The Distillery of Modern Art is a really interesting operation in Chamblee, Ga., just northeast of downtown Atlanta inside the I-285 loop. The relatively small distillery produces only about 2,000 barrels per year, both for itself and as a contract distiller for several other small brands. But what it's producing is already really, really good after only a couple of years of experience.
I first tasted through some of their products late last year during a virtual session with founder Seth Watson. The company hadn’t locked down Middle Tennessee distribution at that time, so I didn’t want to get Bites readers' hopes up. But now I’m happy to say that Tennessee Crown has been locked down as their distributor, representing the entire DoMA product line.
So where does that name come from? Seth came to the spirits business via entertainment production, and art has long been an important part of his life. When he decided to open a distillery, he chose to do it in a multipurpose facility that includes an art gallery that sells works from local artists without charging a commission, a cocktail lounge and a rentable event space.
Barrels age alongside art at DoMA
This is all in addition to housing a pot still and a column still used to create seven spirits for DoMA along with several other recipes for contract customers. Young distilleries almost have to come out of the gate with a vodka so they have something to sell immediately. Head distiller Matt Greif developed an affordable Atlanta Vodka, distilled from a French wheat base. Inoffensive and inexpensive, it gets the job done. It’s also the base of a peach-flavored vodka, which is a little on-the-nose for a Georgia distillery, but I did appreciate that the fruit flavors from the peach simple syrup were more subtle than I expected and not cloying like the peach schnapps that usually makes me flash back to horrific “Sex on the Beach” cocktails during my misspent 20s. Additionally, DoMA offers a Peach Amaro, which is a nice combination of fruit, sweetness and bitter notes to be enjoyed neat or as the bittering agent of a black Manhattan. (More on that one later.)
Much more interesting is DoMA’s Nouveau Gin, an award-winning 96-proof gin made with 11 botanicals, including coriander, juniper, orris root, angelica root, lemon and orange peel, cassia cinnamon, Szechuan peppercorn and chamomile. I found this to be a delightful gin — and apparently the judges at Tales of the Cocktail’s spirits competition agreed with me, naming it Gin of the Year. The San Francisco Spirits Competition also awarded a Double Gold to Nouveau Gin this year.
A traditional London dry gin, this product had a nice tongue-coating mouthfeel, and Watson advised drinking it with lemon instead of lime in a G&T so the acid can brighten the flavors. He was correct!
The distillery’s fifth product is a novel corn whiskey, an overlooked category in the bourbon-centric environment of today, but an interesting addition to the product line. Made using 100 percent local white corn, this 102-proof whiskey offers savory notes to balance the sweetness of the corn. I found the floral notes of the nose to be surprisingly delicate and delightful.
Of course, almost every distillery is judged by their bourbon and rye whiskeys, and the Distillery of Modern Art has been waiting for more than two years for the magic of oak barrels to add color and flavor to their initial distilling runs. It was worth the wait, because for still relatively young products, DoMA’s rye and straight bourbon whiskey already show great promise.
The bourbon is bottled at 90 proof, although Watson hopes to offer a 100-proof bottled-in-bond version once the spirit has reached the minimum four years in oak for that designation. The current product should retail at around $50 per bottle, but this is meant to be a daily drinker. As Watson tells me, “You're supposed to drink it — don’t stare at it!”
Once I stopped staring (apparently), I discovered interesting tannins and sweet tea notes that I quite enjoyed. But the real hit was DoMA’s rye whiskey.
Distiller Greif actually wrote his thesis on rye whiskey, so you know it’s near and dear to his heart. Instead of using malted rye from the Midwest or the plains of Canada, Grief and Watson source their grain from the Abruzzo region of Italy. European rye is known for its creamy mouthfeel and dark chocolate aromas, and this particular whiskey definitely delivers on both those accounts.
Light on the palate, the rye has developed a nice bit of color after only three years in the barrel, and the oaky and vanilla flavors extracted from the wood play nicely with the nutty character of the grain. Watson suggested making a quick Black Manhattan with the rye and his peach amaro, and mixed at a 3-to-1 ratio, it was an easy and delightful cocktail. Maybe add a few dashes of Angostura and orange bitters and call it a day. (Or more probably, a night.)
Now that DoMA is officially distributed in Middle Tennessee, you should start to see it popping up in more stores and on cocktail menus. I’m impressed with their first few chapters, and I’m looking forward to whatever is next!
