A rough season awaits the distillery

Lovers of apricot, cherry, calvados or traditional plums, roasted from their own crops, have no choice but to reach for their stocks, if they still have some after the previous not very fat years.

“Well, we’ll survive somehow. Some will always take the offer of shops, others will ferment everything that can be put in a barrel. It will be dry jáky for people from Prague or Ostrava, who don’t normally drink it themselves and have it on sale. A mixture like that gives me a headache the next day. A pure plum is a pure plum. This cannot be replaced by anything,” stated Jaroslav Žáček from Uherské Brod. “The price of spirits and punched ones will skyrocket. Already now, a liter of plum wine is sold for almost five hundred,” added Žáček.

Distilleries probably don’t even seal

Nervousness before this year’s distillery season, when cherries, sour cherries and apricots are the first to arrive, reigns in all Czech and Moravian distilleries. The stone fruits are completely frozen, and it looks the same with apples or pears. There is hope in some areas for later-blooming plums.

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“Last year’s season, when we only burned for a month, was not worth anything. This year will be much worse, if at all. We are all in the same situation in Slovakia. Nobody here remembers this. It looks like we won’t burn anything at all,” says Věra Úšelová from the distillery in Nedachlebice near Uherské Hradiště.

Photo: Věra Úlehlová, Novinky

Distillery in Nedachlebice near Uherské Brod

The operators of a family distillery with an almost century-old tradition, where they burn a liter of fifty percent brandy from kvass imported by growers for 175 crowns, are wondering if it is even worth setting up a distillery. “You have to contact the customs officials to unseal the distillery, clean the boiler, pipes and prepare the entire distillation equipment,” described Úšelová.

“Fortunately, we are not vitally dependent on the distillery. We always had a second main job,” she added. “It hasn’t happened yet that we didn’t have something to burn from. There was always something to be found. I’m not giving it much of a chance this year,” says Jan Bakeš from the Knížecí distillery in Jaroměř in Náchodsk, whose employees in four centers in eastern Bohemia are supported by the production of fruit distillates.

Growers will not be leaving the distilleries with full demijohns this year.

Distilleries will survive on supplies

Distilleries combined with grower distilleries will survive this year’s unsuccessful season by selling accumulated stocks of fruit distillates. Unlike other edibles, these do not spoil and improve in quality with age.

“It is a given that there will be nothing to be excited about this year. We can make do with the supplies we have in stock for two years. This year’s shortage of domestic fruit will take place after a two-year gap. However, fruit spirits will become more expensive anyway. I would estimate it to be at least ten percent,” predicts Zdeněk Krňávek, the owner of the Lžín distillery in Táborsk, South Bohemia.

The distillery does not plan to save production by importing fruit from southern countries unaffected by the frost disaster. Distillers from Lžín do not want to change the unique taste of the wide production of distillates from Czech fruit.

“Bringing in fruit from Italy or Spain would not be a problem. It would not be the real thing, mainly because of the higher sugar content, which domestic consumers are used to,” Krňávek claims.

“Certainly, according to the strategy of individual distilleries, there will be a higher import of fruit and fruit distillates and liqueurs will become more expensive,” replied the owner of the e-shop Destilérka Pavel Švarc.