Description
Founded in 2010 by Bryan Davis and partner Joanne Haruta, Lost Spirits Distillery began in Castroville, California. In 2014, Davis perfected a process allowing him to create a 20-year rum in the space of a week. In the basic terms, special lights break wood down into flavor precursors, accelerating the aging of the wood. Then, the booze is heated to drive reactions to form the same type of flavorings you'd find in aged spirits. In early 2017, Lost Spirits Distillery launched in the Los Angeles Arts District.
One large project is the Angel Sucking Machine, which is the first Lost Spirits technology created in Los Angeles. Based on the scientific explanation of the so-called ?angel?s share,? which says that spirits evaporate inside the barrel over time to create a more concentrated liquid, the concept aims to create the same intense flavors of a 30-year-aged rum by manipulating in more molecular ways the 20-year-aged product from the reactors. In 36 minutes, the ?Angel Sucking? process adds the flavors usually imparted by a decade of barrel aging, according to Davis.
You?ll receive four bottles of Lost Spirits? Navy Style Rum 61, named Best in Class 2014 and 2017 by the International Rum Expert Panel and the Miami Rum Festival, the title ?global master of innovation? from The Spirits Business Magazine and many additional awards.
A blend of Guyanese and Jamaican rums, Lost Spirits? Navy Rum is 61 percent ABV (120 proof) and is as dense and fudgy as it is a thermonuclear fruit bomb. Peer-reviewed papers prove that this liquid has the same chemical properties as a Navy pot still rum that?s been sitting in an oak barrel for 15 to 20 years. But, this liquid spent just six days inside one of Davis? proprietary reactors.
You will also receive six engraved Glencairn glasses. These beautiful glasses are engraved with the Lost Spirits Distillery logo on one side and the logo for Northern California Public Media on the other. Definitely a collector?s item!
And, you will also receive six Guest Passes to visit the Distillery in Los Angeles. ?In your wildest dreams you cannot imagine the marvelous surprises that await you!?
Lost Spirits Distillery is like an amusement park for adults, fueled by whiskey and rum and peppered with allusions to pop culture. Guests who embark on its unusual tour gather in a lobby where a pair of topiary triceratops spring to life with a disarming coo. Using the restroom introduces you to their operating system TESSA, a computer with a warm, disembodied voice not unlike the computer on the Starship Enterprise. There's still a boat ride through a rainforest ahead.
Each room of the distillery takes inspiration from a different movie or novel. The lobby has hints of Jurassic Park, while the first tasting room is a homage to The Pirates of the Caribbean. Dimly lit and occupied by an eyepatch-wearing skeleton, this is where you take your first sip of Lost Spirits Navy Rum: well-spiced, strong and bold, with a sharpness that fades to a lingering sweetness. Next, you climb aboard a wooden boat and drift slowly down a tunnel on the distillery's cooling water. This portion of the trip is oddly serene, and occurs in complete darkness. A soundtrack of distant thunder and trilling birds surrounds you, and as you float along, you?re sprinkled with a light rain?refreshing in the heat of the distillery.
The boat ferries you to a red-lit room where two of several copper vats ferment molasses, water and yeast. Visible are a pair of copper stills, where the rum gets distilled twice. Each is embellished to look like a dragon.
When you leave the copper vats, you emerge in a more modern world. You pass Lost Spirits' famous reactors and into the lab, which is where the distillery dives into "whatever our flights of fancy are in the world of booze at the moment," Davis explains.
From the lab, the boat ride takes you to the whiskies room, inspired by H.G. Wells' The Island of Doctor Moreau. Here, you taste Lost Spirits' Abomination range, made from near perfect heavily peated base spirits from Islay, Scotland.
At the conclusion of the tour, you?ll leave full of fantastical tales of drinking lore, and a deep appreciation for just how much science goes into a sip of rum.
Must be at least 21 years of age. You?ll redeem your pass for the tour online. Tour is approximately two hours.