Making Whiskey, Brooklyn Style

Micro-distillery Brings Whiskey-Making to NYC

By Kurt Maitland

David Haskell of Kings County Distillery
fermenting new product
(Credit: Kurt Maitland)

For centuries, when the world speaks of or thinks about New York City, they think of Manhattan first. It’s the home of the Empire State Building, Wall Street, and Broadway. Yet New York City is really five boroughs (Manhattan, Brooklyn, Bronx, Queens and Staten Island), and each waxes and wanes in popularity. It may be hard to believe but in the Seventies and early Eighties, the now posh and trendy areas of Soho, Tribeca and Lower East Side were burned out shells that bore a closer resemblance to post-World War II Berlin than part of the United States.

For years, Brooklyn was in much the same boat. Brooklyn Heights, with its views of the city always retained a certain value and charm but the rest of the borough could not compete with Manhattan in a battle for “coolness”. Much of the borough was still battle-scarred by the downturn in New York’s fortunes in the Seventies and early Eighties. In the Nineties, as the economics of the area improved, Brooklyn, for many, was where you went to “retire”. The borough you went to when you wanted room for a family and you couldn’t afford to do the upgrade in Manhattan.

The steel and copper at Kings County
(Credit: Kurt Maitland)

But over the last decade Brooklyn has taken on a new significance. What was once “wilderness” at best and “dangerous” at its worst  – places such as Williamsburg, Red Hook, Bushwick and Gowanus have become some of the coolest neighborhoods and home to some of the hottest concert venues and bars in the five boroughs.

Making Whiskey in the Navy Yard
Brooklyn has also become home to something else: a burgeoning craft movement that uses recent changes in New York State law to create small distilleries and breweries that cater to the now-trendy bars and neighborhood liquor stores that has helped to make Brooklyn the hot spot it is today.

One of those distilleries is the Kings County Distillery, newly located the more than 100 year old former Paymaster’s Building in the Brooklyn Navy Yard. In fact it’s more than “one of those distilleries,” as it’s actually the first distillery in New York since prohibition. I got the chance to tour Kings Country facilities (they conduct tours for the public on Saturdays), as well as speak briefly to the owners and I liked what I heard and I saw.

The next stage for Kings County: aged whiskey
(Credit: Kurt Maitland)

The new location was an excellent choice. It gives co-owners David Haskell and Colin Spoelman a barnlike space in an urban area that allows them to store and experiment with different distillations that couldn’t have been done in the constricted space of their original location. This type of space is easy to come by in a more rural environment but in NYC, space is a premium and this type of space (high ceilings, open floors and a little outdoor area to try and raise a little corn for their own) is a godsend.

In speaking to David and Colin, it is also understand how they have to compete both with the other distilleries that have sprung as well as the established players. They’ve said they “can’t let time fix their mistakes”. Whatever they make it has to be good now. This they achieve with their current lineup and with that mindset I look forward to whatever they release in the future.