Q&A with Harley House Distillery

Q & A

with Phil Steere of Harley House Distillery

Harley House Distillery - Adam Cowley

Where did your journey begin to becoming a distiller of spirts?

Our distilling journey began with me waking up one morning with the random idea to build a still!

After researching still designs and teaching myself to solder, I went ahead and built a reflux still from a stainlesssteel milk churn and some copper pipes of various sizes.

Before long I was up the end of our garden distilling under moonlight!

After quite a few trial and error attempts, I succeeded in making a pretty decent gin.

Our friends were our guinea pigs and we got to the point where they said that we should start to sell it. At the same time, my wife (an accountant), said to me that my hobby was in fact illegal even though I hadn’t sold any at all...

So I had 2 options. 1. Stop distilling completely, or 2. Apply for a license to distill. Obviously I opted for the latter! We now have numerous government licences!

What makes a good spirit?

In my opinion, what makes a good spirit is multi-layered. 1. One can tell the quality of the ingredients immediately, so using the best available is paramount. 2. Quality of the distillation. When one knows how to distill, one knows when to ‘make cuts’ correctly. This means separating the heads, hearts and tails. Different distillers cut at different points during the distilling run and this hugely effects the end result.

This applies to all spirits. The end result should be balanced, smooth and refined, not harsh with unintended ‘off’ flavours. A good spirit should be warming, not fiery hot to your throat!

What was the hardest part of creating your distillery?

Probably the jumping through endless hoops in acquiring our full distillery licences! ¢

Do you take inspiration from your surroundings when creating a spirit?

Yes absolutely, you can’t help but be inspired by the beautiful East Sussex countryside that surrounds us. For instance, our magical Sussex Blue Gin is based on the life cycle and colour of the iconic Adonis Butterfly which frequents the chalk downs which surround the distillery.

What is your favourite botanical combination?

This is a tough one! I think it would be impossible to pin it down to one in particular. One of my favourite things as a distiller is to come up with new combinations from the vast array of botanicals available. It’s a constant voyage of discovery!

This is highlighted by our ‘Curiosity range’ of spirits, where flavours are voted on from a selection of options by the public, with the winner being the one produced!

How do you set yourself apart from your competitors?

We are different from the vast majority of our competitors due to the fact that we produce our own neutral spirit in house. We also distill our water and therefore have full control over every aspect of our product, making a truly artisan spirit. We also try to offer our full range in 5cl miniatures, which make perfect gift packs!

www.harleyhousedistillery.co.uk

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