Long Island Spirits: The First Distillery On Long Island since the 1800s
Long Island is usually noted for their wine. Now one can have fine liquors from Long Island by Long Island Spirits. Long Island Spirits was established in 2007 as the first distillery on Long Island since the 1800s. The company became the 100th distillery in the United States. There were over 1,600 distilleries throughout the U.S.
Long Island was noted for farming over 5,000 acres of potatoes, rye, corn, and malted barley farms. The loamy soils and unique climate, added 15-20 extra days to the growing season. The company changed their win-cupola barn into a state of art craft distillery where all their spirits are non-chill filtered.
The farmers harvest the potatoes in the fall, and typically plant winter rye, which is known as “cleansing” grain due to its deep roots. This means that the rye from Long Island is different than rye from anywhere else. Long Island is a leader in the preservation of open spaces.
Their fermentation process uses a variety of yeast strains including Champagne and Brewers Yeasts. These innovative techniques are more costly and add more time to the fermentation process, but the results reveal unique flavors not used by most other distilleries.
Long Island Vodka (LiV) is created using small batch pot and column distillation, bottling only the heart of the distillate. Each batch is distilled three times over through the twin 650-liter custom-made copper pot stills equipped with 30-foot tall rectification distillation columns.
The company’s liquor was the winner of the Double Gold in NY International Spirits Competition.The liquor won the Gold Awards 2012 San Francisco Spirits Competition and the NY International Spirits Competition 2011.
LiV is distilled from 100 percent locally grown Long Island potatoes and is naturally gluten-free. The potatoes are smaller in diameter so there is more skin to fruit contributing to the sweet vanilla flavors and creamy mouth feel. This is done in small batches, distilled and handcrafted sustainably.
LiV Standard Edition is an amazing local corn-based vodka that was released in 2017 for the 10-year anniversary of LiV Original Vodka. LiV Original Potato Vodka is transformed into an amazing Espresso Vodka, by a slow cold press method. They use Ristretto style with locally ground espresso beans. Ristretto means “restrict” in Italian. In this way their Espresso Vodka translates into a concentration of more concentrated espresso flavor along with being slightly sweeter without any of the bitterness.
Deepwells Botanical Dry Gin is a unique farm-to-bottle small batch gin produced by Long Island Sprits. Long Island Spirits uses 100 percent locally harvested NY White Round Marcy potatoes and pure glacial water from the Magothy Aquifer (aka “Deepwells”) to craft the base spirit. The potato base spirit is triple distilled to 191 Proof using custom 650 Liter copper pot stills and twin 19 plate copper rectification columns.
There are 28 local and exotic fruits and botanicals that are delicately infused with the base spirit, first in the pot still and then in a custom basket inside the botanical gin chamber. A special blend of botanicals softens in the pot still for 36 hours before the vapors of the blended spirit travel through the gin basket to infuse with the remaining botanicals. Very few gin producers make their own neutral spirit. Even more rarer that a gin uses potato as its base spirit.
The company has Sorbettas– the first potato-based liquers to be available in the United States. They are made in micro-batches from the spirits of the company’s vodka, combined with hand-peeled citrus fruit and locally-grown berries. Long Island Spirits offers five different flavored Sorbetta’s: Lemon, lime, orange, strawberry, and raspberry.
Rough Ride Bourbon is made in a proprietary manner using hand selected barrels of aged straight bourbon whisky, using local Long Island wine casks and a unique 180 proof brandy “cask finishing wash.” The bourbon starts out as a highly refined mash bill, consisting of 60 percent corn, 35 percent rye, and 5 percent malted barley. Then it is aged for several years in charred new American white oak barrels.
Long Island Spirits Team was able to manufacture Pharmaceutical Grade Hand Sanitizer in a quick response to the pandemic. This hand sanitizer meets the standards by the US Department of HHS, FDA, and Centers for Drug Evaluation & Research Policy for Alcohol Based Sanitizer Production During a Public Health Emergency. It is required by law that vodka needs to be distilled to above 190 Proof before it is blended down. LiV Vodka is distilled to 192 Proof, which only a small number of distilleries have the proper rectification columns to do. They are then taking the equivalent of a full Liter of their LiV Standard Vodka Beverage Grade Alcohol (which would retail for $30 per Liter) prior to being blended with distilled water and producing the equivalent of 16 oz of Hand Sanitizer.
More about the company and their fine liquors can be found at www.lispirits.com.
