Some places we plan to go to and some we come by and the brown sign draws us in. Sunshine & Sons Distillery started around 2020 when four mates, Adam Chapman, Daniel Vinson, Matt Hobson and Michael Conrad, decided to follow their passion.
The distillery is in Woombye, a little up the road from the Big Pineapple. We had been passed here a few years earlier but the addition of the brown sign caught our attention. The driveway is a little way off the Nambour Connection Road and the outside sitting area is at the back, so it is quiet from traffic noise.
As you approach, the sweet caramel smell of aging spirits hits you. On the right, you find the shop and a few tables and chairs, surrounded by what must be 50 barrels or more, many stamped with Nil Desperandum.
The main products are rum and gin, with several varieties of both on offer. Vodka and Cane spirits are also available, without the variety shown for the rum and gin.
Tastings are available for a very reasonable price, with cost taken off a bottle if purchased in the shop afterwards. The tastings went through 4 different gins and three rums. The gins were sampled with and without tonic water to get the full flavour experience with each.
The original dry gin is delicious, and the one I decided to buy on the day. It has a botanical mix of pomegranate, lavender, and pink rose petals, giving it a wonderful floral and citrus flavour.
Next was the pineapple parfait gin, a tribute to the grounds of the pineapple farming that bore the emergence of The Big Pineapple nearby.
The third, and very nearly my choice of bottle to buy, is Biosphere Gin. The flavours are from elderflower and native black myrtle, a collaboration with the Creative Ecologies Research Cluster at the University of the Sunshine Coast. It celebrates the Sunshine Coast becoming a UNESCO Biosphere Reserve in 2022.
The fourth gin was called Wild Peach, using native Australian quandong and wild Australian peach. It was the lightest of the four and more suited for sipping than mixing with some tonic. It was softer too, not as distinct of that gin flavour that I have been enjoying in recent years.
On to the rums, the first was the 2 year aged Nil Desperandum. Rum isn’t my drink of choice but I enjoy the odd one here and there, and tend to prefer a spiced rum. I found this rum very pleasant to drink, and found out later it was awarded silver in the World Rum Awards in 2024.
The second rum was Artfully Corrupted rum, spiced. Lightly sweetened with honey and sugar and aged in bourbon barrels emptied of sherry and port, it is spiced with vanilla bean, Jamaican pepper, ginger, cinnamon, cardamom, star anise, fennel seed, clove, nutmeg & tea.
The final tasting was a liqueur, Mr Barista Coffee Liqueur. Made with Nutworks Macadamias, and cold-brewed Segafredo Zanetti brewed coffee, it was a great finale for the tastings. Not part of the tastings, but a portion of this, a portion of cane spirits, and a shot of cold brew over ice makes a great afternoon drink.
I walked away with a bottle of Original Dry Gin and the sampler glass used for the tastings in hand. Yes, you get to keep this too. I was told the tastings works out to be about 3-4 standard drinks, so I took the passenger seat for the drive home. It gave me time to add Sunshine & Sons here and was the first official test of visiting a location with the new Brown Signs App… coming soon!
