In our “Archives” we found another nice article about the hamlet Den Hool, published in 2009 on CoevordenHuisAanHuis.nl.

Monument 179 >> Article Coevorden Huis-aan-Huis

Step 1: After several trial moments and careful consideration we have selected 4 barrels that we will be bottling this year. This is a combination of new American oaks, First refill Bourbon and a PX sherry barrel. These are brought together and a sample has been taken to determine the exact alcohol percentage and specific weight.

Step 2: Marry. The last few weeks the whisky is “married”. This is not to say much more than that the 4 merged barrels are well mixed together. Water has also been added to reach the desired alcohol percentage of 46. We can now prepare for bottling.

Or it’s time to sow new (brew) barley!

They are currently hectic weeks. After a very wet period, the arable work is still under way. Most beets have been sown and on a single parcel is also all summer wheat and barley sown. The rest of the country is already preprocessed to be able to move on to the greatest job, the legs of the potatoes.
It will take a little longer for all labels to be pasted. The boxes are now also printed, but still have to be folded and glued and will be delivered in the course of next week. The sale of the whisky starts at the earliest in the last week of April.

The cereal harvest 2016 sits on it!
The basis for the whisky of the coming years was laid in late April this year with the sowing of the barley.
We have chosen the breed Odyssey, which is very suitable for the production of whisky. This is sown on the parcel “track” to Fungus.

The beautiful weather had a very long wait, but on Thursday 18 August. We can still mow the barley under wonderful conditions.

Unlike last year, it was relatively dry in the months of March/April and the conditions were ideal for the country to be manipulated and planted and sown.
The brewing barley (varieties Irinia and Odyssey) was sown this year on 12 April. In the second half of April the last potatoes were seeded.
The crops are all well started. There followed a couple of exciting nights with night frosts (especially for the young beet plants), but fortunately it has ended well for us.
But not only the weather is affecting the fortunes of the crops. The geese find the young barley plants very tasty and we find some places with afgegraasde plants here and there, but also the damage is happy with that.

It does not take as long as it has matured the distillate of 2011 6 years. Time to select the barrels that will be bottled this year.
There are several numbers and combinations possible, but we have finally selected 3 barrels! The Veenhaar 2011 will be a combination of new American oaks, Bourbon and Oloroso sherry barrels.

It’s so far!!
On 23-09-2017, the peat was 2011 exactly 6 years old. After a careful selection, 3 drums were merged and the alcohol percentage was reduced to 46.
As with the Veenhaar 2010, there are 2011 New American Oaks, Bourbon and sherry barrels used for the peat, but this time Oloroso instead of PX sherry. Absolutely family of each other, but each one still very clear with a different character and unique taste!

Friday, November 10, Jl. It was finally so far and we bottled 995 beautiful bottles of whisky.

Sale of Start
In recent weeks we have been busy writing and pasting the labels. A rather time consuming chore, because everything happens by hand.
But from Monday 27th November a start will be made with the distribution to the liquor stores and the whisky will also be offered via the webshop .

We have a new distilling kettle!

Our previous kettle turned out to have just a little bit of capacity. In particular, the amount of man-hours per litre was rather on the hefty side. The new kettle is once as big with a better return.
The process technique has also become something else that will enable us to be able to pursue our goals even more precisely.
We have been a few weeks trial and are super enthusiastic.
In the coming months we will use it to refill a number of barrels, before the work starts on the land.