INTEL: Take a Tiny Cocktail Flight at Klocke Estate
The Tiny Cocktail Flight at the Klocke Estate, Hudson | Photo: Konrad Odhiambo/The Dishing.
Take a tiny cocktail flight at Klocke Estate
Tiny cocktails are popping up everywhere spurred by declining alcohol consumption, preferences for low-alc or zero-proof drinks, and Ozempic shrinking appetites + tolerance for booze. For some, the tiny cocktail is the answer with cute names like the “snaquiri” + “snacktini” — plus half the size and less than half the cost.
Words: Susie Davidson Powell
Photos: Konrad Odhiambo/The Dishing.
Shoot location: The Klocke Estate
The cocktails: A flight of Klocke Estate FLYBACK ready-to-drink (R.T.D) cocktails — $29 for 3.
The bottles: Take a full-size bottle home for $39.
The place: The Klocke Estate, Claverack (nr. Hudson)
The backstory: The Klocke Estate borrows its name from the Dutch word for clock (klocke) to highlight time as the essential ingredient in brandy production. And now their ready-to-drink cocktail range is branded Flyback, the name for the second hand of a stopwatch.
Since The Klocke Estate opened to the public last year, its elevation, soaring views, sunsets, meticulous interior design by celebrity designer Ken Fulk, onsite farm-to-table restaurant helmed by Californian executive chef Becky Kempter - and staggering $21 million investment - have been much of the story. But there’s far more to the 160-acre estate’s distillery operations where every detail - from soil testing and irrigation to the regeneratively farmed 43 varieties of apples and 9 cold-tolerant grape varietals (including vidal blanc and ugni used in cognac and Armagnac production) planted in 2018, and constant tasting/analysis of the brandy maturing in neutral wood barrels, is carefully logged by the Klocke Estate’s Brandy Distiller and Director of Farming and Production, Caleb Gregg. As Caleb explains, “we’re still learning about our parcel of land so the exact variety of apples, precise fermentation times, fruit batches, nitrogen levels — all of this data helps with our learning” to produce the most consistent, terroir-driven estate brandy, eau de vie and vermouth.
The tour: Whether you go for cocktails and dessert or full dinner, the pro move is to stop by for a tour of the distillery. Owner John Frishkopf imported the copper Charentais Alembic still from France along with the German müller used to make eau de vie. Along the way, you’ll be invited to smell the botanicals and herbs, taste the distilled spirits at different points in production and see barrels aging in the chai (“shay’.) Tour tidbits include intel that fruits pressed during spirit production are composted for the gardens while heat generated by the brandy stills is converted to heat the building and its hot water.
Tiny cocktails: You should have cocktails at the bar, admiring the view through the wall of glass and refractive pendant lamps dangling like teardrops overhead. Even the rich dining room decor to your left and copper distillery equipment behind glass to your right is part of the scene. You might order a low-ABV red or white vermouth spritz or full-size signature appletini served in a shallow coupe with a sidecar on ice. But the new release of the FLYBACK ready-to-drink cocktails means you can sample all three in a flight of tiny cocktails served in miniature stem glasses collected during upstate antiquing missions and estate sales.
The FLYBACK bottled cocktails offer a modern Klocke twist on three classics:
Flyback Appletini: A blend of Klocke Estate Apple Brandy, Honeycrisp apple juice, Brevis white vermouth.
Flyback Brandy Manhattan: Aged French brandy, Brevis Red vermouth + Klocke bitters.
Flyback Claverack Old Fashioned: An Old Fashioned made with Calvados apple brandy, local maple syrup + Klocke bitters.
*Bottles to purchase contain 4 full-size cocktails. ($39)
