Ground-breaking farm distillery produces fine vodka
KINDERHOOK—A premium vodka doesn’t have to start with potatoes or grain.
Third-generation Hudson Valley apple farmer Derek Grout is using what he’s already growing. His state-of-the-art still produces a top-shelf vodka from his family’s Golden Harvest Farm apples.
Harvest Spirits’ first product is Core, a triple-distilled 80 proof craft vodka that is about to go on sale.
Grout and partner Tom Crowell lease a former cold storage building on the family farm on Route 9 to house the gleaming $100,000 copper still that was specially designed for the space by a German still maker.
Building a micro-distillery right on the farm is one of the key elements that makes Core vodka so special. They will be the first in the state to sell right from the distillery, a move that required a change in state law. Customers will be able to see the apple orchards, tour the distillery, taste and purchase the final product.
“It’s a new opportunity for a traditional agriculture commodity to have a higher value product,” says Todd Erling, executive director of the Hudson Valley AgriBusiness Development Corp. (HVADC). His Incubator Without Walls program helped Harvest Spirits with capital to purchase the still.
The $50,000 came from the Columbia Economic Development Corp’s equipment loan fund. CEDC Executive Director James Galvin says the project “provided the perfect storm of opportunity: using a local product, providing the opportunity for future employment, and accomplishing changes in state law.”
Everyone involved in Harvest Spirits sees this cutting-edge venture as just the beginning of several new agriculture and agri-tourism opportunities. Harvest Spirits partner Crowell, whose day-job is as communications and out-reach manager for the Columbia Land Conservancy, has worked for the last eight years helping farmers cope with economic pressures created by global markets.
Crowell, who grew up on a dairy farm, read about distilling traditions in Normandy and thought, “why not do it in the Hudson Valley.” He knew the Grout farm family and so he and Derek Grout, 35, went off to a New Hampshire workshop on making vodka from apple cider.
That was two and a half years and $150,000 ago. It has taken that long and that much effort and money to get to the point of producing their first bottles of Core. Along the way, they had the help of state Senator Steve Saland, Assemblyman Tim Gordon, the Farm Bureau, and U.S. Rep. Kirsten Gillibrand to get a new law creating a Class D Farm Distillery license that will allow Harvest Spirits to sell up to 35,000 gallons/year, although they only expect to sell 1,000 bottles/month, maximum.
“We’re not trying to be the next Absolut. We are hoping to sell 2,000 cases a year. We want to stay small, a boutique,” says Crowell. Grout points out that Smirnoff sells in one week what all the craft distillers in the U.S. sell in a year. Harvest Spirits looks to sell to liquor stores, bars and restaurants from New York City to the Capital District, as well as on the farm.
Harvest Spirits even had to get an old Prohibition town law repealed before they could become operational.
According to State Agriculture Commissioner Patrick Hooker, “This is another exciting step forward in the continuing evolution of Hudson Valley agriculture. Hudson Valley farmers continue to be innovators – not only in better growing techniques but also in farmland protection, value-added marketing and environmental stewardship. We are very fortunate to have entrepreneurs like this who are developing new products and markets, ensuring that our orchards and fields stay in production for many years to come.”
Harvest Spirits is at the forefront of a national micro-distillery movement, which is just starting to gain ground, initially on the West Coast. “There are less than a hundred in the U.S.,” says Crowell.
The fine Core vodka is only the first step. “Because it is not aged,” explains Crowell, “it’s a relatively easy product to create.” Eventually, they look to create a signature gin and a finely crafted barrel-aged apple brandy like a Calvados.
But for those consumers and purveyors concerned about where the food, and now drink, come from, Harvest Spirits is a natural. The distillery will open weekends in early spring and customers can also stop in at Golden Harvest’s large farm stand for fresh fruit and produce throughout the season along with fresh cider donuts.
Todd Erling from HVADC envisions down the road a Hudson Valley distillery tour, similar to the wine trail, that combines agri-tourism and culinary tourism.
And to put the icing on the cake, Harvest Spirits hopes eventually to go ‘green.’ “We have great southern exposure,” says Crowell, “so we may go solar down the road, and try to recapture the heat. We will make it as eco-green as possible.”
For information about Core and Harvest Spirits, go to www.harvestspirits.com, 518-758-2920, derek@harvestspirits.com or tom@harvestspirits.com.
For more information about Hudson Valley AgriBusiness Development Corp.’s Incubator Without Walls and its other innovative agriculture support programs, contact Erling at terling@hvadc.org, 518-828-4718 ext. 103.