Review: Virtue Cider Michigan Harvest
Virtue Cider’s Michigan Harvest is an entry-level cider, “made from all sorts of Michigan-grown apples, fermented deep in our cool cellar and aged in French oak, then blended with this year’s fresh-pressed juice.” (The similar-sounding Michigan Apple, not reviewed here, is also a semi-dry cider but is made from different types of apples.) The cider is…
Review: Papa’s Pilar Dark Rum Sherry Finish
Papa’s Pilar is out with a limited release of 8400 bottles of a new expression of its sourced rum. It all starts with a custom version of Papa’s Pilar Dark Rum: The team of Master Blenders created this special edition expression of custom barreled Papa’s Pilar Dark, with seven different hand-selected rums up to 25 years old, which are both pot…
Review: Drake’s Dark Wing IPA
This latest from Drake’s is an IPA without comparison. A black IPA made with 2-Row Pale Malt, Crystal Malt, and Black Malt, and Denali, Cascade, and Warrior hops, it’s an immediately weird experience. Chewy, burnt toast/overdone pretzel notes up front lead the way to a kind of gravelly, yet intensely bitter body. The finish evokes chewed-up asparagus…
Review: Redwood Empire American Whiskey
Graton Distillery Company, the Sonoma, California-based company behind D. George Benham’s Sonoma Dry Gin, has launched its first whiskey. Redwood Empire is a “proprietary blend of house-distilled and Port barrel-rested rye whiskeys [that] includes mature stocks of four, five and eleven-year-old bourbon aged in classic, high-toast American oak casks.” Functionally, this is a blend of microdistilled rye…
Review: 2015 Kaiken Ultra Malbec Mendoza Las Rocas
Initially overpowering with that unmistakable malbec funk — tobacco, graphite, leather, tar, and a fistful of dried spices — but Kaiken settles down quickly enough into a groove that showcases a richly fruity core, layers of blackberry and baking spice adding more body and nuance that cuts through the otherwise massive amount of tannins, revealing…
Review: Avua Cachaca – Jequitiba Rosa and Still Strength
Brazil’s bustling cachaca brand, Avua, is back with two new expressions, further expanding its lineup. Details on each follow in the commentary for each option. Both remain distilled from local sugarcane Avua Cachaca Jequitiba Rosa – Another native wood expression from Avua, this one is aged in barrels made from Jequitiba Rosa wood, a common tree…
Review: Greenbar Fruitlab Orange Liqueur
From Greenbar Distilling, the L.A.-based makers of one of our favorite new amaros, Grand Poppy, comes Fruitlab Orange Liqueur, a sweet and juicy concoction meant to compete with your rack bottle of $6 triple sec. (This appears to be a rebranding and perhaps an update of Citry, which was made when the company was known…
Winter Cocktails for 2018
What, you haven’t sworn off drinking as a New Year’s resolution? We still swear that when the weather is dreary outside, there is nothing better to warm you than a nice winter cocktail (and perhaps a big bowl of chili — our favorite recipe follows). Enjoy these cocktails as you dream of spring! Winter Rose…
