click to enlarge - Courtesy Of Hooker Mountain Farm Distillery
Some farms sell vegetables through community-supported agriculture programs. Other farms supply CSA customers with monthly drops of pastured pork, beef or poultry. In some areas, you can sign up for regular, prepaid bread or baked-goods shares. Now, if Washington County is convenient for you, skip the trip to the liquor store and get your hooch through a CSA subscription.
Members of Hooker Mountain Farm Distillery's new distilled-spirits CSA pay $89 to $340 in exchange for a share of the Cabot farm and distillery's monthly output for three or six months, co-owner Kempton Randolph said. Each share has a $35 value. The farm's fourth-class liquor license, which covers sales at the place of manufacture and at market, also covers the CSA.
In the spring, a share might include a bottle of the farm's maple whiskey, made with sap and oats and sweetened with a touch of maple syrup. Or it could mean flasks of berry cordial and a bottle of white whiskey infused with bitter, aromatic hops grown from a rhizome of a feral vine found near the farm.
Since Hooker Mountain makes all of its spirits with grains and botanicals grown on-site, the distillery's offerings are always changing. "We have a very different business model than most distilleries," Randolph said. "I have a lot of different spirits that I rotate through, and I'm always running out of things."
Pickup is available on the farm or at the Montpelier Farmers Market.