Routt Distillery is a uniquely conservation-minded spirits producer and has made a commitment to sustainability in three key areas: sourcing locally, minimizing waste, and energy efficiency.

Grain Backstory 

The Western Slope accounts for around three percent of Proximity Malt’s barley supply. The grower for Proximity in this area is David Harold who owns and operates the Tuxedo Corn Company in Olathe, Colorado. The Grain Chain was thrilled to learn more about David’s focus on regenerative farming practices and the company’s contributions towards sustainable agriculture in our state. They are a STAR+ recognized farming operation and Tuxedo Corn plans to increase acreage in the new year, including spring varieties. 

Proximity Malt sources from grain farms across the state and blends for batch to batch consistency. Routt Distillery and the team at Proximity selected their batch because they believed it to have the best chance of utilizing Western Slope grains, based on estimates of when those harvests went through the malting facility. 

For the creation of Sarvis Gin, Brad Christensen started by making a neutral spirit out of 50% malted barley and 50% malted wheat. He did a single infusion mash at 63.5°C for 90 minutes. For recipes like this one, the original gravity (OG) is usually around 1.067 and it is fermented for seven days with the final gravity (FG) usually around 1.003. Brad does on-grain fermentation and distillation in an effort to retain the maximum grain flavor throughout the process. To accompany this, Brad also uses a whiskey yeast for fermenting his neutral spirit. Each batch is around 850 lbs of grain and 1600 liters of water. 

The first run on the still is the stripping run and produces around 500 liters of 30% low wines. The low wines then go through the still for a finishing run and produce around 62 proof gallons (123 liters) of 190 proof spirit. Once the neutral spirit is made the actual gin process begins. Neutral spirit (which is legally required to make gin) is added to the boiler. Routt Distillery does a maceration style of gin production where the botanicals sit in the boiler liquid. Sarvis Gin starts with their Summer Gin botanical mixture which features a citrus and floral flavor profile. Brad envisioned this base would complement the sarvisberry flavors nicely. 

The most time consuming aspect of the project was harvesting the sarvisberries. In the wild lands near Steamboat Springs, sarvisberries grow to about the size of a wild blueberry. They are found in clusters on small to large bushes. Brad harvested from August 16th - September 14th and noted that because 2023 was a very good year for the berries, they were able to harvest 50 pounds. Around 10 pounds of this total were harvested with a local non-profit, Yampatika, who specializes in outdoor education and foraging classes. After harvest the berries were frozen which allowed time to wait to macerate the berries until Proximity’s Western Slope malt was available. The freezing process also accomplished breaking the cell walls of the berries creating a more efficient overall maceration. Once the Summer Gin base was distilled with the Western Slope malt, Brad macerated the sarvisberries in the gin for five weeks before filtering, adjusting proof, and finally bottling. 

Routt Distillery ran several rounds of sensory analysis to hone in on the preferred final proof as well as the “loading rate” of sarvisberries to gin. In the end he found that 66 proof (33% ABV) and around 0.5 pounds of sarvisberries per bottle was the preferred flavor profile. No additional sugar was added to this year’s batch, but he could envision how other years might produce berries that are less sweet and would thus require sweetening. For reference, the classic “Sloe Gin” is made with Sloe berries and tends to be bottled at 60 proof and very sweet.

On this first ever run of Sarvis Gin, Routt Distillery produced 94 750ml bottles. They retail for $44 and are only sold through the Steamboat Springs tasting room. The team explained that it is proving to be a very popular item and they quickly sold through more than half of their stock shortly after announcing the release. 

In the tasting room, guests can enjoy a Sarvis Gin Fizz. This cocktail is crafted with 2 oz Sarvis Gin, ¾ oz lemon juice, ¼ oz simple syrup, and soda water. 

Overall, Routt Distillery is very happy with how this product turned out and they have plans to make it a yearly special release. The biggest limiting factor will be harvesting sarvisberries. Even though this was a great year for their harvest, it was still difficult to harvest enough berries. The Western Slope malt proved to be an interesting flavor contributing element and connected this Steamboat Springs-based maker with growers in the Montrose/Olathe area. Brad has already started to explore using other grains from this region in future distillation projects.