Real Spirits

After 21 years of brewing some of the finest Texas craft beer, Brad Farbstein decided to expand his renowned, independently owned brewery, Real Ale. After filing for a distillery permit in 2014, he worked with Ty Phelps and Tommy Erwin to begin experimenting with creating true grain-to-glass Texas whiskey. In 2016, Ty and Tommy went 3 miles down the road to start Andalusia Whiskey Co., and Davin Topel joined the Real Spirits team coming from High West Distillery. Since then, Davin has been crafting truly unique Texas Whiskies and solidifying Blanco Texas as a new hotspot in the world of Whiskey.

Real Spirits whiskey begins with two variations of Real Ale beer mash recipes, Devils Backbone Belgium Trippel and Real Heavy Scotch Ale. The brewers make the beer the way they normally would minus the addition of hops. After fermenting to around 8% ABV, it is double distilled in a copper pot still. They retain only the most ideal parts of the distillation process (the “hearts” cut) and transfer the new make into charred new American oak barrels for aging. After the maturation process they have two very distinctly different styles of whiskey. These two whiskeys are then mingled together in a ratio that compliments each other’s flavor.

The resulting Texas Hill Country Signature Whiskey is crafted from personally tasted and selected barrels. Some rare barrels with an exceptional flavor profile are bottled as single barrel offerings as well. Once the barrels are emptied of whiskey, they are recycled back into the Real Ale brewery, for barrel aging some of their more exclusive beer offerings. This handcrafted Texas whiskey is available in Select Liqour stores across Texas as well as in our brewery/distillery’s taproom in Blanco, Texas.