The Porróncast
A Wine, Spirits and Non-Alc. Podcast spotlighting the stories of people who share the Porrón.
Hosted by Ryan Looper.
The Porróncast
T.O.S Distillery: A Grain-to-Glass French Whisky Story
Stéphane Bogaert is one of the founders of T.O.S Distillerie, a Craft French Whisky, Geniévre and Eau-de-Vie distiller near the Belgian border in the Hauts-de-France.
Stéphane reveals the hidden treasures within the canon of French spirits, particularly quality eau-de-vie de bière and the ancient classic spirit of the area, Geniévre.
He also charts the future of French Whisky and its growing allure in international markets, including the US.
Follow us on IG: @demaisoneast and @theporroncast
The Porróncast is hosted and produced by Ryan Looper - @iamlooper
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For deeper information on any producer featured on this episode click here and search producer name
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If you find a Porrón on the back label of a bottle, it is imported to the USA exclusively by the spectacular importer and team @dmselections
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Original Music by Julian Tamers - @juliantamers on IG and Tiktok
Welcome to the Perroncast, Stefan. Welcome to New York. It's so good to have you here. Toss Distillery Tell me how it started.
Speaker 1:In fact, we used to be a brewer before being distiller. We opened a brewery in the north part of France maybe 22 years ago, and we have decided 2017 to do something else instead of beer, and we thought it was a good complement to the brewery to open a distillery.
Speaker 2:And Brasserie Saint-Germain was the name of the brewery, correct? Yeah, exactly, and where? In France. When people say the Haute de France right, it's funny. I've been working with French wine and spirits for a long time when you say Haute de France, people don't really know what you're talking about most of the time.
Speaker 1:But some French people don't know because it's pretty new names. They just changed the name of the regions some years ago.
Speaker 2:Oh, is that true?
Speaker 1:What was it before? It was Nord-Pas-de-Calais. In fact it was two states, nord and Pas-de-Calais. So it was the name of the region before being Eau de France. And when they created Eau de France, they just had three other states. Some was EN and now it's five departments, five states and it's called Eau de France. But you have to choose the name of the region, so we have voted for this name.
Speaker 2:Well, it does have a good connotation, I would say.
Speaker 1:Yeah, because it's very simple, very clear. It's the north part of France, so Eau means the hub of France, so that was clear.
Speaker 2:And this is near Belgium.
Speaker 1:Yeah, exactly we are. Maybe this theory is 35 minutes from the border of Belgium. That's why, before, the influence was more about beer in France, because there were only two regions, famous regions for beer in France. All the other regions are more focused on wine and of course it was Alsace, close to Germany, and the north part of France, Haute-France, now close to Belgium border.
Speaker 2:What's the major town in the Haute-de-France?
Speaker 1:The major town is Lille, which is maybe in the top seven biggest city in France and, yeah, a lot of influence of the Flemish history also.
Speaker 2:Cool, and I mentioned this to someone who really knows france and the first thing they said was this is the grain bowl of france yeah, exactly exactly the reason, the main reason why the beer was so famous.
Speaker 1:because we have all the raw materials, all the ingredients to do beer and since we have a lot of grain in the region, that was natural to do beer. And since we have a lot of grain in the region, that was natural to do beer. And also Geneva, but I think we're going to talk about it.
Speaker 2:So for 20 years you did beer and I could use a beer actually right now. What is the style of beer in this area? Because people? The other thing that's been coming up a lot with regard to your distillery project is bière de garde. Could you just walk us really quickly through what that actually means?
Speaker 1:In fact bière de garde is a kind of mistake in the people's mind, because garde means to keep, keep. So most of the people think that once the beer is brewed and bottled you can keep it at the house in the cellar for long years. And it's not in fact. Keep the beer means that we keep after the fermentation in a cold room and at least for three or four weeks before bottling. So the reason and the meaning of this is that you have to clear the yeast that is still in the beer and the flavors that you have from fermentation.
Speaker 2:That's why Amazing. Thanks for clearing that up. That's been a major point of conversation. So you're in the grain bowl of France. It seems obvious that whiskey would be something that comes up. Why hasn't it Just the domination of beer culture?
Speaker 1:Yes, yes, it's true, and in fact, the first French distillery just started in the 80s 1980s, so it's pretty young. But yeah, in our region we were more focused on beer, of course, because beer was available everywhere, in every town, many bars, in even the village in my village, I think, it's less than 4,000 people and there were maybe 10 or 15 bars. So, yeah, people were more focused on the natural beers and, of course, geneva.
Speaker 2:In 2017, I believe, you decided to embark on this project called TOS. Tos stands for the Other Side. We've talked about this in a previous podcast, so you were doing it on the other side of the brewery, essentially, or that was the conceptual idea.
Speaker 1:Project yes.
Speaker 2:Yeah, so you start this and you you're making whiskey. What was it like in the moment when you decided to do that project in the world of french whiskey? Because french whiskey is very much under the radar here. People do not. They haven't jumped in yet with french whiskey. What was it like then when you started?
Speaker 1:when we are started. In fact, in our mind we wanted to start earlier, maybe 2010, 2011 because a lot of friends that we have in the beer industry just started some years before and said it's a good opportunity for you to do something else. Very nice. So we started only seven years ago, but in our mind it was earlier. So we have prepared everything, but the french whiskey was not famous. Today we can say it's not famous, not yet. Even in our own market, for example, the french whiskey is only one percent of the sales. It means one million bottles. The french market is 100 million bottles, which is a lot, but a lot of imported whiskey, like irish and scotch, of course. So when we launched the first artigia, it was we were the 50, 50 or 51st distillery launching French whiskey. By French whiskey, we say brewed, fermented, distilled in France that's a very courageous thing to do.
Speaker 2:My impression is that the whiskey market is not an easy market. It's a large market and what you just said kind of blew my mind 1% in France of consumption is French, so meaning that there's a big thirst for whiskey in France, but not for local whiskey.
Speaker 1:Yet Not yet, but we are working on this because, um, we always say that you have to be, uh, everywhere in your own market, in france, I mean. So we try now to focus on the distribution of the whiskey in the small shops, wine shops, and not for the moment in supermarkets, because they are on the French whiskey but a big brand. So we are more a craft distillery, so that's why we want to be distributed by small shops with owner that knows what French whiskey is.
Speaker 2:Currently in the US, we have three products. We have Artesia, the French whiskey, we have the Genève and we have an eau de vie de bière. We have three things. I'd like to start with the whiskey. How do you make it? Where are the grains from? What's the inspiration? How do you make artesia?
Speaker 1:The grain is local because we have two moutries not far from the distillery. It's less than 45 minutes and, as you said, it's a big region for the barley and wheat, for example. So we decided to apply the same philosophy we had for beer working with many local ingredients as much as possible. So that's why we are working with both both malt trees. As a brewer, we were always focused on fermentation using yeast and these kind of things and, according me, most of the French distilleries are distillers of other products, like wines I mean cognac and this kind of Calvados for apples and they were not very. They didn't have a big knowledge about the grain and, as a brewer, it was important for us to use what we knew from being a brewer and apply it to fermentation, control, fermentation temperatures, the good yeast and to get all these wonderful flavors that you can have after very well-controlled fermentation. That's why we were pretty focused on this before being focused on distilling.
Speaker 2:Is there a requirement? On artesia, this French whiskey that you make at TOS, it says pure malt on the front. Is there a requirement to put that on the label, or is that something that you just decided to do?
Speaker 1:In fact it was a kind of mistake, because most of the people say they know better single malts. But as a brewer you know it was our past. As a brewer we say pure malt, it's a good thing because we know it's 100, we wanted to mean that it's 100% malt, nothing else. And in fact in France most of the people only know single malt. That's why now we are changing a little bit the labors to do what people are waiting for, so it is a single malt. It is a single malt yeah.
Speaker 2:Yeah, that's one of the reasons I ask. And so you have this local grain, you have the know-how from your, your beer, your your history making beer, and then you are distilling and aging. So is there anything particular with regard to the distillation and the aging that you think is important to know about? Toss artesia.
Speaker 1:I would say we are classic in uh distillation and we we are using um holstein uh pot still. But uh, when we we bought it, we went to see the the supplier and discuss with him about what we wanted to to do with the pot still, and we have good advices from the manufacturer of the pot still. And yeah, we are doing um, a normal distillation in fact, as as we did for the brewery. People know us for for for the beer, the quality of the beer. So, as a new producer and using new distiller, we didn't want to to make people unhappy with the product. So we chose to do classic things for the beginning and after, when the people had the chance to try the product and be happy with it.
Speaker 1:Of course, they will follow us on different things, but by aging the whiskey we are also doing pretty classic things. I mean using a lot of ex-bourbon barrels for the moment, but we also have some limited series with sherry. Cask. Wine is not, for the moment, what we are focused on, because I can understand that some french distillers located in the wine region are focused on this kind of barrels, but we have no legitimacy to do this because we have no wine in Haute-France, except champagne. We have a small part of the Haute-France doing champagne, but it's not in our project for the moment.
Speaker 2:After you've placed in ex-bourbon casks and a little bit of French oak, as I remember there's a portion of new oak that you always like to have. On Artesia, yeah, we have a. I remember there's a portion of new oak that you always like to have.
Speaker 1:On artesia yeah, we, we, we had a small portion of a new oak, exactly.
Speaker 2:Yeah, it's like 10% or less. Yeah, how long do you age? There's no age statement, right, but how long do you age on average, the whiskey?
Speaker 1:Uh, at least three years, because three years is the minimum, uh, minimum, the legal minimum of aging in whiskey in Europe. So, but now we are, because in the beginning we were selling all the bottles that we produced. So now we have time to keep the barrels a little bit longer. It was not possible in the beginning, since we had a lot of success when we started the distillery.
Speaker 2:Let's take a break and we'll come back and talk about Genev and Eau de Villebière. You're listening to the Peroncast, All right, we're back. Genev has a deep history in your area and it's virtually unknown in most of the US. I don't think there are many producers of Genev. How many current producers make Genev?
Speaker 1:There are only two producers. In fact, we were the third one with Toast Distillery, but there was one of the oldest 1817, who was about to collapse, so we bought it in 2019. So now we are still two producers, but we bought one of the third. Uh, that was uh some years ago incredible congratulations.
Speaker 2:What is genève?
Speaker 1:oh, genève is um, it was the, the only grain spirit that you could find in france before, uh, being able to do whiskey, and many people don't know that.
Speaker 1:And, as you said, genève is pretty unknown in the US, but also in France, I have to admit it, because we sell 100% of the production locally. I mean, locally is not even Eau de France, it's only the two historic states, nantes and Pas-de-France, it's only the two historic states, you know, and Pas-de-Calais. So it's not so famous in France because I think the distribution was not so good at that time. And of course, I would say that each region has its own spirit to drink made locally or even at home. So the people who used to drink Geneva were most of the time the people, the miners because we have coal mines in my region and people working in industry close to Lille, and so it was a kind of habit to have Geneva in the morning before going to work. I know that it can be funny to say that, but it was the habit of the workers at that time. And yes, the problem is that the distribution was not done to other places in France.
Speaker 2:And it's just for clarity. It's a malt base with juniper infusion.
Speaker 1:Yeah in fact it's a malt base spirit. For example, we use rye and barley and it's like a kind of beer that we have to distill, in fact, and we are obliged to do it in two steps, two distillations. The first one is only the grain and the second one when we get some alcohol, about 30-35% alcohol. You can do the second distillation with juniper berries inside which give the flavors of juniper to the product.
Speaker 2:This probably sounds familiar to people as, like Yennefer or some of these other similar styled spirits out in the world, you're saying that people to fortify essentially themselves before heading out to a day's maybe a tough day's work probably a tough day's work they would have a little shot. Are people still doing that today? Is that how people take the Genev?
Speaker 1:No, it's not so famous now anymore, Because of course, you know that there are so many communications about drinking was not good, especially at work, that people changed the way they are using Genevieve. Now you can have it more as digestif I know the word exists in English, yeah digestif. Digestif after the lunch or the dinner, and now we are trying to open our minds to using it to cocktails, for example. But no, in the morning you can't drink anymore of Geneva.
Speaker 2:What about the eau de vie de bière, which I mentioned in a previous episode, that people really flip out when they have the eau de vie de bière? It's in some very well-known cocktails right now in the city. I imagine that you just came upon this as, like we have a really high quality beer, why not distill it to an eau de vie? Am I way off, or was it more than that?
Speaker 1:In fact, normally the eau de vie de bière was a kind of spirit made from bad beers, and that's why the reputation of eau de vie de bière was not so good some years ago, because Incredible.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:You know, it's like some spirits made from old wines or bad wines. It was a kind of the same system for beer, but we decided to do it only with good beer, which is for Fantastic philosophy better.
Speaker 1:And we chose the Iildegard Blonde, which was it's a kind of tribute to Hildegard Blonde. Hildegard Blonde was one of the beers that we do at the brewery Saint-Germain and it was one of the most famous beer we have, because we won a lot of French medals to the national contest. And what is really nice with this beer is that she's 100% local, with barley and also local hops. We are using Brewer's Gold and Streusel Spalt hops that are produced close to the brewery.
Speaker 1:And yeah, since all the people know this beer and it was a kind of return to bitterness at that time because bitterness was not so famous anymore in the beginning of the 20s and yeah, we have decided to return to the roots of beer de garde style with a kind of higher bitterness around. If you know the high bus, it was 32 ibus, so if you drink ip, of course it's nothing. But at that time the other garden was not so bitter. Most of the other guns were about 18 ibus, for example. So that's why this, this beer just became famous, because it was the real taste of the old beer de garde, and doing Eau de Ville de Bière from this beer was a kind of tribute to the success of this beer.
Speaker 2:That's wonderful. I had no idea that Eau de Ville de Bière was kind of like an exhalation of bad beer inventory. You're right. How do you use the whiskey? Let's start with Artesia. How do you take it? How do you? How do you use the whiskey? Let's start with artesia. How do you take it? How do you drink it at home? What do you advise people to do to really enjoy it?
Speaker 1:there are different ways to use it. Of course you can use it normal, classic no ice to me but you can also use it as a cocktail, because there are some people who dislike whiskey the taste is too strong for them, for example and we recommend to do some cocktails with it, of course the Manhattan or things like this. But we recently tried a kind of Moscow Mule, but no vodka, only whiskey, and it was a perfect association. We have founded a club of artesia which has maybe 50 members and once a year we are doing a kind of special dinner about whiskey and, according to the meal and the whiskey, this kind of cocktail, the Moscow Mule artesia version, was really appreciated by the client.
Speaker 2:That's great. So we talked about Genev. I would imagine that one could use Genev in a lot of gin cocktails and it would add a different dimension. Has that been your experience?
Speaker 1:Yes, because of course Genev, Geneva, was kind of a historic gene. The thing is that the Geneva that we are doing is very special, especially because it's produced in a French area. You can also do in Belgium and Netherlands, for example, but the one that we are doing is 100% from grain and you can mostly find Geneva done by classic alcohol. But you can do it with alcohol coming from beetroots, from wheat, and it has not this powerful taste of cereal. The Geneva Bouthe has it because it's 100% grain, so the base is very strong if you compare to a normal gin made with this kind of alcohol. Yeah, that's why most of the time when you are using it you have to balance the flavors, because if you have a strong ingredient with strong genie, with maltiness taste, it can be really difficult to balance it. So you have to be careful. But the association could be very nice because you have I know that American people they like the taste big taste, strong taste, and I think it could be a good base to do cocktails.
Speaker 2:I've been doing Negronis with it, which is really fun. Eau de vitibière is this really just digestive for you?
Speaker 1:oh, yeah, could be a more digestive, but also you can use it in cocktails. It's quite also difficult because you have like a earthiness and bitterness, yeah, a kind of vegetable aspect, but uh, yeah, it could very be very nice. For example, we we have tried with asher, uh, with uh pomegranate, uh grapefruit juice, and it was a perfect association yeah, the.
Speaker 2:I find it a perfect association. Yeah, the. I find it very versatile and it kind of gives a harmonic or a top note to some things very quickly. Maybe not in large quantities, but it's a. It's something that it has a lot of applications and just because a lot of people haven't seen it, they're playing with it a lot. So it finds itself into a shandy or a float with certain cocktails.
Speaker 1:It can bring something new to cocktails that you can't imagine you can't have had before.
Speaker 2:I completely agree. What do you think it's going to take to get French whiskey to the next level?
Speaker 1:I think the most important, because I'm going to talk about my influence with beer. We used to be imported in the US and we were about five or six different French breweries and we asked to be more present in the US, more present in the US, and our importer, who used to go very often to France, said but you are not even in Paris. Why would you like to? You would like to be more imported in the US, but I can't find you in France. So I would say that the first thing is to be present everywhere in France as much as possible. Present everywhere in France as much as possible.
Speaker 1:I mean especially in big cities like Paris, because the more people will see the French whiskey in restaurants, in bars, the more they will be interested in to visit and maybe try a new French distillery. So we have a lot of work to do. Even in our own country, even in my region, Some people don't know that we are doing whiskey. I would say, not in my town, but maybe a hundred kilometers far from the distillery. Some people don't know that there are French whiskey locally made, with local ingredients. So we have a lot of work to do still.
Speaker 2:I find myself often saying that as a this is kind of a setting the tone for TOS. I say France has great water, they have great grain and I talk about the Haute de France very quickly and a very deep distilling history. So those three things to me are the most important things. I think you forgot the barrels also are the most important things. I think you forgot the barrels also. Well, yes, of course, absolutely, the aging of barrels locally. Yeah, absolutely so.
Speaker 2:Yes, the French whiskey trajectory is aided by a deep history of distillation incredible water, incredible grain that has been going into beer for a very long time and the access to fantastic forests and barrels. This is not a typical thing, and so I think it's just a matter of time. The one thing that's very surprising to people is the grain, and I think people just haven't quite crystallized that that's the case Also that there's an elegance to the more craft French whiskey I've tried for at this point. I find them to be very open and drinkable, not so heavy and like high impact boozy. There's an elegance and balance to them, which I think is really special.
Speaker 1:We are working with other distillers, we have a kind of federation and we are working on a special appellation about French whiskey what is a French whiskey? And we are writing a kind of concept that says what is a French whiskey?
Speaker 2:Almost like a charter. You're writing like a charter for French whiskey.
Speaker 1:Exactly, and we are working to get a special appellation certificate of origin, the French whiskey, because, of course, when something is a little bit more fashionable, there are many people. They are importing Scotch whiskey, for example, aging in France. It's a French whiskey and we are working on that because it's very important to be clear to customer what is a French whiskey. And one thing is also interesting comparing to some other countries doing whiskey, is that we have, as you said, many different historic spirits done by different shape of pot, steel, for example, different manufacturer and, for example, we are working with a company, a distribution company, and they ask to 11 different distillery to do a wash, to do whiskey from the same beer, I would say, and because the 11 had 11 different styles of pot still, and it will be interesting to see the program because they send some samples to all the producers and the flavor and the taste was completely different depending on the pot still that was used to.
Speaker 2:Someone once said to me that there is a terroir in a still, which I think is an interesting and that's a deep conversation. But you're right, you know, it's not just the hand of the distiller, it's the actual still that imparts some sort of personality. It's a little bit magical. Exactly what else do you want people to know about tolst distillery?
Speaker 1:um, um that. We, we are pretty nice people.
Speaker 2:You definitely are you've always been so nice and so generous with us. I'm missing some beer next door, but other than that, it's been really incredible. No, I'm kidding. Yeah, you are very nice, that's true. What else?
Speaker 1:We are very focused on, of course, the quality, but what is interesting with whiskey comparing to beer, for example is that we have time to do things. That is really good, because doing something good needs time. And, of course, france is not uh, it's pretty far from the us, but if you had the chance to go to france, it would be nice to to see our region, of course, and maybe visit our district and maybe visit our distillery. We are now we have the project to build our own distillery, or building, so I hope, finger crossed, that will be done next year, because we have to split from the brewery. We were in the same building, same location, so we have to split and, of course, you'll be welcome if you had the chance to come to France. Thank you very much.
Speaker 2:I really appreciate you coming to New York and spending some time on the Perroncast. If you see Toss Distillery out there, grab yourself a bottle. It's special and made with a lot of generosity.
Speaker 1:Thank you so much.
Speaker 2:Thanks for listening to the Perroncast. I'm your host, ryan Looper. Today's episode was produced by yours truly, theme music by the Julian Tamers. Special thanks to today's guests, the teams at Demaison East and Demaison Selections and all of the growers in the Demaison portfolio. Remember, if you turn the bottle around, you find the Perron, it's Demaison. And if you have the Perron, that's Demaison. And if you have a Perron at a party, you should really share that thing. Quit hogging it. Okay, pass the Perron. If you like the podcast, you want to find it on one of the platforms. Just search the Perroncast, hit, follow. We got lots more to come. We're also on the Instagram at the to come. We're also on the Instagram at the Perrone cast. Look forward to sharing some more with you soon. Thanks,
