Review: Sugarlands Birthday Cake Sippin Cream
Sugarlands Birthday Cake Sippin Cream was released March 2024 to celebrate Sugarland’s 10th birthday. This is one of 9 rum based cream liqueurs produced by Sugarlands in Gatlinburg Tennessee. They also produce 21 different moonshine varieties, High Rock Vodka, and Roaming Man Tennessee Straight Rye Whiskey. Sugarlands partnered with the Golic family as Brand Ambassadors including Mike and Chris Golic, their three kids Mike Jr. Jake and his wife Jenny, Sydney and her husband Ben Braunecker. Read more 
Review: Penta Diamante Tequila Reposado Cristalino
Penta Tequila was founded by Steve Reynolds and four of his winemaking friends from Napa California, bound together by their love of wine and tequila. Steve Reynolds once crafted a wine from all 16 different growing regions in Napa California. That was that experience that lead them to craft a tequila from 100% agave grown in all five of the legal growing regions of agave for tequila. Those five regions include Jalisco, Guanajuato, Michoacan, Nayarit, and Tamaulipas. They worked with Casa Aceves and Master Distiller Ana Maria Romero to craft Penta. Pente Diamante Cristalino starts with hand selected agave from all five regions. Some of the agave is slow roasted in a brick oven for 3 days. Some is cooked at low pressure/temperature in an autoclave for 22-24 hours. The extracted juice is fermented in stainless steel tanks with Champagne yeast, then double distilled. The spirit is aged for 7 months in new French oak barrels followed by a completely new filtration process with a loose charcoal system where they top the tank with a thick layer of charcoal. A weighted screen lowers the charcoal slowly through the tank. This allows the charcoal to gently absorb the color without stripping the tequila of its complexity. Read more
Review: Nadar Vodka
Nadar Vodka is the world’s first climate positive vodka. It is made from peas grown on their farm. Nadar is Gaelic for nature. Peas capture all the nitrogen they need from the air and return it to the soil. The Arbikie Distillery is a family run farm distillery. It is the worlds first hydrogen powered distillery with a wind turbine, electrolyser, hydrogen storage, and a hydrogen boiler system. The idea to build a distillery presented itself in a New York bar in 2010 when brothers David Stirling who co-owned a bar, Iain who started his career at Whyte & Mackay, and John an Accountant at KPMG hatched the idea to build a distillery on their 2000 family farm in Angus Scotland. The Stirling family has been farming since 1660 and records show a distillery was on their farm as far back as 1794. They built their distillery from an ancient barn. They founded the distillery in 2013 and released their first spirit Tattie Bogle Potato Vodka in 2014. Since then they have produced several gins, vodkas, and rye. Nadar Vodka is distilled in a copper pot still followed by a 40 column distillation. Read more
Review: Planteray Cut & Dry Coconut Rum
Planteray Cut & Dry Coconut Rum is the first rum to be released under the new Planteray Rum name. The former Plantation brand name had negative connotations associated with the term “plantation”. Planteray Coconut Rum is distilled and infused with coconut flesh at West Indies Rum Distillery on the west coast of Barbados. After four years of experimentation where they tried coconut juice, jelly, fresh coconut, and dried shells they found coconuts picked fully ripe from local coconut farms then cut into small chunks and left to dry before infusing in the barrel aged rum base worked best. One whole coconut is required to produce each bottle of Planteray Cut & Dry Coconut Rum. In case you wondered, a coconut tree yields about 45 coconuts per year. Read more
Review: UNI Organic Blanco Tequila
Uni Tequila was founded in 2020 by Metta Risdal who grew up in Lindesnes, on the Southern most coast of Norway. Metta left Norway and moved to London and then New York where she worked as a bartender at both locations. After several visits to Mexico she fell in love with the people, food, and tequila and later moved to Puerto Vallarta Mexico where she visited dozens of distilleries researching tequila harvesting and distilling. She partnered with Tequila Las Americas to produce her tequila. Tequila Las Americas currently produces tequila for 39 brands including Solento, Don Abraham, Casa Azul, 123 Organic, and Tequila Cabal. They currently make UNI Blanco and UNI Anejo. UNI Blanco is crafted from 100% estate grown organic blue agave and once the spirit is distilled it rests for nearly 2 months in oak barrels before botting. Read more
Review: Voudoux Vodka
Voudoux Vodka is crafted at BKO Distillery in Medina Ohio. BKO was established in 2018 and gets its name from Founders Brad Kochmit and Ken Obloy’s initials. They opened to the public February 22, 2020. In August 2021 they added 7000 square feet to their original 1000 square foot distillery. The founders despised vodka thinking they all tasted like nail polish, paint thinner, and gasoline. They spent years researching, and developing a vodka they could drink straight at room temperature. Voudoux Vodka is distilled from 100% pure NON GMO cane sugar. The sugar is slow fermented at low temperatures for a longer period of time. It is batch distilled over 20 times, slow filtered in multiple stages using a proprietary process, and bottled with zero additives. Read more
Review: Lunazul Primero Tequila Anejo Cristalino
Lunazul Primero Tequila Anejo Cristalino was launched May 2014 joining Lunazul Blanco, Reposado, and Anejo. Lunazul was founded in 2002 by former Jose Cuervo Co-Owner Francisco Beckman a seventh generation descendent of the Beckman Family. He sold his share in the family business keeping his share of the agave fields. He established Tierra de Agaves in 1992. Lunazul is made from 100% 7-9 year old hand harvested estate agave grown in the rich red clay of Jalisco. The pinas are slow cooked in autoclave ovens. The extracted juice is fermented with a proprietary yeast, a family strain used for generations that comes directly from the agave plants and soil on their estate. The spirit is distilled twice in stainless pot stills with copper coils. Lunazul Anejo is rested in charred white oak barrels from 12-18 months. The final step includes reverse filtering the tequila eight times prior to bottling. Read more
Review: Heirloom Rye Vodka
Heirloom Rye Vodka is crafted at Six & Twenty Distillery in Greenville South Carolina. David Raad founded Six & Twenty in 2011, and in 2019 the moved into the former Poe West Hardware and Supply Company building. They currently also produce Old Money Wheat Whiskey, 5-Grain Bourbon, Carolina Cream, Double Made Gin, and several Limited Release spirits. Heirloom Rye Vodka is 12 times distilled from South Carolina grown Black Seashore Rye. Read more
Review: Rey Supremo Tequila Blanco
Francisco Gonzalez was born and raised in Mexico. His ancestors were skilled cultivators of agave plants for years. His grandfather was a skilled tequila maker. In 2019 he decided to launch his own tequila and he partnered with Proveedora Y Procesadora de Agave Tres Hermanos. Rey Supremo Tequila Blanco is made from 100% Azul Tequilana Weber agave grown in Los Valles of Jalisco and the reddish lands of Nayarit. The hand trimmed agave is cooked in stainless steel auto claves for 16 hours. The extracted juice is fermented with special yeasts and the natural environment from Amate trees in the area. The spirit is double distilled in stainless steel pot stills and bottled additive free. Read more
Review: Aspen Vodka
Aspen Vodka is crafted at Aspen Distillers on a high bank adjacent to the Roaring Fork River in Aspen Colorado. Matthew Patel a doctor from Ohio founded and built the 18,000 square foot facility on 8 acres once used as a lumberyard. Aspen Distillers operates as the largest carbon negative distillery. Aspen Vodka is made from Non-Hybrid, Non-GMO heirloom red winter wheat exclusively grown on a 2200 single estate centennial farm in Colorado. The wheat is milled onsite prior to distilling. The water is sourced from snow melt that travels down the mountain and into the natural aquifer below the property. January 30, 2024 Aspen announced a partnership with WES Brands which will make it a lot easier to purchase a bottle of Aspen Vodka as WES will increase their distribution. Read more