The Bullock Distillery opens with a flourish

If opening day enthusiasm is any indicator, The Bullock Distillery in Charleston, WV has a great chance to do some serious liquor business. Sales were brisk all afternoon at the distillery’s grand opening on Saturday. 

After having been working on the project for several years, you could tell distillery Chief Operating Officer Tighe Bullock was so very glad to get the place opened.

“It’s butterflies in my stomach right now—in a good way,” he said. “We’re really excited. It’s been years in the making, and here we are.”

With a total of only 900 bottles initially available, it’s not unrealistic to imagine that their inventory could be depleted fairly soon. The distillery’s crew is already planning it’s next bottling and release, which should be announced in the next few weeks. 

People filling the distillery tasting room definitely enjoyed the Prohibition themed grand opening event, which featured spirits sampling, distillery tours, and live music. Overall, very positive comments were heard from those tasting Bullock’s initial distilled spirit products. With bottles of three quite different types of liquor for sale, just about anyone’s taste preferences could be charmed. 

Leblanc Vodka

The Bullock Distillery’s first house-made product is their Leblanc Vodka. 

This unfiltered premium craft vodka was distilled from grape wines, made from a mix of grape varieties. Taken out of the still at a very high proof, which is required for a vodka, the distillate was then mixed down to a bottle strength of 100 proof with Bullock’s special limestone water sourced from its cave in Greenbrier County. 

Adam Anderson, one of the head distillers at Bullock, says he can see wine lovers also loving this vodka due to the hints of fruit that come through. We can see that too.

While the vodka is potent at 100 proof, its taste is clean, bright and light with a distinctive fruity touch on the back end. If you think all vodka is basically a tasteless alcohol made only for mixing drinks, you’ll be pleasantly surprised with this one. Craft distillers have led the way in making vodkas with a little more flavor than the bland industrial-produced vodkas, which are made primarily from corn and then charcoal filtered to remove all flavors. 

While it would make a stellar mixed drink, we think Leblanc Vodka could also be enjoyed straight as sipper. It’s a very nicely done product.

Barrel Rested Gin

Most all gin you’re familiar with is un-aged, colorless, and meant to be consumed in cocktails, however, Bullock Gin has a bit of a different stripe. While the Bullock Distillery did not distill this gin itself, they certainly found a beautiful product from another high quality distiller up in New York state. 

This gin was distilled and flavored with a variety of botanical ingredients giving it a proper gin character. But then, it was put into a used rye whiskey barrel where it sat for three years and mellowed. It also picked up some barrel color and vanilla and tannin flavors. Because the barrel was previously used, the gin doesn’t get a big dose of wood, but just a kiss. It makes for a very interesting, very smooth, taste experience. 

The Bullock team selected the barrel of the gin that they liked best, then shipped it to Charleston where they diluted it with their special pure cave water and then bottled it at 90 proof.

The barrel aging seemed to mellow out the juniper flavor and complement it with the whiskey barrel generated inputs. Even those who are not fond of the typical juniper aromatics normally associated with gin might want to give this gin a try. It’s a gin you’ll want to sip straight up, as well as in your favorite gin cocktail.  

Single-Barrel Straight Rye Whiskey

Distilled at the same New York distillery as the gin, this rye whiskey comes from a single barrel specially selected by the Bullock team. The whiskey was made with 85% rye grain and 15% malt. Once distilled it was placed into a freshly charred oak barrel and aged. When it arrived at The Bullock Distillery, the two year old spirit was mixed with Bullock’s limestone water, and bottled at 90 proof. 

This rye is straightforward, nicely flavored with distinctive character from the rye grain. You may taste hints of vanilla, ground pepper, and even unsweetened cocoa. No doubt it would be excellent in a Manhattan or an Old Fashioned cocktail, or on the rocks with a splash. Bullock has several more barrels of this rye continuing to age in house, so you may expect to see more of it in the future.

Brandy, bourbon, rye in the works

Beyond making more vodkas, and possibly some gin, Bullock has plans for more premium distilled spirit products.

From the same wine from which they made the vodka, Bullock also distilled six barrels of brandy. Unlike vodka, brandy comes off the still at a lower proof, much like whisky, so it retains more of the character of the fruit wine from which it was made. Brandy must be aged for a minimum of two years before it can be bottled. Bullock plans to age its brandy for four years or more. Those six barrels of brandy they made were just barreled up around Thanksgiving. That means we won’t be seeing Bullock’s brandy on the market anytime soon.

BOURBON COMING — “Right after the holidays we’re jumping right into doing some bourbon cooks and some rye whiskey cooks,” Adam Anderson said. And he explains that like the brandy, those whiskies will need their aging time, so they won’t be available for at least four or five years. 

The limestone water from Bullock’s Greenbrier County cave will be the extra special ingredient in its bourbon and rye mashes. Water with high levels of calcium carbonate, such as Bullock’s cave water, are reputed to make the very best bourbons. Bullock will truck tanks of this water from Greenbrier County to Charleston each time they cook up a whiskey and also use it for diluting the finished aged whiskey to bottle strength. We expect their bourbon to be more in the wheated-bourbon style, like brands such as Maker’s Mark.

Aging time presents challenges

The required aging time for premium whiskies is certainly a challenge for small start-up distilleries. If they want to stick with that business model, it means they have to be very patient and quite well-financed. That’s why so many other small West Virginia distilleries produce unaged corn whiskey, normally marketed as moonshine. They flavor up the moonshine with commercial flavoring products and it’s relatively inexpensive to make and can be quite profitable. Adam Anderson says Bullock didn’t have much interest in making unaged moonshine since they don’t feel it fits in with the premium product philosophy they desire to achieve.

So for distilleries committed to the more premium, higher-end business model, the options for making products that don’t need aging are few — often limited to vodka, gin, and liqueurs. To supplement that, they typically purchase barrels of good whiskies from other distilleries and then bottle them under their own brands. This model worked beautifully well for Smooth Ambler Spirits, and you may see Bullock following in Smooth Ambler’s footsteps.

The Bullock Distillery Tasting Room Experience

The distillery tasting room is an attractive, welcoming space, showing off lots of wood and masonry. A large front window fills the room with warm natural light — light that is augmented by a set of uniquely beautiful chandeliers. A long, s-curved bar, reminiscent of a mountain highway, graces the left side of the room. You’ll want to take a close look at the bar top, which is made from a very long, curvy, live-edge wooden slab.

Customers may try thimble-sized free samples of the liquors, up to three per visit. Once you find your favorites, you can then purchase bottles to take home. Due to state law, the distillery may not sell any other alcohol products, and beyond the small samples, it may not serve any other liquor drinks, such as cocktails.   

The tasting room will be open the week leading up to Christmas from 9:00 a.m. to 9:00 p.m. daily. Hours will be adjusted after the holidays. Business hours will be posted on the distillery Facebook page.

Distillery tours will also be offered periodically, so call ahead to check on getting a reservation. The tour shows off all the new Bullock stills, columns and tanks, but pleasantly provides you quite a bit more than just the basic details of distilling. You also get some interesting history, Bullock family lore, and get to see pieces of the oldest legal distilling equipment still in use in West Virginia.

Merchandise

The Bullock Distillery is also a showroom for a variety of local handcrafted goods and upscale cocktail supplies. In addition to that, there’s plenty of Bullock Distillery logo clothing and other merch for sale. You could easily imagine doing your one-stop gift shopping there. 

Photo Gallery

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The Bullock Distillery
121 Washington Street West
Charleston, WV

Phone: (304) 532-5115