Food & Drink

At Song Dog Farm Distillery, the land is part of the recipe

A look inside the Boyds site where local grain is transformed into award-winning spirits

By

Jacqueline Kalil

June 25, 2026 9:39 a.m.

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On a sunny Father’s Day afternoon, families sprawl across the lawn at Song Dog Farm Distillery in Boyds, sipping cocktails beneath blue skies while children dart between tables. Near the entrance, staff assemble a temporary pen for a goat petting zoo that would soon become the main attraction for younger visitors—and a few adults, too. The smell of bánh mìs and tacos drifts from a food truck parked out front.

Inside the tasting room, a bartender shakes cocktails and pours whiskey while guests settle onto a porch overlooking the rolling fields of Montgomery County’s Agricultural Reserve. Beyond the bar, another operation was underway—one focused less on cocktails and more on the grain that gives them life.

Head distiller Kristian Naslund leads Bethesda Today through the production facility, which opened in October 2025. The scent of fermenting grain hangs in the air and copper stills hum in the background.

Naslund, who moved to Washington, D.C., from Colorado about a year ago to join Song Dog, oversees every step of production, from grain selection and fermentation to distillation and blending. On this Sunday, he is producing rye whiskey using grain sourced largely from farms surrounding the distillery.

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Most of the distillery’s ingredients come from local farms and those in neighboring counties, a point of pride for the business and one that Naslund says directly influences the flavor of its spirits.

For example, “our corn is a Bloody Butcher red corn, which has a really high oil content,” he said. “It gives the whiskey a really nice mouthfeel and smoothness.”

The heirloom variety is one of several locally grown grains that define Song Dog’s products. The distillery also uses specialty rye grown in the region, and wheat and malt sourced from a malt house in Carroll County.

The focus on terroir — the idea that geography, climate and growing conditions shape flavor — has earned the distillery recognition beyond the county. Song Dog Bourbon won a silver medal at the 2025 Heartland Whiskey Competition hosted by the American Craft Spirits Association in central Indiana, a distinction co-owner Megan Draheim said reinforces the quality of the locally sourced grain that forms the foundation of the distillery’s spirits.

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“We have a lot of research showing differences even from field to field in how grain tastes once it ends up in whiskey,” Draheim said. “We’re really proponents of people understanding that about spirits and developing a sense of place in Montgomery County and in Maryland farmland.”

As Naslund walks through the facility, he points out towering fermentation tanks, wooden fermenters and rows of aging barrels. The barrels, made from air-dried Missouri oak, are carefully chosen to enhance flavor development.

“That two years sitting outside is really important,” he said. “It allows our whiskey to get deeper into the wood and pull out more flavor.”

He then stopped beside one of the copper stills as a stream of clear liquid trickled into a collection vessel.

“We’re separating ethanol, the stuff we like to drink, from the things we don’t want,” Naslund explained.

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The process is meticulous. A typical batch begins with roughly 2,000 pounds of grain, which is milled, cooked and fermented before being distilled. After hours of work, the yield is just a few barrels of whiskey.

For Naslund, 47, the blend of science and craftsmanship is part of the appeal. He began his distilling career in 2008, 17 years before joining Song Dog.

“When I started, there really weren’t university programs for distillation in the United States,” he said. “A lot of it was learning on the job.”

Just outside the production building, Draheim reflected on a different journey—the one that led her and her husband, David Harris, to create Song Dog.

“In my other life, I’m a conservation ecologist,” said Draheim, 49, whose career includes 12 years of teaching at Virginia Tech’s Northern Virginia campus. Harris, 56, spent two decades working in politics.

The couple’s fascination with whiskey began as consumers. They visited distilleries while traveling and became increasingly interested in how spirits were made. Around 2013, as states began modernizing licensing laws that had constrained small-scale distilling ventures since Prohibition, they began exploring the possibility of opening one themselves, according to Draheim.

The road to launching Song Dog proved longer than expected.

The couple initially purchased a building in Rockville and planned to open there. But when the COVID-19 pandemic hit in 2020, those plans fell apart. Around the same time, the county created a farm distillery license that made it possible to operate within the Agricultural Reserve.

For Draheim, the change opened the door to the kind of business the couple had always envisioned.

“We were able to pivot and buy a farm,” she said. “That’s always what we would have rather done because we’re all about the grain, we’re all about the land and terroir in spirits.”

Today, Song Dog produces vodka, gin, bourbon, rye whiskey, liqueurs, amaro-style spirits and a bottled Rock & Rye cocktail. Montgomery County’s farm alcohol production permit requires the distillery to produce every drop of alcohol used in its cocktails, leading the team to create a wide range of house-made ingredients, according to Harris.

The tasting room, open Wednesday through Sunday year-round, has become as much a community gathering place as a destination for spirits enthusiasts. Live music, craft nights and seasonal events draw visitors from across the region. Sometimes, as on Father’s Day, there are even goats.

But whether guests come for the cocktails, the scenery or the family-friendly atmosphere, Draheim hopes they leave with a deeper appreciation for what grows in the fields surrounding them.

“We want people to understand that spirits have a sense of place,” she said. “What’s growing here in Montgomery County can create flavors that are unique to this region.”

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Originally published at Bethesdamagazine