We’ve been secretly distilling and nobody knew,” Adam Smith says. He’s mostly joking: Maplewood Brewery & Distillery hasn’t exactly been hiding the distilling side of its operation. (It’s right there in the name.) But in the nearly three years it has been making spirits, it hasn’t released a single one. Aside from festivals where Maplewood has poured tastes of its whiskey, rum, and gin, the public has never had a chance to taste any of them. With the opening of Maplewood Lounge on December 15, that’s about to change. “To show people what we’ve been doing—it’s pretty exciting,” says Smith, Maplewood’s brand manager and one of its brewers.
Beer likewise figures in all the cocktails, which are being developed by Matt Frederick, a bartender who most recently worked at EZ Inn and developed the cocktail program at Mi Tocaya Antojería. At Maplewood he runs the taproom and works on the distilling side of things—which also involves beer. The Fat Pug malt whiskey begins with the grain bill for Fat Pug milk stout, optimized for distillation by leaving out the hops and lactose and tweaking amounts for some other ingredients. Two more whiskeys, which are still aging, are inspired by an Oktoberfest and a sour pilsner. One of the two slushies on offer, the Pug Slide, is a take on a Mudslide involving both Fat Pug white whiskey and the milk stout itself, plus chocolate, coffee, and coconut milk. A draft cocktail called Fizzy Pants features gin, a syrup made with Son of Juice Pants IPA, and orange oleo saccharum.
