Hector, N.Y. — Hazlitt’s Red Cat, one of the best-selling wines made in the Finger Lakes, has long been known as a party favorite.
Now you can add hard seltzer to that party.
Hazlitt 1852 Vineyards recently launched a line of hard seltzers made from Red Cat, its most popular sweet red wine, and its pink, white and dark variations. The four products in the “Splash” series are Red Cat Splash, White Cat Splash, Pink Cat Splash, and Red Cat Dark Splash.
Hazlitt’s Red Cat wines, launched in the 1980s, use native grapes like Catawba, Niagara and Concord to produce a classic sweet flavor profile. The new seltzers use those wines as a base, along with water, of course.
But there’s nothing else in the cans. No added sugar, nothing that contains gluten.
“This Red Cat seltzer is not a phantom of Red Cat (wine) produced by chemistry,” said Brad Phillips, Hazlitt’s director of sales and business development. “It’s a real Red Cat.”
Hard (alcoholic) seltzers, along with other ready-to-drink products like canned cocktails, have been the hot drinks trends for several years.
Hazlitt began considering a “wine seltzer” a few years ago, just before the Covid pandemic hit, Phillips said. Although Hazlitt produces many varieties of wine, including dry ones made from vinifera grapes of European origin, the Red Cat brand seemed a natural fit.
“The Labrusca (native) grapes used for the ‘Cat’ wines have the perfect flavor profile to develop into a refreshing wine seltzer,” said Hazlitt winemaker Tim Benedict.
The Splash series seltzers contain 6.1% alcohol, a little above a standard beer but far less than a typical wine, which is about 12% alcohol.
Hazlitt experimented with putting straight wine in cans a few years ago, but discontinued it, in part, because of the alcohol level, Phillips said. Hazlitt expects the wine seltzers to appeal to health-conscious younger drinkers, who have taken to low alcohol drinks.
“We have wanted to offer a low-alcohol option for years,” Hazlitt co-CEO Leigh Hazlitt Triner said in a statement. “With the ready-to-drink category exploding, it felt like a great time for us to enter the market with a product that allows us to remain unique and true to our fun approach to enjoying wine.”
The seltzers come in 250 mililiter cans that sell for $3 each.
They’ve been available for several months at the Hazlitt tasting rooms at 5712 Route 414 in Hector on the east side of Seneca Lake and at 1 Lake Niagara Lane in Naples at the south end of Canandaigua Lake.
This month, Hazlitt is making a push through its distribution network across the state. As wine products, they can be sold in wine and liquor stores in New York, but not grocery or convenience stores.
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Don Cazentre writes for NYup.com, syracuse.com and The Post-Standard. Reach him at dcazentre@nyup.com, or follow him at NYup.com, on Twitter or Facebook.