Coming Soon: O’Shaughnessy Distillery – Mpls.St.Paul Magazine

Very well, major o’ the early morning to you. Here’s some news which is pretty much as superior as your initial Irish espresso of the working day: We are about to have a planet-class whiskey distillery in our midst when O’Shaughnessy Distilling Co. opens in the up coming number of months. It can be beneath development up coming to Surly Brewing, and across from the coming Malcolm Yards Sector. Prospect Park is so scorching right now.

What tends to make this new distillery planet-class? The team, the house, the dedication to what they want to realize. This is anything the Twin Towns hasn’t really found in advance of, and when I walked the house a number of weeks in the past, I discovered myself comparing it to the whiskey distilleries I’ve toured in Kentucky and Japan. 

Let’s begin with the O’Shaughnessy family. They are not the types who have a winery in California, nor are they the family powering Valspar (both rumors I’ve read). They are a superior ol’ St. Paul family that is energized about Irish whiskey—this is a regionally owned job. What they have previously carried out is kind of unbelievable: They’ve lured globally identified Grasp Distiller Brian Nation absent from Jameson. Let that sink in. The male who was in charge of generating the golden tones of Jameson, Redbreast, Powers, and Middleton whiskies is relocating to Minnesota to now make whiskey.

I caught a number of seconds with him while he was in town very last month, and I asked him the problem we always inquire persons who relocate listed here: Are you positive? “I’m energized! Of class it was an beautiful opportunity to be involved in a brand from the ground up, but it was also the society. Meeting Patrick O’Shaughnessy and really just viewing the enthusiasm, the perception, the foresight, and also the aid of the family society. It can be an experience for me and my family to basically take myself, my wife, and my a few young children to shift from Eire. We’ve never lived outside Cork in our life! And as persons say, I never do points by halves, so it truly is a shift from Cork all the way to Minneapolis.”

So generating American whiskey in the common Irish design and style of triple copper pot distillation in Minnesota will be a matter. They prepare to use one hundred% American grains mingled with the Irish approaches. Using a mash bill of malted and unmalted barley, the triple-distilled whiskey will be matured in virgin American oak casks. “We have been kind of conversing about this for a while, and we’re conversing about Irishizing American whiskey and Americanizing Irish whiskey, and I consider that would give us a lot of scope, a lot of opportunity to innovate. But I consider one matter that we’re likely to be very pleased of, and the one matter we will always be very pleased of, is the quality of the whiskey that we will develop. We’re really energized about this fantastic state of the art distillery, and there’s likely to be a lot of adaptability within it. It gives us fantastic prospects to present what we can do and to really showcase not just distillation, but the training, and the experience, and the beneath tale, so I consider we’ve received a lot listed here to be really really very pleased about.”

Section of that experience will be the accountability of Pip Hanson. Regarded in the Twin Towns as the innovative beverage professional who produced the Marvel Bar, Hanson still left town to extend his wings and landed as head of Artesian Bar in London, winner of World’s Best Bar. He returned to Minnesota in 2016 and labored powering the scenes, until finally now. He’ll be heading up the beverages at the distillery’s bars.

The distillery alone was shaping up to be quite a looker when I walked as a result of early development. There will be various bar spots, non-public spaces for occasions, outside patio seating, and food stuff company of a sort. Gleaming copper pot stills are a fantastic concentrate, and there will be an comprehensive tour program which will walk you as a result of the entire whiskey generating method. Which is the training piece they are energized to develop. 

And what about the whiskey? Very well you are likely to have to wait around to get your hands on it, but now, on St. Patrick’s Day of 2021, O’Shaughnessy’s is launching their Keeper’s Coronary heart Cask Modern society. Keeper’s Coronary heart whiskey will be their initial start this summer months, and this associates-only modern society is the initial opportunity to get it. As a member you’ll get the first opportunity to buy the unusual whiskey aged in a exclusive cask bearing your title. Plus, associates will get powering-the-scenes access at the distillery, personal meetings and dialogue with Brian Nation, personalized bottles, individualized tastings, and an official Essential to the Continue to keep. 

From a assertion, co-founder Patrick O’Shaughnessy shared, “Keeper’s Coronary heart is all about family. The whiskey is a tribute to our Irish American heritage, and we see the distillery as a residence absent from residence to convey persons with each other. The Keeper’s Coronary heart Cask Modern society generates an opportunity to be among the the initial to join our family.  Members will share anything exclusive and delight in unique experiences. The opportunity to experience the growing old of a cask is anything definitely unique. We are pretty very pleased of what we’re making, including a neighborhood that we are happy to welcome on this journey with us.” 

Whiskey nerds like me recognize that there is anything substantial occurring listed here, this is your initial opportunity to be a aspect of it. Keep tuned for more news about the opening of the taproom and what that area experience will appear like.