From The Lens w h y d i d n ’ t i th i n k o f th at ?
Sweet Success in Bitters El Guapo Bitters, Syrups and Tonics has become a fast favorite with home cocktail makers and James Beard Award-winning restaurants alike. by Ashley McLellan photos by sara essex bradley
New Orleans and its residents have a long-
storied history with the cocktail, from its fabled first beginning in the Crescent City, to the overall population’s matter-of-fact rejection of Prohibition, to New Orleans women storming the Sazerac Bar in 1949. We take our spirits seriously. Follow that local love affair to a new national resurgence in the craft of cocktail making, and the time is ripe in New Orleans (and beyond) for a local company looking to cash in on quality-made cocktail products. That local company is El Guapo Bitters, Syrups and Tonics, a line of hand-crafted bitters, tonics and syrups inspired by New Orleans flavors and experiences and created by Christa Cotton, CEO of New Orleans Beverage Group. Cotton, a Leesburg, Georgia native, was born into the spirits business, and in college at Auburn University worked to help her family create 13th Colony Distillery, Georgia’s first craft distillery. She moved to New Orleans in 2010, where she married her public relations background with her love of craft cocktails. Cotton took on Trumpet Advertising’s Louisiana Office of Tourism account before establishing the New Orleans Beverage Group in 2017. She acquired the El Guapo brand that same year, with the goal of taking the already established bitters and tonics company to a new level of success. “El Guapo started as a hobby,” she said. “Our first commercial kitchen began production in 2014, and we’ve been developing award-winning products ever since.” Since its 2014 launch, Cotton said the company has garnered national recognition within the specialty food and beverage community.
88 / Biz New Orleans / february 2019
El Guapo Bitters, Syrups and Tonics features craft cocktail accessories inspired by New Orleans flavors such as “Creole Pecan,” “Crawfish Boil,” “Lemonade” and “Gumbo.”
“Our products have been recognized by the Good Food Awards. Our Chicory Pecan Bitters and Rose Cordial Syrup were both winners in 2018. El Guapo’s Sweet Potato Syrup and Tricentennial Bitters are finalists for the 2019 Good Food Awards as well,” she said. The Good Food Awards is an annual small-batch, hand-crafted food and beverage product competition held by the Good Food Foundation in San Francisco. Finalists are selected from more than 2,000 total entries from across the United