El Bandarra Al Fresco - Barcelona Aperitivo, Drink with Tonic or as a Spritz, Bittersweet, Alternative to Pink Gin, Notes of Grapefruit and Mediterranean Botanicals - 1 Litre Bottle, 14% ABV

Product Information

Susan: And always trying it with tonic to make sure you get the proportions? Right? Because I assume that was the idea to always have it with tonic. A Spritz is simply made,” says Luca Missaglia, Italian bartending legend and the managing partner of aperitivo brand Amaro Santoni. “You make a Spritz with the heart. You make it how you feel, you know?” Alex: So, imagine when my grandparents started in 1962, basically they bought a winery and they started selling bulk wine. At that point, the wine consumption in Spain was so high. It was around 70 liters per person per year of consumption, which now is less than 20. That’s the reality.

Our expert panel put each apéritif to the test, making them according to their “signature serve”, as outlined by the producer. They were seeking a drink that was dry, bittersweet and lighter in alcohol; but, ultimately, an aperitivo they’d like to drink all summer long. Susan: Now, you say that your family had a winery. Were they making vermouth? What kind of wines were they making?Alex: I’m El Bandarra, but it was my brother’s idea. We are a great team, Albert and I spent most, all, of our whole life together. We are twins and he’s a genius, he’s a super creative person. He came up with this idea, so I always say that he’s the software and I’m the hardware. Alex: Yeah, at some point, we thought maybe we should add some more sweetness, but it has a good, really perfect balance between bitterness and sweetness. Maybe it’s a touch dry, but it’s not as dry as or more bitter as others, it’s a soft vermouth. It’s very soft. That’s what we did. We maintained the recipe. At that point, there was no branding. It was only in barrels. No branding. We add some alcohol at the vermouth house for 15% of alcohol volume. And at that moment, we add the sweetness. The traditional method is adding a little bit of caramel and the old vermouths in Spain do it. It’s the traditional way to do it.

If you’ve been to any rooftop or riverside haunt when Britain hits the balmy temperature heights of 12 degrees – hell, even if you haven’t – then you’ll know that the most popular way to serve an apéritif (think: Aperol or Campari) is with soda and a citrus wedge. Most apéritifs add quinine to bring that bittersweet characteristic, meaning tonic is a welcome mixer, too. A new vermouth created by two brothers in Barcelona to challenge “the uptight nature of the drinks business” is being launched in the UK. Susan: I’m thrilled to have you on the show because you were the first person in my “How To Drink” series to discuss vermouth. Why don’t you introduce yourself to everyone and tell us who you are and what you do?So, what we do with this wine is we make a maceration with wormwood to get the bitterness, but we also use different citrus, like grapefruit, bitter orange and different red fruits as well. So, more fruit, more than the ones that we use for El Bandarra vermouth. For Al Fresco, instead of caramel, we use nectar of must or the juice from the grapes for that touch of sweetness. We add a touch of must to give the sweetness. What we did was, we took this recipe and we bottled it and we created El Bandarra. And that’s how it was born in September 2014. Alex: El Bandarra is that kind of friend, she or he, who when you go out, he’s the one who remains in the club until the end of the night. He or she is that this kind of person that is a good person, but he’s a troublemaker. So that is El Bandarra, what El Bandarra means? So, we hope that it brings takes out the Bandarra that you have inside of you.

Alex: First, we tasted it and we loved it and thought that this vermouth was a great product. Then we thought, because it’s wine-based, we are in the middle between wine, beer, and spirits. Vermouth is in the middle. It’s an easy serve. We thought we need to put this drink in a food market or in a festival in Spain, and I’m talking about the first two years when we were seeding the brand in Barcelona mainly and Catalonia region. Alex: In Barcelona, we are the kings of La Hora del Vermut. Not only us, but all the brands of vermouth are also. Then there’s the early afternoon and early evening. We call it tardeo. Tarde is the word for evening in Spanish. Tardeo is that moment, after lunch, that you meet some friends who start drinking, and then the night comes.Alex: Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. They never get drunk. They always stay in this perfect level. We have a word in Spanish – it’s called piripi. When you feel you are a piripi – it’s this moment when you’re not drunk, but you’re you have this feeling. The grannies are the best. Records the default button state of the corresponding category & the status of CCPA. It works only in coordination with the primary cookie.