Craft Spirits Weekly
Welcome to the 52nd issue of Craft Spirits Weekly , a service dedicated to bringing you the news most important to the craft spirits distiller. Check your inbox every Thursday to find a curated selection of articles and news pieces from the American Craft Spirits Association.
There's a Rye-volution Stirring in Minnesota
Mike Swanson thinks Minnesota could be at the center of a whiskey revolution. And he is accumulating the data to prove it. Whiskey aficionados pay a lot of attention to the aging process when they look for high-quality whiskey. Swanson, who owns Hallock, Minn.-based Far North Spirits, argues craft distillers need to pay more attention to the front end of the process. In the case of whiskey, it's the rye that makes the mash that makes the whiskey. (MPR News) 
Dead Reckoning to Open in Norfolk, Virginia Jan. 12
Norfolk’s first microdistillery with a tasting room will open next month. Dead Reckoning Distillery, a small-batch rum maker, plans to offer its first tours and tastings Jan. 12. It also will be able to sell bottles of its Tidewater Rum for customers to take home. (The Virginian-Pilot)
Tattersall Distilling Launches Cocktail App
What is pommeau? What does it mean to dry-shake a cocktail? And how do you make a Lawn Dart, or a French 75? The answers to these perplexing questions lurk in Tattersall, a new iPhone app released Dec. 7 by Tattersall Distilling, a dynamic, 2-year-old Minneapolis distillery whose co-founder Dan Oskey was a longtime bartender.
Miss. Distiller Looks to State After County Denies Sampling Permission
A planned gin distillery will have to get approval from the Mississippi Department of Revenue to operate after a local government rejected it. The Lafayette County Board of Supervisors declined to recommend resort status for the project, which would have allowed for it to serve alcohol in an area where sales are otherwise banned, the Oxford Eagle reported. (WTVA)
NOLA Entrepreneurs Sign Letter of Intent to Buy Tales of the Cocktail
New Orleans natives, Gary Solomon, Jr., founder of Solomon Group, with the support of the Solomon Family, and Neal Bodenheimer of Cure and Cane & Table, two of New Orleans’ most beloved bars and restaurants, have entered into a letter of intent to take over Tales of the Cocktail (TOTC), the beverage industry’s premier cocktail and spirits festival. (The Drinkable Globe) 
New Tennessee Whiskey Made with Rare Heirloom Corn
In the world of Tennessee whiskey, the names of Jack Daniel’s and George Dickell come to mind for most. There are a range of small- and mid-sized size craft distilleries in this state, however, with some making use of rarer corn types to create fascinating bottlings. One of these is Fugitives Spirits.
NJ Distillery Owner Injured in Explosion
An explosion Saturday inside Ocean County's first rum distillery, which opened in August, left its owner hospitalized with burns, police said. Peter Martorelli, 38, suffered multiple burns as a result of the explosion and had to be flown to the Burn Center at Saint Barnabas Medical Center in Livingston, Lacey police said. (NJ.com)
Craft Distilleries Driving Surge in Demand for S.C. Cooperage
The sound of hammers banging and machines humming fills the workshop of Bamberg, S.C.'s Black Water Barrels. Some employees are busy working the wood through the milling process while others can been seen putting round hoops on the barrels. A little further down, the interior of a 53-gallon barrel catches fire at the charring station, helping to prime the wood so the vessel can hold bourbon.
American Craft Spirits Association | americancraftspirits.org