Bastrop—With 130 historic sites, Bastrop has earned the title of “Most Historic Small Town in Texas”. On main street, you will find one of those particularly old buildings built in 1836, making it the same age as Texas. Inside, you can toast to our great state!
Copper Shot Distillery is owned by husband and wife team, Stephen and Cheri Todee.
“My wife and I, we were constantly trying to figure out a business that we could do, that we would enjoy and work together doing,” explained Stephen.
Turns out nothing brings together a budding bride and her man like booze.
“I mean, who doesn’t like to drink? Happy, sad, celebrating. We can make money doing that, and it’s something that we could both have a part in,” said Cheri.
“It was kind of weird,” Stephen added. “It just came together.”
Stephen has an eclectic background—he’s a smokejumper, a certified fire fighter, and a master of heavy equipment.
“I’ve got so many certifications it’s unreal,” he said.
His day job happens to be at the oil company, making separating equipment for refining. Sound familiar? Kind of like making alcohol.
“All it is is a form of separation,” said Stephen. “You’re separating different elements out of a liquid. It just whatever you are trying to separate. You know? In our case, we’re trying to separate out ethanol.”
A lot of libations are to be found in this little distillery, including moonshine! The process all starts in a shack in the back that feels like you’ve been pulled backed to prohibition.
“It’s not original here, but she’s 150 years old…The still itself was a design of my own that I had built,” Stephen explained. “This is my bourbon. It’s made with a red and blue corn, and then the moonshine is made with natural yellow corn. It, actually comes from the Bryan-College Station area.”
In fact, all of the ingredients at Copper Shot come from Texas.
“We make it all with rainwater, Texas grains, and sugar, and that is it,” he confirmed.
Stephen forgot to mention, the local honey too!
“We literally take our 120-proof White Lightning and blend local raw honey into it. So the honey hasn’t been pasteurized, filtered, processed in no way. So once we’ve blended it [in], you got to let all the paraffin and minerals fall out,” he explained.
It’s not all just straight shots at Copper Shot.
“The local ladies have dubbed us the Willy Wonka of spirits because of our rainbow, our different fusions that we do,” said Stephen.
Some of their spirits include Blood Orange ‘Rita, 120 Lightning with peach slices and juice, and a mixture known as The Godfather.
“It’s half amaretto that we make with our moonshine and the pecan shine…You get that sweet end on the whiskey,” Cheri commented on The Godfather. “Sip it with a cigar.”
Well if you want to sip on some sensational spirits in a shop as old as the Lone Star State, then Copper Shot Distillery in Bastrop is well worth a stop!