Spring Mill Distillery Tour

So it's quarter to 9 in the morning on a chilly Thursday morning in the middle of December. This week has been as numbingly cold as Toronto gets and yet here I am taking a GO Bus to Guelph. Why? Well that's because I went to explore one of the most interesting new distilleries in Ontario: The Spring Mill Distillery!

Not many whisky fans in Ontario have heard of this distillery yet and its surprising to see because this distillery has deep roots in Ontario history given that one of Guelph's most famous residents in John Sleeman, the founder of the Sleeman Brewing Company, is the owner and founder of Spring Mill. Since the distillery was announced to open for early 2019 after almost two years of construction, I hadn't heard too much about the project until I was given the amazing opportunity to go on a private tour of the distillery! I'm very excited to see how progress has been going since first spirit runs began in April 2019, especially their aging "soon-to-be whisky" spirits!

Getting to the distillery by car from Toronto is quite easy and for those using transit there's a GO Bus running from Mississauga City Centre and a Via Rail train from Toronto that takes you to Guelph Central Station which lies 10 minutes away from the distillery by walking. However, if you make it to Spring Mill Distillery (located in The Ward district of Guelph) know that the road south of Elizabeth and Arthur St. South is closed off for road work so you'll need to go up Arthur St. South from Cross St. if you want to make it into the distillery.

The distillery itself is very much a mix of old and new. It reminds me a lot of the Holyrood and Ardnahoe distilleries in Scotland given how modern the facilities look, to where the halls to each section feel more like a public hall then a distillery, but the different section rooms themselves give a bit of a Victorian feel that take me back to my experiences at Glengyle and Glen Scotia in Campbeltown. I'm taken around the distillery by Darryl, a rep from Sleeman, and Cooper, the sales and marketing manager for Spring Mill as well as John Sleeman's son!

We start at the fermentation room where I get a look at Spring Mill's two malt bins, one of the few if not only operating ones in Canada for single malt whisky production, as well as the stainless steel fermenters and two wooden washbacks made from B.C. pine making it possibly the only wooden washbacks used for single malt whisky in Canada. Spring Mill ferments and distills all of their spirits, with fermentation lasting between 2-3 days for their whiskies. There are also bags of malted barley on the floor, which usually come in pallets but they recently came as bags due to a mix-up with their U.K. barley provider, which is sent to a malter in Ontario before reaching the distillery.

Next we move to check out the cooling tanks and the bottom end of the wooden washbacks and fermentation tanks. We also get a peak at the distilleries mash tuns.

We now move to the still room where John, one of Spring Mill's distillers, joins us to explain more about the distillery process. Spring Mill operates two copper pot stills made by Forsyths in Rothes, Scotland and a column still system. The copper pot stills run from March to May and then from August to November while the column stills run 12 months a year. There's also a spirit safe between the two pot stills which is also made by Forsyths.

Next we head upstairs to the milling room where the grains are all milled for fermentation. The mill is made by MacDonald Steel Limited of Cambridge, Ontario. There are also some bins at the back of the room containing the botanicals used in the gin as well as grain samples they show during tours. All of Spring Mill's grains, minus the barley, are sourced from Canada where they have rye, corn and wheat grains stores on site!

Speaking of storage, right outside of the milling room is the lower roof. This is where a set of silos lie which store all the grains used for distillation. This part of the distillery is important to watch over for the team, especially as cold weather can freeze the grains inside!

Next we go to the cooperage...wait a cooperage? Yes my eyes didn't deceive me! Cooper's brother is actually a cooper apprenticing in Scotland and does inspections and repairs on all of the barrels used at Spring Mill. The barrels themselves are sourced from Kelvin Cooperage in Kentucky and from Canada's only cooper Pete Bradford!

Finally, we finish off in the distillery warehouse! Currently the warehouse at Spring Mill is located on one of the upper floors and can house up to 250 or so casks before they'll have to consider a new warehousing location for future casks. There's an array of virgin American oak, ex-bourbon and ex-Canadian whisky casks around all housing the distillery's various spirit types which include:

A 100% malted barley spirit
A minimum 51% corn blended mash whisky distilled in the column still
A blended mash whisky distilled in the pot stills
And a 100% rye whisky

I had a very fortunate chance to get a quick nose from the different styles of spirits being matured so far, none older then 6 months in barrel, and so far I've been very impressed with the aromas and textures that I've been getting from each one. The single malt and copper pot mash spirits are very floral and soft with not a whole lot of youth showing, the flavouring rye is delicate and herbal, and the column still mash blend spirit with just 6 months in virgin oak smelled spectacularly good with great oily and buttery smells that make me very excited to see how it'll taste when it's ready for bottling, hopefully in the near future!

And that's the end of the distillery tour! We finished off at the distillery bar, called The Ward Bar, where I tried their vodka, gin and small batch spiced liqueur. All of their spirits are non-chill filtered which makes the white spirits have a lot better texture then most Ontario-made white spirits at 40% ABV. The vodka, made from red winter wheat spirit, is clean but has a nice touch of honey and the gin, made from the same grain, is very palatable and light but has a great aromatic profile that will make this a solid sipping gin for those who don't want too much alcohol presence in their gins. The spiced liqueur is sweet but it has great honey and spice notes that make it a great digestif liqueur for the holiday season, and theres no artificial flavouring to boot! I made sure to grab a bottle of this one to bring home for family!

Overall, the distillery experience at Spring Mill was wonderful with very solid white spirits and liqueurs and even better maturing spirits that will definitely continue to get better and have a very bright future ahead of them. If you're in Guelph or visiting soon definitely give Spring Mill a look as you surely will love the buildings charm as well as the mantra of their spirits making.