A cocktail from our tasting room manager, Denise Petty, which reminded her of her travels to the Dominican Republic.

2 oz Catoctin Creek Roundstone Rye 92 Proof "Distiller's Edition"
2 oz Unsweetened Coconut Milk
¼ oz Lime Juice
1 oz Hot Honey
1 Saffron Thread

Rim a tall glass with Toasted Coconut Flakes/Gold Sprinkles. Shake all ingredients vigorously, and strain over fresh ice.  Paper umbrella garnish, if you have one!

Cocktail and photo courtesy Denise Petty.

2 oz Catoctin Creek Roundstone Rye Whisky
¾ oz Pomegranate Rosemary Syrup
1 oz Lemon Juice
3 oz Ginger Beer

Shake whisky, lemon juice and syrup with ice. Add crushed ice to glass. Fine strain cocktail into glass, top with ginger beer and fresh ice.

Recipe and photo courtesy A Bar Above, @abarabove on Twitter.

Nothing tastes better during the holidays than a hot toddy.  Try this one using our Quarter Branch Apple Brandy, or substitute your favorite brandy into the recipe for a different take.

1 oz Catoctin Creek Quarter Branch Apple Brandy
1-2 barspoons of AR's hot honey
2 barspoons of fresh orange juice
Boiling hot water
Orange peel and cinnamon stick garnish

Add the honey and juice to a punch glass, teacup or mug.  Mix well.  Pour in 2-3 oz of boiling hot water and stir well.  Add the apple brandy and garnish with orange peel and cinnamon sticks.

Recipe courtesy Denise Petty.

Currently a best seller at Brabo in Alexandria, this cocktail is a doozy.  It's a mix between a hot buttered rum, a hot toddy, and a sangria.  It comes to us courtesy Emmanuel Pressley, head bartender at Brabo.

1 oz Catoctin Creek 1757 Virginia Brandy
3 oz Ginger Darjeeling Tea
½ oz Suze
¼ oz Catoctin Creek Apple Brandy
¼ oz Lemon Juice
¼ oz Benedictine
2 bar spoons of maple butter*
1 oz Rhone Red Wine

To make the cocktail you want to combine all the ingredients except the wine and tea into a mixing glass. Start stirring the cocktail and slowly add the tea to dissolve the butter. Once fully mix roll warm cocktail into a serving coffee mug. And float the red wine over top.

*Maple Butter: Melt 16 oz of butter in a double boiler. Then slowly add 8 oz of maple and 2 oz of brown sugar. Let the sugar dissolve into the solution and once finished separate the butter into 2 batches and chill.

Recipe and photo courtesy Emmanuel Pressley

The Waterford Fair is a tradition in Loudoun County, Virginia, that goes back 75 years! Every year, local producers gather to sell their wares: quilts, leather goods, woolen goods, cheese, beer, wine, clothing... you get the idea. Thousands of customers descend upon the gentle rolling landscape of Waterford to browse the fair and kick off autumn. 2020 has been a tough year, and this year, the fair will do its first virtual event.

This cocktail was created by the Waterford Fair as their official cocktail, using both our apple brandy and some of Doug Fabbioli's hard apple cider. This little beverage is very delicious, and packs a punch!

The Fair runs Oct 2-4.  Get your tickets to the Waterford Fair - HERE:  waterfordfairva.org

One 1" piece of fresh ginger, peeled
1½ tsp simple syrup (or agave syrup)
1½ oz Catoctin Creek Apple Brandy
1½ oz Fabbioli Cellars Attitude Adjuster (hard apple cider)
1½ oz chilled ginger beer
1 lime wedge
1 apple slice

In a cocktail shaker, muddle the sliced ginger with the simple syrup. Add the brandy and ice. Shake well and strain into an ince-filled glass and top with equal parts ginger beer and hard cider. Garnish with the lime wedge and apple slice.

Courtesy of the Waterford Fair and used with permission.

Glass Type: Coup

Garnish: *Charred Dehydrated Orange Wheel

Method: Fill a shaker tin with ice and build cocktail. Stir until tin is chilled and then strain the cocktail into a chilled and smoked coupe glass.

Ingredients:

6 drops Earl Grey Bitters
6 drops *Saline
¼ oz Carciofo Artichoke Liqueur
¼ oz Blood Orange Juice
½ oz Byrrh Aperitif
½ oz *Brandied Cherry Syrup
2 oz *Duck Fat Washed Catoctin Creek Distiller’s Edition Rye

* Saline - In a sauce pan over low heat add 10 Parts Water to 1 Part Salt and stir until fully dissolved. Store in a glass container in a cool dark place for up to three weeks.

* Brandied Cherry Syrup - Add 1 cup of water, 1/2 cup sugar and 1/2 cup brown sugar (or 1 cup raw sugar) to a sauce pan, stir and bring to a boil. Reduce to simmer then add 4 cups cherries, cloves, cinnamon & cardamom to taste, half of lemon’s zest. Stir and allow to simmer for a few minutes or until liquid has reduced by half. Add 1 cup of brandy and allow to sit in a cool dark place. Store in a glass container and refrigerate for up to three Months. Substitute with store bought brandied cherries to skip this step. A second alternative is Cherry Heering Liqueur but the final product will not be as rich and spiced.

* Duck Fat Washed Rye - In a container, blend half a bottle of 750 ml Catoctin Creek Roundstone Rye 92 Proof Distiller’s Edition and mix with 1.5 Oz of rendered duck fat. Shake up mix and allow it to incorporate then allow to sit in a warm place for 6-8 hours. Freeze mix over night. Remove disc of fat from top then fine strain whisky into A glass container. Refrigerate for up to 3 months.

* Charred Dehydrated Orange Wheel - Take an orange and cut it into thick wheels then place on a parchment paper lined baking sheet. Preheat oven to 200 degrees and place wheels inside and close the door. Allow to dehydrate for nearly a day. Check back every few hours to make sure they are not getting too dry. You’ll know that they’re done when they are dry and don’t feel tacky anymore. With a kitchen blow torch, scorch one side of the orange peel until darkened. Store in a glass container at room temperature for over a month.

Photo and recipe courtesy Pheylan Blue Martin and used with permission.

This cocktail comes to us from Facci Ristorante at Turf Valley Town Square.  Find them and their delicious food and cocktails on Instagram at @facci_turf_valley.

Cocktails are always a good idea.... Who's in?

Our "Italian Greyhound" is a grapefruit cocktail made with craft gin, fresh grapefruit juice, crushed rosemary, aperol liquor and a sparkling sugar rim.

2 oz Catoctin Creek Watershed Gin
1 oz Aperol
Grapefruit Juice
Fresh rosemary
1 tsp sugar (crystalized/granulated)

Muddle the sugar and fresh chopped rosemary.  Add the gin and the Aperol and shake lightly with ice.  Strain over fresh ice in a collins glass with a sugar rim.  Top with grapefruit juice and give it a stir.

Recipe and photo courtesy Facci Ristorante and used with permission.

From [The Vivant] feature, "The Vivant’s Top Ten Fabulous Gin Cocktail Recipes," tasting room manager Denise Petty at Catoctin Creek Distilling Co. uses strawberries and rhubarb for a great summer drink.

There are a few things that always define summer for me. Strawberries and rhubarb are two of those things, usually in combination. Denise Petty, tasting room manager at Catoctin Creek Distilling Co., thinks the same way, and she’s come up with the perfect summer drink with a wonderful floral profile.

Denise tells me, “The rhubarb in this drink provides a drier sweetness than the strawberries do which gives a bit more depth of flavor. The earthy and floral profile of the rhubarb certainly enhances the complexity as you sip through the foam of the delicate egg white and bold bitters.” Denise shares her recipe for the Slide Back Sour below:

Ingredients:

1½ oz Catoctin Creek Watershed Gin
1 oz strawberry rhubarb syrup
¾ oz lemon juice
1 egg white

Strawberry rhubarb syrup:

5 cups strawberries
1 cup rhubarb
1 cup sugar
1½ cups water

Directions:

Place ingredients in shaker with ice. Shake and strain. Now dry shake those ingredients (place back in the shaker, no ice, and shake). Serve up in Nick and Nora glasses. Atomize Angostura and Fee Brothers rhubarb bitters over the foam. Garnish with a rhubarb twist.

For the strawberry rhubarb syrup: In a saucepan, combine sugar, water, strawberries and rhubarb. Stir well over medium heat and bring to boil, and then remove from pan and cover. Let it steep for about 30 minutes, then drain the syrup into a container and cool in the refrigerator.

Recipe and photo courtesy of Denise Petty.

Yesterday, we had the pleasure of interviewing Lauren Paylor, who has been a bartender/hospitality queen in the District of Columbia since about the time we started our company in 2009/2010.  She started out in Derek Brown's empire of Southern Efficiency, Mockingbird Hill and Eat the Rich, before moving into several other great ventures, like being GM at Dos Mamis and working at Silver Lyan.  Find out more about this amazingly talented person by watching the video below.

For this cocktail, the name of which was taken from the motto of the Passenger, a DC industry bar where we all met, Lauren doubles up the rye:  Rye whisky in the drink and a rye infused simple syrup for a nutty addition.

2 oz Catoctin Creek Roundstone Rye
½ oz Rye Syrup*
2 dashes Angostura bitters

Smoke a rocks glass with cinnamon sticks, then construct the drink as a normal old fashioned with a big rock in the glass. Garnish with torched cinnamon and orange peel.

*Rye Syrup - Toast 500 grams of the whole rye grain and blend with 500 grams of water, 1000 grams of granulated cane sugar, 1 tsp szechaun peppercorn, and 1 tsp fennel seed.

Drink and photo courtesy Lauren Paylor, and used with permission.

This cocktail comes to us from Allison Barger Eddy, aka @tiptoeingthrujuleps on Instagram.  Allison writes:

For these hot summer days, I have fully embraced the pre-batched-mason-jar-cocktail trend. Just combine your cocktail ingredients in a mason jar and store it in the fridge until go time. Then add ice, shake it up, and enjoy! It doesn’t get much simpler than that!

Today’s #frontporchsipper took advantage of a strawberry-peach simple syrup I made last week and some of the fresh fruit that we can’t get enough of these days. The sweet, tart, fruity flavors at play here still allow the rye to shine... and what a good rye it is! (So good that I used my “backup” bottle for these photos rather than the almost-empty bottle that’s sitting on my bar shelf.)

2 oz Catoctin Creek Roundstone Rye 92-proof Rye Whisky
½ oz Grand Marnier / Orange Liqueur
¾ oz Lemon Juice
½ oz Strawberry-peach simple syrup
Approx. 3 strawberries, hulled and halved
Approx. 4 slices of fresh peach
Mint sprig, for garnish

In a mason jar, combine all ingredients except garnish. Screw on the lid to the mason jar and store in fridge until ready to drink. When you’re ready to have your cocktail, add ice to the mason jar, screw on the lid, and shake everything together. Remove the lid, insert the mint sprig and a straw, and enjoy!

Cocktail and photo courtesy of Allison Barger Eddy.

This cocktail comes to us from Eddie Harris, our son and national brand ambassador currently living in Texas.  You can follow Eddie and his cocktail exploits on Instagram at @theboozygay.

Eddie writes about this cocktail:

This cocktail first appeared in 1922 as a promotional recipe for a Rudolph Valentino movie of the same name. It first appeared in the Savoy cocktail book in 1933. The film was later remade twice with the second remake starring Tyrone Power, Rita Hayworth, and Linda Darnell winning an academy award for cinematography.

So grab a glass and raise a toast!

1 oz Catoctin Creek Roundstone Rye 92 Proof
½ oz Old Pultney Maritime (or your favorite Scotch)
1½ oz Sweet Vermouth
1½ oz fresh orange juice
1½ oz Pratt Standard Cranberry Orange Syrup (or to taste)

Shake all ingredients and strain into a chilled stemmed coup.  Garnish with orange peel.

Recipe and photo courtesy Eddie Harris.

Let's get into that summertime mood with a great smoked peach and whisky cocktail!

1½ oz Catoctin Creek Roundstone Rye 80 Proof
½ oz Catoctin Creek Short Hill Mountain Peach Brandy
1 barspoon Campari
¼ oz lemon juice
½ oz rosemary simple syrup
½ oz dry vermouth
3 dashes peach bitters
Rosemary sprigs for garnish and burning

To prepare glass, take rosemary leaves and burn on Catoctin Creek barrel stave, let smolder under rocks glass.

Add rye, brandy, campari, lemon, rosemary, vermouth in shaker. Shake vigorously and strain over large sphere, add 3 dashes of peach bitters and rosemary sprig garnish.

Recipe by Denise Petty.