What is the Old Fashioned Passport?
Explore Wisconsin's favorite cocktail at over 100 establishments across the state. Take your family, friends, lovers, or yourself to supper clubs, distilleries, taverns, restaurants and more to get a buy one old fashioned get one old fashioned free at every stop. The Old Fashioned Passport is an ideal tool to make memories and save money, one OF at a time. The perfect gift for any Wisconsinite who loves a good old fashioned, be it brandy or whiskey.
Including locations from Milwaukee to Superior, from the boarder of Iowa to the North Woods. The participating establishments are spread across the dairy land, but there's almost always pockets of locations grouped together so that you can explore a few spots on a day trip or sip a handful in a weekend. The Wisconsin Old Fashioned Passport was designed to be the optimal way to explore Wisconsin.
One BOGO Old Fashioned per participating location. All deals expire December 31, 2023.
Map of Participating Businesses
Check out the map of participating locations to get an idea of the 101+ places you can explore: https://bit.ly/3Xa4gyC
A Brief History of the Old Fashioned
The Old Fashioned began as a "Whiskey Cocktail" in the mid 1800s and got popular in New York City. A few decades later American's wanted their cocktail made the "Old Fashioned" way and they got a drink with sugar, soda water, whiskey, bitters, ice, and a garnish (usually an orange peel). The drink would continue to ebb and flow in popularity and style until Prohibition.
After Prohibition ended 1933, the drink came back on the scene, but with a strange new configuration, pineapples, orange, lemon, and cherries (sometimes even using curacao). Historian Robert Simonson suggests this is likely because many thirsty Americans visited Cuba to get their booze on during Prohibition, and fruity drinks were popular among tourists visiting the Caribbean.
In Wisconsin, brandy was popular with German and Scandinavian descendants. Fun fact, Korbel Brandy is only the fourth most popular brandy in America, but in Wisconsin it's by far the most popular. Why? Madison journalist Jerry Minnich (RIP) is thought to have cracked the code when he documented that Korbel brought their California brandy to the Columbian Exposition in Chicago of 1893. This popular event saw 27 Million people (25% of the US population at the time), many from nearby Wisconsin. Then in the 1970s, Korbel, a premium brandy option, ran an extensive billboard campaign across Wisconsin that read, "A nickel more a drink -- and worth it!" And now here we are today, we hope this passport lives up to the devotion and history of the old fashioned cocktail.
Do you or your family and friends prefer craft beer and wine? Click around the site and see our other products and package deals!