Highland Moon

Distilling Moonshine in Dundee

Harris Brown has a fine Scotch from the year of his birth, the down payment on a future celebration that will happen when he turns fifty or makes a million. The former is in 2045 but he is hoping the latter intervenes.

His chosen path to an early celebration lies in distilling moonshine in Scotland. He is making something unique, a grain spirit that is neither whisky or gin, using honey before distillation to create the alcohol and the signature flavour profile. In a country with an uneasy relationship with alcohol his product wears its social conscience on its sleeve as it looks over its shoulder and pays homage to the past.

Infectious enthusiasm pours forth as he talks about the journey he is on, a story he must have told a hundred times but like all good entrepreneurs it feels new and fresh with this telling.

I wasn't one for academia, I was a bit more P.E. and sports. But what really caught my attention was business and economics, because obviously I've got a passion for doing my own thing.

When I left school, I wanted to prove people wrong. A lot of people probably thought I wouldn't have gone to university or got a degree. I'm quite competitive and if you say I can't do something, I promise you I'll try. I wanted to do a drinks business and in 2013 I'd started to look at doing gin as it was becoming the world’s number one seller. But then there was this thing in the back of my mind – ‘wait, go mature a little bit, go try and get into a course, find out a little bit more about how to set up a business’. The angel on the shoulder was my mum – make sure you stick in with academia and go and learn some theoretical stuff. So I did. My mum wanted to be my first customer, she supported my education so I owe a big thanks to her.

A confluence of factors helped create his magic water. His honours dissertation focussed on the ability of social media to level the playing field between large and small businesses. His time spent making cocktails was a crash course in flavour management and innovation. Memories of history classes teaching prohibition in the US triggered further research and discovery, foreshadowing the contemporary COVID restrictions on alcohol sales.

History at School – 1920’s Prohibition era. You can’t go in public and buy alcohol in bars and restaurants. So that's why I branded it as moonshine. We put it in canning jars because back then bottle manufacturing slowed down as there was no need for bottles. But they had all these jars, and it was a way to hide the alcohol because if they got pulled over they would say that they were making jam or chutney. They're all food grade so you can reuse them to make jams, chutneys, pickles, anything. You don't need to throw them out.

Favourite flavour? Like asking someone to pick a favourite child an agonising wait ensues before he picks Original, then Rawberry, as his answer gathers pace I cut him off before he names all his children…

The cocktail list demonstrates his passion, varied and contemporary, befitting a cocktail mixologist. Smouldering a cinnamon stick and trapping the smoke under a glass before pouring in the drink sounds exotic and interesting (Apple Pie and Smoked Cinnamon Old Fashioned), but his favourite is an Espresso Martini.

I would love to one day have my own distillery and visitor centre in Dundee. A history tour through the stages of prohibition and moonshine before you come to the tasting room to try. But then it's also a destination as well. There will be some fun activities, a mechanical Highland Cow, instead of a bull! When people think of Scottish Moonshine they will think of Highland Moon, just as when you think of vodka, you think of Smirnoff.

Highlights so far include finishing runner up in the Craft Distiller of the Year category, 2022 The Menu Food & Drink Awards.

During lockdown a lot of people struggled with mental health issues, I struggled massively at university and wanted, for every single jar that I sell, to donate money to a mental health charity. There are two sides to this coin, I like to tell people about the story, but I don’t like to use it as a sales approach, because it’s not. The goal is to give to a mental health charity every quarter, the first was ‘Run Talk Run’ and I would like to create a foundation. A lot of people go to alcohol as a coping mechanism, a crutch as they say, I believe that alcohol companies should counter that and try to be the other crutch to support. Some companies might do that, but in the shadows, no one puts it in the forefront, I do. It’s on every one of the jars and I want it to be OK not to be OK. You have to build a brand, but responsibly.

Teachers are inspiration investors. Striving to excite, hopeful that their passion will take root in years to come. Harris Brown took seed in history class and years later is creating something real and tangible.

The bottle of single malt may be opened well before 2045, in the meantime I am off to look for a cinnamon stick and a match.