Norwegian-Portuguese-Swede says hello

[PalCabral]

Howdy!

Just joined. I'm a Norwegian guy who grew up in Sweden and married to Portugal, bringing with me distilling traditions from all three countries. However, I am here to learn, in fact, I am afraid I will be learning more than I can give back, but let's see with time. I'm 58 years old, live in Stockholm Sweden. I am married and have three kids, two of which are still living at home. I love Beer, BBQ, Bourbon and Brandy - the four B's.

I am returning to distilling. It was a hobby of mine back in the 1990'ies, when bought an SS column still of a work buddy and set up in the bathroom of the apartment where I lived in Stockholm. It was a CM still, about 35 inches tall with water cooling halfways up the column. Worked like a charm, used to make neutral spirits based on sugar washes with it. Later in life, while living in Portugal, I got a Portuguese alambic which I used to make grape brandy in. I wasn't too sure about the copper quality in the Alambic, though. I still have it but I'm not using it.

So why did I join? I would like to get back to distilling again. Initially I am mostly interested in making neutral stuff plus Gin and Aquavit, the Scandinavian spirit. However, long term I would like to make fruit brandies and Whiskies, going into oak maturation. Step by step, little by little. I've been reading a lot of posts in here already and I realized that column stills have evolved a lot since the 90'ies. I'm looking at buying a combo still, where I can change parts depending on what I want to still. I will probably ask a lot of questions about it, because it's an expensive hobby and I want to make sure I spend my hard-earned cash on something useful before I buy. What I like about the combo set up where you can add components as you go along is that I can upgrade with more components as I get more experienced.

Expect that I will ask a lot of questions, please bare with me. I look forward to interact with you guys!