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Dahi — whose day job before this was in marketing — and business partner Tony Salloum hope to foster that sort of atmosphere one day at their distillery. They’ve got a ways to go. Their offices, located in one of those single-storey office complexes in Mississauga, are more or less empty. You have to squint to imagine the steel glint of a still — they don’t own one yet, though the paperwork is nearly done. Until then, the products are made from grape spirit produced by Dixon’s Distillers in Guelph, to a recipe of the partners’ specification. The resulting arak is intensely licoricey, more vivid and complex than a popular Turkish brand.

The distillery also makes a pastis, as in the French anise liquor. It’s sweetened with maple sugar (“We wanted to put a Canadian fingerprint on it”), and has a herbal complexity that could persuade the firmest fan of the dominant brands, Pernod and Ricard. Dahi proudly unscrews jars of ingredients and waves the air to propagate the scent of hyssop, coriander seed, star anise, and lavender grown locally, at Bonnieheath Estate in Waterford.

Dahi’s background is in marketing, which prompts the question: what is the market for craft-distilled arak and pastis? Far from being restricted to Ontarians of Syrian and Lebanese origin, The White Distillery is targeting a broader swath of people with roots in the Mediterranean. Anise-flavoured spirits are a staple everywhere from Spain and France to Italy (which has sambuca, anisette and mistrà) to Greece (ouzo) and Turkey (arak, in a different style from the Levantine version). The White Distillery’s labels put the French language above the English, reflecting the expectation that Quebecers, with their penchant for pastis, will be among the biggest customers.

The LCBO hasn’t stocked either product for general sale — yet — so the only way to bring home some White Distillery Dayaa Arak or Pastis d’Hameau is to visit a store and place an order for a case of six. That, or take Dahi up on the housecall offer first.