Blue Fish Distellery, Colorado Springs

When Blue Fish Distillery founder John Fisher visited his grandmother as a child, the beautiful fish-shaped, cobalt blue empty bottle of Fisch's Bitters she kept by her garden always caught his eye. After his grandmother moved out years later, the bottle unexpectedly arrived in Fisher's mailbox, which he took as a sign to begin work on his dream of opening a craft distillery. A mechanical engineer by trade, Fisher had deep insight into manufacturing techniques, perfecting his methods to result in a lineup of spirits that taste as good on their own as they do in cocktails.

Fisher proudly calls his process "grain-to-glass", mashing, fermenting, and bottling all of his liquors at his distillery. What starts as raw ingredients ends up as potent, subtly flavored spirits, such as the clean-tasting Blue Fish vodka, the American White Rum, or the Pike's Peak Clear small-batch moonshine.