Launched in 2022, Bearface was introduced with a blended whisky made with matsutake mushrooms foraged in British Columbia’s Monashee Mountains.Supplied
Bearface’s master blender Andres Faustinelli is on a mission to make whiskies that take you to a specific place. The first of his Wilderness Series was meant to transport drinkers to a walk in the woods, looking for mushrooms, he explains.
“Here, with Number Two, the taste is like you have been swimming in the ocean,” says Faustinelli. “There’s a connection between the brininess, salt flavours and the whisky.”
Launched in 2022, the adventurous label was introduced with a blended whisky made with matsutake mushrooms foraged in British Columbia’s Monashee Mountains.
The second of the limited-edition series features the GPS co-ordinates for Mitlenatch Island, a provincial park nature reserve in the middle of the northern Strait of Georgia. It’s a spot that captured Faustinelli’s imagination while scouting locations.
I was obsessed with the dramatic coastline of Canada’s west coast, says Faustinelli, who travels with little bottles of high proof whisky to infuse with ingredients he finds in his travels. He collected kelp samples, considered the possibility of filtering whisky with seashells, and dreamt up other ideas to capture the essence of this remote island located where the powerful north-south tidal waters converge.
Along the way, at a visit to the Vancouver Island Sea Salt company, he found the right ingredient to unlock the flavour he was after. While touring the business, he noticed how the makers captured the condensation of the seawater that evaporated over maple wood fires when it smoked sea salt. Ever inquisitive, he asked if he could taste the water.
“It was amazing,” he recalls. “Tasted like the sea and was slightly smoky in flavour.”
After testing to satisfy health and safety concerns and convincing the company to increase its maple smoked sea salt production to provide the necessary amount of liquid, Faustinelli used the distilled water from maple-smoked salt to proof down the matured spirit from cask strength to the 42.5 per cent alcohol by volume of the finished whisky.
To balance that salty and briny note, Faustinelli needed to find the right mix of barrels to use for aging the whisky. He settled on a mix of used French oak wine barrels. Ones that had held chardonnay provided richness and depth to the flavours, while barrels that were used to age pinot noir were taken apart so the wine-soaked staves could be scorched to contribute honey and spicy notes to whisky as it aged.
Following standard practice, the barrels were matured in repurposed shipping containers and exposed to the elements in the Canadian wilderness. The extreme in temperature is said to amplify the flavours of the whisky as it ages.
Faustinelli says he’s not sure where the next edition will lead: “I am stalking a couple of ideas for Number Three, but it is hard because every release leads me to rethink everything.”
Bearface Wilderness Series Mitlenatch Island Release 02 sells for $59.85 at LCBO outlets and will be available at selected retailers in other provinces soon.