Distilling course in Barneveld

Finally, another day off on Saturday….. And what are you going to do? How abouta  distilling course in Barneveld?

Something I’ve wanted to do for a long time: distill a course! Whisky, gin or moon shine… Give it a name. After a long search I ended up on the site of the Tok  in Barneveld.

The course is taught by Carl van de Scheur, a self made distiller who makes regional specialties outside the course. Think of herbal bitters, liqueurs, gins, gin and since 2017 also whisky. The whisky is now maturing in two oak barrels and will be bottled and sold in 2020 (you can still subscribe to a bottle).

Upon entering, Carl and his Compaan receive Jack (a kind of Mac Gyver who knows everything about whisky and can assemble a distileer tank in front of you). After a cup of coffee (with or without a coffee liqueur and local pastry) you will get text and explanations about the production process of whisky.

They show you several videos. That starts with wetting the barley. Then the barley is poured on to a drying floor and regularly scooped up until the barley starts to germinate (malting).

This process must then be stopped again. This is done by setting fire under the drying floor so that the barley dries again. The specific taste that you can add to the smoke during drying the malt means that you can get different types of flavours in the whisky. You can also see on the videos how the distilling process works.

 

Distilling course in Barneveld

Then we will go to work in the distillery ourselves. Get to see and taste different types of cereals. Then we mash the dried grains are coarsely ground and put in the double-sided kettle. Add water to this and boil this mass for about 1.5 hours.

Then you cool this mass back to 28c and add the yeast.  This will leave you fermenting in a special ton for 3 days. Then you can distill (strip) this malt wine for the first time.

The gentlemen had prepared it so that the stripping had already been done so that we could immediately start distilling.

In the self-made distillery kettles we had to do 4 liters of malt wine and bring it to the boil.

The first drops

The first drops that come out of the device are the front. Smells quite strong like acetone and you should throw this away too. That which comes next is the middle course and then the follow-up follows.

When the distilling process is over, mix everything together.

Now you have a drink with an alcohol content of +/- 68%.

A special app allows you to calculate how much water you need to add. So you get a young whisky with a good drinkable alcohol percentage. Then you put the young whisky in a weckpot and add 8 grams of wood on a liter.

 

And then …… 3 months to wait because that’s what the whisky really needs to ripen.

At the end of the day you can taste some different types of whiskey and specialties of the Tok. Of course some extra bottles brought home and a limited edition blue gin

All in all a very nice day given by people with passion for what they do. The course is from 13:00 to 17:00. Lunch and tasting at the end are included.

Thank you Carl and Jack for a fun afternoon

Do you want to learn how to cook with Whisky?
Watch the workshop