A modern take on ~ THE CLASSIC FRENCH ANISEED SPIRIT - 42% abv
THE FIRST PASTIS TO BE MADE IN THE UK
Distilled with ~ 13 HAND-SELECTED BOTANICALS
INCLUDING LIQUORICE ROOT, ORANGE PEEL & FORAGED GORSE FLOWERS
Distilled in ~ SMALL BATCHES
IN OUR FLAME-FIRED COPPER POT STILLS
BOTANICALS
We’ve hand-selected 13 different botanicals – carefully sourced from both distant and exotic locations around the world – to create a truly unique spirit that reflects our celebration of experimental craft distilling.
GREEN ANISEED ~ from Turkey
FENNEL SEED ~ from Turkey
STAR ANISE ~ from China
LIQUORICE ROOT ~ fromUzbekistan
ANGELICA ROOT ~ from Poland
GREEN CARDAMON ~ from Guatemala
CINNAMON ~ from Madagascar
ORRIS ROOT ~ from Morocco
JUNIPER ~ from Italy
FRESH ORANGE, LEMON & GRAPEFRUIT PEEL ~ (seasonally sourced)
GORSE FLOWERS ~ foraged from the nearby Atlantic clifftops
OUR PROCESS
As a fully-independent, family-run business, we at Southwestern Distillery like to celebrate the fact that we do things a little bit differently.
At the heart of our distilling process lie Tarquin’s three 250 litre hand-beaten copper pot-stills.
TAMARA, SENARA & TRESSA
To this day, these stills continue to be fired by direct naked flame and are sealed at the joints with bread dough. These distilling techniques are about as old-school as you can find.
Alongside these original copper pot-stills proudly sits the newest addition to the distillery, FERARRA – a state of the art, one-of-a-kind 500 litre copper still. Championing a combination of the progressively modern and the authentically traditional Tarquin uses these four stills collectively to create his internationally award-winning spirits.
When it’s time to create our Tarquin’s Cornish Pastis, 12 of the botanicals are added to our stills (with the exception of the gorse flowers) and left to macerate overnight in a wheat based neutral grain spirit.
In the morning Tarquin’s simply adds the gorse flowers, to complete the botanical recipe, and then it’s time to fire up the stills.
As the stills heat up Tarquin is constantly monitoring the process, nosing and tasting as the distilled spirit as it comes off the still at different temperatures. We collect only the purest ‘heart of the distillation’ (achieved when the still has reached the magic temperature of 78’c), collecting and setting aside the ‘heads’ and ‘tails’ cuts (the first and last parts of the distillation) that don’t make the most selective taste and texture grade.
Post distillation, this ‘hearts cut’ (around 76% abv neat Pastis) is cut with de-mineralized Cornish spring water to bring it down to the desired 42% abv. Then Tarquin adds extra liquorice root and fresh orange peel to bring some colour and beautiful freshness to the final spirit.
Every single bottle is then individually hand-filled, hand-labelled, dipped into a slow-cooker filled with paraffin wax, stamped with our Puffin logo, given batch tasting notes and then individually hand-signed.
We truly believe in the value of maximising the human-touch at every stage of the process.
NO SHORT-CUTS ~ NO OUT-SOURCING ~ NO COMPROMISE
When Tarquin puts “Handcrafted in Cornwall” on every bottle, he really does mean it.
