Why Colorado Whiskey Lovers Are Heading to Minturn’s 160-Square-Foot Tasting Room
Two hours up I-70 from Grand Junction, on the banks of the Eagle River in a town most of us blow past on the way to the lifts, somebody is doing the whisky thing the hard way.
On purpose.
That somebody is Minturn Whisky Co. And before you roll your eyes at another Colorado outfit slapping a mountain on a label, sit with this.
Their single malt walked into the 2026 North American Bourbon and Whisky Competition, a room stuffed with brown liquor, and walked out with medals. In a bourbon fight. Made from 100 percent barley.
A Ski Patroller and a Doctor Built This Colorado Distillery in Minturn
Spence Neubauer moved here in 2007 to chase powder and ended up patrolling at Copper. He was also the guy drinking peated Scotch in college. Not ironically. He just loved the stuff that tastes like a campfire wrestled a Band-Aid.
Stefanie grew up Colorado to the bone, then stacked up a chemistry degree and an actual MD. And then she did the thing almost nobody has the guts to do. She walked away from medicine because she'd rather make whisky. Took her twenty years to admit it out loud. She was right.
A trip to Scotland tipped the hobby into obsession. They learned they could import barley malted over real peat fires, came home with a plan, and set up shop on the Eagle River. The mash bill everybody else guards like a state secret? It's barley. That's the whole list.
People keep telling them to add a bourbon, a rye, a vodka. The answer is a permanent no. One hard thing, done to perfection. In a world where every brand wants to be everything, that stubbornness is the highest compliment I've got.
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Is Minturn Whisky Worth the Drive From the Western Slope?
Yes. The tasting room, The Wee Dram, is about 160 square feet, making it one of the smallest and coolest whisky bars in the country. No reservations. You walk in, grab a seat, stay a while.
There's also a hidden one. Find the Snow Bunny store in Beaver Creek, then figure out how to walk through the fireplace. On the other side is the best Old Fashioned you've ever had.
Gas up the car. Minturn's waiting.