Charlottesville Area Masters of Real Ale

I posted this on my blog, but completely forgot to mention anything on the forums.  Two weekends ago, my family and I went on a tour of the Copper Fox Distillery, which is located in Sperryville, VA.  The owner, Rick Wasmund, and his "Master of Malt" (Mom) operate the distillery and provide very personal and educational tours. They have an innovative aging process where they age the whiskey in contact with apple and cherry wood, which imparts an interesting color and taste to the whiskey. But, the coolest thing of all is that they malt their own barley.

Copper Fox uses 6-row barley as the sole ingredient in their whiskey. They get the barley from one farmer, who lives about 3 hours from the brewery, and bring the raw grain directly into the distillery. Then, during the cool times of the year, they soak the barley in giant vats and then lay it out on the floor of a special section of the building. They let it germinate and then they kiln it right on site, using apple and cherry wood (http://www.copperfox.biz/products/). This imparts the malt with a interesting smokey note that helps make the whiskey distinctive. As far ask Rick knows, they are the only distillery in North America that malts their own grain.

Rick was kind enough to send me home with a sample of this special malt. I am planning on using it in a German-style smoked lager that I will likely brew this weekend.  I have no idea how strong the smoked flavor will be, but I am using it in a 50/50 mix with pilsner malt and some other specialty grains.  Hopefully, the beer will turn out good and I can bring some to a tasting in the future for others to try.

I'm going to have to check it out, sounds like a worthwhile excursion. Smoked malt samples are great and all, but how about some whiskey? 

They can't sell their whiskey directly at the distillery, nor can they do tastings.  We picked up a bottle from the ABC store on the way home.  It had a very interesting flavor coming from the apple wood.  Interesting and different, in a smooth way.  It is not my favorite whiskey, but I like it.

Yeah, I read about these folks about a year ago in some magazine (one of the "Hoity-Toity" Albemarle or Upper Crust Virginia magazines that feature 'Quail hunting on your own plantation with engraved 28 gauge double-barrel shotguns with your Debutante daughter's beau.).  I thought the local barley and "malt their own" was interesting but only of value to brewers if we could get them to malt a large batch (or smaller batches) in a different manner (not smoked). 

But the smoked part was almost all of the fun!  I can buy base malt anywhere, but this was smoked malt with an interesting smoking mechanism.  So, I figured I would try some in a traditional German rauchbier lager format.  This should showcase how well that malt works (how strong the smoke flavor is, if it is too complex, if it remains on the palate, etc.).  If things hold up, it would make a nice addition to a smoked porter or other dark beer.

I had my smoked beer brew session yesterday, so we will see how it turns out in 6 weeks or so.  Cheers.

I guess I was thinking of a "Purely Virginia" beer, made from malted barley grown in Virginia, with [hopefully] hops grown in Virginia.  Yeast?  Well, perhaps that can overlooked, OR Spidey could collect and grow some wild Virginia yeast.  Of course, you could add some smoked Virginia grown and malted barley for flavor.

More unique than just "made in Virginia" beer.