Five minutes into meeting Dave Smith, head distiller at St. George Spirits, he graced us with the most profound characterization of craft alcohol that I've ever heard.
"Craft is a meaningless term….craft doesn't mean anything," Smith said. "The only thing we can do is decide what craft means to us, and how we apply that to our creative efforts."
Dave was the guest on the latest episode of the Tails, Ales & Trails podcast, representing the legendary Alameda distillery. For the better part of an hour, Dave, my co-host Kyle and I mused about spirits, his passion for distilling, and the craftsmanship, ingenuity, and attention to detail that has defined St. George Spirits for four decades.
How we found St. George
Part of the fun of recording these podcast episodes, for me at least, is the deep dive we get to do on each guest or organization that joins the show. I first found St. George Spirits through their collaboration with Sierra Nevada Brewing (our hometown brewery), and was a particular fan of the whiskey that St. George distilled from Sierra Nevada's cult classic Ruthless Rye IPA.
That said, I didn't know Dave. On paper, he's got a laundry list of experience, accomplishments and monikers from 21 years working at St. George. He was named to the "40 under 40" list by the San Francisco Business Times, and has been more colorfully called "one of the mad scientists of American whiskey," by GQ magazine.
Dave Smith off the page
As impressive as his bio reads, though, the real-life Dave jumps off the page. He's intentional with his words, whimsical about the world of craft spirits, and hilarious in ways I wasn't properly prepared for. More than anything, he is a source of tremendous insight for the course St. George has charted over the last two decades. Talk to Dave for a minute, much less 60, and you'll understand St. George's unique spirits and its delicate caretaking of the responsibility of creating not just great, but impactful whiskey, gin, vodka that resonates with the distillery's ever-growing community of fans and followers.
Making the dartboard bigger
As great as Dave's dismantling of craft as a buzzword was, it was an analogy about St. George's process and approach to distilling that struck me more than anything. It was simple, but it perfectly spelled out the essence of one of California's most revered distilleries.
"Here's a dart board. Most people when they're making a spirit, they're trying to throw a bullseye on that dart board," Smith said. "I don't want to throw a bullseye. I want to make the dart board bigger than it is. I want to expand a category, and push the edges of that category into a place that no one's really experienced yet.
"Our best job is to make something that's going to be a new tradition for someone 50 years from now. That's where we live and breathe."