VERMOUTH IS LIFE!
LAIE is about capturing the feeling of “Vermut hour” – where our friends get together after work and indulge in each other’s company, surrounded by great Vermouth and Tapas. LAIE is a tribute to the Laietani, the original settlers of the beautiful and bountiful lands around Barcelona. Artfully crafted by the oldest Vermouth maker in Catalonia, following the same methods in use since 1880, we select the highest quality wines and marry them with macerated natural aromatic herbs to produce a beautiful Sweet Red Vermouth suited for enjoying on its own, or in cocktails where you want to let the spirit take center stage. Simply serve on the rocks with a slice of orange and an olive, or add a splash of soda and your favorite gin to enjoy a “Vermouth preparado”, or use in cocktail recipes calling for a great vermouth.
Main Botanicals
20 Aromatics including wormwood, gentian, elderflower, cinnamon, young walnuts & local citrus rinds
Tasting notes
A lush amber in the glass, LAIE beckons with an expansive nose reminiscent of cocoa, orange peel, wisps of elderflower, and brûléed caramel.
On the palate, the bittering spices and dry flowers combine with the warmth of caramelized sugar and lay velvet on the tongue.
A clean finish with lingering cinnamon and cola notes prompts another sip. Then another…
Base Wine composition
D.O Penedes wine, made with Macabeo, Xarel-lo, and Parellada grapes.
COCKTAIL IDEAS
LAIE Classic
LAIE Red Vermouth
Slice of orange
Olive
Serve on good cocktail ice and garnish with a slice of orange and an olive.
Manhattan
1 part LAIE Red Vermouth
3 parts Rye whiskey
2 dashes of bitters
Add LAIE Red Vermouth, Rye, and bitters to a mixing glass. Stir well and strain into a cocktail glass. Garnish with a maraschino cherry.
Negroni
1 part LAIE Red Vermouth
1 part Gin
1 part Campari
Mix directly in a glass with ice. Stir gently until very cold. Garnish with a twist.
DISTILLERY STORY
We are grape growers, village people. It is also true to say that we are wine, we are nature and that LA MADRE Vermouth is a fusion of wine, nature and enthusiasm too. It is made with grapes, botanicals and lots of passion.
We are and we feel young, we love our traditions and gastronomic rituals. We like to chat with our friends and have a laugh.
We love the Vermouth hour leading up to lunch. We are LA MADRE Vermouth and we love going out for tapas and meeting up with friends. We love mixing.
We are adventurous, self-taught and we are from an unknown paradise called TERRA ALTA to the south-west of Tarragona, where the Mediterranean influence can be felt in all its grandeur. We are LA MADRE (mother), she who engendered this Vermouth. WE ARE VERMOUTH-MAKERS!
This Spanish Vermouth is macerated with green apples in addition to the botanicals.
LA MADRE WHITE vermouth is a delicious vermouth that you can enjoy and recognize all its nuances easily with ice – even for non-vermouth lovers.
This Spanish Vermouth is macerated with strawberries in addition to botanicals.
LA MADRE ROSÉ is a bright pink colour with subtle tones of red berries.
Spanish Vermouth made with a blend of 32 botanicals from White Grenache and Macabeo grapes.
La Madre Dry is the dry vermouth of the La Madre family. It is ideal to drink with ice and tonic water or in classic cocktails like Clarito.
At Ransom, the production of Vermouth is the great bridge between the winemaking and distilling crafts.
Ransom vermouth harkens back to the flourishing cocktail culture of the Belle Époque, when joie de vivre filled the air and vermouth made the evolutionary leap from charlatan snake oil and disguised refuse to distinguished mainstay of the era’s most popular drinks—the Martinez, the Martini, the Marguerite, and across the pond, the Manhattan. As a revival in the mixing of these classic cocktails encouraged us to bring such endangered spirits as Old Tom Gin back into production, we yearned for an aperitif with the aromatic complexity and grace to complement our spirits.
So began the era of vermouth at Ransom.
The production of vermouth is the great bridge between our winemaking and distilling trades. Beginning in the winery with small lots of aromatic white grapes, we carefully ferment and blend wines of elegance and character, employing traditional techniques to maximize varietal expression, such as fermenting whites on the skins and employing carefully controlled oxidation of wine in barrel. Taking another cue from classic European vermouth houses, our solera system allows us to maintain the consistency and complexity of this unique base wine blend across vintages. In the distillery, we alambically distill and barrel age brandy from our house-made base wine for fortification. Next, our vermouth is infused with a proprietary blend of aromatic botanicals, divined through two years of test batches and blending trials.
While ours are original recipes with elements of whimsy, these vermouth’s are fundamentally classical formulations, with eponymous base notes of wormwood. Our vermouth’s lend depth, complexity, and elegance to cocktails both classic and modern and are worthy aperitifs either neat or on ice. We believe our vermouth’s retain the traditional apothecary signatures of their Belle Époque ancestors while contributing meaningfully to the modern vermouth tradition. Bonne santé!
Ransom Sweet Vermouth
The base wine for this sweet vermouth is a blend of organically and conventionally farmed aromatic white varietals, including Gewurztraminer, Muscat, Riesling and Pinot Gris. To this base Ransom adds the brandy, alambically distilled in house and barrel aged in mixed French Oak. The Vermouth is then infused with a tantalizing blend of aromatic botanicals.
Ransom Dry Vermouth
Wine Enthusiast – 94 points
Taster’s Guild – Gold Medal
The base wine our our Dry Vermouth is a blend of organically and conventionally farmed aromatic white varietals and Pinot Noir blanc. The fortifying brandy is Alambic pot distilled in house from a blend of wines from Pacific Northwest grapes. Barrel aged in mixed French Oak.