Over this past year and a half many people have found the great pleasure of making themselves a nice craft cocktail and enjoying it in the comfort of their own home.
The problem is that some of us, myself included, don’t really know where to start when it comes mixology. I don’t know why sometimes you shake and sometimes you stir a drink, and I can’t recall ever muddling anything in my life.
I do know that if I am going to have a drink, I want it to be good, and I like to try new flavors. But that is hard thing to do if you don’t know where to begin. I envy a good bartender who can make a craft cocktail and wondered how I could get that experience at home.
Luckily, a new local business, Happy Valley Nomadic Spirits, is here to help home cocktail makers get started on a monthly adventure for your tastebuds. Started by Boalsburg couple Michael and Amy Tedesco, the HVNS takes Michael’s years of experience as a bartender, puts it in a box, and has it delivered to your door.
At Kelly’s Steak & Seafood, where he bartends and creates the craft cocktail menu, Michael enjoys helping customers develop new tastes and try different flavors. The “nomadic” couple loves to travel and experience different drinks from around the world, and the experience comes out in the beverages Michael concocts either at home or behind the bar.
While he was out of work during the pandemic, Michael and Amy started noticing a variety of cocktail subscription services out there, and they decided to “throw their hat in the ring and give it a shot,” using their world travels, Michael’s experience behind the bar, and their home base in Happy Valley as a launching off point.
“We like to travel, and when we do travel, we like to find whatever cool restaurants and bars we can find. As we do that, we kind of search out speakeasies where you are going to find cocktails that you normally don’t get. We kind of gain our inspiration from them,” says Michael.
After testing out some recipes on lucky friends, they started to develop their own unique monthly craft cocktail boxes. Each box contains three handcrafted recipes and enough ingredients to make four cocktails for each recipe at your own home bar.
“Everything we make is essentially from scratch. We go down to the farmers market every Tuesday or Saturday, and we see who we can work with,” says Michael.
They use the kitchen at Kelly’s to whip up the local finds into the ingredients for the cocktails. A typical box will include syrups for mixing, mixers such as club soda, tonic or cider, fruit, garnishes, and other tinctures that are needed in the recipes. All you need to supply is the booze.
Each month has a theme that is shaped around a certain type of liquor. In July was Jamaican rum, with suggestion of Smith & Cross as the “spirit of the month,” but the customer could choose to mix with any Jamaican rum brand they would like.
The recipes are detailed, providing step-by-step guidance on how to create the perfect drink. Those who would like to a little more direction can follow videos starring Michael, Amy, and guest bartenders on their website. And if you are missing some of the tools of the trade, they also offer a cocktail shaker set that has everything you might need to make craft drinks at home.
For Michael and Amy it has been an adventure coming up with and trying all the new recipes, and their friends are enjoying themselves too.
“It is so much fun coming up with and trying new things, especially for all my friends who are like, ‘When are you going to taste test this?” says Michael with laugh. We all could use friends like that.
So far, things have been going smooth, and they are sending those Happy Valley flavors all over the region and beyond and having fun along the way.
Michael and Amy were nice enough to have me over to their house to try one of their new recipes on a humid July day. Michael mixed me up one of their newest concoctions, Yah Mon, a perfect drink for a summer’s day.
The Yah Mon is made with Jamaican rum, and Michael used Smith & Cross that he says is very funky with a lot of banana flavor to it.
“So, we wanted to compliment the banana, so we made a roasted banana simple syrup for it,” explains Michael, and it is this kind of knowledge that helps home drink makers expand their pallet. I would never think to add banana flavoring to a drink, but it pairs perfectly. The drink also contained fresh lime juice and bitters, all of which was neatly in the box shipped to your door.
“Then we topped it, like most Caribbean Island drinks, with fresh nutmeg,” says Michael. It was interesting watching Michael put the drinks together, his knowing hands not needing a recipe book, and shaking the drink to perfection.
One of the cool things about drinking a craft drink is finding the different flavors. From the sweetness of the rum and bananas to the sensation of the spices, this drink kept on showing different sides of itself.
“As it sits and develops it takes on a whole different taste. Right here, you are going to get more of the spices and the sweetness of the nutmeg. As this goes through, the banana and the rum are going to come forward, then the roasted banana and the syrup, as it gets a little warmer, are really going to start popping out.”
Michael, Amy, and I sat in their comfortable living room, sipping on our drinks, and it was nice to hear about their travels around the world and learn about how they met. The different profiles of the drink did start to develop as I sipped my way through it.
It would be fun to entertain my guest the same way, mixing a drink to perfection just like Michael did. Now I know where to start.
More information about Happy Valley Nomadic Spirits can be found at www.happyvalleynomadicspirits.com.
Town&Gown staff writer Vincent Corso enjoys drinking local and meeting new people at central Pennsylvania’s many interesting establishments. This story appears in the August 2021 issue of Town&Gown.
