Slashfood http://www.slashfood.com Slashfood http://www.slashfood.com/media/feedlogo.gif Slashfood http://www.slashfood.com en-us Copyright 2009 Blogsmith, LLC. The contents of this feed are available for non-commercial use only. Blogsmith http://www.blogsmith.com/Diary of a Distiller: Chapter 30 - Done for the Dayhttp://www.slashfood.com/2008/12/12/diary-of-a-distiller-chapter-30-done-for-the-day/http://www.slashfood.com/2008/12/12/diary-of-a-distiller-chapter-30-done-for-the-day/http://www.slashfood.com/2008/12/12/diary-of-a-distiller-chapter-30-done-for-the-day/#commentsFiled under:

Over the weekend we had a very busy time at the Winery. Saturday night was the culmination of a month of work by several dozen people from the area who entered in our Gingerbread House competition for charity. We have had several classes a week on how to make and decorate gingerbread houses and ended up with almost thirty contestants. There were five categories: Professional, Under 17, Traditional, Historical, and Fantasy. There were some absolutely wonderful creations, and I was surprised at the quality of all the entries, especially the fact that some of the best were by people who had never done this before.

Sunday night I went to a Sunday Night Cocktail event hosted by my friend and award winning mixologist, Lydia Reismueller, formerly of the speakeasy style cocktail bar PDT and restaurant/cocktail bar Elettaria in NYC. Lydia has been having these Sunday events for the past two months at the Westcot Forge restaurant in Blue Hill, ME and they have been a big success. I tried a few of her new creations and said my good-bye's for the season, as she heads off to travel the world until March with her chef boyfriend. I'm already looking forward to when she starts up the Cocktail Sundays again next Spring when she comes back to manage one of the excellent, local, organic farms.

Continue reading Diary of a Distiller: Chapter 30 - Done for the Day

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]]>Jonathan M. ForesterJonathanM.ForesterMainePenobscot Bay BreweryPenobscot Bay DistilleryPenobscotBayBreweryWinterportWinterport WineryWinterportWineryJonathan M. Forester2008-12-12T10:01:00+00:00Diary of a Distiller: Chapter 29 - 75th Anniversary of Repeal Dayhttp://www.slashfood.com/2008/12/05/diary-of-a-distiller-chapter-29-75th-anniversary-of-repeal-da/http://www.slashfood.com/2008/12/05/diary-of-a-distiller-chapter-29-75th-anniversary-of-repeal-da/http://www.slashfood.com/2008/12/05/diary-of-a-distiller-chapter-29-75th-anniversary-of-repeal-da/#commentsFiled under:



Today is the 75th Anniversary of Repeal Day, a day of celebration and rejoicing of the end of one of this nations debacles in judgment, Prohibition. Although Prohibition only lasted for 13-14 years on a national level, it was in force for many decades prior in several states. Here in Maine it started in 1851.

I'm starting off my day with a business meeting of the Maine Winery Guild. Last year I kick-started the association into forming and this will be our third business meeting. Owners of most of Maine's 18+ wineries will be there. I also invited the owners of the State's micro-distilleries to attend, so we can decide whether to join the Maine Winery guild, or start a separate association. I know that after-wards a few of us will be celebrating Repeal Day by tasting each others products.

After that I'll be going back to the winery to bottle Cranberry Wine. The job just got much easier. When we bought the brewery equipment a large filter was part of the deal. We never got around to cleaning it up and using it until this week. It's four times the size of the one we were using before. With that much more surface area the pump works much faster and easier. So running a 500 gallon tank of wine through the filter takes only forty minutes, compared with 1/2 a day or more with the old filter. Wine needs to be filtered sevral times through finer and finer levels until it is crystal clear. So what took three days before, we can now due in one day before lunchtime. Mike was practically dancing with glee.

In the last of the photos below you can see the old filter, without its plates, in front of the much larger new one.
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]]>Cocktail BarsCocktailBarsJonathan M. ForestePenobscot Bay DistilleryPenobscotBayDistilleryWinterport WineryWinterportWineryJonathan M. Forester2008-12-05T11:02:00+00:00Diary of a Distiller: Chapter 28 - Happy Thanksgivinghttp://www.slashfood.com/2008/11/28/diary-of-a-distiller-chapter-28-happy-thanksgiving/http://www.slashfood.com/2008/11/28/diary-of-a-distiller-chapter-28-happy-thanksgiving/http://www.slashfood.com/2008/11/28/diary-of-a-distiller-chapter-28-happy-thanksgiving/#commentsFiled under:

It's been quiet here at the winery the past week.We had our first snow and the temps have been in the 20's and even down to the 'teens at night. Mostly we have been prepping for the Holiday Season, repairing and hanging lights, bottling wine, and sprucing everything up. We're also hosting a Gingerbread House Competition at our culinary school and restaurant, Pairings, and lots of folks have been taking classes and coming by to work on their cakey homes.

I'm in NYC visiting family all week and going around meeting up with all my mixologist friends. It will take me all week to catch up on what's going on the the cocktail world. I missed all the fall cocktails and hope to try a few before the winter ones come onto all the menus. With luck I may still be able to sample the fall creations.

I have a few bottles of wine from the winery for family, and a few bottles of our new hard cider for friends and the bar crew at a few of my favorite cocktail bars. I'm looking forward to seeing everyone's reactions. I've also been planning a reunion with friends from back as far as elementary school and the neighborhood where I grew up, as well as friends from college and my early 20's. It should be an evening of carousing and good, loud, fun; as we catch up on the latest. One friend of mine who I have known since 5th grade is a Lt. Colonel in the Army Reserve and has been called back to active duty for his third tour of duty. So we are going to give him a wet and wild send off as well. I hope everyone had a fantastic Thanksgiving, and have a fun weekend!
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]]>Jonathan M. ForesterJonathanM.ForesterMainePenobscot Bay DistilleryPenobscotBayDistilleryWinterportWinterport WineryJonathan M. Forester2008-11-28T10:01:00+00:00Diary of a Distiller: Chapter 27 - Getting Closer and Closerhttp://www.slashfood.com/2008/11/21/diary-of-a-distiller-chapter-27-getting-closer-and-closer/http://www.slashfood.com/2008/11/21/diary-of-a-distiller-chapter-27-getting-closer-and-closer/http://www.slashfood.com/2008/11/21/diary-of-a-distiller-chapter-27-getting-closer-and-closer/#commentsFiled under:

Over the weekend we finished installing new steam pipes and condensate returns for the brewery boiler. Late Saturday afternoon we fired the boiler up and it seemed to work fine. When we got in Monday to check on things, the sight glass on the brew kettle was broken. We think it probably had the wrong gaskets or some other small problem and cracked during the cool-down. We ordered a replacement, and some valves, and then we're set to start brewing.

Later Monday we got our first shipment of brewing ingredients: crushed malt, hops, yeast, and assorted adjuncts and fermentation nutrients. So as soon as we clear up the last little things we will be brewing beer!

Much of the rest of the week was spent in the winery, bottling wine, re-arranging storage, and all kinds of things to get ready for our busiest time of year, the Holiday Season. Later in the week we found out that we still had some major problems with the boiler. Actually, not the boiler, but the configuration of the piping, where and how parts are located, steam condensate traps, pumps, etc. An expert came in and very soon was able to figure out the problems and we ordered some more parts and started what we hope will be our final re-design. Just another week or so and we'll be able to brew.

Continue reading Diary of a Distiller: Chapter 27 - Getting Closer and Closer

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]]>Jonathan M. ForesterJonathanM.ForesterMainePenobcot Bay BreweryPenobscot Bay DistilleryPenobscotBayDistilleryWinterportWinterport WineryWinterportWineryJonathan M. Forester2008-11-21T13:01:00+00:00Diary of a Distiller: Chapter 26 - Oops!http://www.slashfood.com/2008/11/14/diary-of-a-distiller-chapter-26-oops/http://www.slashfood.com/2008/11/14/diary-of-a-distiller-chapter-26-oops/http://www.slashfood.com/2008/11/14/diary-of-a-distiller-chapter-26-oops/#commentsFiled under:



This week went by very quickly, even though it was a six day week for me. On Monday I went in to the winery even though we were closed, so i could do some paperwork and research. The boiler guys showed up as well, to do some more work. They had to re-do a section of pipe work near the boiler where they hadn't tightened down the pipes enough and there were steam leaks. Tuesday we were closed as well for Veterans Day, but I was back again, doing more research and paperwork. I had the place to myself for most of the day and it was nice and quiet.

On Wednesday, just before lunch time, the delivery of 6,000 pounds of peach puree arrived. Twelve drums, each weighing 500 pounds, stacked four to a pallet. As the first pallet load was being lowered on the gate lift to the ground, it started teetering, and almost fell. But made it semi-safely to the ground. The second load got out of control and came crashing down onto the asphalt of the parking lot. As you can see they were torn open, dented and partially crushed like soda cans. Luckily, the puree is packed aseptically inside very thick Mylar bags that have a breaking strength in the thousands of pounds. So with a huge struggle we were able to right the drums and manhandle them down into the winery. It took us almost two hours to get the twelve drums down the ramp and into the basement. Leaving us sore and aching in every joint.

Then on Thursday the boiler guys came to correct some other minor problems, and we powered up the boiler. Everything seemed fine, except for the cloud of smoke wafting along the ceiling. As the steam pipes heated up for the first time any oils accumulated on their surface burned off. So we walked around in a haze, and daze, choking on oily smoke. We set up some exhaust fans to vent the winery, and turned on the big exhaust blower in the distillery, which helped a lot. Then we started to have some more problems with the boiler shutting down due to pressure problems, so we spent the day re-thinking the installation. Friday and Saturday were spent adding new sections of pipe for the condensate return to the boiler. Hopefully this will be the last hurdle in the boiler drama, and then we can make beer. I REALLY need a tasty brew right now!
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]]>Jonathan M. ForesterJonathanM.ForesterMainePenobscot Bay BreweryPenobscot Bay DistilleryPenobscotBayDistilleryWInterportWinterport WineryWinterportWineryJonathan M. Forester2008-11-14T11:01:00+00:00Diary of a Distiller: Chapter 25 - A comedy of errorshttp://www.slashfood.com/2008/11/07/diary-of-a-distiller-chapter-25-a-comedy-of-errors/http://www.slashfood.com/2008/11/07/diary-of-a-distiller-chapter-25-a-comedy-of-errors/http://www.slashfood.com/2008/11/07/diary-of-a-distiller-chapter-25-a-comedy-of-errors/#commentsFiled under:

Like usual its been a busy week. The fire grate for the copper spirits still was re-worked from square to round. I feel they overcharged me. It cost as much to re-work it as it originally cost new.

We had a few more small things to fix in the brewery. Basically, like I've mentioned before, everything that could be broken, or ruined through neglect, was. Sometimes it's difficult to order parts, they may not have been made for 20 years since the equipment was new. We had to get in touch with France and England to find new valve bodies since the rubber was fried in all the ones for the brew kettle, lauter tun, and fermenting tanks. Hopefully we can get them in the next few days and fix the valves. Otherwise they need to be replaces, at a grand or two for six of them.

We did quite a bit of work on our wine. After making wine all summer it's time to bottle most of it, so we're getting some of it ready to bottle and bottling the rest. The new batch of dry blueberry is very nice. Dry, full bodied, spicy like a shiraz, and just a hint of oak.

Continue reading Diary of a Distiller: Chapter 25 - A comedy of errors

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]]>Jonathan M. ForesteMainePenobscot Bay DistilleryPenobscotBayDistilleryWinterportJonathan M. Forester2008-11-07T09:05:00+00:00Diary of a Distiller: Chapter 24 - A loooong, weak, weekhttp://www.slashfood.com/2008/10/31/diary-of-a-distiller-chapter-24-a-loooong-weak-week/http://www.slashfood.com/2008/10/31/diary-of-a-distiller-chapter-24-a-loooong-weak-week/http://www.slashfood.com/2008/10/31/diary-of-a-distiller-chapter-24-a-loooong-weak-week/#commentsFiled under:



Last week was a busy, busy, week. Lots of hard work that brought us much closer to our goals of opening the brewery and distillery. At the end of the week I came down with a mild version of the flu, thanks to the open and sharing nature of my friends and partners. Finally on Saturday morning I ground to a halt at work. I was feeling pretty under the weather, not so bad I couldn't work, but my mental faculties were slowed down.

I decided to do some photography of bottles of the very rare, and out of production, Tanqueray Malacca Gin in my collection; to send to a potential customer who also collects rare spirits. As I was putting things away and moving cases around, I stumbled back in forth in a daze. Then due to my clumsiness a case of empty wine bottles fell from the top of a pallet onto my big toe. Usually I have pretty fast reactions and can catch falling stuff, or at least slow down or break their fall. This time I didn't even notice it until a few seconds after it landed, directly with the pointy corner of the case in the middle of my toe. It didn't hurt at first. Mike was near me hunting for some tools and I pointed out the case balancing on it's corner, sitting on my toe. He just shook his head and shrugged with a rueful smile. I knew it should hurt, but my reflexes were so slowed down that I felt nothing.

I picked up the case and heaved it over my head and back onto the pallet. Grumbling under my breath that this was going to hurt like hell. I started to make my way up the stairs to my office and as I did so my toe started to get warm, then hot, then to burn unmercifully. By the time I hobbled up the stairs and sat down at my desk in the distillery my toe really, really hurt!

Continue reading Diary of a Distiller: Chapter 24 - A loooong, weak, week

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]]>Jonathan M. ForesterJonathanM.ForesterMainePenobscot Bay BreweryPenobscot Bay DistilleryPenobscotBayDistilleryWinterportWinterport WineryWinterportWineryJonathan M. Forester2008-10-31T08:31:00+00:00Diary of a Distiller: Chapter 23 - Boiling & Foaminghttp://www.slashfood.com/2008/10/24/diary-of-a-distiller-chapter-23-boiling-and-foaming/http://www.slashfood.com/2008/10/24/diary-of-a-distiller-chapter-23-boiling-and-foaming/http://www.slashfood.com/2008/10/24/diary-of-a-distiller-chapter-23-boiling-and-foaming/#commentsFiled under:



Over the weekend Mike and I finished most of the pipe work for the brewery and distillery chilling system. All we now need is the pump and that project is done. I mentioned before, but we are using a 500 gallon wine chilling and clearing tank as the reservoir and cooling system for our chilling system. We had it already available, Mike had picked it up awhile ago very inexpensively, and it was just sitting there taking up room and unused. So being thrifty, we decided to make it useful once again. We ran PVC piping many months ago along the walls of the brewery / distillery; going to all the fermenters, the copper spirits still, and locations of future stills. Then we connected the brewery chilling plate and transfer system for the hot wort to the network. Finally we ran the pipe along the ceiling of the basement to the cooling tank, and prepped everything for installing the pump.

You can see some photos of this in the galleries to come. Also I show a few of our 500 gallon wine fermenting and storage tanks. The reason I'm show them is to focus on the PVC piping along the ceiling above the tanks. This is for venting CO2 from the tanks, to the outside. Each tank that has active fermentation still in progress has tubing that comes out of an airlock and goes into the CO2 vent pipe. This way the basement winery doesn't become filled with CO2, killing us. That just wouldn't be fun.

Early Monday morning the boiler guys came to start the boiler installation. We are usually closed Sundays and Mondays, but Mike went in to work with them; while I was off down to Rockport, near where I used to live in Rockland / Owls Head, to meet with a Steel Work company to discuss my latest project. The boiler guys spent several days working on the installation, and will come back next week to finish it.

Continue reading Diary of a Distiller: Chapter 23 - Boiling & Foaming

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]]>Jonathan M. ForesterJonathanM.ForesterMainePenobscot Bay BreweryPenobscot Bay DistilleryPenobscotBayDistilleryWinterportWinterport WineryWinterportWineryJonathan M. Forester2008-10-24T09:01:00+00:00Diary of a Distiller: Chapter 22 - An apple (cider) a day, keeps the Doctor awayhttp://www.slashfood.com/2008/10/17/diary-of-a-distiller-chapter-22-an-apple-cider-a-day-keeps/http://www.slashfood.com/2008/10/17/diary-of-a-distiller-chapter-22-an-apple-cider-a-day-keeps/http://www.slashfood.com/2008/10/17/diary-of-a-distiller-chapter-22-an-apple-cider-a-day-keeps/#commentsFiled under:



Last Friday we took the day off from installing the steam pipes for our new brewery boiler, to bottle our first hard cider. This is the first new product to be released since I joined the team, and I had a lot of input towards its design. I have had some experience in the past creating hard ciders, both as a home brewer and wine maker, as well as commercially. Right after Mike and I shook hands to form our partnership late last November, I set off to Cornell University's Agricultural Experimental Station in Geneva, NY to take a week of workshops, primarily on advanced hard cider development and production techniques. The new information I picked up helped fine tune this cider into a great product over the past year.

We started with several different batches of sweet apple cider, fresh pressed from locally grown apples. Each batch had a different blend of apples and was fermented at cool temperatures using different yeasts. After the primary fermentation, the cider was taken off the lees (old, spent, dead and dormant yeast that settles to the bottom of the fermenting tank.) Then put into new tanks to age slowly for months and months, all at cool temperatures in our wine cellar. The cool temperature and slow, slow, slow, fermentation ensure that there will be lots of fresh apple flavor in the finished cider; as well as the tones and notes from the fermentation. Since each batch was made from different apples, and different yeasts; they had a completely different character from each other.

One of the craft secrets to creating a great hard cider is long and slow aging; and this we had done. The other is blending the cider. If you just make one, huge, batch of hard cider using all your apples, it tends to taste flat and one dimensional after fermentation. But if you make several smaller batches, with different apples in each, and later blend them carefully together; you get a final cider that is greater than the sum of its parts. Really great ciders save back some of the final blend to age even longer, and this is added to the blend the following year/s to bring in even greater complexity.

Continue reading Diary of a Distiller: Chapter 22 - An apple (cider) a day, keeps the Doctor away

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]]>Jonathan M. ForesterJonathanM.ForesterMainePenobscot Bay DistilleryPenobscotBayDistilleryWinterportWinterport WineryWinterportWineryJonathan M. Forester2008-10-17T11:01:00+00:00Diary of a Distiller: Chapter 21 - Hangin' Tighthttp://www.slashfood.com/2008/10/10/diary-of-a-distiller-chapter-21-hangin-tight/http://www.slashfood.com/2008/10/10/diary-of-a-distiller-chapter-21-hangin-tight/http://www.slashfood.com/2008/10/10/diary-of-a-distiller-chapter-21-hangin-tight/#commentsFiled under:



Hi Folks, well the last of the work in building the brewery, then distillery, is well under way. I mentioned that we are finally installing the steam boiler for the brewery. It's a difficult and heavy job. First we took apart all the old steam pipes attached to the brew kettle, and scavenged all the pieces that we could use. Then we cleaned them up to remove mild rust and treated them to prevent further corrosion. Many are already cut to the perfect lengths and threaded at the ends. So it will save us a lot of time and work to re-use them.

We here at Winterport Winery / Penobscot Bay Distillery & Brewery live by the New England and Maine way of thrift. As Francis H. Sisson said almost a hundred years ago, "Thrift was never more necessary in the world's history than it is today." But there are many sides to thrift. As Orison Swett Marden said, "Thrift means that you should always have the best you can possibly afford, when the thing has any reference to your physical and mental health, to your growth in efficiency and power." This holds true in business, as in personal matters. So, while we use and re-use what we can, we also make sure to use the best quality available as well. So in matters of construction, if it is good, solid, and recyclable, it's back in the game. If not, then chuck it out; and replace with the best available.

Just as a side note: the type of pipe we are working with is called "Black Pipe", the type of steel pipe used for natural gas, hot water and steam circulation in boilers, and it is made of heavy steel. It's thick, strong, but not as hard as stainless steel; and so more malleable. It expands and contracts better and is able to handle shifting; that would crack the harder, but more brittle stainless steel. You need heavy equipment to cut and tread the pipe ends. So we rented a pipe cutter/threader to do the job. This pipe is connected with even more malleable cast iron fittings. All of which are very solid and long lasting, but weigh a TON.

Continue reading Diary of a Distiller: Chapter 21 - Hangin' Tight

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]]>Jonathan M. ForesterJonathanM.ForesterMainePenobscot bay Distillery BreweryWinterportWinterport WineryWinterportWineryJonathan M. Forester2008-10-10T09:01:00+00:00Diary of a Distiller: Chapter 20 - Ups n Downshttp://www.slashfood.com/2008/10/03/diary-of-a-distiller-chapter-20-ups-n-downs/http://www.slashfood.com/2008/10/03/diary-of-a-distiller-chapter-20-ups-n-downs/http://www.slashfood.com/2008/10/03/diary-of-a-distiller-chapter-20-ups-n-downs/#commentsFiled under:



Wow, the twentieth chapter of my journal, and still no distillery! Whodda thunkit? Well, it won't be much longer now. (Fingers Crossed, as well as toes, eyes, lips, legs... I must look like I have to pee REAL bad.) Anyway, I always loved to climb, as a kid, and then a teen, I would scale the highest trees in the neighborhood, always trying to get my head above the canopy. I only fell twice when branches broke. The first time was on a young willow tree when I was in 4th grade. I slightly twisted my ankle and learned that willows have weak branches for their size. I promptly went to the library and read up on trees and learned to identify them and which were strong or weak. I also moved on to climbing the sides of buildings, radio antennas, and anything else that was possibly climbable, and a few things that probably weren't. There were no rock-climbing areas near me, so I really got into tree-climbing, sometimes even using safety ropes, and what later became known as "Buildering," climbing buildings and other structures. The neighborhood cops got to know me by name, since they found me on roof-tops, telephone poles, flagpoles, light poles, street signs, tall fences, etc. on a regular basis.

The second time I had a tree branch break on me was when I was nineteen and I messed up my right knee real bad for the first time and was on crutches for awhile. (Note: Do not have keg parties in trees without safety harnesses. I learned the hard way.) As soon as I was healed I fell off the roof of a house during a thunderstorm. It had been real fun running along the long, low, slanted roof in the pouring rain and sliding down it; and then to bring yourself to a stop before you got to the edge. One time I tried to do a stunt from a cowboy movie and grab the gutter as I slid off, and do a drop kick onto a friend. Oops! There went my other knee. That was a great summer! As I got older I started working for Outward Bound and was always up in trees on challenge/ropes courses and got so comfortable I could make it through these airborne obstacle courses 30-60 feet in the air, blindfolded.

Every now and then over the years I would put in a stint in contracting and construction, thereby ending up on ladders and rooftops. Well, unsecured ladders started to scare the hell out of me real quick. I had a best friends father fall and break his neck when a ladder slipped. A fellow worker had a ladder slip and he broke both his wrists. I started getting really conservative when it came to ladder safety. Even when setting up access to a ropes course I always made sure the ladder was secured at the top so it couldn't slip. Even after all my years going up and down ladders I am still fearful. But I also stubborn and refuse to be intimidated or controlled by anything other than myself.

Continue reading Diary of a Distiller: Chapter 20 - Ups n Downs

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]]>Bionic BreweryBionicBreweryJonathan M. ForesterJonathanM.ForesterMainePenobscot Bay Distillery BreweryWinterportWinterport WineryWinterportWineryJonathan M. Forester2008-10-03T09:01:00+00:00Diary of a Distiller: Chapter 19 - The Bionic Breweryhttp://www.slashfood.com/2008/09/26/diary-of-a-distiller-chapter-19-the-bionic-brewery/http://www.slashfood.com/2008/09/26/diary-of-a-distiller-chapter-19-the-bionic-brewery/http://www.slashfood.com/2008/09/26/diary-of-a-distiller-chapter-19-the-bionic-brewery/#commentsFiled under:



Wow, it's the first weekend of Autumn and in marshy areas and along ponds and rivers the leaves are starting to turn red. It's only the first hint of color in most places, but it's that time of year again. My favorite time of year. The nights have already gotten cool enough that I have had the heat on for more than a week and that wonderful smell of woodsmoke from my neighbors' fireplaces drifts by every now and then. Time sure flies. It's been almost ten months since I first met Michael, Joan, and Jody; my partners here in Winterport; and eight to nine months since we first started building the brewery & distillery. A Loooong nine months! I had hoped for a small distillery that would be up and running by Memorial Day. Then I hoped for a small brewery and distillery and hoped it would be up and running after nine months of gestation, but alas, that was not meant to be. Now we are ten times the size we originally planned and will grow even more.

As you may have noticed as I write my journal, things are speeding up here at our facility. I am starting to feel like an expectant papa once again. The feeling is almost indescribable; exciting and scary, filled with impatience and frustration, and every now and then a sense of wonder. We are now finishing the construction that had been put on hold way too many times, until we got certain parts and pieces of equipment. When we first got the brewery equipment we knew it was a good deal. What we didn't realize at first was how badly the equipment had been misused. It came to us third-hand. The first owners knew what they were doing, but the second owners were clueless. Everything that could be broken, was. Fixing it all has cost almost as much as the original price. You wouldn't believe how many hours have been spent on it as well. We have been building, rebuilding, cleaning, polishing, taking things apart, repairing them, and putting them back together. Manuals were ordered, read, studied, and memorized. I see the disaster of equipment in all stages of use and misuse, then partly dismantled and in a state of repair; littering what was once the beautiful and clean home of my future brewery/distillery. Finally it is all slowly coming together.

Do you remember the 70's TV Show "The Six Million Dollar Man"? At the start of each episode they say "Steve Austin, astronaut. A man barely alive. Gentlemen, we can rebuild him. We have the technology. We have the capability to build the world's first bionic man. Steve Austin will be that man. Better than he was before. Better, stronger, faster." Well that's what's going on here. I feel like we are team of surgeons, or maybe mad scientists... re-building a living being from the horribly injured wreck of what once was great. Sometimes the surgery is detailed. Piecing together tiny wires, resistors, connections. Other times you reach for the biggest hammer or wrench you can find. We are discarding old and outdated parts of the brewery and replace them with the best, cutting edge, adding new technology. Computers, sensors, probes, you name it. We will rebuild it. Better than it was before. Better, Stronger, Faster. It will be The Bionic Brewery! (And hopefully not cost six million dollars!)

Here and after the jump are photos of the first part of installing the steel vent pipe. It was heavy as hell, and I had to lift it into place by hand as the brew kettle was jockeyed into position, that had to be exact to within a 1/2 inch so it could connect to the pre-cut and fitted pipes that attach to other pieces of equipment.

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Continue reading Diary of a Distiller: Chapter 19 - The Bionic Brewery

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]]>Bionic BreweryBionicBreweryJonathan M. ForesterJonathanM.ForesterMainePenobscot Bay BreweryPenobscotBayBreweryWinterportWinterport WineryWinterportWineryJonathan M. Forester2008-09-26T10:01:00+00:00Diary of a Distiller: Chapter 18 - Hey! Cut it out!http://www.slashfood.com/2008/09/19/diary-of-a-distiller-chapter-18-hey-cut-it-out/http://www.slashfood.com/2008/09/19/diary-of-a-distiller-chapter-18-hey-cut-it-out/http://www.slashfood.com/2008/09/19/diary-of-a-distiller-chapter-18-hey-cut-it-out/#commentsFiled under:



After a hectic week in NYC I finally made it back up to Maine for a relatively a quiet and relaxing weekend. That is if you call driving 160 miles round trip on Saturday relatively quiet and relaxing. And that's after driving the 470 miles from NY City back to Winterport on Friday. Well, it's Maine; driving is part of the deal. You have to go quite a bit to get from place to place. Saturday turned out to be a day all about seeing my friends all over the place. Starting in the morning I had a date and we drove the 25 miles to Blue Hill for the North East Regional Mixed Doubles Petanque Championship. We didn't play, but were there to watch a friend of mine from NYC, Ernesto, play. He is a seriously good Petanque player and it was fun to watch.

In the afternoon we drove from Blue Hill down to Rockport for the the First Annual Mid-Coast Food and Wine Festival which was coordinated by my friend Bettina of Cellardoor Winery and Cathe of the State of Maine Cheese Company. It was like a reunion in that I saw so many friends who I only get to see on rare occasions, now that I moved up north 55 miles to the border between Mid-Coast and Down-East Maine. There were several wineries represented; my friend Keith's Sweetgrass Farm Winery & Distillery, my friends Buddy and Holly of Savage Oakes Winery, and of course we at Winterport Winery had a table at the tasting. Mike and Joan's daughter and her husband were there representing our winery, as I played hooky for the day. Another friend, Brian, who just started up Oyster River Winegrowers was supposed to be there, but couldn't make it for some reason. That's too bad because I haven't yet tried his white wine that came out this summer.

At the food stalls I ran into several more friends. Ann Marie of Ann Marie's Kitchen was there serving great pork cooked medium rare and juicy after being marinated in her Secret Sauce. Ann Marie is a firecracker and I like her and her fiance a lot. They don't live to far from me and I have to get together with them soon to kick back and hang out, although hanging out with Ann Marie is usually anything but quiet, more like being in the presence of a human dynamo that's putting out 10,000 volts.

Continue reading Diary of a Distiller: Chapter 18 - Hey! Cut it out!

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]]>Jonathan M. ForesterJonathanM.ForesterMainePenobscot Bay DistilleryPenobscotBayDistilleryWinterportWinterport WineryWinterportWineryJonathan M. Forester2008-09-19T10:01:00+00:00Diary of a Distiller: Chapter 17 - Noshing on the Big Applehttp://www.slashfood.com/2008/09/12/diary-of-a-distiller-chapter-17-noshing-on-the-big-apple/http://www.slashfood.com/2008/09/12/diary-of-a-distiller-chapter-17-noshing-on-the-big-apple/http://www.slashfood.com/2008/09/12/diary-of-a-distiller-chapter-17-noshing-on-the-big-apple/#commentsFiled under:

The past week has been more focused on my career as a Food / Spirits writer, than on the distillery. I am in NY City covering several events which I will post about in the next week or so. One is a bacon tasting, hosted by my friend Josh Ozersky, of Grub Street. Another is a tour of a underground Chinese food malls in Flushing Queens. I found out about these food malls, which remind me of ones I ate at in my travels in China a few years ago. The NY Times and other sources have covered them a bit in the past few months, but I'll talk about two of my favorite stands. One has a fantastic "Lamb Burger" and "Cold Skin" which isn't. The other has a fabulous lamb soup with hand pulled noodles six feet long.

Also this week I had to connect with my friends in the cocktail business. I have been to tiki bars, rooftop bars, bars with hidden entrances, bars in train stations, ones with unpublished addresses, floating spirits events, etc. I'll tell you more about some of these later as well.

So everyone have a great weekend. I'll be driving five hundred miles back home to represent Winterport Winery at the Mid-Coast Food and Wine Festival in Maine.

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]]>Jonathan M. ForesterMainePenobscot Bay DistilleryWinterportWinterport WineryWinterportWineryJonathan M. Forester2008-09-12T11:04:00+00:00Diary of a Distiller: Chapter 16 - A whole world of Pearhttp://www.slashfood.com/2008/09/05/diary-of-a-distiller-chapter-16-a-whole-world-of-pear/http://www.slashfood.com/2008/09/05/diary-of-a-distiller-chapter-16-a-whole-world-of-pear/http://www.slashfood.com/2008/09/05/diary-of-a-distiller-chapter-16-a-whole-world-of-pear/#commentsFiled under:



As it has been for the past few weeks, and will continue for the next few months, this is wine making time. We are making every kind of wine you can imagine, and bottling as much as possible as well, to empty out fermenting tanks so we can start new batches. Our total wine capacity in tanks is around 7,000 gallons between fermenting and storage, and we are at around half that right now. The amount in tanks changes weekly as we start new batches or bottle mature ones. The beginning of the week was spent on labeling bottles we filled last week, but didn't have labels for. They arrived just a day or two after we needed them, so we were able to finish off that batch of cranberry wine and it's now ready for the holidays.

Then we bottled up the last of the strawberry wine, which should last us to next strawberry season. We started up some pear wine and apple wine and will be making quite a bit of both of these, especially the apple wine. Some of that will be ear-marked for when we get the distillery up and running, so we can make a Calvados style aged apple brandy.

Well, the brewery/distillery had another slowdown. By this time I am amazed I have any hair left, let alone a full head. I have been pulling at it non-stop for months now. Well, it seems to be straighter than before, and lighter in color as well. Interestingly, my mustache and sideburns have started to go white in patches. I guess my hair is as stressed as I am. The latest is that the boiler quotes were way too high again from the last dealer we spoke to, and so we are getting in more quotes. These guys can't seem to understand that we don't want or need some multi-million btu steam boiler, but something on the smaller side.

Continue reading Diary of a Distiller: Chapter 16 - A whole world of Pear

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]]>Jonathan M. ForesterJonathanM.ForesterMainePenobscot Bay DistilleryPenobscotBayDistilleryWinterportWinterport WineryJonathan M. Forester2008-09-05T10:01:00+00:00Diary of a Distiller: Chapter 15 - Glasssss and Raspberry Rainhttp://www.slashfood.com/2008/08/29/diary-of-a-distiller-chapter-15-glasssss-and-raspberry-rain/http://www.slashfood.com/2008/08/29/diary-of-a-distiller-chapter-15-glasssss-and-raspberry-rain/http://www.slashfood.com/2008/08/29/diary-of-a-distiller-chapter-15-glasssss-and-raspberry-rain/#commentsFiled under:



I had a nice time last weekend wandering the woods. I spent Sunday with the Maine Mycological Association on a foray for wild mushrooms, then some hikes looking for wild teas and edibles on Monday.

Tuesday it was back to work. I have been researching many products I want to develop and have been seeking out old texts on distilling, wine making, etc. I spent my mornings brainstorming and working on possible recipes. I won't say what they are quite yet, but when I get them into production in a few months, I'll tell you more.

Tuesday afternoon we got in a nice large shipment of glass. Bottles that is. There is a bit of a global glass shortage and we have had certain wine bottles on back order for months and months; especially needed are the 375 ml. frosted bottles for one of our dessert wines, raspberry Rain. We haven't been able to meet the demand and actually took it off our current list for almost five months since we didn't have any bottles. We do have a full tank of the wine aging in the cellar, so bottling is the focus for the week.

Continue reading Diary of a Distiller: Chapter 15 - Glasssss and Raspberry Rain

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]]>Glass wine bottlesGlassWineBottlesJonathan M. ForesterJonathanM.ForesterMainePeenobscot Bay DistilleryPeenobscotBayDistilleryRaspberry Rain wineWinterportWinterport WineryWinterportWineryJonathan M. Forester2008-08-29T10:01:00+00:00Diary of a Distiller: Chapter 14 - Blueberry Winehttp://www.slashfood.com/2008/08/22/diary-of-a-distiller-chapter-14-blueberry-wine/http://www.slashfood.com/2008/08/22/diary-of-a-distiller-chapter-14-blueberry-wine/http://www.slashfood.com/2008/08/22/diary-of-a-distiller-chapter-14-blueberry-wine/#commentsFiled under:



Wow, it's already August 22nd and the summer is almost over. The past three days have been the best weather we have seen since early July. Until this recent weather change we had only two sunny days out of the prior 41. Now it's nice and sunny, and will be for a week at least, but already there is an Autumn nip to the air. High 70's with blue skies and puffy clouds during the days, it was actually cool enough last night that I had to close the windows and turn on the heat.

You've heard me complaining again and again about how we have so much equipment back ordered and it's keeping us hanging on building the distillery and brewery. Finally it looks like some of the last obstacles are getting cleared up. Our propane burner for one of the stills arrived yesterday. Of course it seems that the box of parts opened up during shipping and was re-boxed and delivered to us missing one part. One of the air venturis is floating around out there in the back o some truck. So we have to return the burner and get a new one shipped to us. Personally I felt that just the missing part needed to be shipped, but that's not how the shipper and seller feel.

The other thing we have been waiting on is our steam boiler that will heat the brewing kettle and some of our stills. We were originally going to go with propane, but after crunching numbers decided on an oil burning boiler instead. Now next week we will get some quotes and move on to get it installed as fast as possible. (Which means not as fast as we would like.)

Continue reading Diary of a Distiller: Chapter 14 - Blueberry Wine

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]]>Blueberry WineBlueberryWineJonathan M. ForesterJonathanM.ForesterMainePenobscot Bay DistilleryPenobscotBayDistilleryWinterportWinterport WineryWinterportWineryJonathan M. Forester2008-08-22T09:03:00+00:00Diary of a Distiller: Chapter 13 - Work hard, play hardhttp://www.slashfood.com/2008/08/15/diary-of-a-distiller-chapter-13-work-hard-play-hard/http://www.slashfood.com/2008/08/15/diary-of-a-distiller-chapter-13-work-hard-play-hard/http://www.slashfood.com/2008/08/15/diary-of-a-distiller-chapter-13-work-hard-play-hard/#commentsFiled under:

bottle of sparkling apricot wine

I'm going to keep it brief this week. It's been hectic up here in Maine for me, and I am heading out for the weekend for a much needed vacation. Maine's nickname is "The Vacationland," so how come I feel like I need to get away to get mine? I thought I had a vacation early this summer around the Fourth of July, but it wasn't as relaxing as I needed. I was so set on relaxing that I never did. Then I was in New Orleans for eight days for Tales of the Cocktail, but that turned out to be hectic work as well. So I'm heading down to the Hampton's on Long Island in New York for the weekend. I'll be seeing some of my oldest friends who I have known since I was in my late teens. It's been a year or two since I last saw some of them and it should be fun.

So it's wine making time for us at Winterport Winery, and bottling time as well. We have been making blueberry wine this week. The wild Maine blueberries are in season and we are making the most of it. These tiny, low bush blueberries have an intense, sweet flavor. Much better than those giant blueberries you see most of the time in the supermarkets. We have had an order placed for a year waiting for harvest time and earlier this week we got our delivery of organically grown wild blueberries. Joan scooped up four quarts for me to take home and packaged up a many more for the rest of the crew. I figure I'll take mine to the party and make blueberry pancakes and preserves for breakfast.

As for bottling, our sparkling apricot wine, Fancy That, became the star at a bottling party Wednesday night. After closing for the day we sat down with a few pizzas and were joined by friends of the winery, come to add a few more pairs of much needed hands. To efficiently bottle the sparkling wine at any type of speed it takes us eight people. A few more would have been better, but at least we had the critical number. This is only the second time we have bottled a sparkling wine and while we have some equipment on order to make it easier, right now it's a pretty exhausting and frazzling process.I'm glad that it was only a couple of hundred gallons that had to be bottled.

Continue reading Diary of a Distiller: Chapter 13 - Work hard, play hard

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]]>Fancy ThatFancyThatJonathan M. ForesterJonathanM.ForesterMaineSparkling wineSparklingWineWinterportWinterport WineryWinterportWineryJonathan M. Forester2008-08-15T11:01:00+00:00Diary of a Distiller: Chapter 12 - Sometimes it's just soggy out, sometimes it's soaking wethttp://www.slashfood.com/2008/08/08/diary-of-a-distiller-chapter-12-sometimes-its-just-soggy-out/http://www.slashfood.com/2008/08/08/diary-of-a-distiller-chapter-12-sometimes-its-just-soggy-out/http://www.slashfood.com/2008/08/08/diary-of-a-distiller-chapter-12-sometimes-its-just-soggy-out/#commentsFiled under:



Well, most folks have a dry job, but mine is wet. Making, serving, and enjoying fine libations is a hard and trying occupation. If you are one of those dry types, it just isn't your calling. Me, I like it wet. I lived near a dry county once. I shudder to think about it. Yup, I like it wet. But in some things moderation is key. Until recently I wondered what those things were. Now I know. Sometimes it can be too wet. I guess it's time to finally break out the umbrellas.

It's been a dreary week here in Winterport, Maine. Actually a dreary summer is more like it. The weather has been the same as far back as mid-June. Hazy, rainy, humid, hot, wet, yuch. I'm normally like a duck and love wet weather, but some times it gets to be Just Too Much.

One day last week the weather broke and it was a Beautiful Maine Summer Day. Yes, it has to be capitalized. Warm with Cool Breezes, Sunny, Occasional Puffy Clouds Decorating the Skies, the Smell of Green Growing Things All Around and the Scent of the Ocean on the Wind. Not too hot, not too cool, as Goldilocks said, "This is just right." Well, that lasted all of one day.

Continue reading Diary of a Distiller: Chapter 12 - Sometimes it's just soggy out, sometimes it's soaking wet

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]]>Jonathan M. ForesterJonathanM.ForesterMainePenobscot Bay BreweryPenobscot Bay DistilleryPenobscotBayDistilleryWinterportWinterport WineryWinterportWineryJonathan M. Forester2008-08-08T09:01:00+00:00Diary of a Distiller: Chapter 11 - Another brick in the wall...http://www.slashfood.com/2008/08/01/diary-of-a-distiller-chapter-11-another-brick-in-the-wall/http://www.slashfood.com/2008/08/01/diary-of-a-distiller-chapter-11-another-brick-in-the-wall/http://www.slashfood.com/2008/08/01/diary-of-a-distiller-chapter-11-another-brick-in-the-wall/#commentsFiled under:



Building our brewery and distillery is much like building a wall. first you have to lay the foundation. Then the first course of bricks, then corners, edging, etc. If you goof up in one area, it affects the whole thing. So you have to tear it down, correct the problem or make the change, and start all over again. As you can see above, we are taking apart every piece of equipment, one by one, and cleaning sterilizing them, replacing any wort out or broken parts, and putting them back together.That specific piece of equipment with the parts laid out on the floor is the diverter and chilling plate. It's the arteries and veins of the whole brewery. By placing the elbow joints in various configurations we can send water or wort (freshly brewed but unfermented beer) to any piece of equipment such as fermenters, filters etc. and heat or chill it.

Well, this has been an intense week. As I mentioned, a few weeks ago we got out federal brewery permit, but the state permit is the one that makes us official. On Tuesday the state inspector came, and even though we still have lots of work to do before we can start brewing, we now have our state and federal brewery permits and are an official micro-brewery. Hooray! Now we just have to locate the rest of the equipment we need and finish putting it all together. Then we can work on recipes for our beers.

Once the brewery is up and running it won't take much at all to finish off the distillery. Of course the simple, small distillery I imagined at the start of this whole journey, is nothing compared to what is in store. One small still is rapidly becoming two, then three...

Continue reading Diary of a Distiller: Chapter 11 - Another brick in the wall...

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]]>Back Porch Hard CiderBackPorchHardCiderJonathan M. ForesterJonathanM.ForesterMainePenobscot Bay BreweryPenobscot bay DistilleryPenobscotBayDistilleryWinterportWinterport WineryWinterportWineryJonathan M. Forester2008-08-01T10:30:00+00:00