After going on the Vapor Distillery tour the day before, I felt like I had a leg up on the older couple who were the only other people on this tour with us. I asked our tour guide if the yeast strains varied for any of their whiskeys and he looked pretty impressed, so my ego only ballooned from there. (They use the same strain of yeast for everything.) When it came time to taste whiskeys though, my confidence turned sour in my mouth as I chocked and grimaced. Whiskey was apparently not my cup of tea…or anything close to tea in that manner. So when the opportunity came to add water to my whiskey, I happily obliged.
The original whiskey is a blend of years 2, 3, 4, and 5; it’s 94 proof and not labeled as a blend since it is all technically the same whiskey, some of it is just aged longer. This whiskey was complex and had different levels to its flavor. My favorite (out of the two whiskeys in this situation, considering I don’t plan on drinking straight whiskey again) was their Diamond Whiskey. Aged for four years, it was sweet with notes of caramel and vanilla.
Although we didn’t sample it, Snowflake is a unique whiskey that they make every year using special barrels from all walks of life and then all of the different whiskey is blended together. Only 1200 bottles are made and it can only be bought at their store. Apparently people camp outside their store waiting patiently to buy a bottle every Winter.
All of the barrels used for aging the whiskey contain a 3rd level char. The barrel room itself is sealed off and temperature controlled, because of the risk of too much evaporation at such a high elevation. This meant the room contained ethanol vapors and if you fell asleep there over night, you would wake up drunk the next morning.
Something unique they do, is have their bottling done by volunteers. You sign up online and are chosen at random to work the bottling line. You work a few hours and get a bottle of whiskey and pizza for free.
Fun Fact: Instead of using a pot or a column, they use a hybrid that combines the two together.
Fun Fact: The ‘head’ is removed and used as a cleaning agent around the brewery.
