It’s the holiday season, so we’re all thinking festively, right? We’ll be throwing or attending parties, and we have to think of gifts for friends and neighbors. A bottle often fits the bill perfectly, so many will be bought, given, and consumed in the coming month. For those who like the hard stuff—or have friends on their list who do—there are a number of new and exciting products made by talented distillers in the Hudson Valley. Any fan of spirits has extra reason to rejoice this winter.
The modern local spirit industry began with Ralph Erenzo and Brian Lee of Tuthilltown Spirits. Their pioneering efforts helped to pass the New York Farm Distillery Act in 2007, allowing farms to distill and sell alcohol on their properties. Tuthilltown quickly gained a reputation for high quality small-batch whiskies, especially their Manhattan Rye and Baby Bourbon. They also produce two apple vodkas (twice- and thrice-distilled), some seriously moonshiney corn whiskey, and rum—the only one of their line made with nonlocal ingredients (the molasses comes from Louisiana). Tuthilltown’s efforts are not cheap—about $40 gets you one of their trademark squat 375 ml bottles—but there’s no small amount of pleasure to be had in the drinking or gifting of them. And the heavy lifting that Erenzo and company have done has made it possible for a new crop of microdistillers to begin diversifying and expanding the region’s range.
The Mighty Catawba
Warwick Valley Winery and Distillery makes a wide variety of products; hard cider is their biggest seller, followed by wine. For the last five years or so, co-owners Jason Grizzanti and Jeremy Kidde have also been producing the American Fruits line of liqueurs and brandies. The sweet ones—liqueurs and cordials—are excellent choices for sipping with a dessert or mixing in cocktails. A standout is the Apple Liqueur, a blend of lightly fermented cider mixed with their apple brandy and aged in Bourbon barrels, which has the complexity of a good Port and matches well with desserts from fruit tarts to chocolate cake.
American Fruits also makes brandies, offering old-world standards like apple and pear eau de vie in addition to black currant brandy and Grappa made from a mixture of Baco Noir and Catawba grapes. Their eaux de vie are fine examples of the craft, with rich fruit aroma and a clean finish. The apple brandy is aged in American oak for two years, and a five-year-old batch is now ready; their ultimate goal is to release a blend each year with an average of five years of barrel age, including some aged in charred bourbon barrels to add more caramel notes and deeper color with an eye towards rivaling Calvados, the great apple brandy of France. The grappa is unique; the local hybrid grapes—especially the Catawba—possess the characteristically foxy aroma of native fruit that’s totally unlike the traditional Italian varieties.
Other noteworthy local black currant cordials (Cassis) are made by Ray Tousey—sweetened with honey instead of sugar—in Clermont, and Clinton Vineyards in Clinton Corners. Any of these liqueurs would make a splendid holiday aperitif when mixed with a local sparkling wine. Kidde from Warwick Valley suggests adding a bit of local honey, too, then the Cassis, then topping up the glass with bubbly to make for a beautifully increasing gradient of fruit and sweetness as the glass is emptied.
No Apple Left Behind
Golden Harvest Farms on Route 9 in Valatie looks like a thousand other roadside farm stands in New York. But behind the store, there’s a sign that reads “Distillery.” Inside, Derek Grout is producing 500 bottles a month of excellent vodka made entirely from apples grown right there on his family’s farm. Using a beautiful German still, he’s also making apple and pear brandies and an Apple Jack—brandy aged for a year in American oak—is out this month. All are bottled under the Harvest Spirits label. Grout’s Core brand of vodka is crystal clear, unctuously textured, and has an elegant trace of apple on the finish. It’s real sipping vodka, offering more pleasure by itself than many well-known luxury brands, and seems suited to experimental mixing with other high-quality local tipples rather than juices or anything that would mask its qualities. The brandies are good, though Grout admits that he’s still learning the ropes; the first batch was made with fermented juice, while the next will be made by fermenting crushed whole fruit for a much richer and subtler flavor. (Warwick’s are made with crushed whole fruit.)
Such a learning curve is understandable, though, given the short time that Harvest Spirits has existed. The enterprise, only a year old, is a collaboration between Grout and his business partner Tom Crowell, who approached him with the idea after hearing how many apples the farm discards every year. Grout speaks earnestly about developing a market for all of the fruit produced in the Hudson Valley, saying “We can make truly great products from the fruit we have, and it gives us complete control from tree to bottle. Some people think imported means higher quality, so our job is to change that.” He’s determined to find ways to use all the wasted fruit in the region, whether in juice, cider (still or hard), or spirits.
The Green Fairy is loose in Delaware County
Another exciting local spirit well worth trying is the Absinthe made by Cheryl Lins in the Delaware County town of Walton, under the Delaware Phoenix label. She’s been selling it for less than a year, but it’s garnering raves from aficionados all over the country. Lins buys pharmaceutical grade neutral spirit that she uses as a blank canvas on which to mix flavors, then dilutes it to about 130 proof. “All you taste is the herbs,” she says. She makes two versions: Walton Waters and Meadow of Love. The latter has violet in place of lemon thyme, and offers a rounder, more feminine flavor profile. Both are characteristically anise-y, and the powdery, gently bitter flavor of wormwood asserts itself on the finish. Other herbs, many locally sourced, embellish the flavor with subtle details.
Absinthe is traditionally drunk diluted with three to five parts cold water to one part absinthe (sugar is optional, but not recommended) which should be slowly dripped or poured in so that the louche—the elegant clouding as insoluble compounds react to the added water—can be enjoyed. Lins’ work is exceptional, and is best savored as intended, but this reviewer made an interesting martini using Core vodka and a few drops of Meadow of Love which suggests some other possibilities. There’s also Ernest Hemingway’s famous “Death in the Afternoon” cocktail, which he described in a celebrity cookbook in 1935: “Pour one jigger absinthe into a Champagne glass. Add iced Champagne until it attains the proper opalescent milkiness. Drink three to five of these slowly.”
Lins found her calling quite by accident; she read an article on the subject in early 2006 and “fell in love with the word; I needed to know what it was.” From there, she bought a small still and began making it as a hobby. In 2008 she got her federal distiller’s license, and in February of this year received her state permit. Currently she produces about 100 or so bottles a month, but expects to double that in the near future; among others, the trendy neo-speakeasies in New York City have responded very favorably to her work. Absinthe excites in part because it was illegal or quasi-legal for so long; as it stands now it is legal provided that the proportion of thujone—a compound found in wormwood—does not exceed a certain limit. Thujone was blamed for a myriad of mental and physical afflictions, but nearly all of these claims have now been shown to be spurious. And it is not hallucinogenic. Sorry. Also, any frat-house foolishness involving fire is to be avoided; that was a gimmick invented as a way of hiding the harsh flavor of inferior products from Eastern Europe.
Micro Miracle
A year ago, this article could not have been written; half of the producers were not yet up and running. Now we’re at the beginning of a full-blown renaissance of artisanal microdistilling in the Valley. Ken McGuire of In Good Taste Wine and Spirits in New Paltz is enthusiastic: “People are really clamoring for the stuff—they love the idea of local products of this caliber.” And even nondrinkers can be happy, since many of these fruit liquors make excellent additions to pâtés, sauces, or desserts. Therein lies the key to any locavore movement: When the quality is high enough, switching to a local brand is a move motivated by pleasure—the best motivator of all. And couldn’t we all use more pleasure this time of year?
RESOURCES
Clinton Vineyards www.clintonvineyards.com
Delaware Phoenix Distillery www.delawarephoenix.com
Harvest Spirits www.harvestspirits.com
Tuthilltown Spirits www.tuthilltown.com
Warwick Valley Winery www.wvwinery.com