Poor Harriet, she was so sad, as she didn’t have a partner to sip bubbly cocktails with on Valentine’s Day (it is, by the way, Valentine’s Day today, if you’d forgotten), and was thinking she’d spend the whole day alone, staring out the window, sighing as sad music played in the background. But then she came up with this very drink, with a gin base (London-dry style here I think), and lover’s favorite, the pretty Parfait Amour (which, if you don’t know, is florally with citrus and spice cuddles), a bit of fresh orange juice (brilliant Harriet knows fresh is best), a dash of Peychaud’s bitters, some bubbles in the form of prosecco, and a tiny bit of simple syrup (she wavered a bit here – you might too, and dropping the simple is okay). Once she whipped up this drink, she had offers for days from people wanting to be her valentine. But then she realized spending a day alone and not buying into the corporate holiday is actually quite lovely, and she made herself one of these and enjoyed it immensely.
Here’s the thing: I was drinking this drink with this name before said name showed up on the tip of the tongue of every pirate thanks to a famous movie that then became like, what, five famous movies? Are there more? I can remember going to the first of said piratical movie franchise in the theater (of all things) and thinking “great, now everyone’s gonna think the Black Pearl cocktail is named after Cap’n Jack’s ship.” But now, upon reflection – does it matter? As long as this bubbly, sort-a romantic (I always suggest making it for two, and why you might ask? Perhaps it’s the bubbly, perhaps the addition of Cognac, a historic drink for those in love, or the sultriness of the Tia Maria, or even the cherries? But I think it’s all combined) number is consumed, that’s all that matters. And anyway, pirates like romance, too.
Black Pearl, Serves 2
Ice cubes
2 ounce Cognac
2 ounces Tia Maria
Chilled Champagne
2 cherries, for garnish
1. Fill a cocktail shaker halfway full with ice cubes. Add the Cognac and Tia Maria. Stir well.
2. Strain the mix equally into two flute or wine glasses. Top each with Champagne (should be about 4 ounces apiece). Garnish each with a cherry either dropped in, or speared and floated on top.
Well, it’s already deep into the winter holiday season, and I haven’t yet put up a sparkly drink suggestion for your holiday gatherings, because I am lazy, or busy, or some combination of the two? Either/or, you may still need a special sparkler to make your holiday party stand out from the party pack, or to enthrall your relatives with, or to just make yourself because you deserve a nice shiny drink at the end of the year, I think you do! For all of those occasions, let me present How Silver-Sweet, a treat this time (or any time) of year. It uses Castello del Poggio sparkling Moscato, which is light on its feet, featuring pretty fruit notes, including peach, pear, and strawberry, swirling about the sparkly bubbles. It’s a wee sweet (in the best way), and goes delightfully here with Strawberry brandy (a true fruit brandy is what you want, dry, crisp, no additives), Pierre Ferrand’s lush orange curaçao, and a dash of earthy Peychaud’s bitters. It’s bound to make the holidays even more jolly.
How Silver-Sweet
Cracked ice
1 ounce strawberry brandy
1/2 ounce Pierre Ferrand orange curaçao
1 dash Peychaud’s bitters
3-1/2 ounces Castello del Poggio sparkling moscato
1. Fill a cocktail shaker or mixing glass halfway full with cracked ice. Add the brandy, curaçao, and bitters. Stir well.
2. Strain into a wine glass (or flute). Top with the moscato. Stir briefly.
I’ve had a couple Erik Ambler Cocktail Talks in the past (the long-ago past if we’re talking about the full age of this blog, but the short-ago past if we’re talking the age of peoplekind), and today feel I maybe didn’t give Mr. Ambler enough credit way back when. Or perhaps I’ve changed, as I just read Journey Into Fear, his international, I suppose intrigue novel is one way to describe it, spy-ish, is another, though the main character is in no way a spy, but an engineer of sorts. Said main character is in Turkey for his company in hope of updating Turkey’s water defense systems at the beginning of/right before WWI, and it turns out other countries aren’t hyped for this and so want to kill him. Exciting, right! I loved the pacing, the person-thrust-into-the-espionage-world nature, the exotic historic locales, and the intriguingly suspicious side characters that populate it. Enough that I went back and re-read another one of his books, and liked it better than in the past, too. Now I’m on the hunt for more! Hopefully more with Cocktail Talks like the below.
“I think some food would do me good.”
“My dear Mr. Graham! How stupid of me! Some food. Of course! We can stop at Novi. You will be my guest. And if there is any champagne to be had, we shall have it. There is nothing like champagne when one is depressed.”
Graham felt suddenly a little light-headed. He laughed.
The Consul raised an eyebrow.
“I’m sorry,” Graham apologized. “You must excuse me. You see, it is rather funny. I had an appointment to meet someone on the two o’clock train. She’ll be rather surprised to see me.”
It is, according to my calendar, the last day of May. Which means tomorrow (for those who are calendarly challenged) is the first day of June. And while the first day of June isn’t the official start of summer, it is the official (I’m making this up as I type btw) first day of Planning for Summer Drinking season. Though perhaps that should be like April. But let’s make it June 1! I’m all for it, and with that in place now and carved into stone like commandments or famous last words, let me present to you a drink for your summer, the Summertivo.
You may be able to guess that this is specifically a summer pre-dinner drink, a warm weather aperitivo as it may be. And it is! But it is also a drink that you can have with summertime brunches or breakfasts, in the mid-afternoon when you need something just a smidge stronger than tea, or after dinner, when the summer romances are blooming and you don’t want to be weighed down by your sipping. It starts with Galliano L’Aperitivo, lovely drink solo, or mixed as it is here. It’s bitter, but not too bitter, made from a host of delicious ingredients, starting with regular oranges, bergamot oranges, and bitter oranges, as well as citrus pals chinotto, tangerines, and grapefruits, and then spices such as anise, juniper, cardamom, sandalwood, sage, lavender, peppermint, cinnamon, and vanilla, with a bit of the regular (delicious, also) Galliano, too. Altogether, it delivers this fresh, citrusy, herbally, taste, very flavorful, very balanced. And very perfect with Italian sparkling wine prosecco, which is our second ingredient here. The third is a simple lemon twist, to add a hint of high-end tang. As with all good summer drinks, no sweat to make, too. One note: you might try a dash of Scrappy’s legendary Black Lemon Bitters in here. I don’t have it listed below, but it’s worth a gander. Call it Summertivo 2.0 to be all modern.
1. Add the L’Aperitivo to a flute or comparable glass. Top with the prosecco.
2. Carefully stir in a manner that brings everything together without being wacky. If your prosecco isn’t really chilled, or if it’s hot out, add an ice cube.
3. Garnish with the twist. Give a toast to the sun, and to Italy.
Here we have another British Library Crime Classics Cocktail Talk. What are the British Library Crime Classics, I can hear you ask? I’m glad you did ask, friend! These are rediscovered novels and short story anthologies brought back from the mists of time for our modern-day reading pleasure. I’ve read a few of the novels, but even more of the short story collections, which are marvelously done (the editor is a chap named Martin Edwards, who also writes his own mystery novels, and does so much editing I doubt he sleeps). The most recently read one for me was called Murder At the Manor: Country House Mysteries, and as with all of them, it’s a delight in the main, with stories from a host of authors known and unknown – really, these are dandy ways to discover authors from the past you may have missed. For me, that includes J.J. Bell, journalist and author, who it seems wasn’t as well known for his mystery output as perhaps he should have been (perhaps more known for comic fiction). The quote below from his story “The Message on the Sun-Dial” features a not-so-savory man named Bolsover. You might not like him by the story’s end, but you have to admire his ability to drink at lunch.
He lunched leisurely at an unusually early hour. He preceded the meal with a couple of cocktails, accompanied it with a pint of Champagne, and followed it with a liqueur. He felt much better, though annoyed by an unwanted tendency to perspire. On his leaving the restaurant, the tendency became more pronounced, so much so that he feared it must be noticeable, and once more he took a taxi, telling the man to go Kensington way.
For our third jaunt into the politics, romance, customs, and (most importantly) drinking in the upper-middle-and-upper-classes as shown in the Anthony Trollope book The Prime Minister, we go on a little vacation. This takes us back into contact with Sexty (!) Parker (for more on Sexty, see The Prime Minister Cocktail Talk Part II), and with his wife, and with Emily Wharton, here using her married name, Mrs. Lopez (for more on Emily and for a brief overview of the whole book, be sure to see The Prime Minister Cocktail Talk Part I, and don’t miss the past Anthony Trollope Cocktail Talks). The below quote is a bit long, forgive me! But I didn’t want to miss the so-called bubbly or the not-called (but still seems to be) whiskey toddy. You deserve both – and deserve to read the book, so do if you haven’t.
It was all his ordering, and if he bade her dine with a crossing-sweeper she would do it. But she could not but remember that not long since he had told her that his partner was not a person with whom she could fitly associate; and she did not fail to perceive that he must be going down in the world to admit such association for her after he had so spoken. And as she sipped the mixture which Sexty called champagne, she thought of Herefordshire and the banks of the Wye, and,— alas, alas, — she thought of Arthur Fletcher. Nevertheless, come what might, she would do her duty, even though it might call upon her to sit at dinner with Mr. Parker three days in the week. Lopez was her husband, and would be the father of her child, and she would make herself one with him. It mattered not what people might call him, — or even her. She had acted on her own judgment in marrying him, and had been a fool; and now she would bear the punishment without complaint.
When dinner was over Mrs. Parker helped the servant to remove the dinner things from the single sitting-room, and the two men went out to smoke their cigars in the covered porch. Mrs. Parker herself took out the whisky and hot water, and sugar and lemons, and then returned to have a little matronly discourse with her guest. “Does Mr. Lopez ever take a drop too much?” she asked.
“Never,” said Mrs. Lopez.
“Perhaps it don’t affect him as it do Sexty. He ain’t a drinker; — certainly not. And he’s one that works hard every day of his life. But he’s getting fond of it these last twelve months, and though he don’t take very much it hurries him and flurries him.
Please, I implore you, read the Vanity Fair Cocktail Talk Part I, so you can hear more about the book, where I land on it, and on what seven glasses of Champagne does to you. Here, we’re not going to get too deep into the book proper, as we have a long Cocktail Talk below, and it’s a good one, funny in a tipsy way, full of eating and drinking, featuring some of the book’s main characters, and highlighted by Rack Punch. Rack Punch! A curious thing, Rack Punch. It’s hard to pin down. I mean, I’m sure a genius cocktail historian like David Wondrich would know without looking up from his drink, but I can’t bother him. It’s either punch made with Batavia Arrack (rum-ish spirit made with sugar cane and a bit of fermented red rice), used in many tiki recipes or Arak, the grape-based anise spirit from the Levant area of the Eastern Mediterranean. You look it up and you’ll see Rack Punch using either one or the other (and even one spot that spells it Arrack but talks about it as if it was Arak!). My feel, my lean, as you might say, is it was made with Batavia Arrack. As it’s rum-y, that would match the time, and I don’t think Arak had made the inroads to Britain that rum and relatives had at the time. Also, the basic punch – sugar, lemon or other citrus, water, maybe some spices – would just pair better with it, as opposed to the anise-side, in my view. Both could be delicious, but that’s my take (btw, both spirits are delicious. The below Cocktail Talk is delicious, too).
The two couples were perfectly happy then in their box: where the most delightful and intimate conversation took place. Jos was in his glory, ordering about the waiters with great majesty. He made the salad; and uncorked the Champagne; and carved the chickens; and ate and drank the greater part of the refreshments on the tables. Finally, he insisted upon having a bowl of rack punch; everybody had rack punch at Vauxhall. “Waiter, rack punch.”
That bowl of rack punch was the cause of all this history. And why not a bowl of rack punch as well as any other cause? Was not a bowl of prussic acid the cause of Fair Rosamond’s retiring from the world? Was not a bowl of wine the cause of the demise of Alexander the Great, or, at least, does not Dr. Lempriere say so?—so did this bowl of rack punch influence the fates of all the principal characters in this “Novel without a Hero,” which we are now relating. It influenced their life, although most of them did not taste a drop of it.
The young ladies did not drink it; Osborne did not like it; and the consequence was that Jos, that fat gourmand, drank up the whole contents of the bowl; and the consequence of his drinking up the whole contents of the bowl was a liveliness which at first was astonishing, and then became almost painful; for he talked and laughed so loud as to bring scores of listeners round the box, much to the confusion of the innocent party within it; and, volunteering to sing a song (which he did in that maudlin high key peculiar to gentlemen in an inebriated state), he almost drew away the audience who were gathered round the musicians in the gilt scollop-shell, and received from his hearers a great deal of applause.
