We started making vermouth out of frustration. Emily was often mentioning how much she liked drinking it, but there was not much interesting ones available around us at that time. One morning, we started drafting a list of ingredients we could use if we were to make some. A few weeks later, Batch #1 was born out of white wine & spring ingredients from the region: elderflowers, rhubarb, mint, lemon balm, etc. Batch #2 followed, a rosé one, which we don’t talk about because it turned out a little weird. The tiny Batch #3 was awesome, made with red wine. During harvest 2019, we made batch #4 with tons of herbs and fresh hops. And then we felt confident to get more serious and make a bigger batch.

Which brings us here to batch #5.

One 225L barrel of skin-fermented white and pink grapes started a new life as Wermoutte when we fortified it with neutral alcohol, and infused it with a significant amount of herbs we grew in our garden the summer of 2020. There is a dominance of anise hyssop which gives this vermouth a minty edge, but you can also find nettles, yarrow, pimprenelle, thai basil, dried elderflowers, sage, sorrel, etc. We sweetened it lightly with elderflower syrup just to round things off, and prayed we had not messed it up. Fortunately a few weeks later it had turned into a copper-tinged party animal.

We drink it at home over ice, pure or with a splash of tonic water. Building cocktails around it is also a lot of fun.

We opted for batch numbers on our Wermouttes because we want our production to go with the seasons and whatever we have on hand/in the garden.

Sulfur: 20mg at bottling.