The Golden Age of Spirits
By David S. Mayne
Introduction
Near extinction
Golden Age of Spirits we need to take
Less than a hundred years ago
a trip in the way back machine and
including all future generations would
got involved with alcohol in the first
and some history.
again. They created a constitutional
we were hunter-gatherers. I have
at Wildwood in Portland, Oregon.
alcoholic beverages would be forever
tribes found some type of fermenting
Csanky does a special thing with gin
my drink and glanced across the bar
properties. There are many cases in
a drink of his choice. He returned
cocktails. How historically ironic, I
We live in the greatest time in the
history of the world — the golden age
America
explain why as I offer an anecdote
never be able to enjoy a legal drink
of distilled spirits and cocktails. I’ll
Recently, I enjoyed Happy Hour
Bartender
par
excellence
Ryan
decided
that
everyone
amendment to insure that drinking banned. I thought of this as I sipped
see the big picture of how humans
place. For most of human history
no doubt that at some point various
fruit and discovered its mind altering
at a group of women enjoying their
nature of animals doing just that.
with a Gin & Tonic. Ah the Gin &
thought, considering in large degree
years ago when humans made a
Empire during the first ugly phase
Prohibition in the first place.
permanent agricultural settlements
contraire Ryan’s Gin & Tonic was
the asteroid that wiped out the
took off.
on Earth 65 million years ago. Only
evolutionary significant — surplus
cocktails so I asked him to make me
Tonic, the drink that helped save an
it was women who helped bring about
But it wasn’t until about 11,000
dramatic shift into a new lifestyle —
like
that our booze drinking history really
one of the best cocktails I’ve ever
dinosaurs and nearly killed off all life
With agriculture you get something
made my taste buds swim in ecstasy.
a small handful of distillers survived
of globalization. Boring you say, au
had with a rich flavor spectrum that It tasted so good it wasn’t fair.
Perhaps it was because Ryan
Csanky distills the Aria Gin himself. He also makes the tonic water. This
was no bathtub gin and tonic. It
made me appreciate the phenomenal
level of artisanship now available to
the spirits drinker and it all almost
didn’t happen.
Prohibition
was
kind
of
Prohibition and it set the craft back for decades.
food
and
that
leads
to
other
important things — a division of
labor to perpetuate that surplus, a
government to manage that labor,
The beginning of booze
plus professional armies to protect
that surplus from outsiders who
want to steal it. Best of all, surplus
But I am getting ahead of myself
food created leisure time. Time to be
understand why we are living in The
that surplus fruit and grain into beer
historically
speaking.
To
truly
creative and figure out how to turn
and wine.
www.ArtisanSpiritmag.com 41