Epic Trip Part II - Wildcat Brothers Distillery at Gator Cove

 Welcome back to the road.  We left Pensacola on 1/13 for the second part of our “Epic Adventure”.  

Our first night was at a Harvest Host called Wildcat Brothers Distillery at Gator Cove.  This was a rum distillery.  They provided a tour at 4pm and we didn’t leave until 10:30pm having spent the night learning, chatting and laughing with the president, Tait, and later on the CEO, Doug, as well. 

                                                       View from the camper where we parked at the distillery 

We learned about the distilling process, why two bourbon drinkers run a rum distillery and so much more.  Tait was originally from a part of Louisiana two hours from the distillery.  He could trace his lineage back to 1726.  Boo was his common phrase, which is what you call someone who is a friend (everyone a Cajun meets) but not family, which is Bab.  Dave and Tait had alot to talk about as Tait got his PhD at and was a professor at Florida State University.    

    

New fangled still

Original still

One of the things that fascinated me the most was how Tait and Doug followed their passion for Happiness and left their “stable” jobs to own a distillery outside Lafayette, LA.  Doug has 5 children, 3 in college currently.  Their key values are Conservation, Moderation, Innovation and Celebration. 

We learned how all the materials that they use are from within a 50 mile radius of the distillery and they use no chemicals.  Sugar cane is the bumper crop in the area, so they take advantage of that.  They teach moderation in all of their tastings, etc.  They work on ways to repurpose ingredients and items that are discarded after use.  For example, the yeast.  They are working with the local university to create fertilizer for farmers and vitamins for cows.  They are always innovating new tastes and combinations with their rum.  They have their Heritage Series, which are the standards they always have and then they have the Snake Oil line, which is ever changing.  If one of the Snake Oils becomes really popular, they rename it and keep the line.  Their latest rum, called rooster, is purple (my favorite color) and sweet (my favorite cocktail). I was not able to get a bottle that night, but it will be available on their website next week.  I will definitely be getting a bottle.  Celebration is Happiness, their passion.  

Here are just some other facts learned about the process and through the night:

*Louisiana produces the most sugarcane in the US.  

*Wildcat Brothers is the oldest distillery in LA (2011 - current owners 2019)

*Tait uses his research background to help the distillery.  Has also talked to bootleggers in the area to learn things.

*They use “old fashioned technology” to make their products.  One example is open fermenting, barrels are open and the doors to outside are open

• water, sugar, yeast are the only ingredients.  Flavors are obtained from barrels or tree bark or other natural ingredients.  Their sugar is from local sugar cane, the water is from the chico aquifer, 3,000 feet in the ground.  The process takes 7 days.  The yeast they buy commercially, but hope in the future to create their own unique yeast for their products.  
• Yeast is temperature reliant.  It also creates its own heat, so these are all factors that need to be taken into consideration.  
• They make french style rum because it is made with sugar or cane juice.  British style is with fructose.
• They use local mix of tree bark to flavor their darker rum - cherry, pear, persimmon, hickory and plum.  They put a sack of various combinations of bark in the barrel to flavor the rum.
• They use a “tasting panel” (people) to figure when the rum is complete rather than a specific amount of time in the barrel for their flavored rums.
• Approximately 15 lbs of yeast is used for 500 gallon fermenter.
• From a 500 gallon fermenter the top 25 is too strong to use.  I missed what they do with that.   The bottom 25 is called the tail, which is not usable for rum, so they use it for cleaning materials and to burn (like in a bottle with a candle wick).
• They make their rum with anything you would find in a cajun kitchen.  He showed us a jar of garlic he had that was sitting to be used as flavoring.
• If you would like to make a daiquiri the proportions are 2 shots rum, 1 shot simple syrup, 1 shot lime, lemon, pineapple or tart cherry juice.  Tait emphasized to make your own simple syrup.  Recipe - equal parts water and sugar.  You can use white sugar or sugar in the raw for different tastes.

Well, probably much more than you ever wanted to know about rum.  I am sure I will curb my details as we move along.

That’s all for now.