Follow Sean Inman to the best in craft beer
Galway meets Belfast as the Micil Distillery and the music group KNEECAP have taken the Distillery’s award-winning Connemara poitín and then ages it in empty oak casks that are seasoned with Kneecap’s favourite monkish made tonic wine.
Each bottle is in a hand-stamped brown paper bag, that are numbered and wax-sealed, with a bespoke swing tag. And they sold out so, so quickly so will have to see if you can find at a bar in Galway.
There are all sorts of celebrity drinks and all sorts of actual involvement by the celebrity with the drinks associated with them. One of the few that is actually hands-on and interested in his brand is the comedian Jim Gaffigan whose Father Time Bourbon sells quite well.
Gaffigan now has a comedy special, novella sized that revolves all around Bourbon culture, called The Bourbon Set….
…you can catch it on YouTube HERE
Usually Umeshu a traditional Japanese liqueur is made with unripe ume plums and shochu or sake plus sugar.
Since Ume plums are related to apricots Ventura Spirits are putting a California twist by using unripe apricots to produce their version of the spirit.
Their distillery between the City of Ventura and Ojai is a great place for a weekend drinking escape and to get a bottle to take home.
We stay in Oregon for our second holiday seasonal but we switch over to cider and a rockin’ around the Christmas tree from 2 Towns Ciderhouse.
“Sled Zeppelin, a 6.9% ABV limited-edition cider. This seasonal headliner blends Pacific Northwest apples, Oregon cranberries, and a dash of cinnamon for a cider that takes your taste buds on a Stairway to Heaven.”
Cocktail recipes are great content for social media. It is photogenic, it is short and you get a cocktail at the end of filming. And I have found another account to follow, this time on the Instagram (if the kids are still using it), High Proof Preacher.
Personally, I am fond of the Old Fashioned riffs but there are plenty of little tutorials to watch to give you some Insta inspo.
Since they have moved on from Casamigos, founders George Clooney and Rande Gerber are eyeing the Non-Alcoholic beer space for their next business foray. And it could be coming as soon as March of next year and considering that Diageo bought the lower shelf tequila for a cool billion dollars they have the financial resources to make it happen.
But should they? I am not against celebrity beverage brands per se. As with any new brands, there are some just in it for the money and some who like the spirit or beer or just the history of tequila creation in Mexico or Bourbon in Kentucky.
My gut tells me this is just a where do we put this Diageo money move.
You can bury your head in the sand about Climate Change but it is a huge factor in agriculture including in ways that you wouldn’t even think of like making is England’s Scrumpy Cider so higher in ABV that it is taxed as a wine!
This is from a Rick Steves Facebook post: “England’s hottest summer on record has produced a bumper crop of unusually sweet apples — which, in turn, have bumped up the alcohol content of scrumpy (hard cider) from its typical 6-8% ABV to as high as 10.5% ABV. As a result, scrumpy is now classified as “wine,” meaning it’s taxed at a higher rate…and too expensive for producers to sell to pubs.”
Hops, barley and other grains are in the crosshairs of weather as well.
In this craft beer retrenchment some of the cooler, niche beer fun has gone by the wayside (hopefully temporarily). Things like beer floats and beer cocktails.
But I am here still banging the drum for both which is why I am adding this Instagram link HERE so you can see how a Beer Americano cocktail is made with bonus point that they pilsner used is from Santa Monica Brew Works.
Nova Brewing Co. makers of Sake here in L.A. has just released a “one cup” Sake named Laichi aka Lychee to combat the wave of seltzer-y sweet single serving Sakes that are out in the market and instead of put some real thought into both the liquid and the packaging with a “lid can partially fold open to be able to sip without pouring it to a glass for portability, but it can also be removed to be open-top.”
Then they “R&D’d to brew sake that goes well with the aroma/taste of lychee and we actually put a lychee fruit in the cup like umeshu for the sake to extract flavor and aroma from the fruit. No other sugar/flavoring/syrup was added. Just rice, koji, water, yeast and whole lychee fruit.”
And considering how little I get around to talking about Sake, it might tell you something about what I think about it.
If you have not been to a Benny Boy Brewing and Cider AppleFest, well, it is a true indicator of the Los Angeles fall season finally being, well, fall.
There is apple pressing, cider slushies and food vendors that will keep you sitting for hours.