This one caught my eye as quite a bit unusual. It is spirits with added mushrooms, sea lettuce, parsnips and other root vegetables. It is Durt-brand spirits, produced by Melkon Khosrovian, and is not to be confused with Root-brand spirits. I don’t see much on the label or on the web to suggest what it tastes like, or how it is to be used, except where the label says “packed full of the umami flavor.” Wikipedia explains that umami is one of the five basic tastes along with salty, sweet, sour, and bitter, and “can be described as a pleasant ‘brothy’ or ‘meaty’ taste with a long lasting, mouthwatering and coating sensation over the tongue.” Not to be left out of the umami-fest, here is a beer with plenty of umami, and a wine/sake “bursting with umami goodness.”

On a long drive recently, NPR held up Malort as the gold standard for what tastes bad, as if this had been firmly decided. So, after hearing about this concoction over the years, it was time to see what all the revulsion was about. The New York Times said “The taste has been compared — by advocates and detractors alike — to rubbing alcohol, bile, gasoline, car wax, tires and paint thinner.” One “Malort face” is here, a collection is here (and NPR’s audio reaction is here).

Malort is Swedish for wormwood, a key ingredient of this liqueur. The same mischievous plant (also known as Artemisia absinthium) also provides a key ingredient and the name for absinthe and vermouth. Recent Jeppson’s labels do not mention the following, but the writing seemed so distinctive that I wanted to capture it before it recedes further into the past:

Most first-time drinkers of Jeppson Malort reject our liquor. Its strong, sharp taste is not for everyone. Our liquor is rugged and unrelenting (even brutal) to the palate. During almost 60 years of American distribution, we found only 1 out of 49 men will drink Jeppson Malort. During the lifetime of our founder, Carl Jeppson was...

We try to stay on the lookout for good and serious patents related to alcohol beverages. A few good ones are here. Today, we wanted to take a look at the ones that seem even less serious and a bit more, frothy. Dan Christopherson is an experienced trademark lawyer, and a registered patent lawyer, and Dan located a few good examples as below. Dan explained, “With all of the bad press coming out lately reporting craft brewers suing each other for allegedly infringing their intellectual property rights, we thought it might be a good idea to try to lighten the mood a bit.”  With that in mind, here are a few humorous beer-related patent applications Dan came across:

• “Tooth Protector for Beverage Bottle and Beverage Bottle Enclosure” – US Patent Application No. 2012/0225166 by Krag David Hopps. I get as excited as the next guy/girl when I crack open a bottle of craft beer. That said, I have, to date, been able to temper my excitement enough to avoid crashing into and injuring my incisors with a beer bottle. Unfortunately for those individuals who have not shared in my good fortune, to quote Mr. Hopps, “No device has heretofore been available to protect a person’s...

All the while you tend your vines, and the U.S. market for the fruits thereof, your precious brand names may be vulnerable to poaching, in the world’s most populous country. Lindsey Zahn points out the risks in a recent article in the Cornell International Law Journal Online. The article is entitled “No Wine-ing:  The Story of Wine Companies and Trademark in China” and it was published on November 4, 2013. It points out the risks and opportunities, and provides a good overview of how China treats wine trademarks, and how that differs from the U.S. system. Lindsey is a lawyer specializing in wine law and food law, and she is a frequent writer on such issues at winelawonreserve.com.

In the article, Lindsey explains:

China follows a “first-to-file” rule for trademark registration. This means that the first person to file a trademark application with the China Trademark Office (“CTMO”) is usually granted the registration rights. Prior use of a mark in commerce generally affords little or no protection to a trademark applicant in China. By contrast, the United States Patent and Trademark Office considers whether the applicant is the first to use or intends to use the mark in commerce.

If a business even contemplates...

Well here I sit, writing on day 15 of the shutdown. All the government stuff I need (such as COLAs Online) is unavailable. Thank goodness that all the private stuff is available. It takes a lot of public and private resources to make this blog go. That is, on the private side, I need my web server, my ISP, my WordPress, Google, a bit of AC power, etc.

Increasingly, I also need my LabelVision. LabelVision is a tremendous resource, provided by the people at ShipCompliant. It provides various ways to scour TTB’s label database, even when TTB’s systems are down. LabelVision enabled me to quickly find the WinterJack COLA as above. To find this label, my other and much less appealing options would have been to wait until TTB re-opens someday, or jump in the car and drive around until I find this new product.

I had a sudden need to look at this Tennessee Cider label in order to explore what is new and current in distilled spirits specialty (“DSS”) labeling, and the statements of composition (“SOC”) that go along with this category of spirits. To recap, where you have a common type, set out in the regulations, it is sufficient to mention...