What's Tony Drinking? Cocktails, Whiskies, plus Genever at HerringFest

The Last Word On The Last Drop? Well, No, But…

Pro tip: If you ever have the chance to experience any of the spirits bottled by Last Drop Distillers, go for it without hesitation. The Last Drop has made its name over the last 15 years with beautifully packaged limited-edition bottlings of ridiculously rare whiskies and cognacs, complete with gripping and fascinating backstories. Now they’re starting to get into the blending side as well, under the leadership of managing director Rebecca Jago. Pro tip #2: If you can be in the same room with Rebecca, don’t pass the opportunity up, as she’s a delightful person and there’s likely to be some top-notch booze nearby. Case in point — The Last Drop 32 Year Old Single Malt Irish Whiskey, unveiled at the Pebble Bar in midtown Manhattan in the presence of the woman who created it, Louise McGuane , founder of whiskey bonder JJ Corry. It’s finished in Oloroso sherry butts, which would normally elicit a yawn from me. But rather than the Oloroso’s typical orange/almond/rancio notes, this gem is lively and fruity, with lots of dark berry on the palate. Rebecca brought other Last Drop samples to, um, sample as well — I’m not ashamed to say I went back for seconds of the astounding Tawny Port duo (release No.11; the Irish whiskey is No. 32), featuring ports from the same bodega — one laid down in 1970, the other in 1870. Like I said, never pass up an opportunity to spend time with Rebecca Jago.

53 Is the Magic Number

The words “pan-Asian restaurant in Midtown” can be translated by most food and drink- savvy New Yorkers as “you don’t want to go here.” But 53, from the folks who brought us the seminal Marea, is the glorious exception to the rule. The missus and I went there because she was looking for good zero-proof cocktails, which they have plenty. Her favorite was the Godai, with kokuto sugar from Okinawa, grapefruit bitters, licorice root, and much to her amazement, a non-alcoholic whiskey that actually tasted like whiskey! And the Leitz Eins Zwei Zero non-alc sparkling Riesling was hands down the best zero-proof wine either of us had ever tasted. But I like my booze, and their higher-than-zero proof cocktails were spectacular. The mai tai, with a blend of rums from Guyana, St. Lucia, Martinique and Jamaica, is a contender for best in town (more research is needed, of course), while their take on a whiskey sour with Kavalan whisky and, I believe, passion fruit (or was it mango?) is a delightful, lightly tropical take on the classic. It’s worth bellying up to the bar just for the drinks, but then you’d miss the mind-blowing food. So settle in for dinner and a bunch of cocktails is my advice.

Get Right to the Point (Seven)

Speaking of surprisingly good restaurants in Midtown Manhattan… Point Seven, the latest venture from chef Franklin Becker, recently opened its doors in that weird five-block non-neighborhood known as Vanderbilt Ave., where Grand Central Terminal and the MetLife building reside. Calling it a seafood restaurant is like calling Aaron Judge a baseball player — technically accurate but does not convey the awesomeness factor at all. The bar is visually stunning, and the drinks match the decor. My favorite of the bunch was the tropically-themed Rescue At Sea, with an unspecified blend of rums, banana, cinnamon, lime, sunflower seed (!), and Tempus Fugit’s Gran Classico bitter, served in a sea monster-shaped mug. If you’re not a tiki fiend like I am, their Among The Ferns is a smoky spirit-forward blast, with Del Maguey Vida mezcal, Sweet Gwendoline gin, blanc vermouth, poblano, Aveze gentian liqueur, and grapefruit bitters. This one is NOT for amateurs. And this isn’t called What’s Tony Eating? but I have to mention that I never knew I liked crispy fish tails before eating them at Point Seven. Now I can’t stop thinking about them.

HerringFest Comes But Once A Year

Established during the halcyon pre-pandemic days of 2019, HerringFest has become an annual tradition — if three years out of the last five counts as “annual” — in the Sachs household. It’s supposed to take place in June with the arrival of nieuwe maatjes herring from Holland, but scheduling being what it is, we waited until autumn for this year’s Fest. Tradition holds that Philip Duff (of Old Duff Genever fame and, of course, a What’s Tony Drinking? regular) commandeers my kitchen and dining room for an afternoon, supplying me and a bunch of the drinks industry’s leading players with copious amounts of fresh herring filets from Russ & Daughters on the Lower East Side and genever from his own supply, while I throw open my packed-to-the-rafters liquor closet, plucking out prime bottles for collective consumption (and occasionally mild inebriation).

Bottles at HerringFest — HerringFest bottles

Did we have fun? When you pack the likes of journalist extraordinaire Kara Newman, Eleven Madison Park beverage deity Sebastian Tollius, Patent Pending grand poobah Nikola Nikoletic, bartender/author/consultant/all-around cool cat Frank Caiafa, and Philip AND Elayne Duff, the First Couple of intoxicating liquors, into a room with massive amounts of fish and booze, it’s impossible to not have a good time. In fact, the fun kept going… and going… and going. Philip and I kicked things off at noon with a taste of his killer new spiced rum, Goatz (available soon? I think?). As the crowd waxed and waned through the afternoon, we worked our way through Old Duff Holland House cocktails; FEW Spirits/Alice In Chains’ excellent new bourbon, All Secrets Known; two expressions of the new raicilla Sebastian is working on; vintage martinis made by Frank with vintage Seagram’s gin bottled in the 1960s; and an available-only-in-Japan shochu donated to the cause by Nikola, to name a few.. It all culminated in a 5:00 appearance by newly-minted Bourbon Hall Of Fame inductee Trey Zoeller, who’d come by for what he thought was a one-on-one tasting of the new Jefferson’s Bourbon expression, Tropics: Aged In Humidity. But he didn’t mind the crowd, and five hours of frivolity had merely warmed us up for what turned out to be an excellent, excellent new bottling. Aged in the high humidity of Singapore, Tropics is a little fruity, a little sweet, a little oaky, a whole lot of delicious. And to make Trey feel welcome in the Big Apple, I brought out a bottle of his limited edition New York bottling, brought down to proof with the finest damn water in these 50 states (fight me, Kentucky). Also delicious! This is why he’s in the Hall of Fame and we’re genuflecting in his direction.

After all that, we STILL weren’t done, despite my wife’s trying to remove all guests from the premises. Frank spotted my bottle of Michter’s 20 Year Old bourbon and said, in all innocence, “How about a nightcap?” I mean, who was I to say no? Seven hours after it had begun, the epic day finally came to an end. But the memories linger on… kind of like the smell of herring, which lingered in my apartment for days afterward.