An exceptional vermouth is dependent upon diverse and aromatic botanicals, and the journey to create Dutch artisanal vermouth Willem’s Wermoed began in one of the oldest and most prolific botanical gardens on the planet, Hortus Botanicus in Amsterdam, planted in 1638. Wermoed means ‘wormwood’, an important ingredient in vermouth that contributes the distinct bittersweet flavor, but wormwood is just one of the 24 fresh botanicals brothers Paul Selier hand-picked from the gardens and infused into a lushly-nuanced oak barrel-aged Spanish white wine.
Pine tops, wild thyme, rosemary and other aromatic botanicals elevate the fruity wine into an intriguingly complex fortified wine with layer after layer of sweet and bitter notes interplaying with one another. Vermouth is edging back onto the trendy bar scene as of late, so rather than dust off a shoddy old bottle on the back of the shelf and sneak a few questionable-quality drops into a Negroni or martini, why not try a small batch, artisanally-produced vermouth like Willem’s Wermoed that one can even sip (gasp) on its own?
