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Empirical Olive is part of our Other collection. It comes from Empirical Spirits and is crafted in the United States.
Empirical Olive transforms the beloved Dirty Martini into a cleaner, more elegant pour by distilling Spanish Gordal and Manzanilla olives with French wheat spirit, creating a bottle that does all the work of muddling, shaking, and straining, while delivering that briny, savory character martini lovers crave in one silky, freezer-ready spirit.
While most olive-forward spirits steep or macerate their olives, Empirical actually distills them, capturing the pure essence of the fruit without any of the murky brine or oil that can make a Dirty Martini feel, well, dirty, meaning you get all the green, nutty, sophisticated olive flavor in a crystal-clear spirit that won't cloud your glass.
Empirical Olive shines when served ice-cold from the freezer as a ready-made martini, though it also adds savory depth to stirred cocktails where you'd typically reach for vermouth or want an umami edge—pair it with briny oysters, aged cheese, or roasted vegetables for an aperitif moment that works year-round but feels especially right during crisp evenings.
Nose: Clean and bright with pronounced green olive brine, like cracking open a fresh jar of Spanish olives. There's a subtle nuttiness underneath, along with hints of fresh herbs and a touch of olive oil's smooth, vegetal character. The wheat spirit base keeps everything crisp and focused without adding sweetness.
Palate: Savory and round with the olives taking center stage—think of biting into a firm, buttery Gordal olive with its gentle bitterness and herbaceous notes. The texture is smooth and slightly oily in a pleasant way, coating the mouth without heaviness. There's a clean, almost mineral-like quality that balances the richness, along with subtle hints of almond skin and fresh cucumber.
Finish: Medium length with lingering olive salinity and a soft, nutty fade. The bitterness remains gentle and pleasant, like the echo of good olive oil on the tongue. Clean and dry, leaving you ready for the next sip with just a whisper of herbal character at the very end.
Empirical Olive is crafted using the Copenhagen-based distillery's proprietary low-temperature vacuum distillation process, which gently extracts the fresh, green, almost raw character of Spanish Gordal and Manzanilla olives along with their oils at temperatures far below traditional distillation—preserving delicate aromatic compounds that would otherwise be lost to heat and creating an exceptionally pure, savory expression that tastes more like biting into a briny olive than sipping a botanical infusion.
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View RecipesThis stuff tastes nothing like a dirty martini. It reminds me of old olive oil that is about to go rancid. I tried mixing it with olive brine, dry vermouth, good gin, and every combination of those. It was still awful. If anyone has a recipe that would make this stuff drinkable, I would love to have it.
It’s certainly no dirty martini. It reminds me of old, almost rancid olive oil. I tried mixing it with olive brine, vermouth, gin and variations of those. Nothing worked. Just my personal taste, but this stuff is awful.
This is not a one ingredient cocktail as implied, even with a dose of dry vermouth this is far from a dirty martini flavor. We haven't been able to figure out a way to blend this to actually be drinkable. My spouse discarded their portion down the drain, I held my nose and simply shot it. Would not recommend.
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Please drink responsibly. CA Residents: Proposition 65 Warning.
