February 3, 2009
Get ready for some Valentine’s Day hugging, kissing, and drinking (you don’t really want to have a Valentine over for a little romance without the right drink, right? I mean, you aren’t that caddish, are you? And, speaking of “caddish” is that a phrase that applies to both ladies and gentlemen? Or is a “cad” only a dude? Cause I in no way want to imply that not serving a good drink on Valentine’s Day is okay if you’re female. It’s bad no matter what. So, put that in your shaker and shake it) with this lovely mix (from Good Spirits, if you wanna relay a little information to your amorous other when serving up the cocktail). I used Washington State’s own Dry Fly gin when making it, and liked it lots, and also suggest using Tillen Farms Merry Maraschino cherries (from good ol’ WA as well), which are yummy and clean, sweetened with pure cane sugar instead of goopy high fructose junk, and which don’t contain artificial dross. Which of course you don’t want to serve up alongside the kisses. That’s just gross.
Ice cubes
1 1/2 ounce gin
3/4 ounce sweet vermouth
3/4 ounce maraschino liqueur
1/2 ounce simple syrup
Maraschino cherry for garnish
1. Fill a cocktail shaker halfway full with ice cubes. Add the gin, sweet vermouth, and maraschino liqueur, and simple syrup. Shake well.
2. Add the cherry to a cocktail glass or pretty cordial. Strain the mix into the glass.
Tags: cocktail, Dry Fly gin, maraschino liqueur, Merry Maraschino cherries, recipe, Sweet Dream, sweet vermouth, Valentine's Day cocktail, What I'm Drinking Right now
Posted in: Gin, Liqueurs, Recipes, What I'm Drinking
December 16, 2008
People always feel bad about riding the pine (meaning, sitting on the bench during a sporting event), but golly, someone has to be there to support the team with yelling and clapping and general enthusiastic behavior right? Without that, how could those stars actually playing get the energy to keep at it? Because, everyone needs support now and then, and, for that matter, everyone needs to sit and take a load off now and then. Heck, even Captain Marvel (the red-costumed one) needed to be Billy Batson on occasion. And when you’re hanging out on the bench in support style, or hanging out to catch your breath for a bit, you should have a drink that’s named for this very scene. Or, named because I had some lovely fresh pineapple that I thought to use in a drink, and this name made sense in that situation cause of the “pine.” One of those two reasons.
The first sounds better, doesn’t it? Like I wasn’t just whipping together a drink, but really thinking deeply about what it means to be a supporter of star players, instead of actually a star, combined with what it means to take a break from stardom, and trying to distill those notions into an ideal liquid form. Now that, friends, is deep (a deep load of crap some might say, but those “some” are probably creepy teetotalers). And, sort-of a lie, because there wasn’t “one” ideal liquid form but two, as I made the drink two ways. The first was muddling up some fresh pineapple, then adding a bit of simple syrup, a touch of pineapple juice for juiciness, and some dark rum (I used Mount Gay Eclipse, cause I’m pretty fond of its mixability, though it’s not super dark–white rum could have been used, too, but the dark gave it a touch more flavor) and shaking it up. The second was adding all of the same, plus some ice, to a blender and blending it up. Wife Nat had an urge for a blended drink (even though it’s freakily freezing out here) and far be it from me to talk her out of it. Drinkers deserve what they want. Both versions, I have to say, came out darn delicious, and tropical, and warming all at once. Which is fitting for the “Riding the Pine” moniker (well, you’re probably dreaming of the tropics when there, and your hindquarters are warm, and the drink is delicious). This drink, probably, could have been called a “Pineapple Daiquiri” or some such. But that’d be awfully boring.
Riding the Pine #1
1/4 cup fresh pineapple, plus one or two cubes for garnish
Ice cubes
1/2 ounce simple syrup
1/4 fresh pineapple juice
2 ounces dark rum
1. Put the pineapple in a cocktail shaker. Using your favorite muddler, muddle well.
2. Fill the shaker halfway full with ice cubes. Add everything else. Shake really well, and strain into a cocktail glass. Garnish with a pineapple cube or two.
Riding the Pine #2
1/4 cup fresh pineapple, plus one or two cubes for garnish
Ice cubes
1/2 ounce simple syrup
1/2 fresh pineapple juice
2 ounces dark rum
1. Put all the ingredients in a blender. Blend well.
2. Pour the Pine into a chilled glass of your choice, or a cocktail glass, or a basketball cut in half (but only if it’s been well-cleaned). Garnish with a pineapple cube or two.
October 9, 2008
Much like it’s easy to get caught up in the day-to-day busy-ness of work and then put off a blog post for a week plus, a post that you’ve been meaning to write every day (but then the corporate hive masters crack their electronic whips over you like you’re a sled dog pulling their dollar-making sled along until you just can’t take it anymore and end up constructing an example like this one, with mixed metaphors and long clauses that go on like a particularly annoying work day), much like this in a really small way is how it’s easy to get caught up in the vast array of ciders and beers available in the smaller towns in the U.K., and forget that there are some tip top cocktail slingers there, too, and that London has a sparkling array of cocktail spots. Whew, after that sentence we all need a drink. If you’re reading this in London, I suggest you find that drink at the Lonsdale, which is the focus of U.K. Drinks: Part Two (if you missed Part One, follow the link or scroll on down).
I was taken to the bar by cocktail-loving pals Ean and Reba (also known as Tales from the Birdbath), and accompanied by them and wife Natalie, but was given the suggestion of the Lonsdale as a tight cocktail spot by the fine writing-publishing folks Jared Brown and Anistatia R. Miller (who are also co-founders of the Museum of the American Cocktail). As a quick aside, if you haven’t picked up Mixologist: The Journal of the American Cocktail Volume I and Volume II, which they published, edited, and contributed to, then I’m not sure you can call yourself a cocktail lover, as these collections are bubbling over with essays from today’s top cocktailians about topics sure to wet your literary whistle. They’re also the authors of a range of books (from Champagne Cocktails to Shaken Not Stirred: A Celebration of the Martini). What I’m trying to get to in my roundabout way is that if they’re nice enough to suggest a spot for cocktails, it’s going to be reliably awesome. Which the Lonsdale was. The crowd may have been a bit stock-brokerish, and have wondered at my Mighty Boosh buttons, but the wait staff was sweet and the drinks were fantastic. I started with what I thought was a fairly under-utilized early-part-of-last-century-ish cocktail that I wasn’t sure was being poured today anywhere outside of my garage (I’d never had it outside of my garage at least. I had it first there when putting together Good Spirits), the Whizz Bang. From the Lonsdale’s in-depth and multi-page menu, I learned the drink was invented by Tommy Burton in 1920 at the Sport’s Club of London (I knew it was named after high-velocity shells in the war, due to the sounds they made). Here’s the picture (it was dark in there, so the photos aren’t the best) and the recipe.
Ice cubes
1-3/4 ounces Baillie Nicol Jarvie Scotch
3/4 ounce Noilly Prat Dry Vermouth
1/4ish ounce absinthe
1/4ish ounce pomegranate syrup
1 dashes orange bitters
1. Fill a cocktail shaker halfway full with ice cubes. Add everything. Shake well. Strain. Serve.
In the past, I’d made my Whizz Bangs with bourbon and Pernod instead of scotch and absinthe (due to necessity until recently on the latter). But the scotch here gave it a polite backbone and light smoky undertone. It may have been one of the best drinks I’ve had out (okay, take this with a grain of “I’m given to large pronouncements and going overboard about oodles of things,” but wow, it was delish), with the balance of flavors and hints of absinthe peeking through like the last rays of sunlight before dusk.
This may seem like an odd move for a cocktailing evening, but for my second drink I went for a Pisco Sour. After the knock out success of the Whizz Bang, I thought it’d be fun to get a more recognized classic, and see how the bartenders (who, sadly, I didn’t get to meet, as the bar area was overtaken by some sort of bungling birthday party, with ridiculous revelers who weren’t even taking advantage of the bar’s white hot staff of shakers, instead drinking beer and causing enough of a traffic jam that trying to get to the bar would have been an ordeal taking far too much time away from drinking) served it up. And, they served it up on the edge of marvelously (in the way that Dombey & Son is marvelous. It’s so marvelous, but not quite as marvelous as Bleak House), with an almost too serious head frothed up, as you can see in the picture below. The Macchu Pisco was exquisite, and the balance of sour to smooth walked the line perfectly. It would have been hard to follow up the Whizz Bang for any drink, though.
For my final drink of the evening, I went for a dessert number (and if anyone reading this wants to take offense with my dessert drink then fooey on you-y), a Coconut Flip, made with La Diablada Pisco (see, I was trying to follow a more natural path between drinks 2 and 3), Velvet Falernum (which I’ve been playing around with my-own-self recently), egg yolk, and sugar, with a touch of nutmeg on top in Flip style (a style which, the menu lets you know, traces back to pre-1810 England. They’re good country promoters at the Lonsdale). It was a great capper, with sweetness that didn’t overwhelm and a nice chewy (I’m not describing it exactly right, but it had a mouth feel that was more robust than most drinks due to the yolk) nature. By that time, I’d given up on taking snaps, due to lighting, but picture a smallish glass (a Delmonico glass, to be precise) of wet fluffy whiteness. Like a beautiful romantic ghost-in-a-glass, in a way. So, here’s to the Lonsdale, again, and to Ean and Reba again for taking us, with thanks for a delicious cocktail evening.
Get ready for some Valentine’s Day hugging, kissing, and drinking (you don’t really want to have a Valentine over for a little romance without the right drink, right? I mean, you aren’t that caddish, are you? And, speaking of “caddish” is that a phrase that applies to both ladies and gentlemen? Or is a “cad” only a dude? Cause I in no way want to imply that not serving a good drink on Valentine’s Day is okay if you’re female. It’s bad no matter what. So, put that in your shaker and shake it) with this lovely mix (from Good Spirits, if you wanna relay a little information to your amorous other when serving up the cocktail). I used Washington State’s own Dry Fly gin when making it, and liked it lots, and also suggest using Tillen Farms Merry Maraschino cherries (from good ol’ WA as well), which are yummy and clean, sweetened with pure cane sugar instead of goopy high fructose junk, and which don’t contain artificial dross. Which of course you don’t want to serve up alongside the kisses. That’s just gross. 
