“There’s such a need for education when it comes to Armagnac,” said Nicolas Palazzi, the owner of PM Spirits in Bushwick, Brooklyn, an importer of several Armagnac brands, including Domaine d’Espérance, one of the spirits poured at the tasting. “We go out, and we explain, and we do training and we let people taste the stuff. At our level, it’s one buyer at a time. We’re creating our own demand.”

Armagnac is single-distilled at a low temperature in column stills — in contrast to Cognac’s double distillation in pot stills — and some houses are so small that they don’t even own stills, employing roving distillers that go from estate to estate. The single distillation means that fewer of Armagnac’s natural elements are stripped out, making a more boisterous, rustic brandy.

“We have no perfect Armagnac,” said Marc Darroze, whose family’s Darroze label was one of the first imported into the United States in the mid-20th century. “We don’t want perfection. Consistency, yes. But we want to be as diverse as possible.”

The Armagnac region grows grapes similar to those used to Cognac (ugni blanc, folle blanche, colombard) with one key exception: baco, a hybrid of folle blanche and the North American grape noah, created in the late 19th century to withstand the phylloxera plague.

Hybrid grapes are not permitted in Europe, and in 2010, the European Union tried to ban baco. Armagnac producers won the right to retain their beloved hybrid, which many believe is the secret to long-aged Armagnac. “As a grape, baco is like an American muscle car,” Mr. Palazzi said. “It can withstand years and years of oak.”

The idea of educating American drinkers often strikes people in Armagnac as funny. “It’s important to educate people,” said Armin Grassa, whose family owns Tariquet, one of the largest independent Armagnac houses. “But not too many people should discover Armagnac. Because, after all, we don’t really have enough.”