Fall 2020 Issue
First ADI Virtual Conference… Was Actually Pretty Great
ADI was among the earliest trade organizations to make the call to postpone and then go digital with their annual conference. It was a...
Interview with Marko Karakasevic
When I think of Wine Country spirits, I think Charbay and the Karakasevic family. Certainly, they are distilling leaders, launching in 1983 around the...
High-Tech Agitator Distillery Goes After Fast-Maturing Whiskey
Agitator Distillery lives in the shadows. No one knows about the distillery. They distill almost in secrecy. The name means troublemaker or rebel; an...
Frey Ranch Shows the Importance of Long-Term Thinking
Colby Frey knows a thing or two about adversity. His family has been farming in western Nevada for 165 years, 10 years before the...
The Sourcing Transition
New distilleries that make aged spirits always face the same problem: How can they build their brand and business before their own spirits are...
Interview with Duke’s Spirited Cocktails
In 2016, a very special bar opened in downtown Healdsburg from three Spoonbar (https://spoonbar.com) alums: Laura Sanfilippo, Tara Heffernon and Steven Maduro. Since its...
The Principal Features of Stripping Stills
Stripping is the process used to separate the alcohol from the water in grain fermentation’s “beer,” or in the case of molasses, “dead wash.”...
Top 10 California Wine Country Bars
California is one ongoing “wine country” with dozens of appellations and massive regions home to hundreds of winemaking pioneers and varieties grown from south...
Taking Sides
“If you are neutral in situations of injustice, you have chosen the side of the oppressor.” — Desmond Tutu
There has been a lot of...
Iron Fish Distillery
For his 60th birthday, Richard Anderson’s wife delivered big.
Sarah Anderson sent him and brothers in-law, Dave Wallace and Craig Maxwell, to Scotland on a Scotch-tasting...
Cask Management for Distillers
When I was interviewed for a job heading up a new malt whiskey-focused farm distillery in rural Quebec, I was asked by the owners...
