KASPERS Elderflower - the new Spirit Drink from Transylvania
We have today collected the papers allowing us to produce a “spirit drink” from elderflower.
Since 2010 our Pivnita Bunicii food products have been based on the innovative use of local ingredients and traditional skills. Collecting and processing elderflower juice is a major part of our business and for over two years we have been trying to get a licence from the Romanian Customs to distil and produce elderflower gin, but nobody in Romania produces gin and so we have been pioneering on the translation and interpretation of the legislation (for now we are not allowed to call our drink Gin, hence the new spirit drink but resolving this is for the next round of these discussions).
Gin is typically (but not necessarily) made from grain spirit to which the botanicals are then added.
Our signature spirit drink from Transylvania, starts not with grain but with hand-picked wild elderflower and contains 11 botanicals, nine of which are commonly used in gin and two are from the biodiversity rich wildflower meadows for which the area is famous. The recipe for our elderflower gin was developed in 2017 as a thesis project by a Ph student at the Department of Brewing & Distilling at Herriot Watt University, Edinburgh.
This new spirit drink from Transylvania will be triple distilled in small batches using two traditional copper pot stills. Home distilling is still widespread, and we are helping to sustain the tradition by training young people but adding some science to the skills passed down from father to son over many generations.
Our brand for the spirit drinks will be KASPERS, named after the family who built our premises in the 1860’s and who were until recently distilling for home consumption on this site.
The new licence is operational from the 1st of March and we have already distilled our first batches of elderflower. We will also produce small quantities of fruit-based spirit drinks from plums, apples and pears. However, we now need to apply for the duty paid stickers that are attached to each bottle and this could take 4-6 weeks, and until then we will not be able to sell anything.
-60x76.png "KASPERS Gin Elderflower - 500ml")
