Daily Objective Distillery - Their Story, Spirits & Vision

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Check out Daily Objective Distillery

We didn’t plan to find a new favorite Missouri distillery, but a quick drive for Christmas gifts turned into a full-on discovery. On the way to Amsterdam, Missouri, we spotted a building that looked like it had a story, took the chance, and ended up at Daily Objective Distillery, a ranch-side tasting room that’s growing fast for a reason. If you love craft spirits, real behind-the-scenes process talk, and places that feel like an instant weekend tradition, this one hits. 

Steve Parks walks us through how Daily Objective came to life, from a wedding conversation to building out a destination distillery with a stage, events, and major production ambitions. We get into what he was making before Missouri, how a moonshine curiosity turned into a serious rum program, and why ingredients like blackstrap molasses, blue agave sugars, and Madagascar vanilla beans change everything. He also breaks down the equipment and process in plain language: fermentation, mash bills, time and temperature control, making cuts, and why water filtration matters when you’re blending proof and bottling for consistency. 

Then Samantha Prothe, the general manager and the brain behind the calendar, shares what’s coming next: concert series plans, festivals, possible comedy nights, pickleball courts, cornhole leagues, rotating food trucks, and how they’re building a true community hub just a few miles off the highway. We also talk signature cocktails and award-winning spirits, including a clean, traditional old fashioned (plus a smoked option), lavender lemonade with vodka, espresso martinis made with rum, and the upcoming Petals Gin. 

If you’re anywhere near Kansas City or looking for a Missouri weekend destination, come hang with us for this on-site tour and some serious drink inspiration. Subscribe to the show, share this with a friend who loves distilleries, and leave a review so more people can find Spandex and Wine.

Transcript

YouTube Launch And Lucky Discovery

SPEAKER_02 0:20

And along the way, knowing you're not alone on the street. Ready to jump in? Or something in your glass that makes you happy because it's time for Spandex and Wine.

SPEAKER_01 0:33

Hey everyone, welcome back to the Spandex and Wine podcast. I have some news. I am finally uploading to YouTube. I know it took me forever. I said that I was going to do this so long ago. I think it was even back in season one, and we are in season three. But anyway, so this episode is live on YouTube. My video skills are not fantastic. But I would love for you to go hit the like button, follow along, subscribe to the Spandex Inline channel. I will make sure I put the link in the show notes here. I'm going to be putting this in my newsletter also, so make sure you get all the things. But today's episode is exciting for me because we stumbled upon this distillery back in December when we were looking for Christmas gifts. We were going down to McBee's, if you've never been there. They have, oh my gosh, like, I don't know, 40 to 50, 50 different types of brats. So think jalapeno, pineapple, and gouda apple. Just so many things to choose from. So we were going to Amsterdam, Missouri to pick those up. And we saw this building off to the south as we were driving by to go to McBee's. We're like, that's interesting. It looks like that was a distillery. We've got to check that out on the way back. And so once we got our brats and we headed back, it didn't look like it was open, but we went ahead. Well, we went ahead. Dave said, no, Robin, we can't stop because they aren't open. And I'm like, well, we have to try. So we did. So glad that we did. It is an amazing facility. They have done a fabulous job. All of their drinks are exceptional. You may have heard me talk about it last week on the podcast. I kind of gave a tease about it. And today I sit down, or I sat down with Steve Parks and Samantha Proley. And they kind of share everything, the ins and outs of the distillery, what is in store. So thank you so much for taking the time to listen. And like I said, this is my first time going on site and doing the video, and all of the audio is there too. So some of what you're going to hear, he's going to be pointing out as if you're watching the video, so I'll just kind of follow along. But you can also go to YouTube, Spandex and Wine, and subscribe to the channel there. Okay, here we go.

SPEAKER_02 2:51

Hey, Steen.

SPEAKER_00 2:52

How are you doing then?

SPEAKER_02 2:53

Spandex and Wine Podcast. Thank you for having me.

SPEAKER_00 2:56

Excited to be here.

SPEAKER_02 2:57

I know. I'm so excited. I am so happy that we stumbled upon your distillery. Um and I want to know like the story behind it. I know that I've heard some of this, but I'm excited for the listeners to hear everything. So share away.

SPEAKER_00 3:10

Well, this I still wake up every day and can't believe that this actually came true. And we're sitting here. So funny story is I met the gentleman who owns the ranch about a little over two and a half years ago through his daughter's wedding. So his daughter, they live out here in Missouri, Kansas. She is married to my neighbor's son in Scottsdale, Arizona.

SPEAKER_04 3:29

Oh, okay.

SPEAKER_00 3:30

Our very good friends. So we got invited to the wedding two and a half years ago, and that's how Mike Christie and I met. And we started talking about distilling because I was distilling rum in Arizona. So which was called the objective rum. So I traded a label for that and got it out to the market a little bit and started taking off. And so when I came out here when I first met Mike, he had several bottles of my rum sitting on a table that he had been drinking. I guess my neighbor's been bringing them around for a couple of years.

SPEAKER_02 3:55

Oh my gosh.

SPEAKER_00 3:56

And he loves it. So we started talking about distilling and the process. And he goes, Why don't we open a district right here?

SPEAKER_02 4:01

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 4:02

So that's basically where the conversation started. So it's been about over a period of six months of him talking, us talking back and forth, trying to see if I'm going to commit. Because I had a lot of things going on in Arizona. I had an art studio and art gallery. I was doing a public speaking, I was doing contracting and distilleries. So that's a lot. So we came out here again and visited and just kind of fell in love with this whole place and we started building. And so we got committed. And now I'm here about a month to a month and a half. Every 10, I go home for about 10 or 15 days and I come back.

SPEAKER_04 4:31

Okay.

SPEAKER_00 4:32

So yeah, we did a lot in a short period of time out here building all this. This is an old farm hospital sitting in that was built in the 50s. And we actually added on to it and got it in and turned it into this venue, which is our tasting room for the daily objective facility. And uh we keep adding on. It's like the uh the song, you know, we got four-car garage and we keep adding on. So that's kind of what it's like here. So now we have an outdoor event space, a venue for a concerts, a stage. We're gonna have horseback ride in the spring. Cool. I'm gonna have wildlife tours and um concerts. We have a whole our general manager, Samantha, uh, set the whole concert venue for us for the spring, the summer. So we have live music every weekend.

SPEAKER_02 5:10

That's so exciting. Yeah, and I feel like like we stumbled upon it, it was around Christmas time because we were headed down to Amsterdam to McBee's to get the um RAS.

SPEAKER_00 5:20

Somebody lost McBee's.

SPEAKER_02 5:22

Yep, and we saw this on the way back and we thought, let's just stop. Um, so I had no idea that it was here, and I feel like it's grown so fast. But you're so, I mean, your your clientele loves it. We see the same people here, um, and new people are here every week, and the bands that you have are fantastic.

SPEAKER_00 5:38

Great music comes out. Everybody is so talented. I mean, everybody I talk to that comes out that plays, I'm like, you got to come back and play the game. And they do, they're constantly coming back. They say the same thing, they love the atmosphere out here. We have a great clientele, and it's growing pretty fast.

SPEAKER_02 5:53

Yeah. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 5:54

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 5:55

Well, you said that you started with rum. I thought it was whiskey bourbon, which I don't know the difference between whiskey and bourbons.

SPEAKER_00 6:00

Maybe bourbon has a whole different set of rules you have to follow. Oh, okay.

SPEAKER_02 6:04

So okay.

SPEAKER_00 6:06

And uh very important you follow those or you can't call it bourbons.

SPEAKER_02 6:09

Oh, all right. Well, interesting. Um, so you started with the rum. And like tell me the the backstory behind that because why were you doing that? Was that just copy?

SPEAKER_00 6:22

No, I gotta I'm one of those guys who's constantly trying to figure out, find something to do that I've never done before, you know, kind of challenge myself. And uh so I always wanted to learn how to make moonshine. So all my relatives live in Kentucky, a lot of them. So growing up, I was always drinking moonshine, was always fascinated by it. So I was visiting my I guess I can I should say as anybody, my cousin in Kentucky, and uh he hooked me up with still from one of our buddies who makes moonshine in the hill. So small, homemade 10-gallon still. So I took that back to my house in Arizona in my backyard, Scot Steel, started making moonshine. And so I kind of perfected that craft over about a period of a year. I just fell in love with it because there's so much that's involved with it, different yeast strains, uh, different types of sugars, different types of corns. And so uh I met some people who owned a distillery in Arizona called Wild Air Distillery, and uh they took me, we'd become good friends, and they approached me one day and said, Hey, why don't you create something you can do legal and take the market? That's great. That's right. Pretty good idea. I was like, What do you suggest? And they said rum, and rum is on the rise again, coming back. So I'm not a big rum drinker. So I started working with some different types of uh recipes that I created, just couldn't find one I liked. And what they're using in all their distilling is um blue webin from Jalisco, Mexico. Oh, okay. Yeah, so it's a sugar mix. So I decided to combine uh black strap molasses, which is the main portion of rum, and blue web brigada. So I combined those two together, the different ratios I tried and worked out, found one that ordered and tasted great. Awesome. And uh I loved it. And then I started barreling it, tasting even better, and then I started adding Madagascar vanilla beans inside the barrel while I aged it. And that's when we got the dark rum. That's what we went there towards for. And uh makes a great old-fashioned, it makes a great espresso martini, and it's great on our odds. So that's when I really got the bug about hey, I I think I have a map for doing some things. Yeah, and now that we're out here, we have this theater production facility and we've got a 300-gallon still there with a 50-gallon still. We have a building that we just finished building, continuous still is going in there, which will give us the ability to do five to six 53-gallon barrels a day.

SPEAKER_04 8:30

Wow.

SPEAKER_00 8:31

And this spring, this April, we'll plant all our own corn on the uh the ranch. So we're gonna be from grain glass right here on the property. I think it's exciting. So, my other partner, Mike, uh, we've been working on different recipes for the past couple months with different varieties of corn. So, we're sticking truly to the airloom corns because they haven't been genetically modified yet. So, they're natural stated corn and they have such a different flavor to each corn. It's unbelievable. So, we've just been working with those for the past couple months and just filling those by themselves and seeing the different flavor profiles, and we created a blend that that's what we're gonna start producing in the big still won't get that, and that's what we're gonna barrel and turn into burger. So a lot of things going on.

SPEAKER_02 9:11

Yeah, yeah, yeah, I would say. So um back up just a little bit. Like, tell me a little bit about your background.

Moonshine Curiosity To Signature Rum

SPEAKER_00 9:19

Well, I I retired from the Navy in 2016 after 27 years. So I was 27 years in the Navy. Oh, my pleasure, best time of my life. And 25 of those years, I was in the SEAL teams. And so when I retired, I was at SEAL team too. When I retired in 2016, I moved to uh Scottsville, Arizona, and uh married my wife. And um yeah, like great having a great time still. Yeah, so yeah, and so that's when I started coming up with all these things. I uh decided to create art in my garage because I decided to take a whole year off, beside how what am I gonna do? Because I got some great advice from some older guys on the teams like uh what do you do when you're retired? Like, don't do anything for a year, don't jump into anything, don't make any big decisions, just take a year off of decompress. Yeah, so during that period of year, I just started creating art in my garage in mosaics, class mosaics. Show them I ended up having people coming over and seeing my artwork and it turned into a business. And then uh I ended up doing commission work for a lot of different people, and I got so busy I had to open my own studio, it's costum. And so all the artwork you see on the walls here um is artwork I created in my studio in Arizona. So and I'm gonna start creating art here, probably this spring. We've got to have a little gallery here on the property as well. And I think I might have I don't know what everything else is going on. I think I can make time for that on the weekends. I gotta get back into it as one of my passions, is creating artwork.

SPEAKER_02 10:39

So yes, well, you do a great job. Thank you. I'll make sure I share all of that too with you guys. Yeah, yeah, it's beautiful. Thank you. Awesome. Well, I'm excited to go check out everything that you have um on the property. I want to go through the artwork. I want to talk to your general manager, Sam. She's got some great things going.

SPEAKER_00 10:58

She's doing a fantastic job.

SPEAKER_02 11:00

Yeah, it's like who's the mastermind behind all of the events and everything?

SPEAKER_00 11:04

Uh-oh.

SPEAKER_02 11:04

Would you have to give her credit? Probably her, yes.

SPEAKER_00 11:07

Yeah, setting all that up. I try to stay out of this portion of it. I like to come in and talk to people, find out a little bit about everybody that comes through here, where are they coming from, how far do they drive the kid here, what do they think about it? You know, I just love talking to people, get some feedback. Because you know, we're out, we're kind of out here a little bit, four miles off the main road.

SPEAKER_04 11:24

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 11:24

But once you get out of here from just this place is beautiful. Yeah. I mean, across the street, as you're looking that way, uh, that's also part of the ranch. That's where all the elk come in in the evenings and the mornings to feed. So you'll see you can be sitting here having a cocktail and see 50 to 60 elk and white tail deer. That's so cool. Right across the street. I mean, massive.

SPEAKER_02 11:41

That's so cool.

SPEAKER_00 11:42

It's pretty neat.

SPEAKER_02 11:43

Oh my god.

SPEAKER_00 11:44

I don't know where there's else you can do that here in this area. You know, we can go have a cocktail, listen to live music, and see wildlife at the same time.

SPEAKER_02 11:50

Yeah. It's kind of fun. We even saw an albino one.

SPEAKER_00 11:54

You saw a fallow deer.

SPEAKER_02 11:55

Oh, okay.

SPEAKER_00 11:56

Yeah. So they're white, really white, they stick out. And uh, I think they're an Asian type of deer, and uh, they come in three different colors. There's dark, dark ones, and there's light brown with spots, and then there's all white ones. And uh they change during throughout the year on the season when the colors are bizarre. They're beautiful.

SPEAKER_02 12:14

That's so wild, huh? Okay, well, we are going to, I think we're gonna go over to see how everything works. Does that sound okay?

SPEAKER_00 12:22

Yeah, let's go check it out.

SPEAKER_02 12:23

Okay, see you in a bit.

SPEAKER_00 12:25

That's my church over there. So we're walking towards the distillery. And if you look over to the right, you can see these five massive tanks on the ground. Those are 20, 2400 gallon fermentation tanks. Dang. And that's the new building where the new still is gonna be going.

SPEAKER_02 12:39

Oh, nice, yeah. Massive. Very cool. Come on in. Thank you.

SPEAKER_00 12:46

So this is where everything takes place that we make uh in the distillery. So this basic uh distillery setup, and you have your fermentation tanks, what we call our mash house, our hot liquor tank, and we have our 300-gallon still here hot still hot still. We have a 50-gallon still with smaller batches like that. Um everything that's processed right in here, we actually started very fast. We have like grains lifting that, so you lift up a grain to sack, and we send a grain all the way up in the pond, and it comes through here and drops out to that tank and we glide it with hot water. It's called mashing in, so we're cooking all those grains. Cook it, add different enzymes to it, cook it more, process it through the heat exchange, cool it back down so we can add different enzymes to it at different temperatures, at different times. Everything's by time and temperature and actually measurement, so it's very important. So when you have a detailed uh measurement for mash fill, you want to make sure you follow that mash fill to the precise as you can because you want to treat what you've already created and make it consistent. So we can control all that right here.

SPEAKER_02 13:55

I can never do that because I can't um it's like follow a recipe.

Navy SEAL Years And Art Life

SPEAKER_00 13:59

It's like baking. You know, if you don't follow a baking recipe, it's not gonna come out. Right. So then we'll heat it down or pull it down some more to about 90 degrees with our yeast and some nutrient in there, and then we send it over to one of these uh uh fermentation tanks, and in there it's gonna be different, different times and days for different things. Um, usually for our corn, it's about anywhere from five to seven days for fermentation. Some of them will finish out in four, it just depends on what type of corn you're using. Then we pump it into the uh 300-gallon still, we'll light up the heat. So everything we use here is steam, steam jacketed. So it gives us an even cooking time. So we'll slowly raise that heat up to about 172 degrees is when we first start getting our vapor coming off of there. So the first collection we take out of what we call our four shots in our heads. Depending on what size we're running there, what size of match we're running there, 200 gallons or 300 gallons, it's gonna be different how much we get rid of all the gates. So there's a bunch we get like anywhere up to five gallons, we're gonna get rid of. Oh, before we even start collecting stuff we need.

SPEAKER_02 15:05

Yeah. And you said something cool last time we were here. Um, you said the corn or whatever it is that you don't use, like you feed to the elves. So it's called the still is the waste.

SPEAKER_00 15:15

So that's what we're done. We cook everything on the grain. Stuff people don't. It depends. Every distillery is different. They'll either cook on the grain or off the grain. We we decided to go with cooking on the grain because I think it adds more of the oils and the flavors back to the alcohol. So that's when we're done cooking our run in here. So we still have all that grain and stuff left in here, and all that leftover liquid that's in there. So we have this thing called a water solid separator. It is badass. Oh wow. So it comes from Middle Eat and what it does, you pump it through there, and this thing spins really fast. It separates all the liquid from the grain. All the liquid goes to a drain outside that goes into that field. All the grain goes into a big hopper that we collect, and then we hook a forklift up to it, we take it across the street, we dump it in that field for the elk and the deer to eat. And that's what I got. They know as soon as that stuff is coming out, provide them a tree line wing for that stuff to dump because they love it. They, I mean, I'll put a huge pile off there and they'll all be gone the next day.

SPEAKER_02 16:08

Yeah.

unknown 16:09

Pretty fun.

SPEAKER_02 16:10

That is cool. This is fantastic. So, your other facility that you're building, how will it be similar and how will it be different than this one?

SPEAKER_00 16:18

You want to walk over there and see?

SPEAKER_02 16:20

Well, sure, let's do it. Okay, I'll follow you.

SPEAKER_00 16:25

Okay. This is like our lavatory part of the distillery. That's where our boiler's at. And we have our own water filtration system back here that is just unbelievable. It goes through a four different process. So we clean up the water and uh to make it what we want it to make it. So that's very important when it comes to distilling. When you blend your final product, you know, you got stuff that's gonna be 150, 160 proof. So you got to add water back to it to get it to where you can put it in the bottle with people to drink it. If you put bad water in there, you're gonna have bad alpha. Yeah. So we have to make sure our water is fast.

SPEAKER_02 16:57

I feel like important decisions are made right here.

SPEAKER_00 17:00

Yeah, this is where all the all the major decisions are made right here. Yep. Usually there's a bunch of empty drinking glasses there. Somebody cleans it up. Thank you.

SPEAKER_02 17:08

Nobody needs to know your business.

SPEAKER_00 17:11

So we do a lot of different sapling and we do a lot of different blending here. I mean, uh, we get we got little barrels over there. We just finished cleaning up and sanding. I did a rum recipe not too long ago. We have it in a tank. So that rum will go into those barrels for aging. And those are huge bourbon barrels that we just dumped all the bourbon out of them yesterday. Yeah. So we're gonna have a bourbon barrel-aged rum. Cool. For about six months, five to six months. It's gonna be awesome.

SPEAKER_02 17:38

Yeah, we'll be here.

SPEAKER_00 17:41

We'll do all our bottling right here as well, all our bottling and labeling. So on a small scale. So, I mean, we can we can knock out quite a bit of you. So we just created a gin. I have a gin in that tank. So we did a few gin runs last week with a recipe that we developed. Nice called petals gin, like flower petal, and uh it's named after an elk here on the property that we've been befriended over the year, uh-huh. And uh, we see her every day. Oh, cool. Well, uh, my wife made a gin after her, so because the first time she saw her, she was eating flower, uh sunflowers. She had a mouthful of sunflowers, and she's got a picture of her. Wow, I love that. She got recipe from a barbed water fest and it's still alive. Oh gosh. So you can see we're expanding out here quite a bit, and uh you can see the size of this building we just left compared to the size of the building we're walking into. So there's still that's gonna go in here. Uh it will actually be here on the 19th. It's all in a way. Um so we still got a lot to do before we put it in here. But it's 24 foot tall, 18 inches in diameter. It's called a continuous fill, and it is a workhorse machine. The whole automated system. And uh as you can see, we're just getting everything laid out. We're all plumbing is really critical inside of a still this size. So you have to know where all your water is going, your wastewater is gonna be treated and it's gotta be flowed back. So we're getting all that laid out now, and all the plumbing will go in next week. Wow. It's a big building. Yeah, it is. And the bar next door with that rolled up glass doors, that's gonna be our first Rick house. So, right now there's a sawmill in there and they're moving out this week.

SPEAKER_04 19:17

Uh-huh.

SPEAKER_00 19:17

And we're gonna just start filling that with barrels. So, our goal is to do 1200 to 1500 barrels a year in our first couple years of production. So, yeah, we have the acreage to grow the corn, so we're gonna be growing a lot.

SPEAKER_02 19:30

You guys don't mess around.

SPEAKER_00 19:32

No, I guess.

SPEAKER_02 19:32

I mean, you're getting some stuff done. That's awesome. Okay, well, thanks for taking us on that tour. And we're gonna meet Sam inside, and she's gonna give us more information.

SPEAKER_00 19:44

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 19:47

Okay, back inside with Samantha Prothe. She, you already heard, is the mastermind behind all of the events and the community. Um, so Sam, give me a little bit more information about your background because I have seen all of the stuff you put on social media. I have seen the events that you're doing, and it is fantastic. You're doing a fabulous job.

SPEAKER_03 20:08

Thank you so much. I really appreciate that. Honestly, a little bit of background myself is um I have been in the this industry for about 10 years. Um Steve's partner, Whiskey Mike, was actually um someone that I worked for. It was actually kind of my first um service industry position, and you know, really enjoyed it and just kind of stuck with it as like my fun job for um this whole time. And then I actually worked for a community bank for um the past couple of years. And whenever Whiskey Mike got uh involved with Steve and Mike and everything, he was just like, oh, you know, I'm trying to get the band back together and all that stuff, and would you be interested? And so I came out here and checked it out and realized what a great fit it would be. And so that's kind of how we kicked off our gate together here.

SPEAKER_02 20:56

So awesome, awesome. Well, I love it. I love it, like I said, I just think you're doing a fabulous job. Um, and I had mentioned that like you have so many fun things on the calendar. So give us a little, um like I know some things are set in stone, and then you're working on some other things, like developing the land, the concerts, all of that. So give us a sneak peek of everything.

SPEAKER_03 21:17

So honestly, we only um got to have a little bit of a sneak peek of the summertime um live music out on the patient and everything, because we did open September 25th. So it was a really nice um kind of head into fall and everything. So we still got to have like a month and a half of live music on the stage, um, which hopefully we'll get some footage of that because it's just like air to be there. So um we basically have about 12 concert series. So kicking off on April 25th, we have Logan Mys. He's a uh local Kansan country music star. Um, he did a lot of stuff in Nashville um in the past decade, and so We're kind of just kicking off with that, and then we'll have uh a little bit of festivals here and there, um, basically here throughout September. And we're just kind of looking at different stuff. Like I think we're we might have a comedy special out here sometime, maybe a magician. Yeah. Um, I'm very looking looking forward to the comedy specials because I think that's huge right now, stand-up and all that stuff. So we're just kind of looking to be diverse with everything. And um as we said earlier, we're definitely putting in some pickleball courts, and we've had some discussions with customers about volleyball as well, which would be really fun. I would prefer that because I've never even played pickleball, but you never know. Well, I'm gonna push the cornhole. Yes, that is one thing that we also talked about. We're definitely gonna do on um Thursday nights to have uh cornhole tournaments and leagues, which I did see on your guys' social media that you do that a lot. Yes. Um that's really fun, which I'm super competitive too. I have my own uh cornhole boards as well. So I totally get that. But you know, just competitive in general. So yeah, it's nice to see that out here and yeah, you know, give the community something to do um since this is a small community and it's a really tight-knit community, but it's um something that I think this type of place was really needed out here just to give people um a place to connect and enjoy their time.

SPEAKER_02 23:15

So yeah, no, I agree. In fact, that's one of the first things that Dave and I were talking about the first night that we were here. We were like, well, of course we stumbled in like five minutes before you even opened. Um do you remember? And so we're like, well, who all comes here? And then we're like, probably a lot of people because there's nothing out here. And even coming from the city, it's not that far. It is not that far. You get on 69 Highway, you hop off, like um Steve had said, it's only four miles off the highway. So I mean, I think the location is it's good, it's fun, it's great for the community. Um, I wanted to ask you about the pickleball courts. I know you said that you're gonna break ground this week or tomorrow, I think you said um how many courts?

SPEAKER_03 23:55

So, yes, weather permitting, they are breaking ground this week. So it's been kind of a rainy, uh rainy bit, but hopefully, hopefully this week we'll get it going. Um, we have three courts going in. So um I think that that's enough for a little bit of a um not tournament but league. So uh I think that um the league will start around April. So we're gonna have a huge April with the concert starting off and and the pickleball courts going in and everything, and then we'll also do the um Cornhole League as well on Thursdays.

Water, Barrels, Gin, And Scaling Up

SPEAKER_02 24:27

So all right, awesome. Can't wait. Thursdays. Uh okay, so I want to I want to switch just a little bit and talk about your cocktails.

SPEAKER_03 24:37

Okay.

SPEAKER_02 24:38

Okay. So, number one, what's your favorite? Like, what is the go-to that someone has to try when they come?

SPEAKER_03 24:43

Oh my gosh, it's actually kind of funny because I've switched that a little bit. So whenever I first started, I was a really big fan of the Manhattan, and it's also um definitely my dad's favorite, and it it's still his favorite to this day. He he always gets a couple of them when he comes in here, but I've kind of switched to our old fashioned because it is a staple as you have one right now. So definitely, definitely a staple. It is a traditional old fashioned, so it is with uh simple syrup, we do not muddle anything. Um, so a lot of and you know, there's so many different variations, and we have people come in here all the time and say how you know clean and smooth and just the perfect amount of um you know sweetness to it. So it really is, you know, definitely a staple. And then so that is definitely one of my favorites, and then honestly, I think that my current favorite is the brown derby. So it's actually our bourbon with honey simple and grapefruit juice, which is a little sounds a little strange, but it's actually like very, very good, very refreshing. Um not it's not you know a huge favorite here, but once people find it, then they love it. Yeah, so that's kind of a hidden gem. Um and I will say that as we talked about the um petals gin that's coming out, I was hopefully April 1st. Um yes, it's very soon. So um that's the tentative date. So um, but as soon as we are able to serve our our gin here, uh definitely a favorite. It's gonna be the gimlet. I love a good gimlet. Um exciting. Yes, my favorite gimlet is actually a cucumber gimlet, so you can just muddle cucumbers in there. Nice. Um, so super, super refreshing. Um, definitely a good summertime drink. So it's hard to pick a favorite, you know. I know good staples. Yes.

SPEAKER_02 26:30

So um your vodka. Tell me about a couple of the drinks that you make with your vodka.

Samantha’s Playbook For Events

SPEAKER_03 26:34

Yes, you know, vodka is definitely um a very popular one when you're trying to just have a drink and not know that you're having a drink. Yeah. Uh our I would say our most popular vodka drink is the lavender lemonade. I've had so many people ask me, is there any alcohol in this? And the answer is yes, and they will sneak up on you if you're not careful. Yeah, so which is a good thing. Uh, and that's the good thing about our vodka is that we made it with a profile that's really, you know, good with everything. I mean, another favorite is the um Bloody Marys. So we just had your Bloody Mary yet. You definitely have to try that on a Saturday at 1 p.m., you know. So that's another good favorite. And the good the really cool thing about our vodka is that we actually won a double gold, excuse me, a double gold award for our taste taste testing competition for the 2025 John Barley Corn Awards. So yes, all right. Award-winning spirits, and our bot our bourbon also won the uh a gold award for that too.

SPEAKER_02 27:38

So oh, I'm so glad you mentioned that because I know Steve had mentioned that you had some award-winning um spirits, so that's fantastic. Okay, now tell me about your rum. What all do you make with your rum?

SPEAKER_03 27:48

So, our rum, we have a couple of different things. Um, definitely the most popular is the espresso martini. A lot of people make their espresso martinis with vodka, but I actually prefer it with the rum. Um so we have a uh dark rum that's made with vanilla beans, and then we have the uh barrel-aged rum, which is um once it was made, it was actually aged for three months in an already used whiskey barrel. So it's got a little spice to it. Um, but we actually use the uh dark rum in our espresso martini. And it just gives it more depth, I think. Um, you can also get the espresso martini in with vodka too, so that's another good vodka one, but it's just a you know preference and different, yeah.

SPEAKER_02 28:27

So I don't know which one I tried then.

SPEAKER_03 28:29

I think I've tried the espresso, so I I think if you had the espresso espresso martini and you didn't have to buy, you got it with rum because that's okay.

SPEAKER_02 28:36

What is that's how it is on the menu. So oh, okay, awesome. Okay.

SPEAKER_03 28:40

Um, and I remember Steve saying something about the rum and like he gives back to yeah, so each uh each bottle sale he gives back five dollars um to the Future Steel Foundation, and then a portion of every bottle is actually donated to the future foundation.

SPEAKER_02 29:00

Okay, yeah, that's fantastic. We love our veterans around here. Yes, that's wonderful. Um, before I forget, how can the listeners find you? Like what are the social media handles, website, all of that?

SPEAKER_03 29:11

Oh, yeah. So um actually, if you go on to dailyobjective distillery.com, we just got our website up and running. So it's got everything. It's got all the live events coming up, it's got um the food trucks out here since we have a rotating food truck uh list going on every time we're open. Um you know, it's got all of our uh summertime events and basically uh everything that's gone up, like Steve said, you know, um all the um I'm sorry, the Tortek writing and you know, basically just everything that we've got going on because there's there's a lot, you know.

SPEAKER_02 29:45

So you can make like reservations for that type of thing. You can buy tickets on the website. Yes.

Cocktail Favorites And Award Wins

SPEAKER_03 29:50

So we will have tickets for our upcoming um concert, Logan Mice, coming up on April 25th. So there's that. And then you can find us basically anywhere on social media. We have presence on Facebook, Instagram, TikTok, um, even um X. I wanted to call it Twitter, but I guess that's X now. I know.

SPEAKER_02 30:10

So is it daily objective? Is that your handle and your website? They're all daily objective distillery. Yeah. Daily objective distillery. Okay, well, yeah, that's okay. I like that you shortened it though, so Dodd. It's easy to remember. Yeah. So what haven't we talked about that you would want the listeners to know? Is there anything that you can think of?

SPEAKER_03 30:30

Um, honestly, just you know, how how fast we're growing and um, you know, everything that we're looking forward to because not only are we working on a gin, but I uh I think I've got them talked into doing an agave spirit, which is technically a tequila because I really want some margaritas on the patio. So I think that'll be really good. And then um, you know, just looking forward to the summertime because a lot of people have come here and their first time here was during the wintertime, and they're like, I cannot wait to experience this place in the patio with the garage doors open and all the greenery and you know, just everything that the summer brings because this place is such a summertime place. So we're very much so looking forward to some uh warm weather.

SPEAKER_02 31:13

Yeah, yeah. Every time Dave and I are here, we're like, I can't wait for these doors to be open. I can't wait to hear the band out there. Um, and you know, I'll do some video around here too to share with the listeners because you kind of have to just see everything. Um, all of the wood on the walls, like Steve mentioned, is from the property. Um, yeah, it's just a really, really cool atmosphere and place. I did have one question for you. When you're making the old-fashioned, you have the option of having it smoked. Oh, yeah. So when someone says pecan or hickory or oak, is that why you ask because you put that type of smoke in there?

SPEAKER_03 31:47

Yeah. Okay. So originally, uh, whenever I had that idea, it was just, you know, you can buy it from various different places. But then we were talking to Sterling Timber, our partners out here, because they have the still out there, and they said, Oh, we can actually get you some of our own um wood chippings and and everything. So as of right now, all of the all the wood chips that we use to smoke them are off the property as well.

SPEAKER_02 32:13

Okay, okay. And Steve did share a lot of the expansion that you're doing. One of the things that that we have talked about in the past is that you have like you're going to have cabins, you're going to have a venue for weddings. Yes. Like, how soon will that be rolling out?

SPEAKER_03 32:28

So it's pretty tentative just because we've got so many things going on right now with a lot of construction at the still and the production distillery and the pickleball courts, but we do have two weddings already on the books for September. Okay. So that's pretty exciting. That is very exciting to see that come to fruition. Um, and then we do have some cabins coming up. They are built. We're just trying to find, you know, logistics and all that stuff. So um, we're definitely excited to um share that with the public as soon as it's available.

Where To Follow, Visit, And Subscribe

SPEAKER_02 32:57

Okay. All right. Well, Samantha, thank you so much for taking the time to be here. I'll thank Steve again when I see him. You guys have to come out and check it out. I will put all the info in the show notes so you can get all of that. All right. Cheers. Cheers. Thank you for listening. If you're enjoying this podcast, be sure to follow Spandex Online so that you don't miss an episode. To do this, just go to the podcast and click subscribe or follow wherever you're listening. Look for the plus five or follow button. This is one of the best things that you can do for the podcast. If you'd also be willing to get a five-star review, that would be 1850 at the looks of thread, 45 to keep the look going. Feel free to reach out to me at 45 by email info at spinx and white.com or at 3593, 392, 2877, 5522, 32.