How Our Drinks Are Made

From paddock to bottle, Lord Byron Distillery take an artisanal approach to distilling. Rather than taking a neutral base spirit and adjusting it with artificial flavours and colours, , we create our spirits using time-honoured artisan techniques which allow natural flavour and character to shine through.

Firstly, we blend our unique water and local molasses with yeast and then allow it to ferment. It takes time to create our unique and special flavours; our brew ferments for about a week, three times longer than a standard industrial scale distillery fermentation. The yeast slowly converts all of the natural sugars into alcohol. Only after all the natural sugar is fully converted and we are satisfied with the flavour profile will we commence the distillation process – aka the really fun part.

Our two 500 litre copper pot alembic stills, named Ada and Allegra, were hand made by a coppersmith in Europe. Because they’re handmade, they each have unique characteristics. We also have a 380 litre six plate pot still we named Alba. Distilling works because the boiling point of alcohol is lower than the boiling point of water. Keeping the stills at below the boiling point of water allows the distiller to separate the alcohol from the fermented wash.

At Lord Byron Distillery we only batch distil. It takes longer but it is also better. The first distillation run in the copper pot stills is called the wash run. The alcohol from the wash run is collected over a distilling run that takes a full day. Our liquid fertiliser is what is left over after the alcohol is removed. It is still full of nutrients and minerals left over from the cane field where it came from. The nutrients and minerals from the  cane field is what makes it a stable and quality liquid fertiliser or cattle feed additive.

The next step in the process is the spirit run. Alcohol collected from the wash run is distilled again through Ada and Allegra, our handmade copper pot stills or Alba, our 6 plate pot still. The distiller doesn’t rely on automation that is so common in a standard industrial scale distillery. The distiller uses all their skill and senses to ensure that each batch delivers the refined tastes in the Spirit of Byron.

As part of our distilling journey we’ve become friends with another distillery in El Salvador, Central America. This distillery has been running for many years and we are able to share this excellent example of what a paddock to bottle 12-year-old rum can be – we call this Rum “The Promise”. It’s the promise of things to come for our aged rums, we hope.

Our double distilled rums are either sold direct from the still as a silver unaged cane spirit or they are aged in specially selected oak barrels at our distillery, to be sold as rum down the track once they are fully mature. Some industrial scale distilleries save money by aging in tired and tasteless oak vats, adding flavours later to make their rums taste like they have been aged in oak barrels. At Lord Byron Distillery all our drinks are free from added artificial flavours and colours. We guarantee that all our rums have been aged on oak barrels and not vats. Our more neutral spirits such as Vodka and the base for our Gin and Limoncello are distilled once more in a 6 plate pot still. Triple distilling delivers the lighter spirit needed for these drink types.

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