By George!
Artisanal distillery St. George Spirits may perform its magic in the East Bay, but Marin County inspired one of its most coveted spirits. By Nicolas Stecher
36 september 2021 marin living.
ALAMEDA’S ST. GEORGE SPIRITS was launched in 1982 by Jörg Rupf, a young judge who moved to UC Berkeley on assignment from Germany’s Ministry of Culture. Raised in the Black Forest, where distilling eau-de-vie (essentially brandy) is the stuff of life, Rupf quickly fell in love with Northern California’s nascent produce-rich culinary scene and began distilling pears, raspberries, cherries and even some experimental kiwi batches in his backyard. Then in 1996 an eager ex–nuclear engineer named Lance Winters knocked on his door. Disgruntled by a lack of joy in his career, Winters decided to switch lanes to pursue his distilling destiny after trying (and becoming enamored with) Lagavulin single malt. “Jörg is a guy with amazingly exacting standards, which is really important if you’re going to be in this industry,” explains Winters of his early tutelage under Rupf. “It can’t just be something that fits the standard of the category and that’s good enough — you really have to knock it out of the park. And that’s what Jörg did for the first 15 years before me.” Together they evolved St. George into a globally respected enterprise, and in 2004 the company moved into their current
Alex Zyuzikov
St. George Spirits Distillery
