What does a seasoned chef, who has worked in kitchens across the country and traveled the world, do for an encore? He creates innovative new gourmet ingredients that enhance the work of chefs and home cooks alike.

That’s just what Steve Stallard has done at Grand Rapids, Mich. based BLiS Gourmet by pioneering barrel aged sauces and other ingredients that were missing in commercial kitchens.

“I really started out with roe first and we were raising some trout in Northern Michigan – brook trout that were kind of a rare fish to make caviar with – and it turned out to be successful,” Stallard said. “I just got into more and more and started putting maple syrup in bourbon barrels, which nobody had done before. Out of that maple syrup going into bourbon barrels, a bunch of other things came out of those barrels like soy sauce after the maple syrup has been in there.”

But to understand the products BLiS makes, we first need to understand how Stallard got to this point. His experience spans from the Culinary Institute of America to Paris, France. Among other gigs, he was the sous chef at The Greenbrier in West Virginia, the executive chef at Amway Hotels and Dow Chemical, and worked at Taillevent, a Michelin 3-star. He also served as general manager of the Racquet Club of Memphis in order to gain hospitality, managerial, and front-of-house experience.

But it was the time in Paris that really allowed Stallard to develop a taste for creating high-quality products. During that time, he estimates that he visited hundreds of wineries from Burgundy to Champagne to the Loire Valley. Here in the states, he has traveled extensively through Oregon, Paso Robles, Napa Valley, and Sonoma tasting wines, and he credits those experiences for his gourmet product success.

“I think that develops your palate,” Stallard explained. “I think that if you taste wine it makes you think about what your palate is tasting in a more detailed and articulate way. I’m not saying that chefs don’t have those accurate and acute senses on their palate but I think wine just makes you think about it a little bit more.

“So everything we do [at BLiS] is very palate-driven and taste-driven. I’ve seen so many people make mistakes that are trying to duplicate the product and they just are not getting it.”

In fact, it took Ballard seven different distilleries to find the barrels that would give him the taste he wanted for his barrel aged products. It’s not as easy as throwing a product into a bourbon barrel and hoping it turns out a quality product.

For example, Stallard explained that barrels that held Pappy Van Winkle, which is one of the most expensive and coveted bourbons, don’t age food products very well because there isn’t enough bite or depth of flavor to impart.

“It’s so smooth because it’s a wheated bourbon that a lot of those harsh edges are off of it, so you just get really light spice but it takes a lot and a long time,” Stallard said. “That’s just an example, it’s nothing against the whiskey at all, it just doesn’t work with the food products very well.”

What Stallard eventually did was find characters and flavors in certain whiskeys that he thought would work, and then traced the barrels back. He landed on specific barrels that delivered the flavor profile he wanted, all from Kentucky, and all single barrels from 10-year and up.

The first product he started aging was 100% pure maple syrup from old-growth Michigan maple orchards, which spent about a year in the barrel. That product, the BLiS Bourbon Barrel Aged Maple Syrup, has been named best bourbon barrel aged maple syrup at the National Craft Maple Syrup Festival each of the past two years, and won the 2016 sofi award in the dessert sauces, toppings, and syrup category from the Specialty Food Association.

Stallard struck a partnership with Founders Brewing Co., who took those barrels and put their Kentucky Bourbon Stout into them to create their award-winning Canadian Breakfast Stout. Each barrel, Stallard said, sucks up about a gallon of maple syrup during his aging process, which then allows those barrels to impart that flavor into whatever is put into it next — in this case, Founders beer.

BLiS took the process a step further and got their barrels back from Founders and filled them with hot sauce. The result is their Blast Hot Pepper Sauce, which is great on anything. Then, he put his steak sauce into those barrels and came out with Blast Steak Sauce.

Stallard also developed a Bourbon Barrel Aged Soy Sauce and Barrel Aged Fish Sauce, but like his other products, he didn’t come about them haphazardly.

Whereas many current barrel aged soy sauce makers develop their own formulated soy sauce product in the barrel, Stallard partnered with Yamato Soy to get a high quality product from the start.

“I went to a Yamato Soy company that has been doing this for 200 years and their techniques are very polished and they come out with the richest soy that I can get my hands on,” Stallard said. “I prefer to age that, rather than to make my own because I don’t have the experience to make that, but I do have the skill to age it and I know which barrels will work well with it.”

He did the same with his fish sauce by partnering with Red Boat, the most exceptional fish sauce in the industry. Red Boat uses pure anchovies as opposed to fish pieces and extracts, so by starting with a high-quality product, BLiS can develop a high-quality product that imparts a subtle sweetness and smokiness into the fish sauce.

Both of those products are great ingredients for barbecue, especially for brines and marinades. In fact, Stallard says, some restaurants marinate almost exclusively in the fish sauce or use it as a base for their seasonings and salt.

That’s what that Stallard says is the most rewarding part — seeing his products on retail shelves and in restaurant kitchens, used by chefs just like he once was.

“That’s the most satisfying thing: I walk into a kitchen and there are two or three bottles sitting up there on the cook’s line and I’m like, “Wow, that is really cool”, Stallard said. “These aren’t just friends buying stuff or whatever, so it’s around. It’s around in kitchens.”

The coolest place he has seen it? French Laundry, the Michelin 3-star restaurant in Napa Valley, Calif.

In addition to the barrel aged versions of maple syrup and soy sauce, BLiS offers barrel aged hardwood smoked variations. The light smoky taste comes from hickory, apple, and mesquite wood through a process that Stallard developed using his barbecue skills.

He found a love for barbecue when he lived in Memphis, as well as when he worked at The Greenbrier, where barbecue was a staple.

“I like the simplicity and I like the camaraderie of barbecue — everybody is kind of open and sharing techniques and it’s just a festive party,” he said. “I love the slow interaction of cooking food. I’m not a big fan of pellet grills and stuff that you just set it and forget it. I want to work and manipulate and baste and I want to just keep touching the food for hours. So it’s really rewarding to me.”

So what’s next for BLiS?

Stallard recently traveled to Jamaica and imported totes of a 7-year old high ester single vintage rum — one that he describes as a unicorn. Then, he aged it in 18-year old bourbon barrels, which imparts a softened bourbon and maple flavor into the rum. It will soon hit the shelves at Mammoth Distillery in Traverse City, Mich. in a very limited run.

With an innovative mind and a well developed palate, Stallard and his team of ex-chefs at BLiS aren’t slowing down any time soon. If you want a secret ingredient for your barbecue or a tasty treat for your next family get-together, buy some BLiS Gourmet products and you’re sure to impress. They also work great as gifts for family and friends.

*Most photos in this post provided by BLiS Gourmet