Bristol Distillery Teams With University To Bring Back Rye Stifled By Prohibition

A handful seeds from a U.S. Department of Agriculture seed repository started Delaware Valley University on a mission in 2015.

They planted tiny amounts of rarely grown Rosen rye seeds around the campus. Staff from the Doylestown-based university harvested seeds from greenhouses and high tunnels. Eventually, they were able to gather enough to plant a hearty batch that was grown this year and harvested.

Now some of that rye will be used by Mountain Laurel Spirits of Bristol, the small business behind Dad’s Hat Pennsylvania Rye, to create a small test batch of whiskey.

The July 16 harvest of the Rosen rye marks the return of the rye that was once widely grown across Pennsylvania.

“I don’t think anyone else is growing this type of rye in Pennsylvania,” said John Urbanchuk, Delaware Valley University’s chair of agribusiness. “The purpose of this project is to revive a heritage variety of rye.”

“Rye whiskey was once a primary distilled spirit of the United States,” Urbanchuk explained. “When Prohibition came, that pretty much shut down the industry.”

By the time Prohibition had ended, rye-based whiskeys had lost their luster with drinkers. However, the rye whiskey has made a comeback, Urbanchuk said.

Urbanchuk is right. The Distilled Spirits Council of the United States released data for 2017 that shows revenue, sales, and exports of American whiskey – from bourbon to rye – were nearly all up. In total, 23.2 million cases of American whiskey were sold by producers.

The award-winning whiskey distillery based in the Grundy Commons Complex in Bristol Borough approached Urbanchuk about growing rye on campus after the university official toured the Bristol facility.

“The best Pennsylvania rye whiskeys of the past were made with Rosen rye and we are doing our best to make the best rye whiskeys available today,” said Herman Mihalich, one of the co-owners and founders of Mountain Laurel Spirits.

Mihalich visited the rye crop before the recent harvest and plans to dry out seeds not used in the test batch for planting next season.

Urbanchuk said the growth of the Rosen rye crop tasked Delaware Valley University students with preparing the field, planting the crop, growing the rye, and harvesting the growth.

“The whole effort has to do not just with planting the seed, but how to identify diseases and pests that might impact the crop. It’s a good practical example that is a little unusual for them to get to see,” Urbanchuk said.

Delaware Valley University said the partnership with the whiskey distiller is in line with other partnerships they want to foster with the commercial sector.

The partnership is not the first for Dad’s Hat Pennsylvania Rye. Over the years, the distiller has collaborated with Philadelphia-based Horn and Hardart to create a whiskey-infused coffee and most recently the band the Punch Brothers as they launch their latest album.

“The band says that they don’t believe their music would be possible to make without rye whiskey, and none of the band members are willing to test the validity of that belief,” joked Mihalich.

In 2011, Mihalich and John Copper started Mountain Laurel Spirits. The two were fraternity brothers and graduates of the University of Pennsylvania decades before Dad’s Hat Pennsylvania Rye would go on to win awards, including Craft Whiskey of the Year Award in 2016.