by Jay Erisman, EQ Wine and Spirits Manager

First printed in our Fall 2007 Drinks magazine, this post recounts my trip to Mexico with our tobacconist Eric Brown in May of ‘07. I’ll post future articles on both the El Tequila of Carlos Camarena and the palenqueros of Oaxaca. But the short version is this: there is no more skilled or passionate Tequila producer than Carlos Camarena; and possibly the only Mexican spirits that surpass his El Tesoro Tequila are the single village mezcals of Del Maguey. Visit again next week for a look at our new favorite Tequila.

(more…)

by Jay Erisman, EQ Wine and Spirits Manager

The Party Source is not only one of America’s biggest and best liquor stores. We’re also one of the most patient. French Alpine elder trees only make so many flowers, and collecting the little buggers by bicycle is understandably time-consuming. So to those hordes of Greater Cincinnatians who requested St-Germain Elderflower Liqueur over the past 14 months, we shall attest your serenity in the face of a distinct lack of elderflower flavor. Now, the wait is over, and this shockingly good liqueur is available for your cocktails, your parties, your peace of mind. Someday, we will all remember where we were when we first tasted St-Germain.

From the heavy, cut glass Art Deco-inspired bottle to the carefully balanced drink within, St-Germain Elderflower Liqueur is a future classic among the world’s liqueurs. The elderflower notes are fresh as a bouquet on your wedding day, the aroma lifting effortlessly from the glass. In the mouth the liqueur is light yet intensely flavored; the sweetness is never cloying. And what St-Germain does in cocktails is unbelievable. It makes a superb match with everything from rye whiskey to Tequila to smoky Scotch. Gin and sparkling wine is a natural with St-Germain; our bartender here in the EQ jay Dickerson likes it with cachaça . It’s hard to make a bad cocktail with this stuff.

St-Germain Elderflower Liqueur  $35.99

The trend of aging spirits in former wine casks that has spread through the single malt Scotch industry, and even made inroads to Kentucky’s Bourbon, has now spread to Mexico. AsomBroso 100% agave Tequila has brought some unusual bottlings to the US market, including “La Rosa Reposado,” finished for three months in Bordeaux wine casks.

Actually, this is not the very first Mexican spirit I’ve seen aged in wine barrels; that distinction belongs to Del Maguey Single Village Mezcal, which has produced experimental and very limited releases of a Cabernet cask-aged Mezcal. But AsomBroso is surely the first Tequila to do so, and the first widely available such spirit.

The color alone is stunning, almost like a pale rosé wine. The wine cask is very present in the nose, offering vanilla-toasty oak and bright red berry fruit—a totally new thing in Tequila—but there’s also plenty of earthy agave aromatics that balance the wine barrel. The cask is much subtler in the mouth, which is dry and dominated by quite zesty agave. The vanilla oak comes whispering back at the very end, a teasing conclusion to an innovative Mexican spirit. Hopefully this is just the tip of the piña in terms of innovation from the Tequila industry, which offers plenty of wacky looking packages (and the AsomBroso package is hardly low key) every month but not so many truly new ideas in top quality Tequila.

AsomBroso La Rosa Reposado 100% Agave Tequila

$51.29