A couple of months ago Camper English wrote a piece for Imbibe about modern day moonshiners. I found out on Sunday that some may be coming my way. Last night a plastic Barton’s vodka bottle showed up. Thankfully, it held something far cooler than vodka.

It was distilled in a custom made copper and silver(!) still from a 100% corn mash and weighed in at 131 proof. I generally make it a point to taste everything neat first, looking for the perception of heat. I’ve tasted cask strength whiskeys that drink with far less heat than some 80 proof whiskeys. So, at 131 proof it had the highest alcohol content of anything I’ve tasted. (Except that time Charles made that tincture with grain alcohol and we tasted it. I was going to cut it with a little water, but he didn’t and I didn’t want to look like a little girl. I should have looked like a little girl.) For all the alcohol in there, it didn’t burn on the nose. Even my wife, who doesn’t have the acquaintance I do with high test booze, agreed. There were definitely the aromas of alcohol, but none of the fire. There was a nice, rounded sweetness that I’ve noticed in other white dogs.

It was when I went to taste it that the proof made itself known. I had to close my eyes against the sting. On the palate, though, not a huge burn. Certainly not enough for this kind of booze. There were, not entirely unpleasant notes, of dirt and slate.

Cutting it with about an equal measure of water rounded out the nose, at which point it reminded me of a grappa without the juvenile delinquent attitude. The dirt and slate were still there, but there was also a distinct apple note.

With a little time in wood, this could be a passable whiskey. It’ll certainly be better the the bottles of rotgut that wind up on the bottom shelf of the liquor store.

They’ll be starting the next batch soon and maybe even tackling a peach brandy. In the meantime, they’re looking over their shoulders, waiting for the revenuers.

“He has equal parts passion and whisky running through his veins,” with only a slight smirk and undeniable reverence, U.S. Glenfiddich ambassador Freddy May said introducing us to the guest of honor.

Mr. Ian Miller, Master Distiller and Global Glenfiddich Ambassador, took the floor at Branch 27 on Monday evening. The night was to be an “insiders look” at Glenfiddich 15yr Solera, with the unique opportunity to try each of its components unblended and at cask strength.

The room was filled with a select group of industry celebs and scotch lovers- including the venerable Mike Miller of Delilah’s and Bottom Lounge and Bret Pontoni, buyer for Illinois spirit juggernaut, Binny’s Beverage Depot. A light atmosphere, pointed with sarcastic jabs, one-liners, singing, and cheers of “up yours” didn’t detract from the subject at hand- artisanal, finely balanced whisky.

The Spirit
The process behind this particular whisky is definitely worth getting into. The finished product is a combination of three individually aged spirits that are then blended and barreled using the “solera” method (more on that later).
The three parts are:
1) Whisky aged in used American oak casks for 15 years at about 111°. These will be reused 2-3 times before being repurposed.
2) Whisky finished in new, toasted American oak casks at about 120.2°.
3) Whiskey aged in used, Spanish sherry casks for 15 years.

These three spirits are then combined in a solera vat (the exact blend is a proprietary secret. It’s one of those “if they told you, they’d have to kill you” kind of things) that holds 5 ½ to 6 thousands gallons of delicious single malt. At no time is more than ½ of this vat drawn off for bottling, leaving a large portion for newly matured barrels to be added. This brings us to the solera method.

Solera in Short: Trickle down blending
The “solera” style of aging is most closely associated with sherry, but can also be found throughout the spirit and food world in brandy, wine, vinegars and more.
In a word, this method of aging and blending is used for one reason: consistency.
Although the Scotch industry is not bound by the strict laws enforced by the sherry industry when it comes to solera, the idea is the same.

The bottom layer, or the solera, contains a blend of the oldest spirits. It is from these barrels that the whisky is drawn off (never more than half in this case) and sent off for bottling. The empty portion of the barrel is filled with the next oldest spirit and so on, all the way to the top, with the youngest barrels receiving new distillate. The result is a recipe for an incredibly consistent product with an average age considerably older than the 15 year minimum for this Scotch.

In The End
It was incredibly interesting to taste through each portion of the blend- sherry cask, new American oak, and used oak- as there was no polite place to spit, I wasn’t rude, I drank my drink.

As fate would have it, work called an early end to my evening with the gents from Glenfiddich. Judging by the company at the event, I trust my Chicago brethren continued to show them a warm, Midwest welcome. If anything is right in the world, they needed a pinch of hair of the dog in the morning.

Tasting Notes:
I couldn’t get over the honey finish in this whisky. It lacked the more aggressive, spirited finale of the 12yr label. This makes for a nice “session” sipper and should find the American drinkers palate quite well.

Other notes include a bouquet of spices, pepper, bitter citrus peel, hints of sulfur aroma at times, and mocha highlights.

Here’s what the Beverage Tasting Institute says.

Cost: 35.99-44.99$

Official Glenfiddich Website

Welcome to Angel’s Share Mixology! You’re joining us at a very exciting and busy time, as we launch both our beverage program consulting company and blog. Both sites will be evolving resources, so check back often for the latest news, recipes, and updates. You can follow us here, at angels-mixology.com, on facebook and twitter. With frequent travels, lots of experimentation, and constantly trying to expand our knowledge, we hope to offer relevant, interesting insight in to all the happenings in the beverage and hospitality industry.

So does the world need another cocktail consultant and spirits blog??? Well, Tim and I think it does and hope you agree with us. We have been working behind the stick at the Drawing Room together for a bit over a year (with 25+ years in the industry between us). Although we express our craft in different styles, we share a common end goal: to create unique, balanced cocktails and provide a comfortable, welcoming atmosphere that invites our guests to feel at home and raises the expectation of what a cocktail can be. We seek to welcome folks into the world of fresh ingredient, hand crafted cocktails by education rather than intimidation. We are in the midst of a cocktail renaissance launched and being nurtured by a generation of extraordinarily dedicated service industry professionals (there are too many great names to list, we’ll have links to other great blogs and websites ASAP) , I couldn’t be more proud to have been exposed to the movement over the past several years. Tim and I are looking to do our part to spread the word and share what we have learned with the public, bartenders, venue operators, and spirit companies. We hope to play a part in the growth of this movement and help quality drinks be an expectation not the exception.

Thanks stopping by and please check back soon! If there’s a topic you’d like to hear about, don’t hesitate to shoot us a note. If you’re in Chicago, let us know, we’ll have a glass chilling for you.

All the Best,

Tim & Charles

Last summer my wife and I spent way too much money at the farmers’ market and went on a canning bender. We started with rhubarb ginger jam and ended the extended lost weekend until we got to orange marmalade in December. One early weekend, after putting down a couple dozen jars of apricot jam and having plenty left over, I brought a couple of quarts into the bar and started mixing.

All of a sudden, every time I turned around someone else was throwing jam into cocktails. It became part of the zeitgeist in Chicago mixology circles.

Using jams in cocktails is hardly anything new. In his 1862 book, How to Mix Drinks, Jerry Thomas says to add a tablespoon of guava jelly to each glass of Brandy Punch to make a Barbadoes (sic) Punch. According to a New York Times article, the current trend was launched by Salvatore Calabrese in London nine years ago.

Trying to work seasonally in the Midwest is difficult. The only things we can really get in the winter are root vegetables. When spring rolls around we finally get ramps. And bitter greens. And stinging nettles. Nothing I’m really jumping up and down to work with behind the bar until rhubarb finally comes around. Jams, jellies and marmalades are a great way to adhere to the seasonality manifesto for those dark five months. They’re nothing to ignore the rest of the year, either.

Note: These recipes were developed with our homemade jams. You may need to adjust for sweetness or acidity depending on the brand you use.

La Manzana
1.5 oz. reposado tequila
.75 oz. lemon juice
.25 oz. simple syrup
4 barspoons apple butter
4 dashes Fee Bros. Old Fashioned bitters
tools: shaker, strainer
glass: double old fashioned
garnish: flamed orange peel

Combine all ingredients in a shaker with ice and shake. Strain over ice and garnish.

Kaleidoscope Eyes

This recipe was developed for a contest sponsored by an absinthe company. The rules required using at least an ounce of absinthe (at 136 proof) while keeping the overall alcohol content in check. Generally we’ll only use a quarter ounce of absinthe in a cocktail. A half ounce is really pushing it. A flip, a cocktail using a whole egg, seemed like the best way to go to deal with the intense flavors of the absinthe, while the sherry helps keep the proof down.

2 teaspoons orange marmalade
1.5 tsp powdered sugar
1 whole egg
.5 oz. lemon
1 oz. manzanilla sherry
1.25 oz. absinthe
tools: shaker, strainer
glass: cocktail
garnish: grated cardamom, orange zest and orange peel rosette

Combine all ingredients in a shaker without ice. Shake for 15-20 seconds. Add ice and shake vigorously. Strain into chilled cocktail glass and garnish.