March 8, 2013
I’ve been drinking up the Scotch and some Scotch cocktails, too, and just wrote about both for the good ol’ Good Life Report. Specifically, the article’s called Auchentoshan Scotch and the Rob Roy cocktail, cause the latter’s what I give a recipe for, and the former what I put in it. Though I talk about more than that, so why not head on over and read the article. You’ll dig it, and can make yourself a Rob Roy for your evening libation. Which you know you deserve.
Tags: Auchentoshan Scotch, cocktail recipe, Cocktail Recipes, Friday Night Cocktail, Good Life Report, Rob Roy, Scotch, What I'm Drinking
Posted in: Cocktail Talk, Good Life Report, Recipes, Scotch
November 6, 2012
Well, wouldn’t you know it—even James Bond gets older. It seems his first film came out about 50 years ago. What does this have to do with anything outside of giving me a chance to make the point that Sean Connery is the finest James Bond and anyone who disagrees is a ninny? Well, it also leads to the fact that the lovely French aperitif wine-thing Lillet figures into the Bond mythos. Which also then leads to a little Lillet article I have in the most recent Good Life Report, which also has an article about Bond. And now it’s all tied up in a mystery even Timothy Dalton could solve (I kid, I kid. Dalton is aces with me).
August 13, 2012
Who wouldn’t want to make their day or summer or life better (or gooder)? I mean, even if you’re walking on sunshine, walking on sunshine with a good drink is going to make it a more memorable experience (provided you don’t have too many and slip off the sunshine. But I digress). Which, if you follow along to a logical conclusion, means that every life could be better (or gooder). But how, you may ask me, how can that be possible? Well, one way to start might be with the Good Life Report. Just look at the name—it implies a life that’s good. Now, to take it up a notch, I’m gonna suggest that you look at two pieces I recently had in said Good Life Report: A Somewhat Sicilian Summer Cocktail Star and Give the Imbibable Power to the People. Both contain tasty drink recipes and words of making-life-better wisdom. Okay, that last bit is probably BS, but hey, at least the drinks are tasty, and could probably get you walking on sunshine. That’s enough of a thing to get you over there reading them, right? Right!
October 30, 2011
Just in time for you kooky fright-fest adult trick-and-treaters, let me present the latest on the Good Life Report, a recipe and such for the Sleepy Hollow cocktail. It’s an ideal Halloween party drink, one that matches both the spooky-fun nature of the holiday and (just in case you’re not reading the article on October 31st exactly) the season. It mixes gin, apricot liqueur, mint, lemon, and a hint of simple syrup (to match up with the candy and such the real kiddies get) into a mix that’s not scary at all, but good enough that you might just lose your head over it. So, get on over there and read the Sleepy Hollow up.
PS: Can’t get enough Halloween cocktails? Watch me make a Warlock cocktail and turn into a demon.
October 13, 2011
As the temperature here in Seattle is coaxing its way down into downright chilly, I’ve been writing about switching into the darker, warming-er, drinks. Or, I just wrote about one of my regular fall/winter drinks, the Bobby Burns, for the always-good-to-read Good Life Report. You, actually, should go read my article right now, and learn how to make this Scotch, sweet vermouth, Benedictine combo cocktail, and learn a bit more about the poet Robert Burns, and learn a stitch of a poem of his about whisky, a poem excerpt you might want to read when having the drink, and also learn about a cigar salesman. That sounds like a lot of learning, but really, it’s painless (and tasty). So get going, and go read my Fall Poetics and the Bobby Burns cocktail article.
August 16, 2011
My latest article on the Good Life Report, The Mysteries of the Margarita, starts by saying:
The Margarita may just be the most curious of the super-popular cocktails (and by “super-popular” I mean being ordered by a massively large number of people as I type). The curiosity stems both from its history, which I’ll talk more about in a second, and from the fact that people seem to be okay about 78% of the time with drinking a really awfully made mix that somebody who doesn’t know better calls a Margarita.
and if that doesn’t get you over there to read the rest of the article, well, you’d better check your pulse pal, to make sure you’re not, actually, a ghost.
August 9, 2011
Okay, I could talk here about how tequila has a bad (as in tough, not un-tasty) reputation (and has nothing to say about its bad reputation), and how thinking this is sure to make your summer less delicious as you’ll utilize tequila less than you should, it being such a fine, fine summer mixer. But, I’m going to skip saying any more than I did already (jezz, I just can’t shut up) to point you to a new tequila-in-summer article I wrote for the Good Life Report, an article which talks up the same points. It’s a quick read, so you can skip over there now and catch it between sips (or between meetings, if you’re at work). Beyond the basic talk, there’s a recipe for a cocktail that proves my points, a cocktail called the Green Garden, which just happens to be from Paul Abercrombie’s book (that you should own) Organic, Shaken and Stirred: Hip Highballs, Modern Martinis, and Other Totally Green Cocktails. It, and the Green Garden cocktail, bring whole new meaning to the term green party.
July 22, 2011
If you’re a regular reader of the Spiked Punch blog (and if you aren’t, why, may I ask, aren’t you? Cause I like you lots. Lots. So much that I want you here, reading, all the time. As long as that doesn’t sound creepy), you know that I was lucky enough to visit the Branca distillery, cause I distilled the visit in Branca Tour 1 and Branca Tour 2. What I may not have hit on enough in either of those articles is how that visit spurred on my love of Branca Menta (my love of Fernet Branca and the vermouths mentioned in those posts was pretty high already). Especially in these summer months, I actually drink more of the more-recent Branca, the Menta. Why, you might ask? Well, I detail the why, as well as give a recipe for the Menta Highball, and talk more Branca and Milan (where it’s made) in this article for the Good Life Report, called Make It a Milan Menta Summer. So get your-own summer-drink luvin’ self over there and start reading.
