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 Kara Newman here, and happy September, Top Shelfers—drinks school is back in session. Don’t worry, we’re not ready to get completely serious just yet: I’ve got the lowdown on one of the most fun vodka flavors that has ever crossed my desk, and a cocktail that promises prosperity. But first, some drink links:
Pizza, but make it vodkaI’m 100% on board to sample something oddball—if it’s delicious. (You’ve already heard my ”always order the weirdest drink on the menu″ manifesto.) But real talk: A lot of flavored vodka is just objectively terrible. The flavored vodka boom of the late 1980s and ’90s brought a number of fruity options that smell enticing but have an ersatz, bitter taste—fine for vodka-sodas and not much else. And the 2000s–10s brought the worst offenders: weird confected varieties purporting to be “cake” or “cinnamon bun” or “bubble gum” (and I beg of you, miss me with this infantilizing ”So Fluffy” cotton-candy-flavored monstrosity). They all taste like vanilla and plastic and broken promises.  Meanwhile Fireball was making cinnamon whiskey with actual human tears. Source: Sazerac So yes, I was a little skeptical when I learned about Pizza Vodka, from Rhode Island’s ISCO Spirits ($30). But I’m a fan of ISCO’s lightly briny Ostreida Vodka, distilled with oysters, so I had to give this bottling a pour. It didn’t disappoint: The clear liquid has a big, tomato-y scent and oregano-forward flavor and a mouthwatering, garlicky exhale. (Seriously; keep a breath mint in your back pocket.) Put all together, it really does taste uncannily like a saucy slice. The product began as ”Li’l Rhody Pizza Strip″ ($20 for 375ml), a nod to Rhode Island pizza strips: sheet pans of focaccia with tomato sauce, served at room temperature and cut into rectangular strips. “It’s a Rhode Island version of something they have in other states, where it might be called ‘party pizza’ or ‘bakery pizza,’” says ISCO chief executive officer and co-founder Manya Rubenstein. Unlike pizza, it’s usually cheeseless, “so it can sit out all day and be fine.”  ISCO Pizza Vodka. Source: ISCO The wheat-based vodka, which made its debut in August, is macerated with tomato, basil, oregano and pizza spices, then distilled to combine the flavors. But what differentiates the new spirit is that—like pizza—it’s also made with mozzarella, which is infused at the end. (No, it’s not a milk-washed clarified spirit; lactose-intolerant folks, proceed with caution.) The Li’l Rhody is sold in Rhode Island and Massachusetts, the Pizza Vodka everywhere else. You can draw a line from the OG Absolut Peppar, which the Swedish vodka producer introduced in 1986 as a shortcut for bars to make bloody marys, straight through to this bottling.  And not too long ago, London’s cocktail craze was for vegetable martinis. Illustration: Patricia Doria While the Pizza Vodka wouldn’t be out of place in a bloody, I can also see it in savory martinis. Bartenders already are finding creative uses for it, including the Caprese punch at Bar Palino Boston, or a Negroni Slice, coming to New York’s Dear Irving Gramercy for Negroni Week later this month. (I’ve written on my feelings about the Tomatini.) Or you can try a different approach. “The Pint in Worcester, Massachusetts, developed the Italian Stallion shot,” Rubenstein says. “You shake Parmesan cheese on your hand, lick it, take a shot of Pizza Vodka, then a whole pepperoncini pepper chaser.” In addition to Pizza Vodka, here are four other boundary-pushing vodkas that might seem a little strange but get my thumbs-up.  Four flavored vodkas worth buying. Source: Vendors Mushroom Flavored Vodka from Mushroom Spirits, an Ithaca, New York, craft distillery ($20 for 375ml). Try the hen-of-the-woods and shiitake bottlings. Read more about them here. Charbay Green Tea Vodka ($35 for 1 liter). Floral and grassy with, yes, a pleasing green tea note. Would be great in a highball. Smirnoff Spicy Tamarind ($13). Think fruity sweet heat; it’s meant to emulate chile powder-dusted Mexican tamarind candies. Kastra Elion Vodka ($55). This isn’t a flavored vodka, but a Greek vodka distilled with olives, which gives a pleasingly unctuous texture and faint salinity. It made Bloomberg’s Best Spirits of 2022. Your next non-alc pourAlthough we still have a minute before Sober ’Tober takes hold, it’s still good to take a break from imbibing every now and then—and the ever-increasing range of nonalcoholic drinks make it easy. One of the first on the NA scene was Seedlip, a botanical distillate that’s a little like gin. A decade after Seedlip’s 2015 debut, founder Ben Branson is returning with Sylva, a wood-aged non-alc that’s a little like whiskey.  Although it’s worth asking, who are nonalcoholic drinks for, anyway? Photographer: Isa Zapata for Bloomberg Businessweek “Sylva is an Old English word meaning ‘of the forest,’” explains Branson from his office (with a tree-lined view) in the Colne Valley in North Essex, where the distillate is currently made. Plans to open a second distillery and maturation lab in upstate New York, on the site of a 500-acre former dairy farm in Columbia County, have shifted from this past summer to 2026. As inspections and paperwork continue—“unsexy things,” Branson says—he’s looking ahead to gaining access to the site’s 250 acres of woodland. “Trees are full of flavor,” he says—and there are 73,000 species of ‘em worldwide. “I asked myself questions like ‘Why do we age liquids in a barrel? Why are 90% of them one species, oak? Are there different ways of working with wood and different woods?’” He began experimenting with varieties of wood, manipulating each by “chipping it, roasting it, toasting it, smoking it.”  Sylva Orchard explores the flavors of cherry, plum and apple woods on a malt barley base. Source: Sylva Instead of a base of sugarcane or fruit, all the Sylva bottlings start with a grain-based NA distillate, making it veer close to whiskey territory. Yet, Branson insists, “I have a lot of love for the whiskey world, but I have no interest in trying to mimic that.” The first Sylva release, Padauk, launched in the UK in September 2024, at high-end spots such as Selfridges, Berry Bros & Rudd and Fat Duck. “It was quite rich, wintery, lots of bold kind of chocolate and spice,” Branson says. Padauk can also be found at some top US spots, including the Dead Rabbit in Manhattan and Chicago’s Alinea (“it was specifically requested by Grant Achatz,” Branson says), and can be purchased via online retailer the Zero Proof ($60 for 500ml). By comparison, the second release, Silver Hazel (made with a malted rye distillate and aged with oak, hazel and silver birch), had a brighter, more vibrant quality. A third release, Orchard, explores fruit wood, and appeared at the end of August.  Sylva’s UK distillery. Photographer: Ned Boggis Although the US distillery is delayed, Branson is still dreaming about which of America’s 881 native tree species will find their way into future batches. “We’ve been doing some experiments here in the US on New York state maple wood, apple wood and American oak, on a New York state rye distillate base. That’s shaping up to be our first US release.” Down the line, an outpost in Japan (“they have fantastic tree coverage, over 70%”) might be a longer-term goal. And Mizunara is already all the rage in high-end hooch. But for now, it’s about “learning as much as we can about trees and wood,” Branson says. “We’re gearing up to taste the next 200 trees in the fall.” I laugh—surely he’s not out there, literally gnawing on trees like a deranged woodchuck? No: The team uses ultrasound to extract flavor from wood into water, for tasting purposes. “There isn’t a book, there isn’t a website where you can understand. Even fig wood or mulberry or lemon or apricot wood—there isn’t an index where you can understand what these woods taste like. We’re doing all the groundwork to have a library,” Branson says. “It’s definitely head-scratching most of the time.” Cocktail of Month: Chom Chom Rambutan MartiniDrink something delicious and want the recipe? Let us know at topshelf@bloomberg.net, and we’ll try to track it down for a future edition.  La Dông’s signature rambutan martini, the Chom Chom. Source: La Dông At Michelin-starred Vietnamese restaurant La Dông in Manhattan’s Flatiron District, the classic lychee martini is given a glow-up with rambutan, a Southeast Asian fruit with a similar, though less floral, juicy sweet-tart tropical flavor. Of note, each drink on the menu is assigned a lucky number; this one is given 2,628—“Promising Prosperity.” “Back home, we honor our ancestors with offerings of fruits like rambutan, believed to bring prosperity,” says owner and beverage director Jaruwijit Jaruthiphayakhantha. In its whole form, the rambutan is hard to miss, with its rosy exterior and spiky, hairlike texture; in Vietnam, rambutan is also called chom chom, the Malay word for hair. But the fruit within resembles an oversize pearl. Here, a canned version is blended into a cordial, which adds delicate fruity sweetness to the drink. Note: Why two vermouths? At the restaurant, the drink is adjusted with citric acid to balance out the sweetness; here, a small measure of dry vermouth provides a similar acidic effect.  As for which vermouth brand to buy? Can’t go wrong with these. Source: Vendors Chom ChomCourtesy Jaruwijit Jaruthiphayakhantha, owner and beverage director, La Dông, New York Serves 1 1 oz vodka Rambutan, for garnish Stir all ingredients with ice in a mixing glass for 30 seconds. Strain into a coupe glass. Garnish with rambutan speared on a toothpick. *To make rambutan cordial: Blend 1 can Aroy-d Rambutan with its syrup and strain through cheesecloth. (Before blending, be sure to set aside one or more whole rambutans to garnish the drink.) More from Pursuits
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