theCompass mobile application is a winery, brewery, and distillery locator for North America.

Our handcrafted Absinthe Verte is prepared following the traditions of European master distillers of the 19th Century. We start with imported Chilean Pisco, placing it in our small 150 liter copper potstill, carefully adding the traditional Absinthe Verte herbs: Anise, Grande Wormwood, and Sweet Fennel, together with a number of proprietary botanicals. The herbs are gently distilled at a high alcoholic strength, capturing the essential aromas and oils that are in the very heart of our hand selected flowers and herbs. These herbs are grown and harvested in the fields of Spain, France, and Western Europe, and the unmistakable aromas of these peaceful European meadows are captured in every bottle of our Absinthe Verte. Before the Absinthe Verte is bottled, it must undergo a coloring step. Many commercial absinthes are colored artificially. Ours is colored in the most traditional manner by placing our hand selected coloring herbs (Hyssop, Melissa, and Roman Wormwood) in cheesecloth and steeping the blend in warmed Absinthe Verte. These coloring herbs strengthen the floral aromas and citrusy undertones of the finished Absinthe Verte. The high alcohol content of the Absinthe Verte leaches chlorophyll from the plant material, turning it a wholly natural, vibrant green color that is similar to the gemstone Peridot. This unique hue is one of the reasons that French Impressionists of the Belle Époque took so strongly to traditionally prepared, handcrafted Absinthe Verte.

Following Prohibition, industrialization and mass marketing changed both the character and the crafting of American whiskey. With our whiskey, we have turned back the clock and revived the traditions that were handed down to us from the pioneers of American distilling. Whiskey production was originally handled by either farmers or millers as an admittedly delicious way to store the remainder of the year’s corn and rye harvest. At the time, whiskey was used as a currency, much in the same way the apple brandy was used. It was as good as cash. Barter was king in those days, and whiskey was a valuable commodity, particularly in rural areas. We begin by fermenting a traditional sour mash of corn and rye at colder temperatures, but without the aid of refrigeration. Fermentation takes more time this way, but results in a softer whiskey and develops subtle flavors such as vanilla, pear, rock candy, and raspberry.

Hand bottled, hand labeled, and hand numbered, we have been distilling Leopold’s American Small Batch Gin since 2002. Most gin is produced by placing spirit in a potstill and adding the entire range of botanicals in the still before distilling the entire steep in one run. Not all botanicals (juniper, coriander, etc.) have the same boiling point, so when a distiller distills all the botanicals together, searching for the best juniper flavor, for example, he/she is overboiling the coriander. When botanicals are overboiled, tannin-like flavors are extracted, drying out the final Gin. We take a different tack by placing each individual botanical in the still and distill them off separately. We carefully make cuts like you would for a whiskey: heads, hearts, and tails. The heart portion is when, as an example, the fruity-floral nose of the juniper is at its cleanest. After the heart has been collected, the refined juniper nose gets muddled and cloying, smelling and tasting a bit like pine trees. We discard this portion, favoring the cleaner hearts portion, and this lends our spirit its rounded, clean finish that is unlike any other gin in the world. We apply this method for the rest of our botanicals: Orris Root, Cardamon, Coriander, and hand-zested Valencia Oranges and Pummelos, carefully extracting the best aromas that these botanicals have to offer. The result is a softer, brighter, and more approachable spirit.

New York City may be known as the Big Apple, but a few hundred miles upstate you will find some of the finest apples that America has to offer. For the preparation of our New York Apple Whiskey, we use a wide range of these apples, from the common Golden Delicious, to the rare Macoun apple, searching for the perfect blend of flavors and aromas. When the selection of apples are nearly overripe, they are juiced and gently blended with our whiskey. The distinctive flavors of several varieties of New York State’s finest apples will provide the backdrop to the subtle whiskey finale. After blending, the Apple Whiskey is racked into used bourbon barrels for additional aging. The barrels will add the oak, raisin, and vanilla finish in this handcrafted American Whiskey. The mix of the sweet and tart apples balance perfectly with the charred oak finish, making the New York Apple Whiskey the ultimate small batch after dinner drink, much like a fine cordial or dessert wine.

Our flavored whiskies are made from all-natural ingredients. We simply take our whiskey, blend it with freshly juiced fruit, and finish it in used bourbon barrels before hand bottling and labeling each bottle. The most important step, and the step that no other whiskey distiller takes, is that we age the whiskey together with the added fruit juice in used bourbon barrels. We do this for several reasons. Aging adds barrel flavors to the complexity of the Blackberry whiskey, adding vanilla, toffee, and brown sugar to the finish. But most importantly, the wood of the barrels “breathe,” allowing oxygen in. This oxidizes the blackberries, yielding complex flavor compounds like currants, raisins, and candied fruit.

This whiskey is truly unique. In fact, it is the only whiskey which uses real peaches harvested from the Rocky Mountain region, not artificial colors or flavors, to strike a balance between intense peach flavors that jump out of the glass with the subtleties of a refined whiskey which even the connoisseur will appreciate. We blend the juice of the most aromatic varieties of peaches from the Western Slope with our whiskey and move the entire spirit to used bourbon barrels. The peaches slowly oxidize in the barrel, yielding more complex flavors and colors. When the time is right, it goes straight into bottles.

Silver Tree American Small Batch Vodka is the highest rated vodka distilled and bottled in America according to the Beverage Tasting Institute. The 2009 San Francisco Spirits Competition, the largest of its kind in North America, agreed, awarding Silver Tree a Gold Medal. We distill Silver Tree seven times from a unique blend of potatoes, malted barley, and summer wheat to give our vodka a smooth finish. It is this blend which gives Silver Tree Vodka its subtle, rounded notes, giving it the character of a grain-based vodka and the silky finish of a potato vodka.