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Craft Distillery


               Engelhorn knew how to ferment malted barley, but     ed whiskey, but there was just one problem:  Like
               he faced two challenges:  First, he needed equip-    a lot of start-up distilleries, they could not afford
               ment, and secondly, he needed base product. Both     to wait for the whisky to provide cash flow to keep
               were in short supply, considering limited resources.  them afloat. Again, like the spirit of the hound dog,
                                                                    they were relentless: In 2012, they celebrated their
                 After substantial research, Engelhorn convinced    grand opening with an 84-proof Classic Gin infused
               his partners to buy copper and the tools to hand-    with local, fresh-picked juniper berries, a product
               build a custom copper pot still following the tra-   that is still popular today. At the same time, they
               ditional specifications used in Scottish whisky pro-  picked up a decaf coffee liqueur called Richardo’s,
               duction. “I looked at pictures of stills, and designed   a homemade recipe that was created years ago by
               an amalgam, limited only by my ability to fabricate   a few Lyons locals. While Spirit Hound Distillers did
               metal,” Engelhorn told Beverage Master Magazine.     not own the product, sales helped keep the coffers
               “Our spirits still is a 150-gallon pot still with a tall,   full until they could release the malt whisky. Spirit
               tapered column, and makes delicious spirits.”        Hound Distillers also crafted a   Sambuca-style anise
                                                                    liquor, rum and an un-aged version of its whisky
                 The search for product was no less daunting. “In a   called White Dog Moonshine.
               nod to Scottish tradition, we wanted peat-smoked
               malt for our grain,” Engelhorn said. “One of our       While Spirit Hound Distillers settled in for the
               tenets was to use all local products. While Colorado  long haul and waited for their prized whisky to
               has many barley farms, we only found one that        age, disaster struck the small town of Lyons: The
               used peat to smoke their malt, Colorado Malting      Colorado Floods of 2013. “We were only about
               Company in Alamosa.” Spirit Hound Distillers  has    eight or nine months old,” Engelhorn remembered,
               been using Colorado Malting Company’s peated         “when monsoons in the mountains sent water rip-
               malt since the beginning and is now their biggest    ping through our little town. I was trapped in the
               customer for the product.                            distillery at the time with one and a half-foot of
                                                                    water, but I stayed put because I was surrounded
                 With equipment and product in hand, Spirit         by a river and was afraid to get out.”  As a result of
               Hound Distillers was able to begin producing malt-   the flood, Spirit Hound Distillers lost raw materials,










































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