A Trip to Wolfhead Distillery in Amherstburg, Ontario

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Tom and Sue Manherz owners of Wolfhead Distillery, pride themselves on being local and combining home-grown ingredients. Corn, barley, rye, hot peppers — and even local limestone, which are used to filter their water —to create flavour profiles for their premium blends of double-barrelled whiskeys and small-batch vodkas.  Wolfhead is Windsor-Essex County’s first premium craft distillery, since prohibition times, and is located in Amherstburg, Ontario.

We recently took a trip to Wolfhead Distillery for a tour tasting and dinner on the outdoor patio. The distillery has a tasting room, a retail store and a 100-seat prohibition-themed restaurant. There is additional seating for 120 on the rustic, lined with whisky barrels patio.

Chef Larry Girard’s menu features Lake Erie perch, charcuterie, portabella fries, barbecued and chicken flatbread.  Chef’s signature dish is garlic fried linguine with mushrooms, green onions, olives, banana peppers and fresh garlic sautéed in olive oil butter. The ingredients are flambéed in "Wolfhead Vodka” tossed in linguine noodles, and finished with parmesan and feta cheeses.

Kavi Reserve Whisky at Wolfhead Distillery

Jackie De Marco and business partner, Steve Wright, are co-founders of Kavi Reserve. Wright a master blender, worked with DeMarco’s father in the business for years and both work as consultants for craft distillers, including Manherz.  Kavi Whisky made at Wolfhead is blended and matured specifically to blend with coffee. It is crafted with a base of aged Canadian whiskies made from a combination of rye, rye malt, barley malt and corn. It exhibits rich oak and spicy rye character, which enhance and complement the coffee. Locally roasted coffee beans (Colonial Coffee in Windsor) are sourced for their unique profiles; cold brewed and then barrel-blended with an exquisite craft whisky. Kavi Reserve is double-aged in barrels, once for the whisky on its own and then again after blending with the coffee.



The rise of small batch spirits in Ontario is driven by indie distillers who craft local takes on whisky, gin, vodka and niche spirits like moonshine. Amherstburg’s Wolfhead Distillery just released Kavi Reserve, another hot new product. It’s the harmonization of cold-brewed coffee and Canadian whisky. An easy way to reinvent the classic Old Fashioned is by simply adding a dash of your favourite bitters and twisting in the oil of the orange zest.
Kavi Old Fashioned
Stir:
2 oz Kavi reserve
2 dashes of bitters
Orange zest 

Pour into rocks glass. Top with ice and orange zest.


7781 Howard Avenue, Amherstburg
www.drinkwolfhead.com

DISTILLERY AND RESTAURANT
·        MON-TUE: CLOSED
·        WED-SAT: 11am - 8pm
·        SUN: 11am - 6pm

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