In Spring of 2021 while we were bottling our Rosé for Cure wine we decided to leave a small percent of the wine unbottled in order to produce a vermouth.
We figured that our Rosé base that is by default very aromatic with a lot of peach and stone fruit flavors would pair well with our Baton Brandy and other botanicals to make sweet vermouth.
Over the next six months, we did a few small trials with botanicals including the classic wormwood, various citrus, and barks to some of our favorites like figs, vanilla, cherry, and came with a recipe that we thought was the best and would complement our existing Baton Brandy for cocktails like a Manhattan which is one of our favorite cocktails.
Once we locked on a recipe, we scaled up production by infusing our first 40 gallons, utilizing a classic cold extraction method, the entire mix infused with wine, our aged brandy and botanicals for over 4 months.
At the end of those 4 months we added Washington wildflower honey to make the vermouth more of a classic sweet style but without the overly sweet combinations that you see for other commerical products.
The result was a clean and delicious vermouth that can really stand on its own.
The winning recipe was a combination of following botanicals:
- Figs
- Wormwood
- Cocoa nibs
- Vanilla
- Cinnamon
- Wild cherry bark
- And sweetened with Washington wildflower honey
Try our vermouth over ice, with an orange slice or top it off with some good quality club soda or tonic.
