In Charente-Maritime, grapes usually take center stage: After all, this department of western France is the longstanding home of both Cognac—the world’s most famous distilled wine—and Pineau des Charentes, a fortified wine that is beloved by connoisseurs. But not everything in this region some 250 miles southwest of Paris concerns grapes or wine. Instead, at the micro-distillery Disent-Elles, what is getting distilled is beer—specifically, donated beer that would otherwise go to waste.
Founded by Camille Cieplik and Luce Lepissier in the tranquil village of Pont-l’Abbé-d’Arnoult, Disent-Elles (roughly pronounced “deez-tell”) occupies a traditional stone building set amongst fields of sunflowers. At less than two years old, it has the feel of a budding business. When I pull up at the address on an overcast summer’s morning, I can see that the duo have not gotten around to painting their logo on the facade of the ancient stone barn. From the exterior, you wouldn’t know that it now houses a distillery.
Saving would-be waste beer is just the tip of the iceberg, as almost everything at Disent-Elles is shaped by Cieplik and Lepissier’s sustainable approach, from their bottle deposit-return scheme right down to the dry toilet. The stills, for a start, are all secondhand. Even their names have been repurposed. Tall and hefty Paul and slightly timeworn Jacques are named after their previous owners. The photogenic, copper-hued Marguerite, from Lorraine, France, is named after Cieplik’s grandmother.
A small, 40-liter (10.57-gallon) copper still with a bain marie—a double-boiler design— typically used for producing fruit brandies, Marguerite now serves primarily for tests and small batches of about 80 bottles. Jacques, a wood-fired Charentais still, and Paul, a wood-fired Armagnac model, are used for producing larger volumes of alcohol. Both were originally designed to transform wine into brandy. But by distilling beer, you end up with a spirit that displays an interesting difference, Lepissier explains.
“There is less methanol in beer than there is in wine,” she says. Because of that, the resulting alcohol has much less of a burning sensation. “It is round and soft in the mouth, and it smells of prunes. It’s incredible.”
It is this spirit, rather than industrially made neutral spirit, that serves as the basis for the entire Disent-Elles product range, which includes four categories. The first, la Goutte, spans various spirits. The second, named l’Amère, meaning bitter, is a product that changes with the seasons. Depending on the time of year, it is made using different parts of alexanders, an edible hedgerow plant. The third category, called la Douceur, is Disent-Elles’s take on liqueurs. Last but not least, there’s a category that has become something of a Disent-Elles signature: la Mistelle.
It might sound like an innovation, but there’s nothing new about mistelle. Anyone who has ever tasted Pineau des Charentes—the fortified wine made by blending grape must and Cognac—or Pommeau de Normandie—an oak-aged blend of apple juice and Calvados—has already drunk a mistelle. The name belongs to a family of alcoholic beverages with an ABV of about 17% that are made by fortifying a fruit juice, lightly fermented fruit must, or, in Disent-Elles’ case, barley-based wort, the sweet, unfermented liquid that is used to make beer.
To fortify the wort, Disent-Elles uses the alcohol it distills from donated, would-be waste beer that is donated by a number of craft breweries in the vicinity. Guillaume Arnault, head brewer at 7-year-old Brasseurs Cueilleurs in the nearby village of Landrais, says that this helps save beer that would otherwise be discarded.
“Most of the beers we give Disent-Elles have had issues in the fermentation process and are therefore overcarbonated,” he says. “We also give them what is left of used kegs that have been returned to us after rentals.”
Once Cieplik and Lepissier have accumulated enough waste beer, they set about distilling it into a high-ABV neutral alcohol. This is an all-consuming task that they tend to do in winter. There’s a simple reason for choosing that time of year: Any distilling process involves cooling, so that the alcohol vapors condense back into liquid. In that respect, Paul has a clever design. Rather than use water as a cooling liquid, this particular still uses beer that hasn’t been heated yet. For Disent-Elles, this is a fantastic way to save on water. However, it means that the beer needs to be as cold as possible.
It takes time and energy to get a still going and, once lit, the fire requires constant monitoring. To be as efficient as possible, Cieplik and Lepissier keep the still going for a minimum of 48 hours. And that can create quite the social event.
“That’s why we get distiller friends to come,” Lepissier says. “It requires a gentle cruising speed and you have to feed the fire around the clock.” These moments are just as much about enjoying long nights with friends as they are about building up a supply of spirit that Disent-Elles can work with throughout the year. Last January, the pair distilled 12,000 liters (3,170 gallons) of beer over five days. That gave them some 900 liters (about 240 gallons) of a spirit with 70% ABV.
Once they’re ready to create a new batch of mistelle, Cieplik and Lepissier add this spirit to sweet wort, which they also get from Brasseurs Cueilleurs. At first, while they were still figuring out their process, Cieplik and Lepissier used the same wort that the brewery uses for one of its beers. Arnault has since developed a specific wort recipe for Disent-Elles that uses biscuit and coffee malts.
To understand what a beer-based mistelle tastes like in its simplest form, Cieplik gives me the Disent-Elles Malt mistelle to try. On the nose and in the mouth, I immediately get the toasted, caramelized, malted notes that come from the wort. There’s almost something whiskey-like about it, but without the big hit of alcohol, since the Malt mistelle is only 17% ABV. This basic mistelle serves as the base for the other three versions—Thymus, Cascara, and Cacao—which spend time in steel tanks, macerating ingredients that impart their own flavors.
“‘Waste’ isn’t a negative word for me, but not everyone thinks the same.”
Disent-Elles sources many of its ingredients from local, artisanal food producers: As with the beer, these are generally ingredients that would otherwise be thrown out. Later that day, before returning to Paris, I wander around the city of La Rochelle, where I find one of their suppliers—thanks to a long line of customers—Roméo, an ice cream maker who provides Cieplik and Lepissier with used vanilla pods. Another local ice cream maker, Dunne, gives them leftover organic lemon zest to make their version of limoncello (and sells an ice cream made using their mistelle, in a fine example of circularity). An artisan chocolatier in Bordeaux gives them cocoa husks, left over from chocolate production, which they use for their Cocoa mistelle.
Not all ingredients are salvaged, though. Some, like the hedgerow alexanders, are foraged, while others, like orange-scented thyme, are grown locally. There’s one exception, Cieplik acknowledges: They use small amounts of imported coffee cherry—which was only approved for import to Europe in 2022—for the Cascara mistelle. “I’m fully transparent about it,” she says. “It’s a waste product that comes from coffee-producing countries. We can’t be 100% perfect.”
Using would-be-waste and previously used ingredients doesn’t necessarily mean compromising on flavor, Lepissier says. When Roméo makes vanilla ice cream, he only uses the vanilla pods once before drying them.
“They still contain a lot of flavor. Since alcohol extracts flavors well, we can dig that bit deeper to find flavor,” she says.
In the background, Marguerite is quietly dripping away, filling the air with a warm, soothing smell. A chocolate-orange spirit is in the making, for when temperatures outside plummet and the festive season begins. Lepissier lets me sample the liquid that is slowly accumulating, drip by drip. Still warm and bursting with layers of flavor, it is inspired by orangette, a traditional French confectionery of candied orange peel coated in chocolate. Just a couple of drops on my tongue are enough to spark intense nostalgia. Childhood memories of Terry’s Chocolate Orange—a Christmas classic in the U.K.—come flooding back to me.
This mastery of flavor is all the more impressive when you consider that Cieplik and Lepissier are relative newcomers to the world of distilling. Before they met, Lepissier was a chemist, while Cieplik worked in social services. Both wanted a career change and were in the process of learning the art of distillation through courses and work experience. In theory, they might never have crossed paths had it not been for a bureaucratic snarl.
During the pandemic, Lepissier worked at a relatively young producer called Distillerie des Marigots in Quebec, Canada. She was about to return to France to start her own project. To replace her, Joseph St-Denis Boulanger, the founder of Distillerie des Marigots, was planning to hire Cieplik, who was in the process of accumulating distilling experience. He put them in touch, so that Lepissier could help Cieplik sort out paperwork for a visa to Canada. Little did he know that this introduction would be a catalyst.
“They had been following similar pathways, they had similar ideas and they have different strengths, so they complement one another well,” Boulanger tells me when I reach out to him for a video call. Instead of trading places in Canada, the two decided to start a project together in France. As a result, Cieplik never did join the Distillerie des Marigots. Instead, Disent-Elles was born.
At Distillerie des Marigots, Lepissier had learned how to make gin using locally foraged or harvested herbs and spices, and visited several other micro-distilleries in the region. She soon realized that each distillery has its own identity, an observation she found reassuring.
“I think it’s the North American way of seeing things: Yes, there is tradition, but you can also have your own signature style,” she says. “There’s no right or wrong way, as long as you’re doing something which you believe in.” This feeling was reinforced further during a road trip of distilleries she and Cieplik undertook together in the south of France. After that, they were ready to create a distillery in their own image.
Although the distillery only opened to the public one year ago, you wouldn’t necessarily know it. They seem very settled in. Lengthy to-do lists and complex tables with maceration start dates are pinned up around the premises. On a shelf on the back wall, taste experiments are underway in Kilner jars filled with alcohol: I spy strawberry stems macerating in one and fennel pollen in another.
One jar captures my attention, revealing the unmistakable jagged lines of oyster shells. I ask about it. The last time they distilled a batch of alcohol with friends, Lepissier says, they cooked oysters on the still’s fire. On a whim, they decided to see if they could capture those smoked saline notes. The result is more potent than they had anticipated, she admits with humor, but it’s still work in progress. It is a reminder that a lot of trial and error goes into creating recipes, but that is precisely one of the aspects of distilling they relish so much.
After our tour, we head back to the area at the distillery’s entrance, designed for welcoming visitors. It’s time for a tasting. The Disent-Elles bottles are on display on the shelves, while branded T-shirts hang on a rail. We quickly get sidetracked into talking about branding and their logo, a simple but bold line drawing of two naked women that lends a strong and dynamic visual identity. They had no problem defining the visual aesthetic with their graphic designer. Instead, one of the more tricky aspects has been vocabulary. As a brand that works with a lot of would-be-waste, it can be a bit of a minefield to know which words will have negative connotations for customers.
“Reclaimed, unsold, recycled… At first, it was hard to know which words to use,” Cieplik says. “‘Waste’ isn’t a negative word for me, but not everyone thinks the same.”
“There’s no right or wrong way, as long as you’re doing something which you believe in.”
Language is key when trying to reframe how consumers think about waste, but there are also other challenges to being as sustainable as possible. To start, they are also working on making it a profitable venture.
“Everyone thinks that because we get the beer for free, it’s easy and cheap for us to produce alcohol,” Cieplik says. “It actually takes a tremendous amount of time to collect the beer, then empty the barrels and the bottles.” A lot of time and attention also goes into creating each batch, Lepissier adds.
“Because each beer is different, the end product varies,” she says. “That means we can’t follow the exact same process each time: It isn’t a case of putting a set amount of grams of juniper berries in one liter of alcohol which we’ll then bottle on a set date.” It would be much simpler for them to buy a base alcohol, she jokes, because it would cut out a lot of the red tape they have to deal with. Bureaucracy is also one of the reasons why they haven’t applied for organic certification: “The certification is expensive, it involves a lot of paperwork and, above all, we pick up so many ingredients left, right, and center, that it would just be hell in terms of traceability,” she says.
I’d originally met Cieplik and Lepissier at a natural wine salon in Paris, where they were part of a small handful of spirits producers in a sea of winemakers. This isn’t unusual for them: They found their footing between natural wine and craft beer. Both worlds have audiences that are curious and open to new flavors.
“On average, there are 250 bottles in each batch and each batch is different. That’s not something that exists in the world of spirits: Companies like Martell have been making exactly the same Cognac for 150 years, even though the grapes might have come from different vineyards and each harvest is different,” says Cieplik. In that respect, Disent-Elles resonates with consumers who appreciate the nuances of small batches and who can draw parallels with concepts such as seasonality and wine vintages.
This, combined with the sustainability angle, means that Disent-Elles is often carried by retailers that sell organic or natural wine, craft beer, or a mix of both. If you’re ever in Bordeaux, for example, you can find their products at Maison Lejeune, an organic deli and wine store. The boutique’s philosophy rests on three pillars: respect, care, and transparency. Based on this alone, I can see why Disent-Elles would be a good match. When I talk to founder Iris Cottrau-Lejeune, she cites the quality and unconventional nature of Disent-Elles products, as well as the brand’s environmental awareness. “They go to such lengths to use waste products that we need to encourage them to continue on that track,” she says.
Since most of Cottrau-Lejeune’s customers aren’t familiar with mistelle, it doesn’t sell itself quite as easily as wine does. It requires a different approach, she says, adding that she has to do more explaining. To help clients understand where to position it, she usually compares it to the regional favorite, Pineau des Charentes. Like that drink, mistelle has a touch of sweetness. The flavors of each mistelle are clean and punchy, be it the bright herbaceousness of thyme or the velvety qualities of chocolate.
“They go to such lengths to use waste products that we need to encourage them to continue on that track. ”
Cottrau-Lejeune previously worked in the realm of Sauternes, a wine that gains its sweetness from noble rot. For her, there are parallels to be drawn when it comes to understanding how and when to drink a mistelle.
“You might drink a 5-year-old Sauternes for a laid-back aperitif with friends, while a 30-year-old Sauternes might be better suited to a cozy night in by the fire with a good book,” she says. “It’s the same idea with Disent-Elles. You can drink the Thymus with a tonic in summer, while the Cacao is great after dinner, to end a meal on a chocolatey note.”
As my call with Cottrau-Lejeune draws to a close, she points out that it is still quite rare to come across two women in the world of spirits. It’s something that the two distillers also touch on after the tasting: The fact that they are both women was key to their decision to forge their own path rather than try to follow tradition. Not least because they are based in a region where the practice of distilling has typically been handed down from father to son. Reviving an all-but-forgotten beverage like mistelle and putting their own distinct spin on it has allowed Cieplik and Lepissier to carve out a space for themselves that didn’t already exist.
The approach has paid off. “It’s the kind of change we want to see,” says Cottrau-Lejeune, noting that an increasing number of people around her are starting to talk about Disent-Elles. Plus, the fact that Cieplik and Lepissier are brimming with new ideas makes Disent-Elles an intriguing brand to follow.
“Camille and Luce are artisanal distillers who do everything themselves, from foraging to distilling.”
That might be true, but Arnault notes that Cieplik and Lepissier might have harder sailing ahead of them. “Now that they are starting to develop and age spirits, they are going to enter a more competitive part of the drinks market,” he says. “But since Camille and Luce are artisanal distillers who do everything themselves, from foraging to distilling, I’m not worried for them.”
Because they are forging their own path, the possibilities open to them are in many ways endless. During our video call, St-Denis Boulanger uses a fitting French proverb when talking about Lepissier and Cieplik’s fateful encounter: “Le hasard fait bien les choses,” or “Chance works in wonderful ways.” Serendipity has indeed played an important role in the Disent-Elles story: It is, after all, how they met, and also how they came across the barn that would become their distillery.
However, their story is also about more than chance. Their passion, for one, counts for a lot: It is infectious. During my visit, I immediately found myself caught up in their world. On the train home, I realized I had barely taken any pictures to refer back to later: I had been too busy hanging on to their every word. If chance was the spark that originally ignited Disent-Elles, Cieplik and Lepissier’s patience, passion, and determination are now feeding the flame.
Words by Ginger Rose Clark
Photos by Nicolas Alvarez
