Members of the Yorkshire Society recently had a tour of the Cooper King distillery at Stockton on the Forest near York.
Chris, the company’s founder, gave us a fascinating insight into the circumstances that lead him and his fiancée to start the business and then went on to explain the process of distilling both gin and whisky. This was followed by gin tasting in the bar.
The second of the company’s commercially available gins will be on the market in a few weeks time but it will be up to five years before the first batch of whisky is ready for sale, they also produce bespoke gins for two high class restaurants.
The company operates on a fairly small scale at the moment, but they do have plans for expansion. They source as many of the raw ingredients as possible from local producers, with herbs and honey being produced on site, recycle most of the waste products and use green energy sources. They also donate a percentage of each sale to a project that plants trees in the Yorkshire Dales.
An excellent visit to a small company that deserves to go from strength to strength.