Two Cocktail Industry Veterans Open Connecticut Distilling In Waterbury

Connecticut has seen a bewildering explosion of craft breweries in our state since the early 2010s, but distilling? Not so much. We do have some very worthwhile options in the state, from Litchfield and the Hartford region, through the Rt. 8 corridor, and Fairfield County. The newest borrows the state’s name, alongside a few familiar faces in the industry.

In March of 2020 [ominous music plays] we brought you the birth announcement of our then-newest Connecticut distillery, Continuum, on the upper outskirts of Waterbury. What was old is now new again, and the cycle continues with Connecticut Distilling.

“We have new spirits, new recipes, new products like bourbon barrel aged maple syrup, new hours for the tasting room; it’s a brand new distillery,” said Stelios Stavrianos, who has partnered with well-known bartender and beverage industry founder, Dimitrios Zahariadis, otherwise known as the Cocktail Chemist, to create Connecticut Distilling.

Everything is different from Continuum at the new venture except the location and head distiller Brandon Collins, who was a chemist by trade who got into distilling the same way most garage-space home brewers do: he just thought it was cool. 

The distillery’s basic methods are the same: still using perfectly drinkable beer – maybe it’s been mislabeled, the print is crooked – and using this as the source for spirits, along with flavorful leftover solids, barrels, and the produce of local farms.

“We really reimagined the distillery from the ground up, apart from some great recipes he had before, like Drops,” said Stelios, who explained the genesis to CTBites on a recent visit.

“I was dating a Greek girl - we met just before the coronavirus lockdown - and she introduced me to Dimitri. I learned he and I were doing a lot of the same stuff in the bartending industry, and learned he was doing his Cocktail Chemist canned cocktails. It quickly came up: we’re both Greek, can we make a Greek spirit? That became Kavo Greek rum.”

Kavo – made in Greece – uses botanicals like Bergamot orange, Mandarin orange, sage, thyme, and honey to give it a completely unique profile compared to any other rum. It was a promising first act for the partnership.

“I had a bottle of Charred (Continuum bourbon) on my shelf at home,” Stelios told us. “And we started to think: what if we could do other products and make them in Waterbury?”

The current lineup will include distilled spirits all produced on-site. Drops, a clear, gin-like spirit made from a base of IPAs, will continue production, but with many new varieties, including peach Drops, and Drops-a-cellos, in lemon, orange, and lime, currently. You’ll also see cranberry Drops, and pumpkin spice Drops for the fall. 

Fort Hill bourbon whiskey, and Charred – made from cane sugar and local malt-forward beers like brown ales and stouts before being aged on charred staves of oak – will be on offer, along with Waterville (in a nod to local geography), a vodka mellowed over local sugar maple charcoal.

There are already a good supply of barrels at the distillery, and some are leant out to local brewers for stout aging before being given back to Connecticut Distilling, with a stop at local Maplewood Farms in Harwinton. The resulting bourbon barrel aged maple syrup is sold at both locations, with the knock-on benefit of having barrels to produce a maple-stout version of their Fort Hill bourbon. Now that’s continuity. 

Local farms produce the blueberries in a Connecticut Distilling rum, and pre-made cocktails - Manhattan, Boulevardier, etc. - will be available, with canned cocktails like Stelios’ Pasha’s vodka lemonade, Dimitri’s Cocktail Chemist array, and a new canned espresso martini named Moonlight Barista in partnership with RISE Brewing coffee. 

“In my eyes there are three types of drinkers,” Stelios told us. “Value, where they just want what’s cheapest, social, where they’re not super into alcohol, but want to drink whatever’s popular, and the third, who want to drink local, small batch spirits, be a little more discerning, maybe support the local economy.”

“We taste test every single batch: even the canned cocktails and Kavo. We went to Greece. We know what we’re putting into the marketplace, the products that were made with passion and appreciation for the brewers, farmers, and distillers.”

Stelios says he and Dimitri go so far as going to the farm to pick the blueberries they use.

I had the opportunity to sample cocktails created by the pair at the distillery – far from the sprawl of central Waterbury, near the river, and shaded by a small peak and several evergreens. Some favorites were an Old Fashioned made with Charred, fig, honey, and bitters, and a punch called a Haymaker, made with the versatile Charred, bitters, hibiscus tea, and a citrus blend. Cocktails will be available on-site, with bottles and cans to-go.

Is a summer road trip calling you? Well, call up a designated driver, and go.

Connecticut Distillery

2066 Thomaston Ave., Waterbury

CTDistilling.com