Category: Spirits, Wine & Cider

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The Queen

Portuguese Bend Distilling recently released their new rums, Queens Passage Rums on February 21st.

According to the press release the “they are small batch dedications to the colonial style rums that fueled revolution and celebrated liberty in early American taverns. Our white and spiced rums are a great base spirits for traditional punches, grogs and innovative craft cocktails.”

Here is more about the (2) new rums:

Spiced rum – “Made with whole spices, no added chemicals, nothing artificial. Warm spice notes of cinnamon, allspice, vanilla and a hint of orange citrus.”

White rum – “A medium dry rum with hints of raw sugar and cane grass. Delicious base for a homemade daiquiri or Cuba Libré.”

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Pilot House Distilling

When in Astoria, I also made a side trip, well, not a long one since, it was across the street from Reach Break Brewing. Pilot House Distilling creates vodka, whiskey, canned cocktails and for me, gin. I had three different versions. A bar version which was my favorite as well as The Painted Lady and a Barrel-aged Painted Lady. The last two had a kick to them but they were very unique and shows how different gin can be.

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Bruery Erosion

Well it seems pretty natural for Patrick Rue of The Bruery to expand into the wine arena. And now they have with Erosion. They have done so many beer-wine hybrids, beers aged in wine barrels and the like. Tasting rooms in Napa and St. Helena and wine in cans too.

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Kampai!

At first this documentary, this was slow without much Sake information.  But then the journeys of the protagonists was revealed and it was really affected me. The writer from Cleveland is my analog, but the UK brewer has nuggets of wisdom, as did the family Sake House with the upstart son and the Fukushima tragedy really struck me. There was one section in Cornwall, where Parker was talking about each year being new that actually rang far more true than any New Years Resolution. And it was really fun to see a North Carolina sake brewery putting their own spin on the beverage.

There is some “how-to brew” segments but that is not the thrust of this movie so you will probably need to augment with some outside reading to catch a fuller idea of what is being done. That is what I am going to do after seeing this.

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Christmas Gin

We can’t let beer have all the seasonal fun, can we?

I don’t want to know beforehand what F&M adds to a gin amidst the other botanicals but this would certainly be a fun gin to taste and find out.

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IPA or Stout Jameson

I have been eyeing the Jamesons whiskies aged in casks formerly home to IPA and Stout but since I am not a big Whiskey person, the prospect of buying a full bottle without a sample first seemed like too big of a flyer.

But, I stumbled across little sample bottles and that was an easy purchase. Of the two, the Stout seemed to have more of a residual beer flavor to it. But if handed both blind, I would have had a really hard time picking which was which.

It is an uncanny valley thing. You know when something looks fake and tastes fake but the closer you get to the look and taste will leave people weirded out even more. I would have needed to get a citrus or pine hop note in the right quantity to have been happy and the same with the Stout, I really needed to have some Black Patent Malt note tucked inside.

For me, the Stout version seemed more on that road than the IPA version but not by a galloping head start for sure.

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Jackson Ranch

Cellador Ales is going fancy on Friday November 15th when they release two Jackson Ranch wild ale variants.  They are whiskey inspired beers as described by the brewery as, “one aged in a High West Double Rye Single Barrel and the other in a Knob Creek Cask strength Single Barrel.”

Cellador will be making cocktails with the beers that night and if you have had one of them before, you know it will be tasty and interesting.

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33 Jigger-Watts

As a gin appreciator with a tiny bit of experience, this recent brand extension from the 33 Books group is right up my alley because I really need to figure out which gins I like and why I don’t like others (looking at you St. George). Plus it will keep me thinking while drinking which will carry-over to beer as well.