The Brandy Bar + Cocktails

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Wed 1/11- $6 specials & In the Company of Writer’s 4-9:00 PM and Thurs 1/12 – 4-9 PM NC School of Arts specials

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Wed 1/11/23 – 4-9:00 PM $6 – Wild Cherry – Notes of rich cherry, marzipan, crushed almonds and a floral edge complemented by nutmeg and cinnamon spiciness with a finish that is unctuous and thick with that allspice and damson alongside dark cherries and fresh tanic grip. OR Do Ferreiro Orujo De Galicia Brandy from Portugal -Notes of flowers, fennel & black pepper, dry and light-bodied with smooth fresh, mentholated fruit flavors on the palate and a long finish. Come on in and learn a little about brandy – you might be surprised!

AND Wed 1/11 – 7-9 PM– NC Writers Network and The Brandy Bar + Cocktails presents guest author John Quinley, PhD. In the Company of Writers presents a series of personal and conversational dialogues featuring guest writers/poets followed by an open mic forum. These inspirational gatherings will elucidate and entertain those attending. The guest author speaks from 7-8 PM with open mic from 8 -9 PM. The Chicago blues music of Mr. Jimmy welcomes you, continues during intermission, and closes the evening. Sign-ups for the open mic visit:https://thebrandybar.com/writers-open-mic/   When John Quinley, PhD, served as a docent at Connemara, Carl Sandburg’s final home, he realized that a biography of Sandburg had not been written in 25 years; most were written in the 1960s and 70s. He wanted to introduce a new generation to this public figure, who during the first half of the twentieth century seemed to be everywhere and do everything as poet and political activist, journalist, lecturer, folk singer, Lincoln biographer, children’s author, novelist, and media celebrity. At his death in 1967, six thousand mourners gathered at the Lincoln Memorial in Washington, D.C. to pay their respects. So, Quinley wrote Discovering Carl Sandburg: The Eclectic Life of an American Icon—an entertaining 140-page book that focuses on different aspects of Sandburg’s life. You can purchase a copy at the Brandy Bar for $16. He can be contacted at jwquinley@gmail.com.

Thurs 1/12 – 4-9:00 PM NC School of the Arts History and Cocktails:  Did you know that North Carolina is home to the first public arts conservatory in the United States? The University of North Carolina School of the Arts (UNCSA) is an arts school in Winston-Salem, NC that grants high school, undergraduate, and graduate degrees  and consists of five professional schools: School of Dance, School of Design & Production, School of Drama, School of Filmmaking, and School of Music. Founded in 1963 as the North Carolina School of the Arts by then-Governor Terry Sanford, the school owns and operates the Stevens Center in Downtown Winston-Salem and is accredited by the Southern association of Colleges and Schools.

The idea was initiated in 1962 by Vittorio Giannini, a leading American Composer and teacher of Composition at Julliard, Curtis and Manhattan, who would later become the School’s founder and first President. He approached then-governor Terry Sanford and enlisted the help of author John Ehle and William Sprott Greene, Jr. and Martha Dulin to support his dream of an arts conservatory. State funds were appropriated, and a Conservatory Committee was established. The School of the Arts became a constituent institution of the University of North Carolina in 1972. Giannini served as President until his death in November 1966 at which time the Pulitzer Prize-winning composer Robert Ward became UNCSA’s second President.

The gala opening of the Stevens Center featured the school’s symphony orchestra conducted by Leonard Bernstein, with Isaac Strn as soloist and Gregory Peck as the Master of Ceremonies. Attendees included Agnes de Mille, Cliff Robertson, Governor James Hunt, President and Mrs. Gerald Ford and Lady Bird Johnson. The school’s campus consists of 77 acres in Winston-Salem near Old Salem.  There are 8 residence halls – 6 for college students, 2 for high school students, an on-campus student apartment complex and an off-campus student apartment complex within walking distance. The school has 11 performance and screening spaces; the ACE Exhibition Complex with three movie theaters. The school mascot was named simply “The Pickles.” There was also a slogan, “Sling ‘Em By The Warts!” but the mascot eventually became “The Fighting Pickles

Some of the Schools distinguished alumni: Christopher Waild staff writer for CBS Series NCIS; Gary Beach Tony award winning actor in The Producers; Tom Hulce Tony Award winning actor Spring Awakening; Joe Mantello Tony Award winning theater director; David Thomas Brown Broadway actor in American Psycho, Book of Mormon; Patrick Bissell principal dancer American Ballet Theater; Leslie Williams principal dancer with Martha Graham Company; Paul Tazewell costume designer with a Tony Award for Hamilton and an Emmy for The Wiz; and Eddie Barbash saxophonist for the Late Show with Stephen Colbert.

Arts Inspired Cocktails:   Oriental Poppies by Georgia O’Keefe: Aperol Spritz – Aperol, Champagne, club soda;  Orange and Yellow by Mark Rothko: Brandy Sunrise – CB Frost, fresh squeezed orange juice, grenadine; Portrait of Van Gough by Toulouse Lautrec: Death in the Afternoon – Absinthe and Champagne;  Self Portrait with Monkey by Frida Kahlo: Pisco Sour – Pisco, Cointreau, sour mix, bitters;  Nighthawks by Edward Hopper – Old Fashioned – C & K brandy, muddled orange & cherries, sugar, bitters; and Fruit/infused flight ½ price       

Reminder we will be closing Jan 16, 2023 through Feb 14, 2023 to recharge. We are accepting party reservations of groups 12+ – just call us 828-845-0546 .     

Wed 1/4 – 4-9 PM – Spiced apple brandy special and Thurs 1/5 -4-9 PM Duct Tape history & Favorites

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Wed – 1/4 – 4-9 PM – Spiced apple brandy special continues!  Due to popular demand, we will continue the spiced apple brandy.  We sold lots with several requests to put it permanently on the menu. 

Thurs – 1/5 – 4-9 PM – Duct Tape History and our favorite cocktails specials:

While sitting around the bar one evening, in a moment of jest, we offered up the subject of “duct tape” and what unusual uses we had found for this miraculous quick fix. Remember the famous Apollo 13 mission?  The astronauts fashioned duct tape and surplus materials into air filtration canisters in the lunar module to keep all 3 astronauts alive for the entire trip home. Every Apollo mission from 11 to 17 carried duct tape with them to the Moon. On the Apollo 17 mission Astronaut Cerman’s hammer in his suit’s pocket had caught the edge of the back right tire’s fender extension and it popped off. Without the fender extension protecting them from the Moon dust, driving the LRV became a serious hazard. Much more abrasive than sand found on earth since the grains are not worn down by wind and water, this lunar dust spread all over instruments and suits and into every nook and cranny. This could heat the instruments to high temperatures potentially causing them to fail, not to mention damage to Astronauts and their suits. Cerman took duct tape and taped the extension together but due to the heavy sand the tape fell off. The astronauts were challenged with creating a replacement fender with only the materials they had on the Moon. Their solution was to attach four of the 28 lunar maps with “gray tape,” carried on board. The maps could be configured in a way that would resemble the fender extension and affixed to the fender with two clamps from the optical alignment telescope. The mission continued as planned. Duct tape, again, saved the day.

But who invented duct tape? The iconic tape was invented by a mom from Illinois named Vesta Stoudt. She wanted to save soldiers’ lives in World War II. In 1943, Stoudt, who had 2 sons serving in the US Navy, was working at the Green River Ordnance Plant. “She noticed that the boxes of ammunition she was packing and inspecting had a flaw,” states Margaret Gurowitz, Johnson & Johnson’s Chief Historian. “They were sealed with paper tape, with a tab to open them. Workers then dipped the entire box in wax to make it waterproof. But the paper tape was very thin, and the tabs often tore off, leaving soldiers frantically trying to open the box while under fire.” Stoudt had one of those “aha” moments and thought: why not make a waterproof cloth tape to seal the boxes. Although she suggested it to her supervisors, she could not gain any support. Like any desperate mother, she wrote to President Franklin D. Roosevelt stating the problem and her solution, including hand drawn diagrams. The President was so impressed he passed her letter on to the War Production Board. The Board asked the Industrial Tape Corporation (later became Permacel – then a Johnson & Johnson operating company) to produce the product. And the rest goes down in duct tape history!

Now back to The Brandy Bar’s conversations on duct tape, one story that we remember was our friend L recounting that she had left her incontinent father in the charge of her 2 sons, ages 10 and 12, while she made a quick visit to the store.  Upon her return she found her father swaddled from waist to knees in rolls of toilet tissue. Securing the entire bandaging was an armor of carefully laced duct tape, crisscrossing and practically covering all toilet tissue. When she asked them why, they pointed out that they wanted to keep grandpa dry, so they made their own solution and it seemed to be working just fine!

A few of your favorite cocktails specials: B & B, Courvoisier and Benedictine – a heavenly drink; Side Car – Martel VSOP, Cointreau, lemon juice – great brandy sour; Jack Rose – Laird’s applejack, grenadine, lemon juice – 1905 drink making a come back; Cherry Bomb – Heering cherry brandy, rum, lime juice, topped with club soda – pleasantly sweet; US flight 1/2 price

Wed 12/28 – 4-9 PM Spiced apple brandy toddy and Thurs 12/29 – 4-9 PM New Year Resolution Manhattans + New Years Eve Celebration

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Wed 12/28 – 4-9 PM – Spiced apple brandy toddy $8 – Laird’s applejack with spices of vanilla bean, orange peels, cinnamon, cloves, nutmeg, and ginger -we suggest heated so as to release the intense spicey-ness of this brandy.

Thurs 12/29 – 4- 9 PM – So have you proclaimed your New Year Resolution(s) (written, oral or silent)? The ancient Babylonians appear to have been the first people to make New Year’s resolutions, some 4,000 years ago. They were also the first to hold recorded celebrations in honor of the new year—though for them the year began not in January but in mid-March, when the crops were planted. During a massive 12-day religious festival known as Akitu, the Babylonians crowned a new king or reaffirmed their loyalty to the reigning king. They also made promises to the gods to pay their debts and return any objects they had borrowed. These promises could be considered the forerunners of our New Year’s resolutions. If the Babylonians kept to their word, their (pagan) gods would bestow favor on them for the coming year. If not, they would fall out of the gods’ favor—a place no one wanted to be.

   For early Christians, the first day of the new year became the traditional occasion for thinking about one’s past mistakes and resolving to do and be better in the future. In 1740, the English clergyman John Wesley, founder of Methodism, created the Covenant Renewal Service, most commonly held on New Year’s Eve or New Year’s Day. Also known as known as watch night services, they included readings from Scriptures and hymn singing, and served as a spiritual alternative to the raucous celebrations normally held to celebrate the coming of the new year. Now popular within evangelical Protestant churches, especially African American denominations and congregations, watch night services held on New Year’s Eve are often spent praying and making resolutions for the coming year.

   Despite the tradition’s religious roots, New Year’s resolutions today are a mostly secular practice. Instead of making promises to the gods, most people make resolutions only to themselves, and focus purely on self-improvement. According to recent research, while as many as 45 percent of Americans say they usually make New Year’s resolutions, only 8 percent are successful in achieving their goals. But that dismal record probably won’t stop people from making resolutions anytime soon—after all, we’ve had about 4,000 years of practice. We can’t believe as popular as the Manhattan is that we have not tried its many riffs but here are five in addition to our “usual”:  Reverse Manhattan – Antica vermouth, brandy, rye, cherry bitters; Black Manhattan – Brandy, rye, campari, bitters; Chartreuse Manhattan – Brandy, Antica vermouth, Chartreuse, bitters; Not Manhattan –Brandy, apple juice, bitters; Rocky Manhattan – Brandy, peach brandy, bitters; Fruit/infused Flight ½ price

Sat. 12/31 – 4-?  Celebration of the New Year of 2023!!  The end of the holiday season will draw to a close on Saturday night and we close with a selection of our champagne holiday drinks that are traditional and special. Entomology of word “holiday,” like Christmas Holiday. Holiday is a compound stemming from the words holy and day. The word ‘holiday’ first surfaced in the 1500’s replacing the earlier word ‘haliday’ which was recorded before 1200 in the Old English book Ancrene Riwle. Earlier about 950, the word was ‘haligdaeg’ and appeared in the Old English Lindisfarne Gospels. It was a compound of halig (holy) plus daeg (day).

Our New Year cocktails – French 75 – Courvoisier, lemon juice, topped with Champagne; Cranberry-Ginger Mimosa – Brandy, cranberry juice, splash of ginger ale, topped with champagne; Jingle Bell Cocktail – Douglas Fir brandy, cranberry juice, soda; or a straight Champagne pour!  Come join us as we watch the “ball’  drop that has been a tradition since 1907, with the first New Year’s Eve Ball having been a 700-pound sphere made out of iron, wood and 100 light bulbs. The custom was inspired by an old maritime tradition, in which “time balls” were dropped at noon so sailors could adjust their clocks to the local time. Since the first ball drop in 1907, a total of seven different versions of the New Year’s Eve Ball have been designed. Eventually, the ball evolved into the newest (and coolest) version that it is today: a brightly patterned orb covered with LED lamps and Waterford Crystal panels that weighs in at nearly 12,000 pounds!