Never.25 Distillery

Kecia McDougall began her talk by explaining how she left Ohio in 1989 to be married to Duncan. On the journey a stranger, realising she was upset to be leaving home, promised to send her a gift and true to her word a beautiful small glass Bluebird ornament was sent with the note “ Wishing you happiness.”

This was to become part of the Never.25 Eau de Vie story and Kecia explained how the name came about – a forgotten 25th wedding anniversary! The Bluebird forms part of the branding label along with other cleverly designed family symbols.

After working for 25 years as a nurse Kecia decided to turn what had been a hobby into a business with Business Gateway and Scottish Enterprise support. She wanted to create something from things around her and a distillery producing Eau de Vie was established in Tayport using only locally produced grains and fresh fruits. With local wheat and malting barley Kecia was determined to make her own base spirit and this she explained was the hardest part.

Several processes take place using a 500 litre still – Milling, Mashing, Fermenting and Distilling. Champagne yeast is used in the fermentation, which takes about a week. The base spirit soaks in 50 kg of fresh fruit and a final distillation is carried out to strip the colour and refine the taste.

Kecia and her daughter had brought along a small still and some of the various flavours of Eau de Vie such as Apple, Blueberry and Raspberry and these were sampled at the end of the meeting.

The talk was much appreciated by club members and 8 guests including Donald Jenks, the local Explorer Scout Coordinator, who before the meal gave a brief explanation of the fundraising they are doing to acquire a new mini bus.