Store Amaro in the Freezer for Instant After

By Anna Hezel

The best dinner parties I’ve been to (or hosted) have involved a few surprise after-dinner drinks right as dessert hits the table and the wine is starting to run out. Best case scenario, this might be an assemblage of scotch, Meletti, and Faccia Brutto Nocino plopped down in the middle of the dinner table with a stack of glasses and a bowl of ice cubes. Worst case scenario, maybe it's some Fernet and that bottle of Opal that a friend brought back from Iceland that has remained stubbornly 90% full ever since. Either way, it's good to keep people on their toes, even when they’re settling in for a slice of pie.

The newly reopened Manhattan restaurant Maialino takes this a step further, serving a menu of four amari that have been frozen to a luxuriously viscous consistency and poured into narrow icy glasses for sipping. Maialino's beverage director Cory Holt borrowed the presentation (and the narrow thick-walled glasses designed to keep the spirit cold) from Vecchio del Capo, a Calabrian brand that markets its amaro alongside the charmingly kitschy slogan, "Freeze your moment."

Since Maialino's new restaurant space, a few blocks north of Madison Square Park in Manhattan, has plenty of freezer space, Holt decided to experiment with giving this treatment to a selection of bitter amari that include some higher-proof picks, like Sirene Canto Amaro, Petrus Boonekamp, and Averna.

"The texture just becomes creamier and the mouthfeel becomes richer. I think it obviously softens the ABV—it doesn't feel as boozy," says Holt. "With most things you taste less the colder they are. I think with things with higher proof, the proof gets mellowed, and if you have bold enough flavors, they’re going to come through no matter what."

Brad Thomas Parsons, author of Amaro, points out that amaro is traditionally served neat at room temperature, and the Vecchio del Capo suggestion to freeze the bottle may have arisen from the Southern Italian heat. "Some will argue that serving it frozen hinders or prevents the many botanical notes to open up as you would experience them at room temp," he tells me. "But for the most part, there is no wrong way to serve or drink amaro, and I do embrace the idea of tucking away some amaro bottles in the freezer." Parsons also likes keeping his Campari in the freezer for making Jungle Birds and Campari and sodas.

"The beautiful thing about amaro is—it's very Italian—there aren't really any rules," says Holt. "There are hundreds of brands that are very well established and regional, like anything in Italy. But if you go there, for every brand in a particular region, there are 10 other little producers that you might find in a bar." Some of those hundreds of amari taste great at room temperature, and some are better with an ice cube or an even more extreme chill.

If you’re going to stash a few bottles of amaro in your freezer to pull out at dessert time for your next holiday meal, stick with the bolder, punchier higher-ABV expressions. (Anything that's really delicate, lower-proof, or wine-based is best kept out of the freezer.) And if possible, carefully stash a few small glasses in the freezer with that bottle so that each pour stays cold even longer on the table.

Beyond this, embrace the trial-and-error process the way Holt has, and let your guests decide on their favorites. "I think the point is just being able to serve it in a bunch of different ways and let people figure out what they like and have fun with it," says Holt.