Our Process

Raw organic grains are sourced directly from local farmers. The amount needed for a single batch is weighed out before it is dry milled to a coarse grist. This allows starch to be accessed while retaining the grain character we want to maintain throughout the distillation process.

The milled grain (grist) is added to heated calcium-rich mash water, which is traditional for our region, before following a multi-step mashing process to extract and convert the grain starches into fermentable sugars. The end result is a large pot of sweet watery porridge.

Now the yeast gets to feast on the sugars, consuming it to give us the alcohol (ethanol) that we are after. We take a slow & steady approach to fermentation, versus a fast & furious one used by 'big alcohol'. This allows desirable compounds, which contribute to flavour, to develop.

To get most of the alcohol out of our fermented mash, we perform a fast 'stripping' distillation run with loose tolerances. We separate the hearts, which is destined for our characterful vodka, from the heads and tails that will get redistilled due to unwanted compounds and flavours.

To get above 96% ABV, and meet other spirit requirements, we do a slow final distillation run with tight tolerances. Again, we separate the hearts, which we will use in our Estonian vodka, from the heads and tails which are redistilled again to become a grain spirit base for other products.

We take our high-proof organic grain spirit and slowly add pure water, down to just above bottling stength. Slow proofing is done in small steps over time. This avoids 'shocking' the spirit and damaging delicate & subtle flavour compounds, as mixing ethanol and water produces heat.

Once our spirit is close to bottling strength, it is allowed to rest for 42+ days. This allows the alcohol and water to 'marry' well, which helps the spirit compounds to combine and final flavour profile develop. We will then add the last drops of water needed to get to bottling strength.

To maintain its original character, we don't chill filter or pass our spirits through charcoal, crystals, or other 'magical' flavour removing material before we bottle. We don't have a harsh finish or bad flavours & aromas that we need to hide and expect minor variations between batches.

Once our spirits are ready to bottle, it's all hands on deck, getting bottles ready, filling and moving them, ensuring they are correctly filled and undamaged, adding our wooden-topped recycled cork stoppers, applying biodegradable cellulose shrink seals and letting them dry.

All that is left to do now is make it obvious what wonders await inside for whoever opens the bottle. We apply our luxurious cotton paper labels, hand write each batch and bottle number, and add any required tax stamps, to complete our true craft grain-to-glass distillation process.