Helping Hands

When all our friends in the bars and restaurants were forced to close their doors, we thought we were likewise doomed. After three years of being in business, we were on track to finally turn a profit this year. Our products are in retail outlets, sure, but we have focused so much of our efforts on getting all these amazing bartenders to invent new cocktails using our liqueurs and absinthe in their cocktail bars. With all of them out of work, we were out of luck, too.

Then the FDA and the TTB got together and put out the call to distilleries. Hand sanitizer has never been in such high demand, and as distilled spirits permit holders, we are in a unique position to fill in the gap. They made it easier (not easy, but easier) to get registered as an Over the Counter (OTC) drug manufacturer, as long as we adhered to certain guidelines of production and distribution.

That notice went out one day, and the next day we were in Restaurant Depot, seeing how little hand sanitizer there was available for the many food services that were still holding on. If it was that bad for restaurants, then everybody must be hurting. We realized that we not only could, but we really *should* get it together to make the stuff. The World Health Organization’s recommended formula called for the same kind of alcohol that we use as the base for our liqueurs, essentially a high proof vodka. Skip the fancy herbs and juices, and we were most of the way there.

Of course you run into problems, rolling out a product in just five days. We can’t get the kind of pump top bottles that people are used to, so we had do deal with what we could get: plain ol’ milk jugs. The first round of labels were thermal paper stickers that we usually would use for printing shipping labels. Luckily our designer was able to improve upon those significantly, and the next round of bottles that leave the warehouse will do so with her signature style.

To date, we’ve delivered over three tons of product to businesses, clinics, long-term care facilities, hospitals, construction companies, and individuals throughout Central Texas. Thanks to our partnership with Bubb’s Seltzer, we have reached even more people than we thought possible.Sometimes we don’t know who we are delivering to, and it we find out that we helped keep a clinic or a restaurant open.

It heartens us to know that the sanitizer we made is helping people on the front lines of essential care and services. As many orders as we have been processing, we’ve even been able to contract a couple of out-of-work bartenders to help us do deliveries. It’s not much, but it’s something.We feel privileged and obligated to share our good news in these pandemic days. For many of us, it’s not just our jobs but our loved ones we have lost to this terrible pandemic.

Our hearts go out to you all as we navigate these troubled waters. We look forward to having a delicious cocktail together when we can. In the meantime, we’ll be furiously bottling and delivering hand sanitizer as long as the community is in need. If you or someone you know can’t find hand sanitizer, or if you want to send some to a worthy cause, send us a message.Stay healthy, ya filthy animals.

Flor de Muertos

Austin bartenders and a gathering of festive onlookers convened Monday October 28th at Bar 508 to make cocktails before a panel of judges in the spirit of the Dia de los Muertos holiday.

Eva Fleming (June’s All Day), Sam Abdelfattah (Midnight Cowboy), Holly Coleman (The Tigress), Kelsey Caudebec (The Tigress) and Drew Jerdan (Midnight Cowboy) each presented their cocktails to our esteemed judges for evaluation. Kirstyn “Kiki” Lytchfield (Owner, Austin Shaker), Marisela Godinez (Chef Owner, El Meson), and Leslie Cobos (Spirits Educator) scored each drink carefully.

In the end it was Drew Jerdan’s cocktail “Midnight’s Children” that took the title. Proceeds from the event and from the sale of the winning cocktail at Bar 508 for the duration of the cocktail feature will go to support the Lone Star Victims Advocacy Project.

Stay Marigold

As a songwriter, Jessica Leigh Graves has always appreciated that art created in collaboration can reach levels that an individual doesn’t always reach on their own. Songwriting and intoxicology have a lot in common, it turns out. Flair and creativity, drama and entertainment, the creation of a singular experience by the performer for the audience, writing a song and playing it for an audience, creating a cocktail and mixing it for a bar patron. It’s a very similar dance.

When one of the team members at Midnight Cowboy, Ryan Ehrlichman, contacted us asking if we’d be interested in creating an amaro, we were all about it. He knew he didn’t want it to be red or brown like so many other amari, so he suggested marigold and turmeric for the color, and from there he and Mancuso and Jessica Leigh went back and forth with different herbs and spices in different blends. adjusting and correcting and dialing it in over time.

The final product is Midnight Marigold Bitter Cordial, released April 2019. Bright floral and honeyed citrus on the nose, this boldly bitter and softly sweet liqueur delivers a gentle herbaceous bite of spice with savory coriander and caraway, soft earthy turmeric and subtle marigold flower with a candied ginger and rye bread finish. It can be found not only in drinks made at Midnight Cowboy, but wherever you find Violet Crown Spirits. Ask for it at your local bottle shop or watering hole.

Respect your Elders

Elderflowers grow wild all over Europe and the Americas. When Harry married Megan, the royal wedding cake was lemon and elderflower. In Englad you’ll also find that the big clusters of small flowers are plucked by their stems, dipped and fried for elderflower fritters. Though some elderflowers are pink, mostly they’re white blossoms, a lack of color which scarcely belie the bodacious, juicy, tropical flavors that the flowers impart. By contrast, the berries of the elderflower plant are packed with color, but barely any flavor at all. In fact, the 3% elderberry juice that goes into our Elderflower Liqueur doesn’t change the taste one iota. Believe us, we extensively blind tasted it with and without. Honey yellow or bright magenta, it tastes exactly the same. And who doesn’t love a pink drink?

Jazzing It Up

That’s right, folks. We have officially released product number two. It’s a blend of green and black jasmine teas with a hint of orange for the citrus note, with only 20% grain neutral spirit and 20% cane sugar. We are quite proud of this product, and it’s already making its way onto shelves in retail and cocktail spots throughout Texas. Our pals down at the CU29 Cocktail Bar had it on their featured menu for South By Southwest, even.

It pairs well with your favorite spirit, or sips just as smoothly all on its own. You can use it instead of simple syrup for a more floral, less sweet version of your favorite cocktail. We like it with something smoky, like mezcal or Scotch.  Any way you have it, you’re going to #jazzitup.

Hepcat Highball

• 1.5 oz Scotch
• 1.5 oz Jasmine Liqueur
• Ice
• Soda or Topo Chico

Pour your favorite Scotch and an equal measure of Jasmine Liqueur over ice into a highball glass, top with soda water (our favorite is Topo Chico), and give it a quick stir, then enjoy. I call it the “Hepcat Highball” because when I #jazzitup with something smoky, I think of the Elephant Room, a basement level jazz club on South Congress Ave. in my hometown of Austin. When I first started listening to the great bands playing jazz there, it was still legal to smoke in bars, and upon entering you descended the stairs into a thick haze. It will always be in my mind as the quintessential smoky jazz club, even though the air down there is much more breathable these days.

Cheers! –Jessica Leigh

Freiburg Absinthe Fest

Saturday, April 29th, 2018, the little neighborhood deli just off the train station in Freiburg, Germany had its tables rearranged and draped in green tablecloths. Over the course of seven hours, hundreds of people walked through and tasted absinthes made in Switzerland, France, Germany, and Texas.

Most of the presentations were delivered in German, but they tolerated English to hear about these Texas upstarts making absinthe. Perhaps the most compelling part of the presentation was the part with the single botanical distillates.

We made new friends and fans, and are honored to have been included in the festivities. Here’s to this year and next.

Whoa, man

Get this delectable drink’s recipe and get the scoop on our co-owner / brand evangelist Jessica Leigh Graves in her interview for Austin Woman Magazine.

All our absinthe’s made in Texas

For those of you unfamiliar with “the front page of the internet,” Reddit is a user driven website full of interest based communities. Among those community interests is absinthe. Our distiller, Matthew Mancuso, went on down to the absinthe subreddit and did an AMA–ask me anything. You can read all the questions he got from the community, and all of his answers, by visiting the archived post here.