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Hello
Welcome to Pretty Parrot
We are a small batch distillery based in Tweed Heads and Tumut. We use Australian and traditional botanticals to make our gin and liqueurs. Our tasting room is closed at the moment as we make a new space.
Blog
April 2022
Winners are grinners, our faithful Lemon Myrtle gin just won Silver in London. This is the only gin we sent and we are very pleaed with the result.
We have been testing out a few cocktails and wil add them to our cockail page. Off to The Gin Palooza in Sydney next weekend. Batlow Cider Festival also coming up on the 21st of May https://www.batlowciderfest.com.au
We are still waiting for our plans to be approved by Snowy Valleys Council. A pretty slow process for a micro distillery.
Blog
March 2022
Lots has been going on We sold our hotel last November which meant we also had to close down our tasting room there. We are still tryig to get our DA through Council to build our new distillery in Tumut. There have been some setbacks, surprisingly from other tourist operators, but most people are really supportive of us. We have moved our production to Tweed Heads whilst we wait for the go ahead and will probably be there until the end of this year.
Markets are back on again. we went to the Snowy Valleys Cycle Challenge, met some wonderfull and very fit people at the Adelong Show Ground. We hope to be in Yass on the 9th April at Cliftonwood.
Just completed a distillery course at the Old Kempton Distillery in Kempton Tasmania. Very informative and am looking forward to using the knowledge that I gained. Unfortunately that is not my still.
Blog
January 2021
Hard to believe it is six months since I last wrote. We won a Silver and a Bronze at the ADSA. Lemon Myrtle, Silver and Bathtub No 1 a Bronze. Had a great time at the Gin Palooza in Canberra and Sydney. It was great to catch up with our customers in Canberra. It was our first time in Sydney so that was interesting. We hope to be part of the Gin Paloozas again this year. We are still battling along with moving our distillery from Lavington to Tumut. I hope to have Council approval soon. We also hope that the markets will open up soon so we get to chat to all our lovely customers. We are experimenting on new gin, it should be ready within the next three months.
July 2020
Some good news, in this time of Covid. We have just won silver at the London Spirit Competition for our Lemon Myrtle Gin (No 2). This is our most popular gin so it just shows what great taste our customers have.
We are now in the process of moving our distillery to Tumut. It is with the local council and we hope to have permission soon.
Our tasting room is still at the historic Oriental Hotel and sales are available on line or at the hotel.
Maybe, in the next few months, we will be able to attend markets again. It will be great to get out and about.
We are currently working on a Vermouth. I really like the bitter sweet flavours. I often drink vermouth either on ice or with soda and fresh orange and lots of ice. It is a really nice drink to have before dinner.
Thank you to all our customers who are still supporting us, hope to see you soon.
Ellen
My Blog
Jan-Feb 2020
April 2020
At the beginning of the year we were surrounded by bush fires and lived in what felt like a dome of smoke. We were in drought and stock feed and water were becoming scarce. By the end of February, it felt like things were picking up. At our hotel and tasting room, we could see an increase in visitors to Tumut keen to support fire affected country towns. We went to Tassie for a distilling course and toured lots of small batch whiskey distilleries. Covid-19 was starting to make big headlines and was about to make our lives, and the way we live, very different.
The Government announced that all hotels, cafes ect had to close their doors by Monday 23 March by 12 midday. This technically put us and all our staff out of work. Talk about confronting and scary. To add to this my daughter, who lives in Melbourne, was about to have a baby, my son, who was playing rugby league in Queensland had to return home. Alec, my eldest, worked at Tipsy Bull in Canberra, was stood down and my daughters' husband, a chef, also lost his job. Not to mention, our youngest son, was having a gap year before going to uni, also worked at the hotel and helped with the distillery.
What is happening now? My daughter had a beautiful baby girl and I spent five days in Melbourne looking after my other grand daughter and was able to meet the new baby. A gift. The two youngest boys were lucky enough to get some work at Woolworths stacking shelves. Woolworths specifically targetted out of work hospitality workers which was fantastic.
The hotel is doing take away five nights a week. It is not actually making money but at least it gives some staff members a chance to get out of the house and go to work for a few hours.
We are making hand sanitiser, like a lot of distilleries, and started selling to locals yesterday.
We have had rain for the last couple of days. Daylight savings has finished and it looks like it is going to be a beautiful day.
