Distiller Phil Lecours pours a couple of ounces of tonic into a glass of cobalt-hued Empress 1908. As the concoction fizzes, the entire cocktail transforms into a striking pinkish purple.
Lecours’ trick isn’t sleight of hand. At Victoria Distillers, where he works, the Empress 1908 is naturally tinted with butterfly pea blossoms, imbuing every bottle with a signature blue. Lecours uses his background as a chef to achieve a balance of flavors with the botanicals in the gin, which include juniper, rose, coriander, grapefruit peel, ginger, cinnamon and the signature tea blend of Victoria’s iconic Fairmont Empress hotel.
Victoria Distillers originally launched a decade ago and has built a reputation mainly as a gin producer – which make sense, given Victoria’s British sensibilities. The distillery was founded on a farm, but outgrew its original space and now occupies a gleaming waterfront facility in the small town of Sidney, just north of Victoria and not far from the ferry terminal connecting Vancouver Island to Anacortes, Washington. Growth aside, the company still opts for small-batch production using a copper pot still.
The larger facility opened in May 2016 and combines a gift shop and bar with the production facility. Tours and tastings are available Fridays through Sundays. The cocktail lounge (currently closed until May 2018) offers opportunities to sip classic and original cocktails with a view of Haro Strait and the San Juan Islands.
In addition to the striking Empress gin, the distillery’s classic Victoria Gin is another celebrated product. The clear gin has nabbed recent awards like a 2016 gold medal Tasting Award from the Beverage Testing Institute, and the top prize at the 2016 Vancouver International Spirits Competition. That flagship gin is also matured in oak barrels, resulting in the buttery, caramel-hued Oaken Gin, itself an award-winner.
While the gin certainly gets a lot of attention, Victoria Distillers has diversified its line-up with Left Coast hemp vodka, crafted of Canadian-grown organic hemp seed; an aromatic spirit called Sydney Spiced, distilled from molasses and Level Ground Trading’s fair trade organic cane sugar and flavored with organic vanilla beans, orange peel, ginger root, star anise seed and orris root; and a chocolate liqueur made with fair trade cacao nibs and husks grown in Ecuador. The distillery dabbled in whiskey production, making a limited run in 2015 that it may eventually revisit.
And finally, the distillery also makes a line of bitters under the label Twisted & Bitter, with flavors like orange, rosemary-grapefruit, black pepper and schizandra.
The distillery prides itself on its sustainability emphasis. The company draws on ocean-based geothermal energy for the cooling necessary during the distillation process. Rather than dumping the excess hot water down the drain, the distillery built a system that delivers that water to the hotel next door for warming purposes. The company estimates it saves one million liters of water a year in the process, while also providing over one billion BTUs of sustainably-produced heat.
