Review: Santo Fino Reposado Tequila
Santo Fino Reposado Tequila was released March 2021. It was crafted by Sammy Hagar, Guy Fieri, and Juan Eduardo Nunez, the Master Distiller at El Viejito. Years ago Sammy worked with Juan in creating the Cabo Wabo brand. Sammy later sold Cabo Wabo to Campari for $80 million. Santo Reposado starts with the Santo Blanco Tequila base made from 100% Weber Blue Agave grown in the Highland region. Once hand selected and trimmed the agave is steamed in traditional stone ovens for 17 hours. The agave pinas rest for 4 hours and are then steamed for another 12 hours. The extracted juice is fermented for 4 days and double distilled in copper stills. The tequila then rests for 4-5 months in lightly charred used American oak bourbon barrels. Read more 
Review: R6 Blue Corn Vodka
R6 Blue Corn Vodka is made from a blend of 100% organic California Blue and Yellow corn mash. It is distilled 20 times in a German Kothe still and reduced to proof with reverse osmosis water and carbon filtered prior to bottling. The R6 Distillery was founded by their Head Distiller Rob Rubens. Rob fell in love with the art of distilling after an unplanned visit to a New Orleans Rum Distillery. He currently also crafts bourbon, whiskey, rye, and caramel flavored whiskey. Read more
Review: Truly Tropical With Real Fruit Juice Mix Pack
The Truly Tropical mix pack is now made with real fruit juice. While real fruit juice always tastes better than natural flavors, real fruit in hard seltzer often translates to an over sweet hard seltzer. So while I’m excited Truly has added real fruit juice to their line of hard seltzers, tasting, like seeing, is believing. Truly is made with filtered water, alcohol from cane sugar, natural flavors, and flavor specific fruit juice from concentrate. Read more
Review: Persian Reed Vodka
Persian Reed Vodka is crafted by Stillwagon Distillery in Coos Bay Oregon with molasses and sugar from sugar cane grown in Louisiana and Texas. Stillwagon Distillery is best known for their craft rums which they make over a dozen varieties but they also craft distill gin, whiskey, falernum and vodka. Persian Reed takes its name from a historical reference to sugarcane from the Romans who found sugarcane cultivated by the ancient Persians around 300 BC. The Persians called sugarcane “the reed that produces honey without bees”. Persian Reed Vodka is small batch distilled three times and reduced to proof with pure spring water. Read more
Review: Bud Light Seltzer Classic Variety Pack
Bud Light Seltzer recently introduced their Classic Variety Pack. If you didn’t notice it may be because the six other Bud Light Seltzer Variety packs and the dozens of other hard seltzer variety packs now found at your local liquor store distracted you. AB introduced the world to their hard seltzer January 2020 and while they were a little late to the hard seltzer party they have done their best to make up for lost time. After launched two standard hard seltzer mix packs they created a higher alcohol hard seltzer variety pack, a couple of canned cocktail hard seltzer packs, Lemonade seltzer, seasonal seltzers, hard soda seltzer, and most recently an apple flavored hard seltzer variety pack. The Bud Light Seltzer Classic Variety Pack brings them back to the future. All of the Bud Light Seltzer’s are made with water, cold fermented cane sugar, natural flavors, cane sugar, and malted rice weighing in with 100 calories, 5% alcohol, 1 gram of sugar and 2 carbs. Read more
Review: High Noon Tropical Variety Pack
High Noon Tropical is one of three 4 flavor 8 can mix packs produced by High Noon. The four flavors include Watermelon, Pineapple, Mango, and Passion Fruit. Unlike most hard seltzers High Noon is made from a vodka base. Real fruit juice, sparkling water and natural flavors are blended with the corn vodka base. Each 12 ounce slim can weighs in with 100 calories, and 4.5% alcohol. Read more
Review: Aha Yeto Blanco Tequila
Aha Yeto Blanco Tequila is currently produced at NOM 1548. It was originally crafted at the now closed NOM 1079. We are reviewing the currently produced Aha Yeto Blanco. In the 1890’s Don Pedro Camarena planted the first baby agave plants in the red soil of Los Altos de Jalisco. Eight years later he established the first tequila distillery in Los Altos de Jalisco. 120 years later his direct ancestors are producing Aha Yeto Tequila. The first thing that stands out is the beautiful blue hand blown glass bottle. This will look great on the back of your bar. Liquor stores may not share that opinion as each bottle takes up a lot of shelf space. Aha Yeto is made from 100% Blue Agave grown in the red soil of Los Altos. The trimmed agave is cut in half and slow cooked in brick ovens. Once extracted the juice is fermented in steel vats and double distilled prior to bottling with no additives. Read more
Review: Ambros Banana Whiskey
Ambros Banana Whiskey was released October 2018. It is made from a 3 year old Irish Whiskey base and infused with only 100% real banana’s in Henderson Nevada. To be specific no artificial flavors, “natural” flavors, fruit juice concentrate, or added sugar are added. 50,000 hand peeled bananas are needed for each batch of Ambros. Banana’s are the most consumed fruit on the planet yet they have yet to make much of an impact in the world of adult beverages. I have reviewed 4 banana flavored vodka’s and all four are no longer produced. The only banana flavored vodka currently produced is Burnetts Strawberry Banana. With dozens of flavor varieties the only banana flavored hard seltzer I’m aware of is the just released Happy Dad Banana Hard Seltzer, available as a limited release. Banana seems to be limited to flavored rum and whiskey. We have previously reviewed Howler Head, Skatter Brain, and Whiskey Smith banana flavored whiskey. Ambros is the only banana spirit I’m aware of infused with real banana, so we are anxious to taste the results. Read more
Review: Clear Creek Vodka
Clear Creek Vodka is crafted from 14 different varietals of Non-GMO apples grown on Hood River and Yakima Valley orchards. The spirit is distilled using a 46 chamber column still and then cut to 80 proof with glacier fed spring water from Mt. Hood. The Clear Creek distillery was founded by Stephen McCarthy in Portland Oregon. His family has owned orchards in Oregon since the turn of the century. Stephen began creating award winning European style fruit brandies but sold the distillery to Hood River in 2014. In 2017 Clear Creek moved to a brand new distillery in Hood River Oregon. Two years later they launched Clear Creek Vodka. Read more
Review: Celaya Tequila Blanco
Celaya Tequila was founded by brothers and former NFL Pro Bowl tackles Ryan and Matt Kalil. The brothers were inspired by years of stories told to them about their Great Grandfather Jose Celaya. Jose was born in 1855 and he cultivated his own agave and crafted his own homemade tequila in Sonora Mexico. The brothers partnered with Destiladora del Valle de Tequila to create their tequila. It is made from a 50/50 blend of highland and lowland grown agave. The agave is split into equal portions and cooked using two distinct processes. The first batch in an autoclave. The second in traditional hornos for up to 54 hours. The extracted juice is fermented with naturally occurring yeast for up to 60 hours then double distilled. Each of the three Celaya expressions is sold in beautifully designed blown glass bottles. Read more