Lisa Kocay - Contributor for Forbes | Oct 27, 2022
Wilderton Botanical Spirit is bringing new life to non-alcoholic spirits. The spirits are rooted in raw botanicals crafted by hand in the Pacific Northwest.
The company’s fragrant Lustre expression is a take on the All That Lustres cocktail recipe that includes Pellegrino Chinotto as a mixer. Wilderton’s version creates a sparkly and slightly bittersweet non-alcoholic spritzer.
Their latest release, the Bittersweet Aperitivo, boasts a fragrant blend of grapefruit, orange blossom and Italian lemon that is married with heady undertones of sandalwood and punctuated with bitters from gentian and a tinge of wormwood. Lending a subtle wine-like note and counterpoise to these aromatics and herbs is Chardonnay grape juice, which offers a hint of sweetness.
Wilderton, co-founded by Brad Whiting and Seth O’Malley, takes a new approach to botanical spirits. The products are handcrafted by lead distiller O’Malley, whose expertise in tea making, perfumery, culinary application and alcoholic craft spirits informs the zero ABV liquid’s elegant flavors and intoxicating aromas. Wilderton utilizes generative distillation for their spirits, which begins as water, thus making it so there is zero alcohol to be removed from the liquid during the process.