However, I did make an exception for the local liqueur distillery. When I went to their liqueur tasting panel in May, I had so much fun that I put my information on their mailing list to ensure that I would be invited to future liqueur tasting panels. I had pretty much forgotten about having done that until I saw a Facebook event for an industry-only tasting panel in early October. That got me excited about the possibility of a tasting panel for the general public. And, wouldn’t you know, la few days later, I received an email with an invitation to another tasting panel. It took me a couple days to RSVP to Hilary, the Lady of the Lair; I felt bad about going out on a night that I should be working out with my trainer. But then I realized that there were three other nights that week that I could meet him, so it would be okay to give myself a night out.
Since I had already been to one of the distillery’s tasting panels, I kind of knew what to expect. The back room was crowded with folding tables and chairs. On each table was three water bottles and a dump cup. At each place was a tasting sheet, tiny tasting cups, and a drinking glass. Of course, we were reassured that the plastic was all compostable material.
For me, the tasting sheet was the main attraction because that outlined all the liqueurs that we would be sampling that evening. Much to my delight, the Spirited Tea category was supplemented by two other categories - Wild Botanics and Wild Moon. All the liqueur flavors in the Spirited Tea category looked familiar; however, horseradish, which was a bonus tasting at the May panel, was the only familiar flavor in the rest of the categories. There would be seven flavors in both the Spirited Tea category and the Wild Botanics category, but only three flavors in the Wild Moon category.
Lelaneia, the company founder, ran the tasting session. She was super energetic, very enthusiastic, and quite knowledgeable. She put the mission of the tasting panel into focus: this was the finale so we would be tasting the best of the best. Our input would be used to determine what the company would be launching in the springtime. Lelaneia also gave us a primer on how to taste the liqueurs: we should take one sip to get ready to taste and then take a second sip to actually get the taste.
The tea panel kicked off after the short introduction by Lelaneia. I was surprised to learn that this first panel would involve two tastings at a time: the straight tea liqueur and a “grab and go” version. Once we started tasting, Lelaneia explained that the alcohol brings out more flavor from the tea leaves than hot water; therefore, the liqueur flavor may be stronger than we might expect or be accustomed to. All grab and go versions would start as liqueurs, but not all liqueurs would need to become grab and gos. Each tea liqueur started off around 35 proof, then was mixed with a complementarily flavored liqueur, and then was diluted down to around 26 proof so that the grab and go can could survive without refrigeration. The beverages in the cans would be lightly carbonated to enhance the flavor, although the versions that we would be tasting that evening would be flat. Lelaneia got very excited when she talked about her concept for the cans’ artwork; she planned them to be pure white with artistic drawings of the tea leaves and the fruit. Her desire was to launch the top four flavors as grab and go cans in the springtime.
The rooibos tea liqueur, which is an herbal tea made from a South African bush, was the hands down favorite of the table. It was very smooth, and had a very pleasant distinctive taste. The earl grey was my second favorite tea liqueur, even though it still lacked the strong bergamot flavor and scent that makes earl grey tea so unique. I had noted the same issue with the earl grey tea liqueur in May, so I was disappointed that they hadn’t found a way to make the bergamot more prevalent. Ranking third in my book was the chamomile tea liqueur, which was very mild but also had a distinctive taste to it. After that was the shu mee white tea liqueur, which Lelaneia explained was made from the same tea plant, but with the baby buds. It was a very gentle liqueur, which I could see mixing easily into vodka or gin and citrus juices. My fifth choice was the Assam tea liqueur, which is a black tea that is the singular tea of India. That liqueur was super strong, but fortunately not bitter. The genmaicha tea liqueur was my fifth choice. Genmaicha is a poor man’s Chinese tea, made from the dregs of better teas and mixed with toasted rice. The liqueur was also quite mild, but something about it made me feel like I wouldn’t want to drink it straight. And I couldn’t think of anything to mix it with. Coming in last was the yerba mate tea liqueur; yerba mate is an herbal tea from South America with no caffeine in it. Something about the yerba mate liqueur was quite off putting, but I just couldn’t put my finger on it.
Everyone at the table had differing opinions about the grab and gos. We were all in favor of the concept, as some of the combinations really made the base tea liqueur much more drinkable. My favorite was the early grey, which was complemented by orange and lemon liqueurs. Other people at the table thought that there was too much citrus for the liqueur to handle. My second favorite was the rooibos, which was complemented by a hibiscus liqueur, which was extremely complimentary and balanced out the distinctive taste of the rooibos tea liqueur. Surprisingly, my third choice was the yerba mate with honey liqueur. While that grab and go mixture was very pleasant, it still had an odd taste to it that I couldn’t quite identify. Chamomile and grapefruit was my fourth favorite, although the combination wasn’t really all that earth shattering. The shu mee white white tea liqueur with blueberry liqueur was my next choice. Lelaneia was very excited about this combination, as it was a natural and obvious choice for her. However, the blueberry liqueur tasted like a citrus to me. The addition of the Wild Moon lavender liqueur to the Assam tea liqueur wasn’t really a winner for me. Even though I could taste the lavender liqueur in the mix, it wasn’t necessarily complimentary. Finally, the genmaicha and lemon was my least favorite of the grab and gos. It just wasn’t all that exciting to me, and I could taste the notes of toasted rice, which wasn’t necessarily pleasant.
The Botanical Liqueurs
Wild Botanics is intended to be the sister line to Wild Moon, which was designed as a commercial line with approachable flavors designed for the homeowner to make excellent cocktails. Wild Botanics is planned to be the weird stuff, which the consumer needs more than another watermelon pucker. Lelaneia’s hope is to launch three of the seven flavors being tested in the Wild Botanics line in the spring. These would be in the same shape bottle as the Wild Moon liqueurs, but with green-brown shaped label featuring a crescent moon and lotus flower.
I really liked six out of the seven flavors. The roasted dandelion root liqueur was so absolutely vile that I couldn’t take a second sip of it. It smelled like horseradish, but tasted like something burnt and bitter. I dumped what I had and double rinsed my tasting cup so that it wouldn’t contaminate the next tasting, which was horseradish. We had tasted horseradish as our bonus flavor at the May tasting panel; it was very good then and perhaps even better now! It was the perfect balance of spicy and sweet, and would be perfect in a Bloody Mary instead of a jalapeño vodka. As good as the horseradish was, it was only ranked number two on my list. Number one was a very approachable five lemons liqueur, which used lemon juice, lemon zest, lemon verbena, lemongrass, and Meyer lemon. It was much more interesting than a straight limoncello liqueur, much more similar to my Buddhacello, which sometimes also contains ginger. As much as Lelaneia wanted to launch strange stuff, the five lemons was the number one vote of the table as well. My third choice was one of the weird flavors: sumac. It tasted like citrus and was as bright orange as the native Connecticut sumac berries it was made from. According to Lelaneia, my favorite Mediterranean restaurant west of the Capitol was begging for her to bring sumac liqueur to market - with exclusive rights. Of course, they do such interesting cocktails that I could see them making liberal use of it on their specialty cocktail menu. Fresh sage was my fourth choice. We actually tasted liqueurs from fresh sage and dried sage, and were asked to rate only the one we like better. Both definitely smelled like Thanksgiving, but all of us at the table preferred the fresh sage over the dried sage. To me, the dried sage had an odd bitter pine taste to it. At first, I could not think of any uses for sage liqueur; then I remembered that certain gins can be very herbal, so the sage liqueur may make a fantastic gin and tonic. Although the thyme liqueur smelled distinctly like the thyme herb, I preferred the fresh sage. And since Lelaneia said that they would only include one herbal liqueur in their Wild Botanics line, I had to rank the thyme after the sage.
The Specialty Liqueurs
According to Lelaneia, the Wild Moon Liqueurs aren’t the priority to launch, so the new choices might not come to market for quite some time while she focuses the company’s energies on the success of the two new lines. The Wild Moon product line was carefully launched - one citrus, one floral, one herbal, one spice, one berry, one vegetable, and one tree - so that there is only room for a few select additions. For example, the line lacks a nut, a stone fruit, a tropical, and a seasonal. For the nut, they had succeeded with an almond liqueur that would be included in the panel that evening. For the stone fruit, they were working on a plum that might be included in the next tasting panel. Unfortunately, Lelaneia said that they had to give up on the peach because they couldn’t find the sweet spot between flavor and proof. They needed a lot of alcohol to extract the peach flavor, but then the liqueur ended up having a strong alcoholic bite to it. The plan is to include a seasonal pumpkin in the next tasting panel. Curiously, they had to create and taste fourteen different pumpkin liqueurs before they decided that Pumpkin Eight was the winner.
The three Wild Moon flavors that we tasted were almond, grapefruit, and cherry. Overall the room voted the grapefruit liqueur as the best of the Wild Moon liqueurs, which was the straight grapefruit liqueur that was mixed with the chamomile tea liqueur to create the grab and go version. I thought that the straight grapefruit was quite good, but that it had much more sweetness to it than the hallmark grapefruit bitterness. Personally, I preferred the cherry liqueur because of its taste and its versatility. It would definitely be better over ice cream and in prosecco than the grapefruit! It was made from fresh organic cherries with the pits in them; however, there wasn’t the slight bitter almond flavor that cherry pits are known to impart. Although Lelaneia had said that they had been working on the almond liqueur for a long time, it had almost no almond aroma. I liked that it had a strong distinct almond flavor, but I didn’t like that it had an alcoholic finish to it. However, I thought that alcoholic finish might disappear if it were mixed - perhaps with some citrus to make a sour.
The Verdict
Yet again, I had an excellent time at the liqueur tasting panel. Hilary, Claire, and Lelaneia were all fantastic. And my table was so lively and hilarious. It was definitely worth leaving the office early and slogging through Capitol traffic to get there in time.
I sincerely hope that the distillery does a blowout launch party in the springtime, perhaps with some of the bartenders from my favorite bar in my town. That would be much cooler than quietly bringing the products to market in liquor stores and local bars. And of course, I would love to be on that guest list!
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