Podkarpacka Destylarnia Okowity in Długie
Anyone who wants to taste the real Galician spirit must visit this distillery. This place shouts its authentic style and uniqueness: old recipes, cleverly designed systems, and the building where spirit (in old-Polish okowita, okovita) has been made for over half a century. The spirit of the place, genius loci, is the most precious feature authenticating local products.
It is created by the owner of the distillery, Grzegorz Pińczuk, and his father, an experienced master of this craft. In the Pińczuk family, alcohol-distilling is a profession passed down from generation to generation. Veneration, attention to detail, both when it comes to the production of high-quality alcohol, as well as the whole environment, including equipment, the architecture of the building, and the entire space of its surroundings, make this place very authentic. Here one can feel that the owner's adventure with this industry is by no means accidental.
The distillery produced pure spirit from the beginning of its operation, at first only from potatoes, and later from rye and wheat. Raw materials in the old days came only from the fields owned by the local manor. The end-product of distillation was called okowita. It was supplied to local taverns and licensed premises in the nearby towns. After World War II, the distillery continued to process potatoes harvested from the fields of local farmers, and various types of cereals and apples. The whole volume of the final product, raw spirit, was delivered to Polmos, a large distillery in Łańcut.
In 2016 the new owner, Mr Grzegorz Pińczuk, decided to adapt the plant for the production of traditional regional fruit and cereal spirits. The opening ceremony will be held in spring 2018, and it will mark the launch of the first distillery in Poland of its type. Its unique feature is to recreate traditional production in the old manor distillery, including bottling of the final product: regional spirits (okovita) and liqueurs (nalevka, traditional Polish herb and fruit vodka). Some of the distillate will be aged on the site, in oak barrels, to make the product’s flavour exquisite and unique. Podkarpacka Destylarnia Okowity is a distillery that combines production with a live museum where guests can have a tour and learn about the production step-by-step.
This special place is likely to become one of the most original attractions of the Podkarpacie region.
