Posts Written OnJanuary 22, 2008

High-End Spirits from the Garden State? Yes.

By Robin Meredith, Cocktail Columnist Even those of us with a relatively enlightened, cliché-free view of New Jersey may be surprised to find out that one of the nation’s most intriguing spirits hails from the Garden State. The most densely populated state in the country seems pretty far removed from the dark hollows of Kentucky and Tennessee or all those wacky mavericks distilling brandy and eau-de-vie in the mountains out west. Laird and Company of Scobeyville, NJ (not far from Red Bank) produces an impressive range of apple-based spirits and has a truly fascinating history. Billing itself as “America’s oldest…

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The Sweet Hereafter

By Bryan Calandrelli, Niagara Escarpment Correspondent One of the coolest parts about living in an area with a burgeoning wine region has to be the fact that you get to literally watch history unfold. Of course, some history takes place outside in the kind of cold that burns your lungs and freezes your eyeballs, but when I regain feeling in my fingers I’ll be able to look back on January 3 of this still-new year as the date that marks the first local harvest of ice wine grapes at not one but two local wineries. When temperatures dropped into the…

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