Wisconsin Cheese Raises Our Spirits
When we were dialing in the flavors and characteristics of our Northern Oasis Spirits, we wanted them to capture what it feels like to experience our home state of Wisconsin. And what’s more Wisconsin than cheese curds?!
“…the squeaky fresh curds add a ton of fun.”
You go to a fancy restaurant and get a cheese plate to pair with your favorite wine, so why not pair two distinct tastes of our favorite state? We recently posted about pairing Shorewood Whiskey with cheese. It only follows that we find out what goes best with other Northern Oasis Spirits, but we want to focus specifically on cheese curds.
Shorewood Whiskey
We’ll start with the easy one. Shorewood Whiskey is crafted to be your everyday whiskey, equally delicious in a variety of cocktails or just on the rocks. Its smooth versatility allows it to work well with just about anything you might throw at it.
On National Cheese Day we tried a few different pairings, but our early favorite won the day: Danish fontina with a little bit of apricot. The fontina is slightly sweet and soft, and the apricot added a pleasing texture and slight tartness that didn’t interfere with the smoothness of the cheese or the Shorewood. Overall very satisfying and comfy!
Based on our experience with the fontina, we would also pair Shorewood Whiskey with fried yellow cheddar cheese curds. The mild yellow cheddar is a little smoother than sharper cheddar, and Shorewood goes perfect with its gooey, fried goodness!
Lakeview Vodka
Our Lakeview Vodka is distilled using 100% upper Midwest corn, making it naturally gluten free with a slight sweetness that polishes off the edge you might get with other vodkas. Its exceptionally smooth finish makes it equally perfect for both Bloody Marys and martinis.
This is an instance where we recommend a contrasting flavor and texture to Lakeview’s smooth sweetness: Fresh white cheddar cheese curds with dill. The dill adds a bright, almost celery-like flavor that contrasts with the smooth medium cheddar. Not only that, but the squeaky fresh curds add a ton of fun to the refreshing dill. That combination of texture and flavor delightfully complement Lakeview’s clean finish.
“Hold onto your taste buds...”
Riverbank Spiced Rum
Our Riverbank Spiced Rum has an orange citrus aroma balanced with deep notes of vanilla, allspice, and cinnamon. It’s not as sweet as your traditional spiced rums, which allows it to mix well in cocktails. But…how does it mix with cheese curds?
Very well, as we found out! While not being overly sweet, Riverbank does still have a sweetness to it, and since its flavor is more citrus-forward, we really leaned into that. We recommend pairing it with beer-battered, fried yellow cheddar curds and—here’s where the magic happens—a dusting of ranch powder. Hold on to your taste buds, because the tangy ranch and sweet beer batter team up with the tart cheddar to really punch up Riverbank’s 10 natural spices! Your tongue won’t know what to do first.
If you can’t find the right type of curds, and you happen to be in Stevens Point, Main Street Taps has the ideal cheese curds for pairing with Riverbank Spiced Rum—they’re even ranked third best curds in the state!
Lone Duck Cinnamon Whiskey
Since we designed Lone Duck to be the star of any cocktail and a favorite stand-alone chilled shot, it’s another versatile one which means it could go a lot of ways. It starts with an up-front, sweet fiery punch that dissipates to a smooth hot cinnamon finish. Making it play well with cheese curds took a little coaxing, and we started by focusing on beer battered fried curds.
The beer in the cheese curd batter adds a different kind of sweetness than what’s featured in Lone Duck, and we decided to use mild yellow cheddar fried curds with a straight beer batter to balance out that delicious cinnamon kick. The batter makes the curds just a touch sweeter, and the mild cheddar adds a lovely creaminess that beautifully mellows out Lone Duck’s exhilarating cinnamon.
Using fried cheese curds to tame the Duck! Who knew?
Northern Oasis Spirits are currently only available in Wisconsin, so if you enjoy our spirits, odds are pretty good you have access to a wide variety of amazing fresh and fried cheese curds. These pairings are fun and tasty (and sure, maybe a little silly), but these are just our favorites.
Next time you hit your favorite bar or restaurant, ask them what kind of cheese curds they have, and see if they carry Northern Oasis Spirits so you can try your own pairing! Let us know what you think of our recommendations, and if you find something you like better, we’d love to hear about it!