ALEX&NDER, the brandy bar upstairs at Copper & Kings American Brandy Co., took just a few words last week to make a big statement about the introduction of food to the establishment.

“We’re proud to announce Chef Dallas McGarity … will be bringing food services to ALEX&NDER,” wrote the proprietors in an announcement at Facebook. “He and his team will deliver a deeply hospitable, superior culinary experience with small and carefully curated menu beginning Labor Day weekend.”

Discerning Louisville diners know McGarity as owner and executive chef of The Fat Lamb (profiled in F&D Vol. 61) and Portage House in Jeffersonville, and earlier this year he brought home Louisville’s 2nd 2019 Chopped win.

McGarity somehow also found time in 2018 to collaborate with Copper & Kings on Take Me to the River, a cookbook with 20 coursed recipes cooked or paired with Copper & Kings Brandy.

Copper & Kings has proven an American Brandy distillery can survive and thrive in the heart of Bourbon country.

The reason a distillery exists today has gone very far beyond just the means of production. It is now your beacon of value and values. It is what physically illuminates trust and affection of one’s products for the modern drinker. The bricks and mortar are what captures the rational and the emotional. Bricks & mortar feeds the head and the heart.

At Louisville Business First, reporter Haley Cawthon has more on the story, including some important days and hours.

“McGarity’s first plating will start on Labor Day weekend,” she writes. “Initial food service will focus on dinner on Wednesdays, Thursdays and Fridays from 5 p.m. to 10 p.m. Brunch and dinner will be served on Saturdays from 11 a.m. to 10 p.m. and Sundays from 11 a.m. to 7 p.m. There also will be a Labor Day offering from 11a.m. to 7 p.m.. Guests will be seated on a first-come, first-served basis with no reservations taken.”