The Spirit of Italy
Take one charismatic, impossibly handsome national war hero. Name your creation after him. Take tens of thousands of Italian prospectors who flocked to California during the great Gold Rush. Make your liqueur a luminous gold, to remind them of their beloved homeland. Add a recipe that reads more like a medieval elixir of herbs, plants, roots, barks, spices and flower seeds. Follow with a distillation process that’s closer to the creation of the finest perfume than that of a spirit. Mix with equal measures of Italian flamboyance and audacity. Shake together vigorously with a liberal dash of passion and humor. And there you have it. The spirit of Italy. Galliano. Spirito Italiano.
Craftmanship
To create Galliano, Arturo Vaccari turned to Fratelli Maraschi SPA, a company established in 1888 in Torino. This area of Italy is famous for its Prosecco, vermouth and aromatic wines. Today, Fratelli Maraschi is known as Maraschi & Quirici, situated in Chieri, a small town high in the foothills of the Italian Alps, just outside Torino. The location of Maraschi & Quirici is important, not only due to it being where Vaccari first created his liqueur in 1896, but because this is where so many of the herbs and spices used in Galliano grow. Though now residing in a modern factory, the standards of Maraschi & Quirici founders prevail. The distillers are celebrated for the quality of their extracts. To this day, Maraschi & Quirici shapes the essence of the incomparable taste and aroma of Galliano. Galliano is distilled in two small (less than 100 liters) traditional copper pot stills, which Maraschi & Quirici reserve for the production of this Italian spirit.
The Anatomy
Vaccari went to great lengths to ensure that every last detail of Galliano was symbolic of greatness. The bottle was no exception. The tall, slender shape with many tapered flat sides was inspired by the columns of the ancient temples of Rome and the mighty glory of the empire. Is it any coincidence that the elevated height of the Galliano bottle alone ensured that it was placed on the top shelf where it stood out above the rest? We think not.
