While not at all booze related, this dining experience blows me away.

I am not going to get into the details of the Scotch Whisky Association's new legislation concerning labeling, I will just say that I think it is a bad move.

Here is a petition to to keep it from happening. I highly encourage you to sign it.

Tuthilltown!!!

I was lucky enough to meet with Ralph Erenzo (and Dustin from Domaine Select) Distiller and sales manager for Tuthilltown Spirits out of New York. Firstly, these are both very nice guys, I was a solid 25 minutes late and the paid it no mind....I hate being late.

On to the product. I tasted most of the line, all of which is well-made, but was really blown away with a few products in particular.

Hudson Manhattan Rye: Solid toasted color, plenty dark and warm. Nose was all about the grain, not overly oaked at all. These two aspects made me ask how old it was, he had already told me that they use new barrels, so I was a bit puzzled by how dark it was compared to how gentle the oak was in the bouquet. "3 months," was the answer. HUH!?!? I don't see how that is possible. Well here is how they do it.

To start, they use small barrels. In Scotland I heard these called Quarter-casks and bloodtubs. Laphraig has a quarter-cask bottling that is super powerful. The idea is that a smaller barrel provides a higher ratio of surface area to spirit volume, i.e. more oak per gallon. This is cool, but not ground breaking. The other move is pretty outrageous. Apparently, Brian Lee, one of the men behind the spirit, is a sound guy. He devised a way to hyper infuse the spirit into the wood using sound waves. At night they crank up a subwoofer in the warehouse and vibrate the resting barrels. I think the result is undeniable.

Two Wine Enter, One Wine Leave.

Rueters had a funny piece about the rivalry between Napa and Sonoma as wine growing regions. I personally find it funny as the bulk of the world has no idea what they are talking about. I would think even most people in the US who claim to be wine drinkers would be a little hard pressed to sum up the differences between the two in a quick and succinct couple of sentences.

The reason I find this interesting is that I am starting to feel a little of the same rivalry in the cocktail world between New York and San Francisco. Like the wine industry, there are actually a very limited number of people who are really versed in both scenes, but plenty who think they are. As well, the two schools of cocktails are pretty different when you get in close and study them. In the end however, we are all just trying to make good drinks, just as the wine makers are just trying to make good juice. So what if we might have different ideas as to what that means.

New kid on the pretty fantastic.

The San Francisco World Spirit thingy just convened and there were a couple of cool aspects this year. Firstly, Absinthe....'nuff said. Secondly, a cachaca won best in show for white spirits. I was very surprised when I heard this a few days ago. Seeing as how I have anounced that we are in a gin boom, I kind of figured everyone else would go along with me. Weber Hauz has put their sandaled foot down however and done it a very smooth way. I was able to taste their white today and it blew me away (the pic above is an old bottle, the new package is great.

The nose is grassy and malty, kind of reminding me of a brewery. I can only think that that must be the yeast coming through. It is bottled kind of light at 38% so I will not sing the praises of it's smoothness yet, but I will talk about how clean it is....It is very clean. The 'funk' level is very low and there is a great grassiness on the finish.

I also tasted a 4 year aged in Brazilian oak and balsam. It was a little weird for me personally (kind of minty), but a very well made spirit for sure. I understand they just got their organic certification for process, not just the ingredients (pay attention Rain!). All in all, I am pretty impressed.

There are shipping direct at the moment, but should have distribution soon and I am predicting great things.

I dare you not to fall in love with Islay Whiskey after watching this.

Jonny Raglin, Walter Moore and myself had the pleasure of running around the warehouses at Bruichladdich with Mr. McEwan a few evevnings last summer.....Magic!

Two really cool hair cuts.

Lifted shamelessly from the Modesto Bee:



Looks like there is another American Gin coming to a cocktail glass near you, New Amerdam. It seems Gallo is getting in on the 'gin-boom" (yeah, I just made that up) we seem to be in. In the last 5 years we have seen Sarticious, No. 209, Aviation, Junipero (I am actually not sure when Anchor started selling this, but it was new to me 5 years ago), Blue Coat, North Shore, g'Vine, DH Krahn, Death's Door, Leeds, Dogfish Jin and Rehorst Milwaukee Gin come to market. Historically speaking, this has got to be some kind of record. If this happened every 5 years we'd be swimming in the stuff.

Man do I love Scotland!

Here is another beautiful bottle from the land of sheep and malt. Ola Dubh (think Oila-Doob) is a super dark-roasted malt stout called 'Old Engine Oil' that has been finished in ex-Highland Park barrels. The Expression I sampled was from a 12 year old barrel and it was great. It pours heavy, almost gloopy with a fairly intense nose of toast and caramel, but drinks effortlessly with a very restrained body. There are the faintest whispers of peat which may even be my imagination, but I honestly don't care.

We have been pairing it with sweets and cheese with much success and am hoping fervently that more comes to the US. The Brewer's website, http://www.harviestoun.com/, says that more bottles in the same line are in the works. I can't wait.

So we have playing around with Anchor Distilling's Genevieve recently. This beautiful bottle garners many questions from guests, a portion of which will inevitably order it with tonic. We pretty much think this is gross, so we needed a quick 'go-to' cocktail to twist it into.

The first one that worked out great was the French 75. We prefer this cocktail served in a flute (I just can't get my head around ice and wine in the same glass). The maltiness of the Genever shows very well when tempered by sparkling wine and seems much less aggressive with lemon.

The second came about when I had a guest order it in a Martini. The conversation was going very well till the guy exposed himself as a cocktail tourist by throwing the word 'dirty' at the tail end. I knew this wasn't going to be good, so I used the force and moved him on to an idea that had been forming as we talked. Genevieve sits kind of fatty on the tongue, so I wanted something to cut through that wasn't acid. Grappa was the answer. Equal parts Genever, Dry Vermouth and Grappa (I really don't think it matters what it is made of in this instance, sure they will be different, but certainly not better). Stirred and garnished with a generous zest of lemon, I call it the Resistance

The Wine Section of today's Chronicle is very, very cool.

http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2008/02/01/WI1NULE4G.DTL

A beautiful new toy.

I have recently discovered the joys of Atholl Brose thanks to my friends at JVS Distribution. This is a Scottish Whisky-based liqueur in the same vein as Drambuie. Atholl is more about the herbs and high notes than the honey syrup in Drambuie and is a great temper when stirred with younger, more brazen Whisk(e)y. I used a half ounce with some Peychoud's to tame a pour of Wasmund's Virginia Single Malt...lovely.

One rockin beer.

http://www.maredsous-usa.com/

Again, I don't want to get into reveiwing product here, but damn this is good beer.

I hit the relativey new bar, Monk's Kettle, with Dom and Kieran tonight and worshipped at the high alter of brew.

Great suds in a great place.

http://www.monkskettle.com/

The Rosle Bar Spoon.

This is, quite simply, the best bar spoon readily available in the US. Get one, then prove me wrong.

Yeah though I walk through the Valley of Rye.... (shamelessly lifted from Dan @ The Teardrop Lounge. Much love bud.)

So my friend and sometime fellow traveler H came in tonight and decided to have an aged Rye fro his night cap. He saw that I had two Black Maple Hill Ryes on the shelf and asked for the 23 year. I assumed he knew what he was about and poured him a healthy one. I could tell immediately that he had never had this one before. I personally don't like it much, the 18 year I dislike just a hair less. While they both are cut to 90 proof, they drink very hot and neither are what I would call particularly mellow. I don't want to get into tasting notes here as that is not the goal of this blog (there are plenty of other places to go for that sort of thing).

Rather, I want to give the opinion I have forming recently concerning Rye as it ages. I quite simply think that Rye should age no more than 10 years. It seems to me that the spirit is too aggressive on the barrel to go longer than that. This theory was shown to be true when I poured H a taste of the Russell's Reserve Rye from Wild Turkey. This comes in at a much younger (and affordable) 6 years and is significantly more drinkable than its older counterpart.

Now that being said, I remedied H's dram by stirring it into a quick Derby cocktail (added Benedictine and Peychoud's) which showed the Whiskey in a completely different light. The addition of the slightest bit of sugar and spice let all those years speak more clearly than they could when left alone with just their own fire. The only problem with this is that this bottle is way too expesive to be mixing drinks with. We give a great deal on it by letting it go at $18 a glass and that just is not right for a mixing bottle.

Conclusion: for sipping, keep it under 10 years, for cocktailing, go as old as you can afford.

VOTE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

http://www.bolsaroundtheworld.com/

(for me would be nice)

So this is what I call full circle.

In my quest to reproduce Abbott's bitters (the few times I had them have been quite special), I had also created an incense of sorts. The Almond wood chips that I charred and threw into the jar to simulate barrel-aging came out being super infused with all the spices used in the bitters (those are another story...when I get it locked down). After letting them air dry, they bled Abbott's aromas in my liquor vault for about 2 weeks. I wasn't quite sure what I was saving them for, but I know tossing them in the compost would have been wasteful.

Well along comes Miss Amy Brown, the Pastry Chef at Nopa, who did not hesitate one second when I offered them to her. What she did with them is simply genius. She set the Abbott's incense to steep in milk for a few hours, then used that milk to make ice cream. It's all there, lavender, vanilla, clove, anise, gentian and allspice lovingly carried by cream and sugar.

Upon the urging of a friend's bride, (we WILL meet one day Mardee) I set about to make a drink with the stuff. My answer to her confection? Well some friends of mine at the Alembic had been playing with a Manhattan float a year or so ago and I never saw it happen. I always liked that idea and saw this as the perfect chance. I mulled some tempranillo with cubeb peppers, cherry bark and mission honey (think jasmine and lavender if that makes sense) and hit this fifty/fifty with Russel's Reserve Rye (that makes it vermouth now, right?). I mixed 2 oz. of this syrup with 2 oz. of seltzer and plopped a scoop of Abbott's Ice Cream on top. I couldn't bring myself to put a cherry on it as it would have been just a little too cute, however, a tiny drizzle of Cherry Herring did not offend and looked great.

This was a one shot and won't appear on any menu...but damn, it sure is inspiration to get some more Abbott's going.

I am just home from a three day trip to Portland which was quite and eye opener. The food scene was tremendous and the drinks scene has high hopes and a great attitude. Also, while they are seriously hampered by Oregon being a control state (all liquor comes from the State and his hampered by arcane and senseless restrictions,) they do have the advantage of a growing group of independent distillers who are poised to make the region as well known for it's Spirits as it is for it's Beer and Wine.

First, the producers:
Clear Creek Distillers (http://clearcreekdistillery.com/index.php)
Was actually a little bit of let down, but their range of bottlings is superior. I was unable to score a tour as they only schedule them for the weekends (being an actual bartender...that ain't ever gonna work). The next best was the tasting room which is open to the public. I was hoping to get a bottle of McCarthy's Oregon Single Malt Whiskey which I have tasted but never really have been able to study. Alas, they we sold out. There are worse problems I guess.

House Spirits: (http://www.medoyeff.com/)
Christiaan was very generous with his time and his enthusiasm for cocktails as well as spirits is beautiful to see. When I rolled into the distillery, I was surprised to find that fellow Bay Areans (Areites, Areaitos, Areaistas ?) Martin Cate (http://www.forbiddenislandalameda.com/fi/) and bride were there as well and halfway into a sample of Medoyeff Vodka. More details will follow, but I will say this was one of the best parts of the trip.

I have been playing with my Sunshine bitters quite a bit recently so I though I would post the recipe since it is so simple.

Take a bottle .750 of a clean vodka. More expensive is not always better, I use Square One, but anything you wouldn't be afraid to drink is fine. Infuse a 2 ounce jigger full of Cardamon pods in the bottle for a full week. (a bit longer for a full liter bottle). Then add a single ounce jigger full of Saffron and infuse that for 2 days or until the threads look bleached. Strain and rebottle. While I developed this for a Sherry based cocktail, it seems to work very well with most clear spirit drinks.

I dont want to love it (hell, I don't even want to admit that it is alcohol), but....I do.

http://talesofcolt45.com/