The TTB has granted us approval of the Mole and Grapefruit bitters. We now have to get city health inspector approval, confirm the FDA labeling requirements and make some corporate changes to move our business from NY to Massachusetts. Our new target release date is January 15 – and it looks extremely positive!!!

We’re now on our second round of reviews with the TTB in order to get certified for production. Unfortunately, what should be taking 3 weeks per round is now taking 3 months.

Though we’re commercially paralyzed and will miss out on launching at Tales of the Cocktail, we’re still working on new flavors. If you’re in the Boston area, we’re going to be testing the new Boston Bittahs at our trinity of focus bars in the area: Green Street, No. 9 Park and Eastern Standard over the next week or so.

Keep your fingers crossed…

Paul Clarke did a fantastic writeup of Bittermens in the Cocktail Chronicles. As soon as we kick this cold, we’re heading over to Death and Company to test out the Camerone cocktail he created.

Team Bittermens will be back in Boston to test out the new ‘Elemakule Tiki Bitters formula. If you’ll be in Boston on the 16th-18th, drop us a line.

We got a great writeup in Friday’s San Francisco Chronicle!

Since our goal is to bring these bitters fully to market, we’ve taken another big step in the process. We’re officially now Bittermens, Inc. – a New York “S-Corporation”.

Over the past few months, we’ve been traveling with bitters in hand to get feedback from some of the best bartenders around the world. This market research has been extremely valuable as we’ve been able to get some fantastic feedback on everything from label design to bottle type to the actual formulas and their applications. We’ve also been able to taste some of the amazing house bitters that are being developed for bars in Boston, New York and London.

Now that the company is formed and we’ve locked down the first few formulations, we can progress to the next step – TTB formulation approval as a Non-Potable beverage.  The target is to be fully legal by Tales of the Cocktail, but there’s still a tremendous amount of work to finish if we’re going to be ready by then!

Thanks to Joaquin from Death and Co, the Bittermens Xocolatl Mole bitters are being used at the next Bite Club NY Dinner. You can find the menu here.

From the menu…

Black Market Brandy
Courvoisier Cognac, Laird’s bonded Applejack, Market Spice tea-infused
Sweet Vermouth, Angostura bitters, Bittermens chocolate bitters [Avery's Note: it's actually the Xocolatl Mole]

Two types of brandy play together here, with Courvoisier’s fruitiness
nicely complimented by New Jersey’s own 100 proof apple brandy (so good
George Washington, a reputable rye distiller, as well as statesman, asked for
their recipe). The black tea gives huge spice notes to the vermouth,
especially clove, allspice and cinnamon. Angostura bitters work their usual
magic here, joined by Avery Glasser’s delightful chocolate bitters, which
give off deep cacao notes and dry out the finish.

A first bottle of Xocolatl Mole Bitters was delivered to Eastern Standard on Monday, along with Brian Miller’s recipe for the Second Sip – a Fernet cocktail featuring these bitters.Based on the response, we’ll be stocking Eastern Standard and No 9 Park with the full range of bitters within the month of November. Bostonians – look forward to getting Bittermens Bitters shortly! 

This weekend, Stephan Berg – co-founder of the illustrious “The Bitter Truth“ bitters in Munich mentioned Bittermens in his latest post on the Bitters Blog (in German).We’ll be hooking him up with samples to bring back to Germany next month. 

A note to the folks out in California looking for refills – it’s on the way! Bottles of the Xocolatl and Grapefruit bitters are on the way to Scott (Coco 500) and Thomas (Alembic).