Getting snowed in isn’t so bad. No work. Movies. Beer. Food. More Beer. It’s the digging out that sucks.
Your everything is probably frozen from all the shoveling at this point. Luckily for you, we’ve been busy perfecting a new winter warmer down at the brewery. This past month we tapped our spin on the classic Hot Toddy cocktail, a Hot Toddy beer served both cold and hot.
The idea came about when our head brewer Eric and his team were scheming up a new beer to bring to the taps this winter. The Plunge, our Belgian-style Ale is a great winter warmer, but the guys wanted to head in a completely different direction with this one. When the whiskey-based Hot Toddy was mentioned, they knew they had to run with it.
The cocktail is traditionally made with whiskey, honey, cinnamon and lemons and we followed a similar blueprint while brewing. The beer was brewed with honey in the boil, fermented with cinnamon and juiced lemons, and aged on whiskey barrel staves to emulate that rich, oaky flavor. It comes in at a soul-warming, hand-thawing 12.5% ABV.
If you’ve been to the brewery for one already, you’ll know that you can enjoy both a cold and hot version. The first recipe that the guys came up with was only meant to be served cold but since it didn’t feel right calling a cold beer a Hot Toddy, they accepted the challenge of challenge of coming up with a hot version that was actually enjoyable to drink.
The two versions don’t differ in the way that they’re brewed; just in the way they’re finished. We modified our in-house draft system in order to serve the hot version which is virtually uncarbonated.
According to Eric, the difference in carbonation and temperature, “actually helps to showcase different flavors in each version. The cold Toddy shifts your palate to focus on the cinnamon and whiskey tones, while the hot Toddy focuses on the honey and oaky characteristics of the beer. You should definitely try both to get the full range of flavors!”
Now that the trains are back up and running, and you’ve had plenty of time to dig out your car after being plowed in, there’s really no excuse not to come warm up with a Hot Toddy available exclusively at the brewery.