, what beats pipe and fiddles
What's stronger than mustard and milder than cream?
What best wets your whistle, what's clearer than crystal,
Sweeter than honey and stronger than steam?

What will make the dumb talk, what will make the lame walk?
What’s the elixir of life and philosopher's stone?
And what helped Mr. Brunel to dig the Thames Tunnel
Sure, wasn't it whiskey from ould Inishowen?

Then stick to the cratur the best thing in nature
For sinking your sorrows and raising your joys.
Oh lord, I’d not wonder, if lightning and thunder
Weren't made from the plunder of whiskey, me boys.

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Bookshelf: The Sovereign People are in a Beastly State

Inishowen swarms with private stills
and an active person is necessary
to suppress them.

~ 1750’s parliamentary report

With St. Patrick’s Day fast approaching, let’s talk about Irish whiskey. For now, the illicit kind.

At almost 300 pages before the index, Aiden Manning’s 2003 account of illicit distilling in Donegal, a single Ulster county perched in the very northwest of Ireland, is a work of love. Or possibly an historian’s obsession with liquor and those who make it in secret. His densely packed and thoroughly annotated pages are underscored by tales familiar to those who follow moonshine narratives in America—killings, beatings, corrupt police, high-minded reformers, and clergy whose sermons railing against local distillers may in fact be fueled by the products of clandestine stills.

If the stories are somehow familiar, it is no doubt because Ulster, that province so rife with strife for hundreds of years, hosted an ingrained culture of smalltime distilling. Many Ulstermen (and women) who migrated to Pennsylvania in the 18th century subsequently migrated south along the Appalachians, where mountain distilling took on a distinctly Irish cast that continues to this day. Even the distilling vocabulary of Irish poitin-makers aligns with that of American moonshiners. Those interested in Appalachian distilling would do well to look to its Irish antecedents and parallel developments: Donegal Poitin fills the role nicely.

Manning looks at the products of private distilling (that is, poitin or Irish moonshine) from its early years through the 1850’s when Ireland’s revenue police disbanded and the aftermath of a series of famines diverted official attention from the matter. He reviews in meticulous detail evolving legislation against poitin as the Irish try to come to grips with the moral, economic, and theological ramifications of endemic private distilling.

For most of the period he covers, illicit distilling truly was endemic and startling, given the number of small stills seized, destroyed, and sometimes put to use by shady revenue agents. To back up his claims about the ubiquity of illegal distilling, Manning taps voluminous records of revenue agents, governmental ministers and magistrates, and court officers as well as old deeds and private accounts from the National Archives of Ireland, Trinity College, the British Library, and other venerable collections. It is, admittedly, sometimes dry reading.

But stick with it and an image emerges of centuries-old battle of wits between those who would uphold revenue laws and seemingly every man, woman, and child in the county hellbent on either making or selling whiskey. Manning’s first words, in fact, are “I am deeply indebted to illicit distilling, as without it, I would probably not exist.” His father, a Garda (or policeman), had been sent to Connemara to suppress poitin-making while his mother was there to teach knitting as an alternate skill. We are fortunate that their efforts to quash the practice led to a damn fine celebration of it.

Despite the charts and facts and figures, Donegal Poitin is indeed a celebration of the Donegal people distilling barley, sometimes oats, and very rarely potatoes into spiritus loci. Distilling kept the Ulsterfolk through all but the hardest of times and, despite crushing poverty, Manning paints many locals as (mostly) honest people beset by corrupt revenue agents spurred on by poorly-planned and special interest-sponsored legislation.

Herein, revenue agents are not villains per se: as in America, local constabulary are often portrayed as sympathetic to distillers’ needs while poorly-paid officers dispatched from other areas widely lacked such sympathy and often turned to bribery, thuggery, and sometimes outright murder to earn what they could. The 1830’s reforms enacted by Colonel William Brereton cut almost 2/3 of the revenue police as incompetent, corrupt, and more of a danger to the populace than the distillers they were charged with to put down. Though the revenue police disbanded officially about twenty years after this, the professional code of conduct Brereton established greatly improved the respect such officers commanded—at least when they were within sight. The light of the moon may have revealed an entirely different story.


Donegal Poitin: A History
Aiden Manning (2003)
Donnegal Printing Company
Letterkenny
€13.95

Goes well with:

A Whiskey Forge review of John McGuffin’s In Praise of Poteen.

Review: In Praise of Poteen

Throughout the book

I have spelt the word ‘poitín.’
This is the correct Irish spelling;
the reason for the emasculated
‘poteen’ on the cover
is my publisher’s idea.

~ John McGuffin
In Praise of Poteen

During the Troubles (Na Trioblóidí), those tragic years not so long ago when Ireland nearly tore itself apart in armed conflict, Irishman John McGuffin penned a lighthearted tribute to that most Irish of spirits, whiskey poitín. In light of the armed and bloody conflict going on, McGuffin’s sly humor comes across as almost subversive in its ability to appeal to audiences on either end of the conflict as he weaves together anecdotes about illicit distilling.

Among Americans, even American distillers, a popular notion holds sway that the illicitly-made poitín is nothing more complex than fermented and distilled potatoes, which Ireland has in great abundance. No doubt, it can be, and has been—I’ve met Irish distillers who related convincing methods for wresting liquor from spuds—but potatoes are not the easiest thing to convert to spirits, and authentic poitín has been made of barley, oats, and other grains for centuries before taters put down rootlets in Irish soil. Barley recipes are particularly venerable. But a lack of grains doesn’t mean it’s not the real McCoy. As with American moonshine, now very old recipes call for sugar, either granulated or as treacle.

McGuffin knows this all too well. In fact, in one “grain bill” he gives us:

At least four stone of oranges
8 pounds of sugar (brown)
1½ ounces yeast
10 gallons of water

“When properly made,” he assured us in 1978, “it doesn’t taste too bad.” Looks like there was at least a gallon of the stuff to go around once all was said and done. As anyone who has made a custom of sampling clandestine liquor since then can tell you, McGuffin admits that some poitín is rubbish, while other examples clearly outshine “parliament” (that is, tax-paid) whiskey.

I had heard while traveling in Ireland that the Troubles were hard on the moonshine trade. McGuffin elaborates. Distributors hauling illicit whiskey in carts, wagons, and—later—cars and trucks have always used subterfuge to slip the product past guards, into towns, in markets, and even courthouses. The Troubles and the violence they entailed changed the way that the Gardaí (the police) looked at suspicious vehicles and behavior. Routine search-and-seizure gambits gave way to more serious investigations into suspicious activities. Autos and lorries on the roads were more likely to be searched, especially near the border with Northern Ireland, since the contraband might just as easily be arms and explosives as a drop of home-distilled whiskey. Hauling a load of empty bottles? Who’s to say they are not for Molotov cocktails rather than homemade liquor? Across the border, local constabulary and the British Army were also on the hunt as vehicles were examined with dogs and mirrors on poles. Under such scrutiny, many haulers decided the time was right to get out of the business.

If it’s straight-up recipes and detailed how-to you’re wanting, this isn’t the book. The few recipes included serve as embellishments to stories about Irish whiskey, its illegal production, its history, and the cat-and-mouse games of diversion and detection between distillers and Gardaí who pursued them. Overall, his rueful tale is one of a craft in retreat except in remote areas long known for an appreciation for “the cratur.” Given the importance of Irish folk distilling in shaping the tenor, methods, and even vocabulary of American moonshiners, however, it’s an important read for understanding the parallel rise of folk distilling on these shores.

Buy it: Appletree Press released a new printing in 2002 that is available from Amazon and Amazon UK. Or, if you're in Dublin, drop by the massive Hodges Figgis (56-58 Dawson Street, Dublin 2) and score a copy.

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Poitin Fails to Induce Rowley Coma

My family is not a whiskey making family, but we are, in large measure, Irish; that is, we are a whiskey drinking family.

After years of tracking down modern American home distillers and old-school moonshiners, I jumped at an unexpected opportunity not long ago to visit Ireland and look into poitíners, transatlantic cousins to our own whiskey-makers.

Making poitín, as homemade whiskey is known in Ireland, is a dead or, at least, a dying craft. Everyone I spoke to about moonshine in Belfast and Dublin confirmed it. Eccentric old men, they allowed, may tend dubious and antiquated mountain stills, but nobody actually drinks the stuff.

Then I went out west.

Within four hours of arriving in Sligo on the island’s western fringe, I had been offered local whiskey by my cab driver, two men in the first pub, a musician in the second, and the owner of the third. By night’s end, two men who initially maintained they knew nothing of poitín shared recipes and revealed a suspiciously savvy knowledge of distilling techniques. In western Ireland, it seemed, you couldn’t swing a dead cat without knocking over a bottle of white mule.

Just as with moonshine, misunderstanding, hearsay, and outright lies regularly obscure truths that a simple round or two of fieldwork would reveal. Much of passes for hard facts is absolute twaddle passed on from one gullible non-distiller to another, neither of them able to tease fact from folklore or just storytelling embellishments. Take, for instance, this from the BBC:

'Oh, my God I Think my Throat is on Fir...' These were the last words of a foolish man after drinking a small tot of poitín. If you ever drink it, which you should not, do not drink more than a thimble full. After drinking a lot of poitín, it is possible to pass out and stay passed out for a few days. Those that do this will have a frightful headache and should not drink anything in the morning, as that will just get them drunk again without doing anything for the headache.

Drivel. Of course you should drink homemade liquor if you trust the source, though, as with any strong alcohol, moderation is key to staying vertical (and, let’s face it, sources are not always to be trusted). But home-distilled spirits are not some magical potions that induce comas. Refusing a drop of whiskey would have been rude. Missing that drop would have been a shame: as clear as water, smooth, with polished notes of barley, the work of an artisan.

If, in your travels, profession, or avocation, you should come across homemade spirits, do try some. Be aware that not all of it is good, but some examples are near nirvana.

Variant spellings

Poitín, which refers to the "little pot" in which clandestine spirits may be made in Ireland, is an Irish word pronounced roughly "put-cheen." In English, you are apt to find it spelled potcheen or poteen (though feisty Irishmen have referred to such spellings as "emasculated"). Commercial examples do exist—though, being made and sold openly, they could hardly be called the real McCoy, whatever merits they might otherwise possess.

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I'm Sorry I Peed on Your Joy

I’m sorry I peed on your “Joy of Cooking”

~ Dr. "Tennessee" Gabriel

Yeah, it was that kind of weekend: a semi-earnest and demi-coherent apology from a good friend who got turned around about five in the morning and mistook a living room bookcase for another piece of household furniture—porcelain, bowl-shaped furniture. With over 2,000 cookery books in the house, thank god I had the foresight to Brodart many of them. And that I bolted out of bed at the sound of books crashing to the wooden floor to stop any further action against books that would actually be difficult to replace.

Three guests descended on the house (making it three anesthesiologists, a physiatrist, and me) for five days of camaraderie, cooking, eating, and drinking. As the old man in the group, I generally head to bed before the festivities wind down or get so wound up that cops* are called. I refrained from talking marketing and advertising, but got an ear full of shop talk about nitrous, Diazapam, Versed, and a laundry list of other drugs designed to take patients to the brink of death, hold them there while surgeons did their tricks, and then bring them back.

I do that, too, but with rum, whiskey, and brandy. Or at least to the brink of respectability. Oh, and without the surgeons.

Speaking of which ~ headed off to New Orleans Tuesday morning for Tales of the Cocktail. Brett Anderson writes that moonshine closes in on respectability for the Times-Picayune and talks a bit about our session. There’s a wee typo in the story: I was talking about poitin, the Irish moonshine, not poutine, the Canadian dish of frites and cheese curds. Mmmmm…what a good meal both together would make, though…

Rowley, seated, pre-Joy, back of his head being held in place, surrounded by minions friends. If you seem him at Tales, say hey.


* Cops have never been called to my parties, but years ago, I won a motorcycle at someone else's shindig. Cool! Next morning, the owner showed up at my back door, sulking behind two officers, claiming I'd stolen his bike. When reminded that he was the one conducting the contest, he admitted that, yes, he'd maybe had something to drink and had forgotten that part. The coppers, poor guys, at least had the sense of humor to laugh it off as the sweating, hungover host pushed his bike back home. I still want a bike...
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For Us, A Guinness

Kim Murphy writes in today’s Los Angeles Times that younger generations in Ireland are turning away from Guinness, the quintessential Irish pint, to…Budweiser. And, also with an influx of cheaper labor from Eastern Europe, to some formerly unfamiliar brews. I can understand Murphy’s or Smithwick’s, but Budweiser just comes off as out of place.

…Even Guinness, it seems, is not immune to the forces of open markets, suburban sprawl and Ireland's evolution from an impoverished backwater of emigrants to one of Europe's economic powerhouses, a country that imports cheap labor now from Eastern Europe.

Even as sales have boomed elsewhere, Guinness has seen its business decline in Ireland over most of the last seven years, a trend that eased only slightly last year with a growth rate of 3.5%.

One does see a lot of Budweiser drinking going on in Ireland, but the Eastern European influence is undeniable, too; in some places out west, signs switch from English and Irish Gaelic to Irish and Polish. Beer selections reflect the shift as well.

Wherever I go, I try to drink local, so in Ireland I’m not drinking Bud.

While in Sligo on the trail of poitin (that’s Irish moonshine to you and me), I stopped off for a meal and a pint at Andy Donaghy’s pub/restaurant Coach Lane. Unfortunately for my belly, the meal I'd been anticipating was not to be—I’d been delayed by a trio of moonshiners masquerading as musicians and Andy’s kitchen was closed for the night. I did, however, treat myself to a tasty late-night meal substitute of Guinness and Taytos.

Now, dat’s livin’.


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