Red Centre Date Liqueur
Date liqueur · Central Australia

Red Centre

A label that reveals itself in the cold.

Four expressions of the date as it ripens, each paired with a native botanical from the same arid country. Chill the bottle and the label tells you which one you're holding.

Chill to reveal Meet the four
A Red Centre bottle split down the middle: the left half warm, with a plain bone label; the right half chilled and beaded with condensation, the label turned slate and red with quandong berries showing in the crest.
Room temperature4 °C

Abundance in the harsh country

The date palm isn't from here. It took to the arid centre anyway and made a home in it, holding on where little else will. Red Centre starts from that: a plant from somewhere else, rooted now in red earth.

The range follows the date as it ripens, through four stages from green and firm to dark and soft. Each expression takes one stage and one hour of the day, and pairs the date with a native botanical. Lemon myrtle at first light. Quandong at midday. The Original at golden hour. Wattleseed after dark.

KimriGreen, firm, unripe
KhalalFull size, crisp, coloured
RutabHalf-ripe, soft, honeyed
TamarFully ripe, dark, deep

A flight from
dawn to nightfall

Four expressions, one for each stage of the date. Drink them in order and the flight moves from bright and green to roasted and dark.

Dawn
Kimri
The Lemon Myrtle bottle on a sandstone ledge beside a tall highball with lime and olive leaves.

Lemon Myrtle Date Liqueur

Lens
Place. First light, the fresh green flush, the bright open of the flight.
Flavour
Bright, tangy citrus lift over the sweet date base.
Midday
Khalal
The Quandong bottle in a red arched niche beside a foamy red sour, with quandong fruit on the counter.

Quandong Date Liqueur

Lens
Provenance. The desert peach, and the country it grows in.
Flavour
Ruby and tart. Native peach against the rich date.
Golden Hour
Rutab
The Original bottle in a terracotta arch with a short pour over one large rock, orange peel and fresh dates.

The Original Date Liqueur

Lens
Ritual. The pure pour the whole range grows from. Unadorned.
Flavour
The date at its fullest, honeyed and soft.
Nightfall
Tamar
The Wattleseed bottle against gold leaf in low light, beside an espresso martini and scattered coffee beans.

Wattleseed Date Liqueur

Lens
Heritage. The oldest staple, the deep roast, the close of the flight.
Flavour
Roasted coffee and chocolate depth, creamy over the date.
The reactive label

Cold enough
to pour

In the warm, the label holds back. The botanical hides and the crest reads as bare form. As the bottle cools, the thermochromic ink turns and the plant appears.

The expression only names itself once it's ready to drink. Pick a bottle, then drag the thermometer down to chill it.

22 °C
Holding back
Two printed Red Centre prototype bottles on a timber stump in low light. The left label is in its cold state, slate and red with the wordmark in bone; the right label is warm, plain bone with the wordmark in oxblood. Between them, a short pour over ice with an orange twist.
Prototype

Printed and poured

The same label, printed and photographed in both of its states.

Chilled, the crest and landscape come through and the wordmark turns to bone. At room temperature the label falls back to bare form. Between them sits the Golden Hour serve: the Original over a large rock with the orange peel expressed.

LeftCold state. Slate sky, red earth, bone lettering.RightWarm state. Bone ground, oxblood lettering.
Signature pours

One serve for
every hour

DawnFresh highball

Lemon Myrtle Date Liqueur

  • 45 ml Lemon Myrtle
  • 15 ml fresh lime
  • Top with soda

Build in a tall glass over plenty of ice. Garnish with a lemon myrtle leaf or a lime wheel.

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MiddayJewel-red sour

Quandong Date Liqueur

  • 45 ml Quandong
  • 20 ml lemon
  • 10 ml honey syrup

Shake hard with ice, fine strain into a chilled coupe. Add egg white or aquafaba for a proper sour foam.

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Golden HourThe ritual serve

The Original Date Liqueur

  • 50 ml Original
  • Orange peel
  • One large rock

Pour over the ice and express the peel across the top. For more backbone, stir with 15 ml aged rum and two dashes of aromatic bitters.

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NightfallAfter-dinner martini

Wattleseed Date Liqueur

  • 45 ml Wattleseed
  • 30 ml espresso, cooled
  • 15 ml dark rum

Shake hard with ice, fine strain into a coupe. Garnish with three coffee beans or a light dust of wattleseed.

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Counter card: DAWN, Lemon Myrtle Date Liqueur, with the bottle, the serve and its recipe. Counter card: MIDDAY, Quandong Date Liqueur, with the bottle, the serve and its recipe. Counter card: GOLDEN HOUR, The Original Date Liqueur, with the bottle, the serve and its recipe. Counter card: NIGHTFALL, Wattleseed Date Liqueur, with the bottle, the serve and its recipe.
Counter cards, one per expression. The hour carries the shelf; the serve sits underneath. Pick a serve to see its card.Swipe to see all four.

Quiet outside,
four things inside

The range reads as one thing at a glance and four things up close. The shell stays the same across every expression; the flavour lives on the inside.

The bone-coloured Lemon Myrtle gift box standing on a timber bar under a brass pendant light, with shelves of bottles behind. Its arch window shows lemon myrtle on a green panel.
The boxA sleeve and tray in bone. The arch window echoes the crest dome and frames the botanical held inside.
The four-panel accordion pamphlet, outside and inside. The outside runs a desert landscape from a rising sun to a crescent moon; the inside gives Dawn, Midday, Golden Hour and Nightfall a panel and a cocktail each.
The pamphletA four-panel accordion. The outside runs one landscape from dawn to nightfall, so folding it open tracks the range. Inside, one cocktail per expression.
The Dawn counter card standing on a wooden base. The Midday counter card standing on a wooden base. The Golden Hour counter card standing on a wooden base. The Nightfall counter card standing on a wooden base.
Counter cardsCounter-standing cards, one per expression. One system, four hours of the day.
Acknowledgement of Country

The knowledge
behind these plants

Quandong, wattleseed and lemon myrtle have been food and medicine for First Nations people across this country for thousands of years, and the meaning they carry here begins with them.

Red Centre acknowledges the Traditional Custodians of the lands these plants come from, and recognises that the knowledge behind them is theirs. We're committed to sourcing native botanicals through Indigenous-owned suppliers, and to returning value to those communities rather than borrowing from them.

Lemon myrtle, illustrated on slate. Quandong, illustrated on slate. Wattleseed, illustrated on slate.