December Newsletter

Hello there friends & welcome to our December newsletter,

Whew, we’ve made it to the end of the year… it always goes by so fast and this year is no different. We have had a wonderful year. We will be sharing our year-end wrap up in a few weeks, but for now, we want to share with you everything new & exciting for December… It may be the end of year, but we aren’t going into hibernation just yet!

We want to THANK YOU all for supporting us during our Small Biz / Cyber Sale at the end of November, you really put us to work, and we appreciate it so much! AND because of you we were able to make a donation of $200 to Utah Diné Bikéyah!!

We have some fun things in store for this month, including our return to Renegade Craft Fair in Seattle, our third annual NYE-Eve Bash is back for another year, AND a new, very exciting collaboration with our friends at Love & Victory… we cannot be stopped!

UPCOMING VIRTUAL WORKSHOPS

December virtual classes are open for registration now, we’ve added classes through the end of March next year too.

PLUS our annual New Year’s Eve-Eve Bash is back for the third year running! We’ll be featuring LIVE music by Cop Kid, charcuterie kits by Maven Oak Creative, Cocktail Kits by us, and a damn good time - more details are at the link are below!

COLLABORATION WITH LOVE & VICTORY

We’re collaborating with our absolute favorite woman-owned small businesses Love & Victory!

Meg & I met through a mutual friend (one of my favorite people and fellow cocktail enthusiast, Chelsea aka Ritual & Craft) back in 2018.

Meg was instrumental in creating our new brand designs, Tote Bag & enamel pins for us over the last few years. Plus, she’s also the wizard behind our absolutely stunning Uncle Nearest Designs!

We love their thoughtfully curated apparel, cocktail supplies & commitment to activism - it was literally a no-brainer to include their products in one of our gift sets.

Introducing our Love & Victory Old Fashioned Cocktail Kit!

The kit includes all the usual cocktail supplies; a 4 oz bottle of Demerara syrup, 4 oz bottle of our Aromatic Bitters, an 8 oz bottle of our Cocktail Cherries, a bag of dried oranges PLUS: Love & Victory Galaxy Cocktail Picks AND a pair of Love & Victory Old Fashioned Socks!

Each kit also comes with 4 different Old Fashioned recipe cards, and is beautifully packaged in a stylish box PERFECT for gift giving!

We know you’ll love this as much as we do, Cheers!

 

RENEGADE CRAFT FAIR IN SEATTLE

We’re back for another year at the Renegade Craft Fair in Seattle, Washington - December 10 & 11th, Hangar 30 at Magnuson Park.

Can’t wait to see you there!

 

Nick, Nora, and The Thin Man

We’ve started a new habit of watching “older” movies recently (like anything made prior to the 1980s); we started with The Thin Man. Coincidentally this film is closely tied to cocktail history, which was an extra bonus for us.

The most famous glass of the cocktail revival was named by a bartender, and former actor, Dale DeGroff, and named after two famous cinematic spouses.

The souses were Nick and Nora Charles, the stylish fictional detective and his wealthy wife, who solved crimes in between belts, from the first Thin Man Movie.

Aside from being a fun & comedic film with many lovable characters, it *might* just feature more cocktails in it than any other movie in history. Considering the year it came out, 1934, that makes a lot of sense.

Wait, so how did DeGroff come to name a cocktail glass?

In 1987, DeGroff was working at the Rainbow Room & put together a list of classic and forgotten pre-Prohibition cocktails. He then began to search for glassware that matched the style of libations he was offering, in the 1980s glassware was… not the best.

To find what he was looking for, DeGroff turned to Minners Designs, a old glass and silver house on Manhattan’s East Side. They were able to recreate a vessel from their original 1930’s catalog, called the “Little Martini” glass for Dale. Dale remembered these characters drinking from these smaller “martini style” glasses (regularly) in the film and he was specifically looking for THAT glass to use in his new bar program. He lovingly referred to it as the “Nick & Nora” glass!

But what’s so great about it, other than the name you ask?

An important benefit is its smaller circumference, for one. It has a tighter bowl with straighter sides than the traditional Martini glass, which allows it to accentuate the aromas in aperitif cocktails, enhancing the overall flavor. The glass also keep cocktails colder longer, (less surface contact with air) and, of course, they are less prone to spillage than a clumsy wide-mouthed Martini glass.

Below, we’ve got the perfect winter cocktail for you to try out in your new (or underused) Nick & Nora glass. Cheers!

WINTER BIRD

1.5 oz Cognac

1 oz Creme de Cacao

1 oz Cream

2 dashes Apricot Vanilla bitters

Garnish: grated nutmeg

  • Add all ingredients to a cocktail shaker and vigorously dry-shake for 30 seconds

  • Add ice and shake again, another 30 seconds

  • Double strain into chilled Nick & Nora glass

  • Garnish with grated nutmeg over the top

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