We are two guys committed to crafting traditional spirits and cocktails, in the most traditional way possible. No fillers. No marketing gimmicks. Crafting beautiful spirits by marrying ingredients with honest-to-God distilling; never using industrially distilled alcohols or flavoring agents. 

We wanted to ensure that our family origins in wine and spirit making was carried on, and that our belief that starting with the greatest ingredients available is essential, prevailed. It’s why we’ll scour the world to find them. It’s the reason why we source our apricots half a world away from family growers like our 40-year family friend with orchards on the outskirts of Belgrade along the banks of the Danube.  From grower to bottle, with unconditional love, in a genuinely uncompromising fashion.  

One of the biggest misconceptions about distillation is that distillation produces alcohol. The truth is, alcohol is created during fermentation and distillation merely concentrates it. Fermentation is the process of simply using yeast to convert sugars to alcohol. If you’re making whiskey, these sugars come from grains. If you’re making rakia, since it’s a brandy, the sugars come from fruits. The source of the sugars for our inaugural Rakia is apricots.

None of what we do would be as authentic and genuine without our custom-made 400-liter (106-gallon) direct-flame copper pot still that was hand-hammered by third generation father and son coppersmiths outside of Belgrade. Its traditional shape was specifically designed for batch distilling to create the most flavorful and full-bodied spirit possible, ensuring just the right amount of spirit-to-copper surface contact, and preventing the stripping away of delicate flavor and aroma compounds, which is often the case with spirits distilled in the more recently developed column, or continuous, stills.

Our Kinsman Apricot Rakia is meticulously double distilled to truly capture the essence and rich characteristics of the apricots from which it’s made.  Once the fermented fruit is double distilled, only the narrowest of hearts cuts are collected, without ever using additives, artificial flavorings, or sweeteners.  

The aquifer water used for blending is treated onsite with a water softener, carbon filter and a reverse osmosis system to ensure no impurities are introduced during the process.  The spirit is then chilled to 28 degrees Fahrenheit over a few days, filtered, and finally bottled by hand for you to enjoy neat, on the rocks or in a cocktail.