When I came to work at Mission at the end of 2020, I knew next to nothing about Armenia and Armenian culture. Now that I work as part of a GIGANTIC Armenian family for an Armenian-owned business, I’m saying “barev” and “inchpes ek?” on a regular basis, and I eat about ten cans of Armenian nuts a month.
I’m actually eating a huge handful of Castania Super Extra Nuts right now as I type this because it’s the best $9.99 you can spend on just about anything. If you don’t believe me, add a can to your next order and tell me what you think. I promise you’ll be adding a can to each subsequent order for as long as you shop here.
Living in California, we tend to think of ourselves as the center of the nut and produce universe, and while—as a born-and-raised Californian—I won’t argue the quality of California’s bountiful agricultural products, there’s some serious quality coming out of Armenia that many of us know nothing about. Over the course of 2021, I got to sample, taste, and enjoy all sorts of incredible Armenian produce from dried apricots to figs, and a number of outstanding brandies that outperform any counterpart in our industry, dollar for dollar.
The apricot is the national treasure of Armenia, so it should come as no surprise that there are a number of apricot-flavored Armenian brandies, like the uber-popular Ararat Apricot for $27.99 that we sell mountains of every single week.
Fruit-flavored brandies are quite commonplace in the market, but pure fruit-distilled eaux-de-vie are always more expensive simply because of the cost of all the fruit and the tiny amount of spirit one gets from the actual distillation.
But what if I was to tell you that there's an under-the-radar brand from Armenia that NOBODY has heard of, making a clean, powerful, pure apricot eau-de-vie for a price that doesn’t seem possible?
Granted it's not at the level of something like Rochelt eau-de-vie from Austria, but it's also $24.99 for a 750ml versus $299.99 for a 375ml, and it comes in a gorgeous squat bottle.
Let me tell you about Mijnaberd Armenian fruit brandies.
Produced in Yerevan from local fruit grown entirely in the Ararat river valley, the Mijnaberd brandies are made with Charentes (or Cognac) style copper pot stills and—given they need to be shipped halfway around the world—present one of the most outlandish bang-for-your-buck values I've come across in years, if not a decade.
Never heard of Mijnaberd? You're not alone. But you're gonna want to know more after tasting these.
Let's break them down:
Mijnaberd Armenian Apricot Brandy $24.99 - Rested for two months in stainless steel before bottling, I've tasted this more times than I can count and I keep coming back to the same conclusion: holy fucking shit. Apricot distillation is not easy, as I learned over ten years ago when putting together a barrel-aged apricot brandy with Old World Spirits for K&L. The nose on this unaged eau-de-vie rivals products at quadruple the price. What I love about the palate is that it's bold at 45%, so there's heat, but the purity of the apricot is front and center. All I want to do is curl up by the fire with a can of Castania nuts and sip this baby into the wee morning hours. It's a stunning spirit from front to back. And, oh yeah, it's $24.99.
Mijnaberd Armenian Mulberry Brandy $24.99 - What is a mulberry, you ask? The reason no one knows is because they're so delicate they can't be efficiently sold in most grocery stores. It looks sort of like an elongated blackberry and it can be even more tart, but with a woody character as well. Mulberries also tend to have a small green stem attached to them, and when picked these stems are fairly labor intensive to have removed. So imagine the labor that went into making this spirit! The nose alone is a spirits geek's dream come true. It's so utterly bizarre that I can't accurately describe it, but imagine something between wet fermenting grains, lavender, and fruit tea. At 50% ABV, it almost comes across like a white dog whiskey because of the tanginess of the fruit, but it finishes with far more complexity. I love, love, love this.
Mijnaberd Armenian Cornel Brandy $24.99 - Next question: what's a cornel? The cornelian dogwood plant produces what's known as cornel cherries, except they're not really cherries. They look like cherry tomatoes, but they have a bitter skin to them. I can't say I've ever tasted one, so I can't tell you how the spirit captures the essence of the berry, but I can tell you how the brandy comes across. The nose is like pure raspberry, but with a funkier profile that skews towards a roasted note on the backend. At 48% ABV, there's some punch, but it finishes with lots of sweet spices and a sizzle of tangy, tart red berries. So much fun!!!!
Mijnaberd Armenian 3 Year Old Reserve Apricot Brandy $29.99 - I remember selling half-bottles of California-distilled, barrel-aged peach brandy for $36 over a decade ago, and they sold out in seconds to all the cocktail guys we had in the store back then. This 3 year old apricot brandy from Mijnaberd is not only far better than that peach brandy, it's higher in proof at 53%, aged three times as long, and less than HALF the price!!! Rich and sumptuous on the palate, bursting with pure apricot goodness, rounded on the edges from the oak, with no added sugar or coloring. This is absolutely LEGIT. For those of you who like fruit spirits, this is like discovering buried treasure in your backyard. There are so many fun cocktails to make with this. The possibilities are endless.
Mijnaberd Armenian 3 Year Old Reserve Mulberry Brandy $29.99 - Take all the flavors I talked about from the standard unaged mulberry brandy, dial up the ABV to 53%, add the richness of oak, and have yourself a blast. There's nothing that tastes like this anywhere. If you're bored with everything in your liquor cabinet, this is definitely a fun vacation for just under thirty bucks.
As I was tasting these with my colleague Ara, he told me about how visitors in Armenia are often invited into homes by complete strangers while walking through the villages, handed glasses of homemade apricot brandy and maybe a bag of fruit and nuts as a gift. Since I can't do any international traveling at the moment, I have to imagine myself in Yerevan while drinking the Mijnaberd brandies and eating my Castania Super Nuts.
For those of you who think of drinking as a passport, and as a means of insight into another culture, I can't wait for you to try these products. All I've been able to think about since receiving these samples is: what else am I missing?
In a world that has been completely picked over, raked, and sorted through by booze hunters here and abroad, there are precious few secrets and even fewer surprises. If, like me, you're in need of that nostalgia—that sense of discovery that made drinking so much fun in the first place—then these are the bottles for you.
I'd take five outstanding, grossly-underpriced bottles of rustic Armenian fruit brandy over one mediocre, grossly-overpriced bottle of rebranded Bourbon any day of the week.
-David Driscoll