Saturday Farmers’ Market Vendor Feature: Wayward Distillation House

One of our regular vendors for the last two seasons, Wayward Distillation House, is changing the way people think about spirits in the UBC Farm Market community. With incredible flavours and dynamic uses for drinking or cooking, Wayward sets themselves apart through their commitment to sourcing their ingredients from local growers. We spoke to co-owner Dave Brimacombe about why the honey he uses needs a consistent floral source, why he loves farmers’ markets, and what curious visitors should try (including a garlic and ghost pepper vodka)!

Dave at market, talking to shoppers

What got you passionate about this business?

I spent a lot of time traveling the world looking into regional booze; like what people choose to spend their time with, in their leisure time. What they want to make, what they want to drink. I was fascinated by the alchemy behind alcohol. Then I started tinkering with home fermentation, making my own wine, beer, cider and mead and then, being inquisitive, it was just a natural progression to start into distilling. Distilling at home is a federal crime so I had to take that step to go professional or be a rumrunner I guess!

How did you end up selling at farmers’ markets? Where did that choice come from and what makes you want to keep on selling here?

Craft spirits are new to the average human being. We’ve been sold “big-budget spirit” for years and years and years and spirits made by hand with local ingredients are just sometimes unapproachable to an uneducated consumer. So farmers’ markets are a chance for me to just talk to human beings and pour my spirit into their hands and talk and educate. So I view markets as an education platform. A place for me to just talk to people. So selling a bottle is an added bonus. And then being here at UBC is great, we’re out here in the middle of the farm, it’s super cool, people are a little more relaxed. And if you consider that I want to talk to people it’s nicer when there’s not 37 people lined up at the end of my booth.

What about your ingredients? How do you make choices about what goes into it and how does that embody what your values are around your product?

Co-owner Andrea offering samples at market

So we use farmers’ market product whenever possible. When I first started doing recipe development I opened my business in December, so I missed the growing season, I didn’t even know, so I went to the store and bought ingredients for recipe development. My very first year, as we started to go through the growing seasons, I started replacing store-bought products with hand-grown products – we’re talking ingredients, flavourings, everything – and the difference was astronomical. I had to re-tool my recipes because the stuff grown with love was just so much better. So I started working with that and now I support other small growers: all of our berries come from local growers, all our garlic comes from local growers, stuff we can’t get from here we buy from ethical growers. So our coffee, chocolate, and vanilla all come from Common Ground.

What about your honey?

One farm. Sole source, it’s not certified organic but he only pollinates organic and pesticide-free crops; likes his bees more than people so that’s super cool. And once again, we can use the same story about starting a business in December and there’s not a lot of honey out there from farmers left over so as we were doing recipe development the real honey just was so much better. And then for me, honey is key, it’s what we make everything out of, and we don’t think about it but those minor differences in floral honeys are concentrated when you ferment and exaggerated when you distill so having a reliable source of honey is key, it’s got to be the same. So that’s why we formed a partnership with one farm in Tomslake and all of our honey’s theirs. It’s unpasteurized and unfiltered.

Wayward’s spirit with the most broad appeal

If someone was new to spirits, or new to craft spirits, what would you suggest as a starting ground from what you have on the table today?

Well every palate is different, every drinker is different. We find the Krupnik, our spiced honey liqueur, seems to have broad appeal: a lot of people like it. If you’re a gin drinker, of course the Unruly Gin, and if you’re into something experimental we’ve got a raw garlic vodka. It might not be the entry-level spirit but definitely something to play with if you’re cooking and drinking. Launched it yesterday: garlic and ghost pepper!

Anything else to share?

Just try it. That’s the biggest thing that I find when I run into guests is that hesitancy to try. Once they’re sampling, they’re good to go, but it’s that first sip or that horrific gin experience from their teens (I love that story, I hear that all the time). Try mine, it’s different!