This Week in the Blogs

• Michael Dietsch of A Dash of Bitters continues his scholarly Cocktail 101 lectures on SeriousEats with one on how to batch cocktails. It is important lesson to learn so that you are not stuck behind the bar at your party for hours making drinks.  Batched cocktails are also great to show up with at other people’s parties too instead of a bottle of wine or 6 pack of beer.
• A Mountain of Crushed Ice’s Tiare reviews a rum I have been eagerly awaiting, Plantation Dark Overproof. Weighing in at 146 proof, this Trinidad & Tobago rum packs a lot of flavor punch for a decent price. Tiare then went on to use it in a variety of Martin Cate’s tasty Tiki recipes.
• Camper English of Alcademic’s has another busy week. He publishes an article about the variety of Fernet liqueurs that are not Branca in the SF Chronicle, one on craft beer in Silverkris Magazine, and 4 recipes in Every Day with Rachel Ray. Camper also shares the new cocktail menus for the Vanguard in Las Vegas, Moonraker in Pacifica, and Maven in San Francisco.
• Cocktail Virgin’s Fred Yarm offers the recipes for a few drinks he had out including Island Creek Oyster Bar’s white port and yellow Chartreuse 1638, Craigie on Main’s tequila and Cynar Libretto, and Deep Ellum’s Hot Old Fashioned. For drinks he had in, Fred describes the brandy and Swedish Punsch Rocket, the apricot-rinsed wine-floated Bell-Ringer Sour, and the Red Hook-Fancy Free-like Buffalo.
• Matt Rowley of the Whiskey Forge spends the week discussing the classic egg nog-like bottled spirit Advocaat including how it can sooth lawyers’ throats. In case you cannot find it being sold on your local shelves or that you know that you can do better, Matt provides an easy but elegant recipe to craft your own.
• Sloshed’s Marleigh suggests some of her past favorite holiday drink recipes.
• Pegu Doug honors the marketing genius of Johnnie Walker by putting Christina Hendricks next to their bottle. Doug also discusses the ramifications of the liquor situation on Washington State.
• Savoy Stomp’s Erik Ellestad reveals a few of the secrets he has learned in the service industry.
* Darcy O’Neil from Art of Drink has a great graphical explanation of the 100 point wine scale from bum wine to epicurean delights.