March 28, 2024

Eau de Vie: The Water of Life

May 24, 2015

Northern Michigan may be celebrated for its wines, but some area vintners are branching out and finding success with another traditional European import: eau de vie.

French for "water of life," eau de vie is a clear, unsweetened brandy made from mashed fruit pulp that’s been fermented and distilled. It’s characterized by its high alcohol content – usually 80 proof or higher – and, most notably, its intense fruit flavor. Except for some apple varietals, eau de vies aren’t aged in a cask or barrel; instead, they’re kept in a neutral container and quickly bottled to preserve the unadulterated flavor of their ingredients.

"What you’re trying to do is maintain the pure essence of the fruit," explained Head Winemaker Lee Lutes of Black Star Farms. "Whether it’s pears, apples, cherries, raspberries, apricots, plums"¦the eau de vie should smell and taste like perfectly ripe fruit of whatever variety you’re making."

In Europe, eau de vies are commonly served as a digestif at the end of a meal in a 1- or 2-ounce pour – a tradition northern Michigan producers also encourage. Lutes notes the spirits have other applications, as well.

"You can use them in cocktails"¦or, if you’re a culinary fan and into cooking, you can use them to deglaze a pan or as a finisher in a sauce," Lutes said. "I’ve also poured them over hot desserts. You can have a lot of fun by being experimental with it."

Black Star Farms is the region’s largest producer of eau de vie, producing roughly 1,000 cases a year. The star attraction in the winery’s lineup of fruit brandies – which the company began producing in 1999 – is the Spirit of Pear. Considered a collector’s item, the spirit involves a painstaking process that begins with tying glass bottles over budding Bartlett pears on the tree in the spring, which then grow to maturity within the bottles.

When ripe, the pears-in-bottles are harvested and washed within the container, which is then filled with pear brandy produced from fruit from the same orchard. The bottle retails on the high end – $60 and up – but Lutes notes it can be a one-time investment: the same pear-in-bottle can be refilled with straight pear brandy for years to come.

"It’s one of those pieces that, if you like to collect exotic spirits or if you want to show off something in your home bar, it’s great to have," said Lutes.

While the winemaker acknowledges the process to produce Spirit of Pear is "laborintensive," he said it’s a unique branding piece for the winery and highlights the versatility of local fruit and Black Star’s production techniques.

"It’s a great story to tell in terms of valueadded agriculture because we take a 10-cent pear and turn into a $60 bottle of brandy," he said au de vies also lend themselves well to a wide variety of ingredients. Lutes said he’s distilled everything from pineapples to currants to Saskatoon berries, but generally, he prefers to focus on the fruits that are widely available in northern Michigan. The most important aspect to an eau de vie, he said, is high-quality fruit mashed at the height of ripeness.

"You’ll often get less expensive brandies made from waste fruit that’s been picked off the ground or sorted out in production," Lutes explained. "But that will never make the quality of brandy you want in a product like this.

Distillation is a lot like concentration. If you have something that’s off, or funky in the base, it’s going to be off or funky in the spirit as well."

Lutes said consumers shouldn’t be fooled by low-end products or syrupy liqueurs that can sometimes be confused with eau de vies.

"If you’re not a spirits person, you might see a clear bottle and associate that with a night of bad drinking," he laughed, citing the glut of flavored fruit vodkas now flooding the marketplace. "They’re mimicking the eau de vie flavor"¦but there’s no comparison. You need to have clean fruits and good clean fermentation so the vibrancy of the fruit carries through."

How can you tell you’ve got the real thing?

Check the bottle for local, real fruit ingredients, said Lutes – no artificial components – and, most importantly, apply a taste test.

"An eau de vie should taste like you’ve just bit into a fresh pear or fresh apple," Lutes said.

President and CEO Marie-Chantal Dalese of Chateau Chantal on Old Mission Peninsula applies that same philosophy to the region’s most famous export: cherries. Since 1998, Chateau Chantal has produced a popular cherry Eau de Vie distilled from local tart cherries. To break the skins and get the juices flowing before the distilling process, the company borrows an old-school technique from the winemaking side of its operations.

"We discovered using our grape crusher was not a good plan, as the cherries exploded"¦so we started stomping them with our feet," Dalese said with a chuckle.

After the fruit is fermented, crushed and distilled, the resulting cherry spirit is bottled and sold on its own in 375-milliliter containers, as well as blended with other company wines to create port-style and dessert wines. As with other regional eau de vies, the end result perfectly captures the spirit of northern Michigan orchards in a bottle.

"What’s so unique is the amazing fruit aroma and taste coming off of it," said Dalese. "It provides the pure essence of cherry."

... And you can cook with it!

Cheese Fondue

600 g. (21 oz.) shredded cheese (1/2 Gruyere, 1/2 Emmentaler)

1 garlic clove

1 1/4 c. dry white wine

3 tsp. cornstarch

2 small glasses Chateau Chantal Cherry Eau de Vie ground pepper

nutmeg

Rub a heavy saucepan or heat proof clay fondue pot with the split garlic clove. Dissolve the cornstarch in the Eau de Vie. Put the cheese and wine into the pan and slowly bring to a boil, stirring constantly. When the cheese is completely melted, add the kirsch and cornstarch mixture, stirring vigorously. Continue to cook. Season with pepper and nutmeg to taste. Serve over an alcohol lamp. The cooking should continue on low heat.

Stir constantly with small pieces of bread spread on a fondue fork.

In Switzerland, fondue is usually eaten with bite-sized pieces of crusty bread speared onto a fondue fork; however, one can also use small potatoes or potato pieces. Fondue aficionados dunk their bread in Eau de Vie before dipping into the cheese. And don’t forget: whoever loses his bread in the pan must pay for a round of beer or a bottle of wine. If it happens to a lady, she must kiss the man sitting next to her. On hte whole, however, the former is more popular.

Fondue is traditionally stirred in a figure eight style to keep all the ingredients well mixed.

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