A beery evening stroll through the new breweries of old Pilsen

By Josh Noel -Contact Reporter - The Chicago Tribune

This is the first in an occasional series tracking Chicago's evolving craft beer scene by neighborhood, each installment in a single evening.

At the only occupied table outside the recently opened Pilsen brewery, a handful of drinkers gathered beneath a string of white holiday lights with glasses of saison and witbier and chatted in the language of the neighborhood: Spanish.

Pilsen. Drinking beer. On a warm summer evening.

As recently as nine months ago, Pilsen had no taprooms or brewpubs. In the midst of a food and drink uprising — some call it gentrification — Pilsen, a home to Mexican immigration since the 1950s, suddenly has three.

There's Moody Tongue, which opened as a production brewery three years ago and opened a lavish taproom in October; Alulu, a cozy brewpub that opened in March; and Lo Rez, which began brewing last fall and opened a taproom in June. All sit along a 1-mile stretch just north of Cermak Road, between Ashland Avenue and Halsted Street. Click Here To Read More!

Bacardi Employees Team Up with Surfrider Foundation for Beach Dune Restoration

70+ Volunteers to Remove Invasive Species and Plastics

CORAL GABLES, Fla. and MIAMI BEACH, Fla., July 17, 2017 /PRNewswire/ -- Teams of Bacardi employees, ecology experts and volunteers for Surfrider Foundation's Miami chapter recently worked together to help restore the beach dune and preserve the unique ecosystem along the Miami Beach coastline.

"Bacardi recognizes the importance of the local communities where we live and work and plays an active role in giving back by supporting our employees to make a difference," said Jessica Merz, director of corporate communications, for Bacardi. "Our goal is to return to the environment at least as much as we take away." Click Here To Read More!

Is the Mezcal Industry Doing Enough to Protect Mezcal? Maybe. Maybe Not

Contributed by Brad Japhe - liquor.com

It’s the latest buzzword of the bar world: sustainability. Brands champion it, marketers co-opt it, and the rest of us pretend we know what it means, if only to feel extra warm and fuzzy while throwing back our favorite cocktail.

But in the quickly changing world of mezcal, sustainability is a lot more than hype. It’s a function of survival. From 2005 to 2015, mezcal sales in the U.S. increased by almost 300 percent, making it one of the fastest-growing spirits in the country and indeed the world. This dizzying uptick in consumer demand comes at odds with an artisanal product that can take years, even decades, to cultivate. Click Here To Read More!

BARTENDER OF THE WEEK Songstress and mixologist Robyn Whitehead

By Becky Montgomery - Florida Weekly Correspondant - keywest.floridaweekly.com

If you haven’t yet stopped into Key West’s newest little upscale bar, the Roost, at 508 Fleming Street between Duval and Simonton, you should. Open for just a month now, it’s a hidden gem you might pass by once or twice before you realize it’s there. It was last known as Baby Cheapee’s, a package liquor store, before becoming the next popular Maria Sharpe incarnation with idea guy/bar manager Chris Shultz at the helm once again. The interior décor is a warm welcome of wood, bar stools with octopus legs, and tables in the front and back for cushy seating. It’s a craft-cocktail bar that offers a small eclectic bar menu (i.e., a salmon plate, caviar and a selection of Pino’s chocolates), local celebrity bartenders, and best of all, they still offer package wine, liquor and beer. Click Here To Read More!

George Clooney sells tequila brand Casamigos for $1 billion

By Sasha Savitsky - foxnews.com

George Clooney has a lot to celebrate this year.

Weeks after Clooney welcomed twins with his wife Amal, the actor announced he sold his tequila brand Casamigos for $1 billion.

"If you asked us four years ago if we had a billion dollar company, I don’t think we would have said yes," Clooney said in a statement to Fox News. Click Here To Read More!

Whisky Lovers - Tennessee's Oldest Bottling Just Hit The Market

Larry Olmsted, Contributor - msn.com

Yesterday outside of Nashville, and why the historic business in rural Cascade Hollow is so interesting and unusual among such tours. But for collectors and whiskey aficionados there’s another reason to consider visiting – and quickly: it’s one of the only places you can get Dickel’s rarest and soon to be obsolete release.

The bourbon whiskey and Scotch whisky businesses are full of stories of “long lost” casks and recently “rediscovered” caches of ultra-premium hooch, but many of these come across as marketing tales made up to create a feeling of scarcity and drive up prices. But in Dickel’s case an honest mistake was the mother of invention. Every time a cask is filled and set aside to age, it is branded with a code representing the date on which it was made, and its exact position in the maturing warehouse (unlike some distilleries, Dickel does not rotate or move casks once they are set aside to age). Back around the turn of the 21st century, a batch was mis-coded for date, and the error was only discovered later during an audit. George Dickel does not usually age any of its whisky (as I explained yesterday, they are one of only two major producers in this country that choose to use the traditional Scottish spelling rather than the Americanized “whiskey”) beyond 12-14 years, but this overlooked batch reached the very healthy age of seventeen. It was then sampled by the company’s head distiller, Allisa Henley, and she deemed it delicious, so it was bottled as a one-off specialty reserve collection. There is no more 17-year old George Dickel, and when it is gone it’s gone. Click Here To Read More!

Limited Edition Bourbon Celebrates Four Roses’ Brand Ambassador & Bourbon Legend Al Young

Press release by William Reigle - chicagobourbon.org

Four Roses Bourbon’s Senior Brand Ambassador and Bourbon legend Al Young will celebrate his 50th Anniversary with the brand this year. To commemorate this milestone, Four Roses will release a special 2017 Limited Edition 50th Anniversary Small Batch Bourbon in his honor this June.

“After 50 wonderful years with Four Roses, I am honored to be recognized with my own bottling of the Bourbon that I love so dearly,” said Al Young. “It is surreal seeing how the brand has grown during my years here and I am proud to have played even a small part in its continued success.”

Four Roses Master Distiller Brent Elliott and Al Young worked hand-in-hand to select four of Four Roses’ 10 unique Bourbon recipes to create the Small Batch Bourbon. Click Here To Read More!