Montpelier VT distillery elevated its food menu, leading to James Beard Award finals

MONTPELIER ― The forced break during the COVID-19 pandemic gave management at Barr Hill the chance to reset. If the distillery is known for award-winning spirits, shouldn’t the new facility in Vermont’s state capital have a food and hospitality program to match?

Patrick Amice, who described himself as a longtime “friend” of the brand, received a call from Barr Hill in late 2021. Would he be willing to relocate from New Jersey to Vermont to become Barr Hill’s general manager of hospitality operations?

For someone who had been visiting Vermont for years to enjoy the state’s refreshing natural setting and world-renowned craft beers, the answer was not complicated. Amice arrived at Barr Hill in January of 2022 and began overseeing the bar/distillery’s addition of a restaurant offering small plates of locally sourced food, ramping up Barr Hill’s focus on hospitality.

“They knew in hiring me that that’s what I brought to the table,” said Amice, who had worked in New Jersey at a wine shop/liquor store that carried Barr Hill products as well as at a restaurant affiliated with a highly regarded brewery.

Two years later, the transformation paid high-profile dividends. Barr Hill is a finalist for Outstanding Bar in the James Beard Awards, the top prize in the American restaurant and hospitality world. Barr Hill joins bars from Baltimore, New Orleans, San Francisco and Brownsville, Texas, in the category that will see winners announced at the award ceremony June 10.

The nomination, according to Amice, acknowledges the prime emphasis since he arrived at Barr Hill − “hospitality at the highest level.”

Highlighted by honey

The distillery has its roots in 2011 in the Northeast Kingdom, where parent company Caledonia Spirits began in Hardwick. All production of the company’s spirits has now moved to the facility that five years ago opened off Barre Street a short drive from downtown Montpelier.

Barr Hill’s eponymous gin is distilled with juniper and honey as is the company’s Tom Cat gin, which is aged in barrels and resembles a “gin-meets-whiskey hybrid,” according to Amice. The company also produces vodka and, as of December, a rye whiskey called Phyllis that’s sold under the Caledonia Spirits brand. All the company’s products are made with Vermont grains, according to Amice.

Honey is the key ingredient for Barr Hill, which Amice said lends a unique, rum-like versatility to its spirits. Honey is a theme for this year’s James Beard Award finalists from Vermont: Executive chef/co-owner Cara Tobin of Honey Road in Burlington is a finalist for Best Chef: Northeast for her restaurant named in part for a famed honey-producing region of Turkey.

Sourcing from Vermont farms

Amice majored in accounting and finance at Rider University in New Jersey but realized quickly he didn’t want to spend his working life sitting behind a desk. He worked at a wine shop/liquor store called Princeton Corkscrew where Caledonia Spirits co-founder Todd Hardie came to bring Barr Hill products. (Barr Hill now distributes in 35 states.) Amice established a rapport with Barr Hill’s representatives and watched from afar as the brand grew in stature, winning national and international honors.

Amice honed his hospitality skills at Brick Farm Tavern in Hopewell, New Jersey, on the grounds of award-winning Troon Brewing. The New Jersey native felt the lure of Vermont, though, heading north often to hike and swim and enjoy the state’s food and drink scene. He moved to Vermont just over two years ago with his girlfriend, Bernadette Pearson, a fellow alum of Brick Farm Tavern who is now head chef at Prohibition Pig in Waterbury.

Barr Hill’s previous food options, according to Amice, consisted primarily of a food truck and a few items that could be heated up easily. The company wanted to raise its dining offerings to the level of its spirits and cocktails and began that transformation once Amice arrived in early 2022.

Barr Hill hired Brandon Arms, a veteran of the Boston dining scene who most recently worked at Michael’s on the Hill in Waterbury Center, to serve as the distillery’s chef. He oversees a menu emphasizing sharable bites and ingredients sourced largely from Vermont farms. The menu on a recent Friday included maple roasted carrots, a Vermont cheese board and crispy pork belly glazed with Tom Cat gin. Barr Hill works to pair its cocktails with its dishes, Amice said.

“It’s really endless” what Vermont farmers provide, according to Amice. “We can create so many things with these flavors.”

‘A team award’

Barr Hill learned April 3 that it made the James Beard Award finals but had little time to celebrate. That was five days before the total eclipse that drew thousands of visitors to Vermont and hundreds of customers to Barr Hill to mark the celestial occasion.

The nomination comes as a direct result of Barr Hill hiring Amice to ramp up its hospitality, but he said the honor is about Barr Hill’s 20 hospitality employees buying into what he and the company are preaching, namely “What can we do to help and what can we do to make it better?” Barr Hill’s staff members, according to Amice, stay positive no matter how difficult and stressful their days are.

“It doesn’t go unnoticed by me how hard that can be,” said Amice, a former bartender himself.

Amice and company co-founder/head distiller Ryan Christiansen are going to Chicago for the award ceremony.

“I would love to bring the team because it’s a team award,” according to Amice. But after Memorial Day, he said, it’s Barr Hill’s prime season, and the distillery can’t shut down or part with that many staffers if it wants to maintain its level of hospitality.

If you go

WHAT: Barr Hill distillery/bar/restaurant

WHEN: 4-8 p.m. Monday and Wednesday-Thursday, 2-9 p.m. Friday, noon-9 p.m. Saturday, noon-7 p.m. Sunday

WHERE: 116 Gin Lane, Montpelier

INFORMATION: (802) 472-8000, www.barrhill.com

Anniversary celebration

WHAT: Five-year “Ginniversary” celebration featuring special tastings, distillery-only releases and live music from Nick Cassarino and opening act Baby Fearn and the Plants

WHEN: Noon-8 p.m. Saturday, June 29 (music from 4-7 p.m.)

WHERE: Barr Hill, 116 Gin Lane, Montpelier

INFORMATION: Free. (802) 472-8000, www.barrhill.com

Contact Brent Hallenbeck atbhallenbeck@freepressmedia.com.