Bittermens was featured on Gizmodo, in an excellent article on bitters and cocktails written by Brent Rose for their weekly booze column “Happy Hour.”

“So, your home bar is obviously not complete without bitters. If you’re just starting a bitters collection, from Bittermens, Teague recommends the Hopped Grapefruit to go with light spirits (vodka, gin, etc) and the Xocolatl Mole Bitters for darker spirits (rye, dark rum, bourbon).”

via Sweet-Talk and Bitters

Bittermens and Amor y Amargo were featured in Edible Manhattan’s “The Alcohol Issue” (Jan-Feb 2012) (click to enlarge):

“Of course, all their products are behind the bar at Amor y Amargo (which translates as ‘Love and Bitters’). The most popular drink on the menu is the house Gin & Tonic, made with their quinine-laced Commonwealth ‘tonic cordial’ mixed with soda water, Bittermens Hopped Grapefruit Bitters, Maraschino liqueur and, oh yeah, gin. The drink was named one of Time Out New York’s 100 Best Dishes and Drinks of 2011.”

The article can also be found online at Edible Manhattan’s website: Indigenous Industry: Amor y Amargo

Avery and Janet were recently interviewed by Kara Newman for an article in Edible Brooklyn magazine (click to enlarge):

The article can also be found online at Edible Brooklyn’s website: To Steep, Perchance to Dream.

Jason Wilson of the Washington Post mentions Bittermens in his latest column about bitters:

“Over the past five years, a slew of new bitters, from companies such as Fee Brothers, the Bitter Truth and Bittermens — not to mention numerous bartenders creating their own house-made bitters — have ushered in a veritable Bitters Renaissance. Now, you can find peach, grapefruit and rhubarb bitters. Certain varieties, such as Fee Brothers Whiskey Barrel-Aged bitters and the Bitter Truth’s celery bitters and Bittermens Xocolatl Mole bitters, have quickly become new classics.”

via Bitters, the acid test for bartenders

The Boiler-Bach – which uses both Bittermens Orange Cream Citrate and Bittermens Xocolatl Mole Bitters – is one of Tasting Table’s Best Cocktails of 2011. From Tasting Table:

“At first glance, you may think Avery Glasser’s Boiler-Bach is simply a glass of beer. But this riff on the Seelbach cocktail and Boilermaker technique, in which beer is mixed or chased with booze, melds hoppy, Pennsylvania-made Stoudt’s pilsner with Cointreau and a trio of bitters. A shot glass of bourbon is plopped in as a final touch.”

The Boiler-Bach is currently on the menu at Amor y Amargo in NYC’s East Village.

via Tasting Table
Photo Credit: tastingtable.com

NPR’s recent story on the revival of soda fountain drinks included a recipe from Gina Chersevani (PS7′s, Washington DC) for an orange soda that includes Bittermens Orange Cream Citrate:

Photo by Maggie Starbard for NPR

2 scoops vanilla ice cream
1 oz orange/vanilla syrup *
1 pinch or half bar spoon acid phosphate
5 drops Bittermens Orange Cream Citrate

In a fountain glass (or Collins glass), add vanilla ice cream, orange/vanilla syrup, and acid phosphate.  Top with seltzer water and stir until frothy.  Serve with a spoon and straw.

* Recipe for orange/vanilla syrup:
4 medium naval oranges
2 cups sugar
1 cup water
1 vanilla bean

Juice the oranges, reserving the rinds. Place the juice and rinds in a saucepan with the sugar and water. Add the seeds scraped from the vanilla bean, and the bean itself. Simmer mixture for about 20 minutes until mixture becomes thick and reduced. Remove from heat, strain out orange rinds and vanilla bean. Keep liquid in a glass container. Refrigerated, it stores for about a month.

via NPR: In Soda Revival, Fizzy Taste Bubbles Up From the Past

Photo by Jakob N. Layman for Time Out New York

The Bittermens House Gin & Tonic – currently on the menu at Amor y Amargo – is one of Time Out New York’s 100 Best Dishes and Drinks of 2011. It incorporates both our Hopped Grapefruit Bitters and our new Commonwealth Tonic Cordial.

“The G is the only thing this complex cocktail has in common with your garden-variety G&T. The bartenders here swap out Schweppes for a boozy, quinine-laced tonic cordial (plus a splash of club soda), then pad the drink’s sweet and fruity notes with maraschino liqueur and a dose of Bittermens Hopped Grapefruit Bitters. The result is an orange-hued, floral-scented nip that coats the palate in sweet citrus, before delivering a bracingly bitter finale.”

via Time Out New York

Bittermens was featured in a recent piece on bitters written by Leslie Pariseau for Eater National:

“If you have to have one bitter in the arsenal, it’s Angostura,” says Avery Glasser of Bittermens. “It’s the most classic—like the black pepper of the cocktail world.” As a rule, bitters add depth and balance to a cocktail and connect or smooth flavors together. “The next flavor you should have is orange bitters,” counsels Glasser, “but it’s when you get to the third bitter that you can start to have fun.” Avery and Janet Glasser, now based in Brooklyn, began making bitters in 2007 with flavors that hadn’t been commercially explored like Xocolatl Mole which they recommend using in dark spirit based cocktails like aged tequila, rum or bourbon. Eventually they worked with New York bartender Phil Ward on a grapefruit bitter, and Brian Miller on ‘Elemakule Tiki bitters.

The Glassers have made Bittermens their passion and livelihood producing everything from shrubs to liqueurs and opening bitters bar and general store Amor y Amargo in Manhattan. It seem they’re having fun experimenting, but they’ve also become very serious about the profession. ”There are a lot of people making seasonal bitters,” explains Avery, “hobbyists who say, ‘Oh wouldn’t it be fun to dot-dot-dot?’” Well-established on the bitters scene, Bittermens shouldn’t worry too much about competition, especially considering their flavor specialization, but Glasser has a point.

The rest of the article can be found here: Bitters: The Bartender’s Spice Cabinet.

Centurion Magazine recently named Bittermens Xocolatl Mole Bitters as one of the five best bitters:

“Mexican chocolate bitters have often been imitated by other brands but Bittermens’ is the original and still the best, combining the flavours of dark, bitter chocolate, cinnamon and various unspecified aromatics. This makes a superb addition to an Old Fashioned.”

Bittermens Hopped Grapefruit bitters were one of the bitters featured at the “Emperor’s New Bitters” seminar at this year’s Tales of the Cocktail. Chuck Taggart wrote an excellent recap of the seminar, and has this to say about Bittermens:

“Reeling from this, we moved on to the American bitters-making company that’s doing some of the most exciting work in the business — Bittermens (with no apostrophe, dammit!), founded in 2007 by Avery and Janet Glasser as experiments in their San Francisco kitchen, and now produced commercially in Brooklyn. Theirs is a completely modern approach to bitters-making, without attempting to recreate historical recipes. Their first product was the amazing Xocolatl Mole Bitters, using cacao as the primary flavor with a broad range of spices similar to what’s used in the exquisite Mexican mole negrosauce. They followed this with a bitters called ‘Elemakule Tiki Bitters, formulated for tropical and tiki-style drinks, and Boston Bittahs (heh, they’re in the yaahd not too faah from the caah), a summery citrus and chamomile blend, plus a few more and more still on the way.

The one we tasted was the latest incarnation of their initial experiments in producing a grapefruit bitters,Hopped Grapefruit Bitters. Organic grapefruit peel and oil, fruity Palisade hops, cinchona bark, gentian, cardamom and other ingredients are macerated in neutral grain spirit to make this bitters, which was fantastic. On the nose you get strong grapefruit and cardamom, and there was one offered aroma note of “irie” (“It smells like pot!”). On the palate bitter grapefruit and a bit of grapefruit pith, hops, crisp dryness, and even a note of the French gentian liqueur Suze. Jacob recommended these highly in tequila and mezcal drinks, and in a gin & tonic. Not so good would be the dark spirits of pretty much any variety, and for this one’s big surprise … beer! Not so much of a surprise, really; he said Hopped Grapefruit Bitters are amazing in a shandy gaff — half beer, half ginger beer, with a slice of grapefruit and several dashes of the bitters on top. I’m making that on the next hot Saturday.”

via The Emperor’s New Bitters