Copa del Aidon

Have a Copa! Copa del Aidon! Just hop ova' Pyriphlegethon!
Have a Copa! Copa del Aiiiii-don!
Muse di'int debunk and now has to get drunk with a Coooopaaaaah!
Don't call H. R....

(for those puzzling, we had an incident Wednesday night that explains everything)


Copa del Aidon
1 1/2 oz resposado mezcal (Los Amantes)
1 oz bianco vermouth (Dolin)
1 oz Becherovka
1 dash orange bitters (Regan's No. 6 or Bittercube)
white sage smoke

Smoke glass. Stir, strain, pour.

Hard to tell where the smoke ends and the spice begins.

May all souls rest in peace, in memory, in love.


As you can see, I like my stogies rolled thick.
What? What do you think covers up the desiccated flesh smell, especially 8 years on?
Nobody gets my undead hamham humor.
grr.. argh...

Falernum and Becherovka: Secret Message

And then, after all the talking yesterday, sometimes it's better to simplify, and then let the drink do the talking. Use this particular bourbon - seriously. Rye spice is overkill when what you want is smooth rippling undercurrent to our feature players. Too sweet? Hardly. A paper-dry finish.

Drink your Ovaltine!

Secret Message

2 oz Four Roses Small Batch bourbon

1/2 oz falernum

1/2 oz Becherovka

Shake. Strain into chilled cocktail glass. Garnish with super-secret clove-lime decoder wheel.

If you use homemade Kaiser Penguin-style falernum like me, don't forget to add a splash of lime juice (just not too much).

NOTE (after the fact): the glass makes sense for the mix, but I would encourage using something more fluted to capture the glorious nose and ensure it isn't drowned out by ice chill or dissipation. The nose makes the cocktail.

Falernum and Becherovka: Rhythm of the Night

It started innocently enough as a near-end-of-work recipe idea jotted down on a post-it. Something a little on the lighter side with a spirit-mixer inversion. But then the accents? Oh the accents. The almost-too-obvious (or is that redundant?) accents that make it better than you could have considered on-paper. The other ingredients potentially drive the drink too sweet, but you see, this just gives the dry Becherovka room to work its magic. And the voodoo spice of falernum wedded to those bitter baking spices? Here's a combination that makes your cocktail come alive, man!

Furthermore, sometimes you find a magical combination that births a heck of a lot of recipe bunnies (and why haven't more recipes done this besides The Exporter, for that matter?). And then sometimes when you go and test some out again, the moment has already passed and they flop for one reason or another. So, in the spirit of being a muse, I'm going to give you two recipes - one today, one tomorrow - then the bunnies can invade your living room! Better be sure to stock up on alfalfa.

Rhythm of the Night
1 oz reposado tequila (Corralejo)
1 1/2 oz Dubonnet Rouge
1/4 oz (fat) falernum
1/4 oz Becherovka
2 dashes orange bitters (Angostura)
1 sprig thyme for garnish

Shake. 

Strain into a chilled cocktail coupe. 

Garnish with thyme.

Nose: orange, faint berry/herbs and spice background. Agave-spice. Faint hint of celery herb.

Palate: LUSH. Busy, rich, dervish delight, despite the relatively lighter-proof. Big ginger-agave spice from the lowlands Corralejo. Berry undertone. Just dive in and taste it for yourself.

Why the thyme? I can't resist jerk seasoning pairings. And, it's an unexpected note that fits the music of the drink while not under or overemphasizing other notes.

When you're feeling around for a cocktail name, sometimes you gotta go with what hits your mind, no matter the kitsch. Granted, I was googling early 90s dance pop hits at the time and "Spark in the Night" had too many articles and prepositions for my taste (I know, right?). The colors involved, down to Corralejo's brilliant blue bottle, scream Corona's so-named song with its Christmas-light-colored blips and bleeps. But then some merry prankster's liable to come along, point out the tequila pushes it into the Latin rhythms of DeBarge's Rhythm of the Night and come back with some terrible Michelada knock-off to further cement the point, or worse, point out another song or twelve with the exact same name because it really is that generic.

Your move, merry prankster.


And, psst, stick around. There's one more recipe in this mode to come, but it's a Secret.

Mixology Monday, June 2014: Pineapple!

Greetings one and all, it's Mixology Monday time (which, as you might've figured out by now in my twisted timeframes is always too close to the deadlines for any comfort whatsoever). Thiago of Bartending Notes is our host this month, with a theme perfect for the summer months or for dreams of the summer months: Pineapple!

Let’s bring the king of fruits back! After being canned, mixed with all sorts of sugary liquids and blended into guilty pleasures not to be named some 80s dreadful cocktails, the pineapple needs more respect!

Once a symbol of hospitality, the King of fruits might be know misunderstood. One of the greatest non-citrus souring agents, used for crazy garnish ideas, infusions, old gum syrup flavoring, the pineapple is a fruit to be reckoned.

Be in a tiki cocktails, an old school classic like the Algonquin, a crazy flavor pairing or just mixed in a delicious Verdita, get creative and make a cocktail using any part of this delicious, juicy fruit or share you favorite pineapple cocktail with us!

When active, follow this link to see what pineappley goodness everyone concocted!


So what pairs with pineapple? Besides the usual rum, coconut, vanilla, baking spices, lime?

Oregano!

I know, I know, let's not let the suspense linger any further.

Island Laurel
1 1/2 oz dry white rum (Brugal Extra Dry)
3/4 oz fresh pineapple juice
1 tsp Becherovka liqueur
2-3 sprigs fresh oregano + oregano garland for garnish

In a rocks glass, lightly press the sprigs of oregano in the rum.

Add pineapple juice, Becherovka and ice (crushed would be nice here).

Stir briefly to chill and dilute.

Garnish with an oregano garland for fresh aroma.






Yes, fresh oregano in a cocktail, and it's not meant to smell/taste like pizza. The thing I really like about this herb when fresh is its almost-floral-yet-resinous quality. You just don't get that from a shaker of dried leaves.

I picked up my bottle of Brugal Extra Dry recently on clearance, since I needed a white rum in stock. Excellent bottle and very cocktail-friendly. When I first opened, nosed, tasted, with a partial mind to this month's pineapple theme, the first thing that cried out at me was fresh oregano of all things (yes, in combination with the rum and pineapple). Probably some kind of unholy vanilla, passionfruit, dry vermouth flavor association going on.

So, after melodramatically throwing up my hands and giving up one too many times with too many other ideas -- and struggling with pineapple's sour yet also quite sweet aspect throwing off the balance of sweeter-oriented cocktails -- I turned back to the original dry-oriented flavor combination. Yeah, it's an odd way to use pineapple, but I like its understated yet very present turn in this drink. A lilting floral quality on the tongue, like a slightly-sweet Martini.

The Becherovka I threw in just to balance the sweetness, and it's a great pairing with pineapple in general, like I found out with Giganta. Though, yes, I was trepidatious about pairing its baking spice goodness with the oregano. Turns out oregano pairs well with cinnamon, however -- whoda thunk?

Mega thanks to our host Thiago for offering to accept this way past due. Pineapple sure was beguiling as a theme, but surprising too. Can't wait to see what everyone else came up with.

Big thanks to Fred Yarm of cocktail virgin slut for lifting the MxMo torch high so we herd of cats know which direction to look.

Thanks also to Mixology Monday founder Paul Clarke for starting one of the best institutions on the web.

Saúde & cin cin!

Mixology Monday, November 2013: Resin, part 1

Greetings once again, this late Mixology Monday night! I've been more fatigable than usual of late, so let's be pithy. Shaun and Christa, the Booze Nerds, have teased out a theme for us this month, the sort that makes you go "Ohhhhh! Now there's an idea with deeper resonance for the season." Or Resin-ance, as the case may be:

We thought hard about a theme that would work well for this time of year, and after contemplating the food, booze, and decor we like for the holidays, we settled on “Resin”. From savory rosemary in a stuffing, to a delicious juniper-y gin in a martini, to a fragrant fir ornament or garnish, our friends the evergreens have a lot to offer. The challenge: come up with an ingenious creation using the resin-y ingredient of your choice. Zirbenz, retsina, hoppy IPA, pine-nut puree, even? Sure! Spirit, garnish, aroma, all are fair game. Whatever resin means to you, we want to hear it.

When active, this link will send you to the summary post of this month's festivities.

Being an Aries, I've read that frankincense is an especially good spice for the sign, and the stress-relieving cinnamon-frankincense candles I've had over the years give that theory much credit. So the scent being close to my heart, how can I not want to cocktail with it? Its exoticism makes me think of a fortune teller, rings and jewels and layers of variegated-patterned frocks, a little of this and a little of that but never quite one thing -- perhaps the reason her senses are so attuned to the other side.

So sit back, breathe deep as the frankincense soothes you, and drink deep of the underlying interconnectedness. And beyond this recipe, stay tuned in a few seconds for another resinous cocktail, which would only clutter this post.

The Shew Stone

2 oz Gewürztraminer

1/2 oz Becherovka

1/4 oz grappa

1/4 oz blanco mezcal

absinthe ice sphere

frankincense-smoked glass

Smoke your rocks serving glass with frankincense, about 1-2 minutes.*

Stir liquid ingredients on light ice to combine.

Add absinthe ice sphere to serving glass and strain cocktail over top.

Sniff and savor.

*Frankincense requires indirect heat, either via a lit specialty charcoal briquet or an aluminum pie plate over a low-heat stove or hot plate. Rest serving glass over the smoke on minimally-conductive lifts made from wood or porcelain (I used a pie plate on the stove with a spare wooden chopstick broken in two to protect the glass from heat damage).

The delicacy of frankincense hits your nose first, all ginger and pine and smoke and white citrus. This leads into the hearth fire of the mezcal (El Buho, here) and then subtle sweetness and rose petals (reinforced by the grappa -- Alexander, di Cabernet in my case) on the tongue. Dryness follows as well as a subtle complexity - a mix of the frankincense and Becherovka. After some time when the ice sphere begins to melt, your fortune (or maybe just intoxication) begins to emerge in notes of anise and fennel - not sore thumbs in the least, but further complexity that play up the frankincense.

As you might notice, there's no base spirit to this cocktail. Sure, there's grappa and mezcal around the edges, but no anchor beyond the gewurtz. Very much intended. Whoever might be telling fortunes would likely be a nomad or gypsy, picking up a wide variety of spirits in her travels, as the recipe demonstrates. This one cocktail I admire, the Against All Odds from PDT, started my thoughts off down this direction.


Notes:

1. I'm not a wine expert, so selecting a precise Gewürztraminer is something I can't do, particularly with the limitations of the PLCB. Overall, the ideal gewurtz for this cocktail would emphasize ginger, rose and lychee notes, while being about midway between sweet and dry - sweet to integrate the other ingredients and dry/acidic to define them so they're not swimming beneath the surface. The two wines I used for testing proved to be on either end of the spectrum (Domaine Paul Buecher 2011 - sweet & Firestone 2009 - dry), so 1 oz of each ended up about right.
2. Also important is selecting a food grade frankincense. Frankincense has multiple grades, some only fit for burning as incense. While you don't have to go all the way to "superior" (très très cher), the paler and more translucent the better. I found this frankincense online, which is marketed as a "tea" (always an excellent signifier for obscure herbs and spices, imo) - it proves quite ethereal when smoked and also functions well as a chewing gum.
3. To make an absinthe ice sphere, fill your spherical ice mold (mine's a Tovolo) with water and let freeze for a few hours until a frozen outer shell has developed, somewhere between 1/4 to 1/2" thick. At that point, drill a small hole in the shell and drain the water out. Replace said water with a chilled mix of 1/2 oz absinthe to 3 oz or more of water. Dilution and chilling are key, because otherwise the absinthe's high proof will melt a hole straight through the sphere and wreck it upon addition. It is possible to just do an ice sphere of diluted absinthe, but the outer rough texture leaves something to be desired aesthetically. Plain water ice will give you a glossy clear exterior like that of a crystal ball, while the absinthe adds a cloudiness and mystique which suggests there's magic happening inside. More pointers on complex/filled ice spheres here.

Mixology Monday, October 2013: Intercontinental

*crawls back from the world of Westeros with a very repaired liver and a creative drive at loose ends* HI!

So not only is it Mixology Monday, but we've got a real doozy of a challenge this time: Intercontinental, courtesy Stewart of Putney Farm:

Everywhere we travel these days we see cocktails on the menu. And not just here in the USA, but all around the world. And that’s not only the drinks, but the ingredients as well. Nowadays when we look behind most bars we see spirits, liqueurs, aromatic wines, bitters, herbs, spices, tools and glassware from all corners of the globe. So let’s celebrate the global reach of cocktails with an “Intercontinental” Mixology Monday challenge. Create a cocktail with “ingredients” from at least 3, but preferably 4, 5 or 6 continents. And if you can include Antarctica, then you get a Gold Star. And remember, sometimes the tools used, glassware, names or back stories of cocktails are important “ingredients”. Creativity and a bit of narrative exploration are encouraged. So if you have been waiting on buying that bottle of Japanese Scotch, Bundaberg rum from Australia, Pisco or Cachaca from South America or Madagascar vanilla, now may be the time to try them out….except for the Bundy…trust us on that. Have fun.

When active, this link will send you to the summary post of this month's festivities.

This recipe is very much indebted to Tiare's Coffee Barrel from A Mountain of Crushed Ice. Her love of the coffee-pineapple flavor combo caught my eye, and then got me wondering: if you've got coffee syrup and orgeat, why not combine the two? And frankly, if you're splitting the atom of orgeat like that, what next?

This is a little cart-before-the-horse: I've been noodling recipes that utilize tea over coffee and then a blend of nuts to expand upon my Itsy Bitsy Teeny Weenie Yellow Polka Dot Bikini Punch. We'll get to those in due course, maybe a slower than in previous times.

But in the meantime, I've envisioned an out-growth of those two cocktails, taking Jane Porter and Jane of the Jungle to great -- nay, GIGANTIC -- heights with another jungle lady of pulp: Giganta, Doris Zeul, DC Comics supervillainess, Wonder Woman rogue and 50-foot (and beyond) woman who classically became dumber the bigger she grew (you can imagine how that works with rum). All that mixed in with mad scientist and gorilla roots from the 50s/60s -- I'm slightly surprised I'm not referencing To Russia With Love.

[insert Comic Books Cocktails Badge here, once designed]

Wonder Woman v2. #3, Heinberg & Dodsons
Blue Beetle v3. #19, Rogers, Baldeon, Bird
As Paco, lower-right, says:
HE NEEDS OUR HELP WITH HIS SEXY FIGHT!

Giganta
3/4 oz Smith & Cross rum
3/4 oz white cachaça (51)
1/2 oz spiced rum
1/2 oz lime juice
1/2 oz pineapple juice
1/2 oz coffee-macadamia orgeat
1/4 oz banana liqueur
1/4 oz Becherovka
banana and macadamia nuts for garnish

Shake all but the garnish in a shaker full of ice. Pour all into a chilled Hurricane glass. Garnish with banana and macadamia nuts as you like. Note: the more overproof the spirits, the better.

For those keeping score at home: cachaça (South America), lime juice (Persian limes as the labels say, albeit from Mexico - Asia), rums and banana liqueur (North America), Becherovka and Tiare's (Sweden) recipe (Europe). And coffee-macadamia orgeat counts for both Africa (Fair Trade Rwanda Wild Mountain Gorilla Fund coffee) and Australia (indigenous macadamia nuts). As far as I know, Giganta hasn't teamed up with The Penguin or joined Justice League: Antarctica, so the seventh continent remains elusive.

The resulting cocktail is a tad sweet, though quite rounded in flavor, particularly due to the sweet ingredients (especially the banana liqueur). You get a nice coffee undernote, enhanced by macadamia's earthiness (would be much different if it were almond). The citruses add bite. I'm still new to the art of Tiki rum-mixing, but the rough 51 cachaça enhances the bite (the petrol note blends seamlessly with the coffee), while Smith & Cross adds needed oomph and hogo, and the spiced rum (Sailor Jerry) brought some vanilla notes which complimented the sweet elements. [Kraken might be nice here as well: a black element would always be favorable in a villain cocktail.] Becherovka restrains some of the sweet elements too, while adding a touch more depth.


Coffee-Macadamia Orgeat
2 oz roasted, crushed macadamia nuts
1/3 cup water
1/2 T coffee
1/3 cup turbinado sugar

1. Crush your macadamia nuts with a rolling pin in a baggie of some kind. You want the nuts well-crushed but not powdered, all the better to quickly extract the oils. If not roasted, roast on a baking sheet in the oven 4 minutes at 400F.
2. Add nuts and water to a small sauce pot and simmer for 5 minutes on the stove. Remove from heat and let rest 30 minutes. (Do not apply too much heat. If you smell cooked nuts/oatmeal, you've overdone it). Pour mixture through a sieve covered in a few layers of cheesecloth into a cup. Thoroughly wring out excess liquid from the nuts.
3. Add liquid back to the sauce pot, bring to simmer, add the same nuts, and repeat step 2.
4. Repeat step 3, but add the coffee along with the nuts this time and omit resting. After sauce pot has been emptied, rinse out any stray particles, then add liquid back along with the sugar. Gently heat and stir to dissolve. Let cool and store in the fridge.
5. No hydrosol necessary due to the use of coffee.

I think I've done enough orgeat at this point that I can really comment on the process. You want to make your nut milk first with as minimal cooking as possible prior to adding any sweetenings and flavorings. The more heat you apply, the more you get a cooked nut flavor -- but that also doesn't mean you have to take a full day or two to make the stuff. A few good wringings and you'll have extracted the bulk of the nuts' oils into your base liquid, to be modified as your wont.

Cheers to Stewart for hosting and Fred of Cocktail Virgin Slut for wrangling!