Month: August 2015

Announcing Von Humboldt’s Natur Wasser, a spirituous accompaniment to Andrea Wulf’s newest book, The Invention of Nature.

Von Humboldt’s Natur Wasser is a limited edition, 40-proof  Tamarind Cordial created right here at Tamworth Distilling and Mercantile. Only 500 bottles were produced, and will be available at talks and dinners with Wulf as well as for purchase in our distillery.

Despite being the most famous scientist of his age, Humboldt has faded into obscurity. His radical vision of nature as a complex and interconnected global force — ‘the web of life’ — totally changed our understanding of our relationship with the natural world. So thorough was this paradigm shift that we take it for granted, rather than crediting Humboldt for his “invention”. His travels and writings inspired many environmentalist thinkers and poets that came after, including Darwin, Wordsworth, Goethe, John Muir, and Henry David Thoreau.

A particular anecdote from Humboldt’s South American adventures led to the choice of the unique tamarind flavor. At the end of March of 1800, the explorer and naturalist packed his boat to the brim with tamarind fruit before departing on an expedition through the Venezuelan jungle. Humboldt had learned from the locals that the pod-like fruit of the tamarind could turn unsavory water into a refreshing ‘lemonade’.

We took this story to our distillers, where a quest began that was almost as ambitious as Humboldt’s. An exceptional batch of tamarind fruit was sourced from Thailand, which had sweet smoke and bourbon flavors resulting from the drying process. The flesh of the fruit was infused in our house-made neutral grain spirit, along with lemon zest and golden brown sugar. Finally, like the original ‘jungle river lemonade,’ the spirit was proofed down with sterilized water from the Swift River, which runs just a few feet from the distillery.

Learn more about Andrea Wulf here. Pre-order The Invention of Nature here.

This fall, Andrea Wulf will be taking both the story and the spirit on the road for a series of talks and dinners:

September 16 – (Mount Vernon, VA) Talk and book signing at George Washington’s Mount Vernon — Click here to learn more

September 17 – (Philadelphia, PA) Talk and book signing at The American Philosophical Society

September 18 – (Philadelphia, PA) Dinner at Talula’s Daily Secret Supper Club from 6:00-8:00pm — To reserve your seat & a signed copy of The Invention of Nature call 215.592.6555

September 30 – (New York, NY) Talk and book signing, followed by dinner at the New York Academy of Medicine at 8:30pm — Click here to reserve your seat & a signed copy of The Invention of Nature

October 5 – (Boston, MA) Talk and book signing at the Massachusetts Historical Society — Click here to learn more

October 14 – (Washington, DC) Dinner at The Tabard Inn at 7:00pm — Click here to reserve your seat & a signed copy of The Invention of Nature

 

Both talks and dinners will include a cocktail hour, and a chance to taste both Von Humboldt’s Natur Wasser as well as select Art in the Age spirits.

The first batches of our spirits were released this summer and the response has been overwhelmingly positive, so we’ve decided to bottle a special run of our most popular spirit – our smooth and honeyed Apiary Gin.

A very limited amount of bottles are now available for pre-order, reserved for you to pick up at our distillery once they’re packaged and ready to go in late September.

Summer doesn’t last forever, which is why we’re bottling one more taste of it just for you.

Reserve your bottle today.

Here in Tamworth, the stories we tell are the spirits we create. Flowers tell the story of seasons, so we’re telling the story of our local flora in the form of the most floral spirit possible: gin.

The conception of  Tamworth Garden spirits began on the hillsides of New Hampshire. Inspired by local flora, we’ve foraged the ingredients to create fresh infusions in our botanical kitchen, as a base for our unique spirits.

While our Apiary Gin celebrates the sweet bounty of honeybees, our next gin will sings the song of flowers themselves. It’s an unfolding bouquet, adorned with local geranium, honey, violet, Lemon Verbena, Elderflower and Red Clover.

We’ve picked the bouquet, all you have to do is pour it in a glass.