Ilina from Raleigh, North Carolina featured this Templeton Rye cocktail recipe on her blog Dirt & Noise a few weeks ago as part of her 5:00 Fridays cocktail series. Ilina’s recipe was inspired by a neighborhood tradition called “Brown Liquor Night,” and features a homemade basil simple syrup.

Many of us have outdoor fire pits or fireplaces so we engage in porch pyrotechnics on a regular basis. Brown Liquor Night just begs for some rocks glasses clinking fireside. So far the drinks flit between whiskey on the rocks or bourbon on the rocks. It’s high time to jazz things up a bit, no?

So for the gentlemen (and occasional gentle women who join the par-tay) here’s my contribution to Brown Liquor Night:

Porch Rye
1 ounce Templeton Rye
3 ounces ginger ale
2 teaspoons basil simple syrup (or a tish more if you like it sweeter like I do)

For the simple syrup:
Stir together 1 cup water, 1 cup sugar, 1 cup torn basil leaves in a saucepan over medium-high heat. Stir frequently and heat until sugar is dissolved. Strain into a container and chill about 30 minutes. This should keep up to a month in the fridge, but I bet you’ll use it up before then.

Mix all the ingredients together in a rocks glass filled with ice. Garnish with a basil leaf or two. If you are feeling particularly industrious, add basil leaves to an ice tray, fill with water and freeze. Voila, basil ice cubes! Go on and go all Martha Stewart on your friends.

Cheers Llina! I love the “Brown Liquor Night” – it sounds like something every neighborhood should start up! Drinking American whiskies straight up or mixed in cocktails is a growing trend as palates change and a quest for domestic products increases.

Nothing says I am a cocktail person more than ordering a rye whiskey cocktail. Rye whiskey offers the perfect combination of dry spicy notes that can stand up to the sweet, herbaceous or fruit juices you might be mixing it with. Making your own different syrups with local seasonal products is easy, just follow the 50/50 water to sugar ratio, steep your creation and strain. Don’t be intimidated.

Cheers,

Michael Killmer, Brand Manager

Feel free to embrace the “Classic Cocktails” at our Barkeep site and on our YouTube Channel.

You might remember bikers Troy Cobb and Zach Snavely from their visit to the Templeton Rye distillery back in July. After graduation, they set out on a cross country biking adventure from Pennsylvania to Oregon, passing through Iowa along the way. We welcomed them to Templeton, Iowa with a tour of the distillery, treated them to lunch and gave them some Templeton Rye gear for the road. The guys completed their trip to Oregon in mid-August and recently sent us this “thank you” note and photos from their trip. Congratulations to the guys for completing their tour. We love meeting people who are doing cool things and were excited to be a part of their journey.

Hey Scott,

Wanted to thank you so much for the generosity you and the rest of the
Templeton Rye crew showed us as we were passing through. We concluded
that Iowa was the most fun state that we passed through, mainly
because of the great people that we met there. Troy and I completed
our trip to the Oregon coast in mid August. I’m attaching a few
pictures we took along the way with our TR gear including Mount
Rushmore, Bighorn Mountains, Yellowstone National Park, and our
continental divide crossing in Idaho. Have been telling everyone here
in PA about the uniqueness of your product; hopefully someday we’ll be
within your sales area! Hope to visit Iowa again soon. Thanks again
and best wishes!

Sincerely,

Zach Snavely

Many of you have been asking about our increased allocation during the holidays so I wanted to take a minute to explain this to you. As you may know, our product spends at least four years aging in the barrel. We can’t go back in time and make more so we “have what we have” until some of our scaled-up production becomes available late next year. We’ve chosen to allocate the product we have until then, and we send product to Iowa and Illinois at the beginning of every month. In Iowa, we have basically sent 400 cases per month to the State from Jan-Sep of 2009. We backloaded our allocation around the holidays and sent 1,200 cases to the State for October last week, and we’re following that up with another 1,200 cases in November and 600 cases in December. The good news is that it should be a little bit easier to find a bottle of The Good Stuff for the next few months. We will return to a lower allocation in January but are quickly approaching November of 2010, the date when our scaled-up production starts to come on line. We sincerely appreciate your patience as we move toward that milestone date.

Cheers,
Scott Bush
President, Templeton Rye

Michael Killmer, Templeton Rye Brand Manager and Brand Ambassador for Chicago, demonstrates how to make a cocktail he created called The First Lady in honor of Michelle Obama.

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Templeton Rye bottler Pat Zubrod talks about writing the labels and other aspects of working at the distillery. If you are a fan of The Good Stuff, you would probably recognize Pat’s handwriting as she fills out the batch, barrel and bottle numbers on the back of each bottle.

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Bob McDermott, owner of The Beer Bistro in the heart of the West Loop in Chicago talks about why he likes Templeton Rye and how he serves at his bar.

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Centenarian Art Rix shares a story about taking a trip to Omaha during the prohibition era and how he and his wife ended up at a speakeasy that served Templeton Rye.

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Michael Killmer, Templeton Rye Brand Manager and Brand Ambassador for Chicago, demonstrates how to make a Shirley Templeton.

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Dick Prall performing at Rock & Rye

The second annual Rock & Rye Summer Music Festival was held on Saturday, August 8th in Templeton, Iowa, and was a great success. The day started at the Templeton Rye distillery with a fermentation and distillation demonstration by Assistant Master Distiller Keith Kerkhoff and distillery tours led by TR Founder & President Scott Bush. Guests were treated to a BBQ lunch prepared by award winning BBQ team the Woodfellas and wonderful beer, including Templeton Rye barrel aged products from Court Avenue Brewery and Rock Bottom Brewery. Local Carroll County winery Santa Maria was on hand as well.

The festival featured a variety of great musical acts. The Nadas played a terrific acoustic set in the distillery on a stage constructed from used whiskey barrels. Outside, Brian Joens played a great acoustic set and was followed by the lively and talented brass swing band The Prairie Cats. Fans rushed to see local favorites Aged Spirits perform their own rock version of Templeton Rye by The Nadas. Dick Prall wowed with a incredible set, and Hairball left no doubt that they came to rock the house. It was a great day in Templeton.

Scott & Keith explaining fermentation and distillation to guests.

Fans enjoying The Nadas in barrel warehouse.

A view of the stage from above.

Fans beginning to arrive.

Kevin and Scott with a member of Hairball.

Hairball being introduced by their biggest fan (Kevin Boersma).

Festival attendees rocking out to Hairball.

Jeff Donahue of Province in Chicago shares the story of the restaurant and how Templeton Rye fits in perfectly.

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