• Erik Ellestad of the Savoy Stomp continues on with his tales of Italy with a photo safari focusing on drink menus and trends.
• Go comment on Matt Rowley’s post on the Whiskey Forge blog to get a chance to win a recipe card set from Tales of the Cocktail 2008! Matt also makes candied peels from the ever strange but aromatic Buddha’s Hand Citron.
• In With Bacchus’ Scott Spolverino quite enjoyed tasting Sweet Leaf Lemon Iced Tea although he’s not quite sure about the can’s artwork.
• Chuck Taggart of the Gumbo Pages shares his excitement about 11/11/11.
• Cocktail Virgin/Slut’s Frederic Yarm provides a summary of Harold McGee and Dave Arnold’s Science of Cocktails seminar at Harvard and a review of the Greater Boston Beverage Society’s Shakin’ It Up event which is a precursor to their Boston Cocktail Week in October 2012 (includes gossip about the new Fee’s bitters flavor for 2012). He also previews four Boston bars that will be opening soon including where Misty Kalkofen will be working, and he gives tasting notes of No. 3 Gin that he tried at a Boston release event at Eastern Standard.
• Darcy O’Neil of Art of Drink recreates the classic sodahouse Chocolate Phosphate drink with both acid phosphate and lactart.
• Alcademic’s Camper English relates stories, recipes, and photos from the Suntory cocktail competition in Japan — I am still blown away by one of the garnishes. Also part of his visit was a tour of Japanese whisky distilleries. Back at home in San Francisco, Camper reviews the new Azucar Lounge and previews Oakland’s Plum Bar. Finally, he makes some garnish-worthy pickled grapes from Can It, Bottle It, Smoke It And Other Kitchen Projects and writes about it on FineCooking.
• Tiare of A Mountain of Crushed Ice reviews a great rum she was introduced to at the UK Rumfest, namely St Nicholas Abbey 12 Year Rum from Barbados. With this “rich and fruity with a touch of spices, wood and caramel” rum, she mixes up one delicious Daiquiri.
• A Jigger of Blog’s Matt Hamlin tinkers around with the Bittermens Commonwealth Tonic Cordial. Instead of a soda or a sweet syrup, this alcohol-laden cordial provides a lot more options for cocktail making.
• Michael Dietsch of A Dash of Bitters passes on some helpful tips on how to host holiday parties in his Cocktails 101 series on Serious Eats. He also shares some cute photos of his home bar’s barback.

This Thursday night at the Mixoloseum chat room, the theme will be “tall drinks” which is perfect now that the weather is getting warmer! So dust off your Collins glasses and start freezing some extra ice cubes to get ready. Everything from Fizzes to Collins, Tiki to Slings, and Rickeys to Daisies is fair game! The action starts at 8pm EST and goes until the last bottle of tonic is drained (around 1am).

The last TDN theme was “In Memorial” to honor a loved one or something completely absurd yet missed. A pair of recipes to represent some of the action (the rest are on the Twitter feed) are the following:

The Elizabeth Reed Cocktail created by SunnyAndRummy
• 1 oz Scarlet Ibis Rum (sub a flavorful amber rum, Trinidadian if you got it)
• 1 oz Old New Orleans Cajun Spice Rum (sub another spiced rum)
• 1/2 oz Maple Syrup
• 1 tsp St. Elizabeth Allspice Dram
Shake with ice and double strain into a cocktail glass.

Basil’s Julep created by theSpeakista
• 1 1/2 oz Old Tom Gin
• 1 1/2 oz London Dry Gin
• 1/2 oz St. Germain
• 2 dash Grapefruit Bitters
• 2 dash Orange Bitters
• 3 Basil Leaves
Stir on crushed ice until the glass is frosted. Garnish with bitters and sprigs of basil.

He waved the man away and turned to Charles Mason. “Now, my young buck,” he said, “I have ten shillings here that say I can beat you at your favorite game of billiards. Want to bet? Of course you do. Well, let’s go down to the Merchant’s Coffeehouse and try our skill. And before we start to play I’ll treat you to a rum fustian.”

“Rum fustian I May I inquire what that is?”

“Oh, I forgot that you are from the benighted land of Virginia, where your favorite drink is eggnog or mint julep. A rum fustian, my dear sir, is made of beer, sherry, gin, the yolks of eggs, sugar and a little nutmeg all stirred together and heated with a red-hot loggerhead.”

Mason reflected a minute. “That sounds like a strong drink,” he said. “But why do they call it rum fustian when there’s no rum in it?”

“That’s where the fustian part comes in, my inquiring lad,” said the Major. “Fustian as you know means an imitation.” ¹

While flipping through Jerry Thomas’ How to Mix Drinks, or The Bon-vivant’s Companion, I came across a curious egg drink served hot, the Rumfustian, which as the bit of history above describes contains no rum at all. Thomas gave the history as “a drink very much in vogue with English sportsmen, after their return from a day’s shooting.” ² Histories across the web did not confirm the sportsmen lore, but suggested it was a drink of English university students, American colonial settlers, and pirates dating back to the late seventeenth or early eighteenth century. The “rum” part of the name derives from the gypsy word for powerful, and evidence of its strength was written about in colonial America. There, the drink was often drank at breakfast and its consumption took a toll on the efficiency and character of the settlers.³

The recipe I used was from Thomas and I provide the volumes I used to make two servings in parentheses:

Rumfustian
• 12 Egg Yolks (2)
• 1 quart Beer (5 1/3 oz Mayflower Porter)
• 1 pint Gin (2 2/3 oz Beefeater)
• 1 bottle Sherry (4 oz Lustau Don Nuño Dry Oloroso)
• 1 stick Cinnamon (1/6)
• 1 Nutmeg (1/6)
• 12 large lump Sugar (2 tsp Turbinado)
• 1 rind Lemon Peel (1/6)
Heat sherry in a sauce pan with cinnamon, nutmeg (grated), sugar, and lemon peel. Mix egg yolks, beer, and gin. When sherry comes to a boil, pour (while straining) into bowl with the yolks, beer, and gin. Serve hot.

I mixed the yolk, gin, and beer in a cocktail shaker instead of whisking in a bowl (be careful to degas it every few shakes to save from making a mess as the beer decarbonates). I also left the shaker in a bowl of hot water to warm up the contents since it contained a larger volume than the hot sherry. In addition, I grated some nutmeg over the top of each cup before serving.
The beer I used from the Mayflower Brewery and was somewhat smokey; its flavors mainly came through on the first part of the sip. The cinnamon, nutmeg, and nutty sherry flavors then followed this initial malty wave. We debated whether or not we could taste the gin as it was rather well masked by the spices. Moreover, the egg yolk provided a thick, rich mouthfeel, but unlike egg white, it did not mute the drink to any degree. In addition, the Rumfustian was not as sweet as eggnog, or perhaps my interpretation of a “large lump” to be a teaspoons-worth of sugar fell short. Some might prefer this drink to be a bit sweeter so adjust accordingly. And interestingly, as the drink cooled, the spice notes diminished with the beer taking a greater prominence in the flavor profile.
Overall, the drink was pretty complex, heavy, and at first a bit bizarre. However, with successive sips, the drink grew on us and the taste became addictive. With the warmth and spice profile, I could see the Rumfustian being a great treat after coming in from the cold. And if Jerry Thomas’ lore is correct, it would most certainly help you to forget an unsuccessful day of hunting.

¹ Woodward, W.E. The Way Our People Lived: An Intimate American History. E.P. Dutton & Company, 1944.
² Thomas, J. How to Mix Drinks, or The Bon-vivant’s Companion. Dick & Fitzgerald, 1862.
³ History of Alcohol in America.

Cross-posted to the Cocktail Virgin blog.

It took a long time for me to warm up to grenadine as a cocktail ingredient, after a childhood chock full of bright red Rose’s Grenadine Shirley Temples.

Rose's vs Homemade Grenadine

But now I know how many great cocktails include grenadine. A couple of personal favorites are the El Presidente and the Blinker. And now that I know how easy it is to make my own grenadine, I’ll never go back to Rose’s.

Like many a first time grenadine maker, I started with Paul Clarke’s epic Grenadine Face-off. The first time I make cold process grenadine, I shook and shook and shook…and finally gave up and used the blender. The results were fine.

Now I use my handy dandy milk frother, and it’s even faster, cleaner, and easier.

Cold-Process Grenadine

1 cup pomegranate juice (I used some POM Wonderful that was sent to me for review)
1 cup + 1 tablespoon sugar
1 tablespoon vodka

Put juice and sugar in a conveniently sized resealable container. Take your milk frother and incorporate the sugar. Add vodka to extend life. Refrigerate. Will keep a good long time.

Have a Heart Comparison

Where Rose’s doesn’t taste much like anything but sugar to me, the homemade has the the taste of the pomegranate juice and a much richer, deep color to boot.

The best grenadine I’ve had to date was an experiment by Zane Harris (newly of Rob Roy), based on a recipe he’d uncovered that called for both pomegranate and raspberry. His process was long and complicated and someday I may try it, but for now, I’ll stick with a recipe that I can whip up even faster than simple syrup (because I don’t have to wait for it to cool).

I used my latest batch to try out a recipe in Ted Haigh’s newly reissued Vintage Spirits and Forgotten Cocktails, the Have a Heart. I dropped the lime juice to 1/2 ounce, adding a lime wedge garnish lets the drinker decide to tart it up.

Have a Heart Cocktail

1.5 ounces London dry gin (Voyager Small-batch)
0.75 ounces Swedish punsch (homemade)
0.5 ounces fresh lime juice
0.25 ounces homemade grenadine

Stir while thinking weepy 1934 thoughts, strain into cocktail glass, garnish with lime wedge.

As in the picture above, the cocktail on the left uses Rose’s, on the right, homemade. The fake color of the Rose’s carries through to the cocktail, while the homemade contributes to a drink with a much deeper, appealing, adult color.

Even more important is the taste. I didn’t care for this cocktail with the Rose’s. With the homemade grenadine, however, this is a tasty, well rounded drink.

I must admit, I also love using my homemade grenadine in homemade Shirley Temples. Fill a rocks glass with ice, some soda water, and spoon in up to a tablespoon of grenadine, and I have a light, refreshing drink that’s just sweet enough. And it’s a great base to experiment with bitters! I especially recommend a dash or four of blueberry bitters!

What’s your favorite way to use grenadine?

Driving along through this or that neighborhood, you spot something on the sidewalk.  A lemonade stand.  Manned by couple of kids.  Me, I always stop.

There’s not much that’s more refreshing than a nice, tall glass of lemonade on a hot summer day.  It’s easy peasy to make, too — water, sugar and lemons.

And what’s better than lemonade?  Grown-up lemonade with booze in it!  (We’ll get back to that in a bit.)

You know how to make lemonade, right?  I would imagine that you do, but let’s assume that your mom always made it for you, and that hers was so good and so perfect that you never really got around to making any for yourself.  It really couldn’t be easier, but as with most drinks it helps to have a method. Before you start squeezing, though, here are some tips to maximize your juice output.

1. Don’t use lemons right out of the fridge.  Cold lemons yield less juice.

2. Even better than using room temperature lemons is putting your lemons in a hot water bath for several minutes.

3. Roll your lemons under the palm of your hand on the cutting board before squeezing.  This helps to liberate the juice.

4. Oh, and don’t pay 79¢ each for your lemons at a major chain supermarket.  I see these prices and it makes me want to yell at someone.  If you can, find a small, local, mom-and-pop produce market or Latin or other ethnic supermarket, where the lemons will likely be a more reasonable 99¢ a pound.

Better yet, plant a lemon tree in your yard, and then they’ll be free. (My favorite price!)

Free lemons from your backyard!

I also recommend straining the fresh-squeezed juice.  You don’t want seeds, of course, and lemon pulp tends to adhere to the glassware and makes it more difficult to clean.

I like to press some lemon zest (only the yellow zest, not the white pith) with a muddler to extract the lemon oils too, which gives an extra depth of flavor.  This is an optional step if, like me, you occasionally are afflicted with laziness. A sharp vegetable peeler is ideal for removing the zest.

SIMPLE, PERFECT LEMONADE

1 cup fresh squeezed lemon juice
3/4 to 1 cup rich (2:1) simple syrup, to taste
Zest of 1 lemon
3 cups water or sparkling water

Combine the juice and syrup in a pitcher.  Add the zest and press with your biggest muddler, getting as much oil out as you can.  Add the water (or a bit more) to taste, depending on how concentrated you like it.

See? Easy peasy. (But you knew that.)

Now let’s have a go at making a single serving of lemonade.  Get a nice tall glass.  Fill it with ice, preferably nice big cubes.  Add an ounce of lemon juice and 3/4 ounce of simple syrup (as above, a whole ounce if you like it sweeter).  Fill it with fizzy water and you have a lovely, summery fizzy lemonade, but … hmm.  This also sounds like … wait a minute, it’s missing something … oh yeah!  Two ounces of gin.  (London dry, Plymouth or Old Tom, like the drink’s namesake.)  Then that glass of fizzy lemonade becomes a Tom Collins.  Well, heck-ola.  Now it’s a cocktail!  (Hold that thought.)

Let’s start playing around with this basic lemonade.  I’ve been attending the Jazz and Heritage Festival in New Orleans for many years, and perhaps the single tastiest and most refreshing beverage on the entire Fair Grounds is Strawberry Lemonade.  The weather tends to be hot and humid, and this drink is bright, sweet, tart, fruity and oh-so-wonderful.  As you’ll notice, the technique is very similar to what I described above.   I never managed to get the exact recipe from the folks who make it at Jazzfest but again, it’s pretty easy stuff and yields spectacular results.   Here’s Emeril Lagasse’s recipe (the man knows New Orleans).

STRAWBERRY LEMONADE

2 cups sugar
1 cup water
1 tablespoon finely chopped lemon zest
1 cup freshly squeezed lemon juice
1 pint strawberries, hulled and halved
2 cups cold water or sparkling water

Bring the water and sugar to a boil, then reduce to a simmer and stir until the sugar is dissolved.  Add the zest and juice, stir the mixture and remove from heat.  Let cool, then strain into a pitcher.

Puree the strawberries in a blender then add to the pitcher with the lemon juice mixture.  Stir to combine and chill thoroughly.

To serve, add the water or sparkling water and stir well.  Pour over ice into tall glasses and garnish with a whole strawberry and a mint sprig.

Did I say that there’s not much that’s better than lemonade?  Well, one of those things would be strawberry lemonade.  Now … think about adding a shot of reposado tequila to that.  Limonada por mi Amante, anyone?  Use this as a launching point — you can use raspberries, blackberries or pretty much any fruit that tastes good with lemons (which would be almost all of them).  Also, that aforementioned Tom Collins?  Instead of building it in the Collins glass start it out in a mixing glass, throw in a few raspberries, muddle them with the gin, lemon juice and simple, then double-strain that into your ice-filled Collins glass and fill with soda.  Nice berry garnish.  Ta-daa!  Raspberry Collins.  Or any other Somethingberry Collins you care to make.  So simple, but believe me, your guests will rave about it.

Let’s take another direction — instead of adding fruit, let’s start experimenting with the syrup.  For another dimension of flavor, try making a lemongrass syrup instead of simple.  Take a cup of water and a cup of sugar (two if you want it rich), plus two sliced lemongrass stalks (center only), bruised slightly.  Bring to a simmer for 10 minutes, then let cool.  Strain and bottle — it’s helpful to add a splash of vodka as a preservative.  Make your lemonade with this as the sweetener, maybe muddling a few kaffir lime leaves or some Thai basil or cilantro, and you’ve got some nicely exotic southeast Asian flavors going too.  (The syrup also makes delicious iced tea sweetener, an idea I stole from Crook’s Corner in Chapel Hill, NC.)

I suspect you see where we’re going with this.  By taking a basic lemonade recipe, varying it by adding booze and/or fruit and/or flavored sugar syrups, you have a range of cocktail before you that’s limited only by your imagination, and what’s in season.

Here’s one I really like — sophisticated, herbal, floral, yummy.

LAVENDER LEMONADE

1-1/2 ounces Plymouth gin.
1 ounce lavender syrup (see below).
1 to 1-1/2 ounces lemon juice (to taste, as to your tartness preference).
Sparkling water.

In a tall Collins glass filled with ice cubes, build first three ingredients, add fizzy water and stir.  Garnish with a sprig of fresh lavender if you have it, a lemon slice if you don’t.

To make the lavender syrup bring 1 cup water, 1 cup sugar and the zest of one lemon to a boil, then lower to a simmer and stir to dissolve sugar.  Remove from heat, then add 1/2 cup lavender blossoms.  Let steep overnight, then strain and bottle.

I’m sure you’ve noticed that this is basically a Tom Collins, but with a flavored syrup instead of muddled fruit.  Try a syrup with basil, lemon verbena, thyme … go to the herb section of your local farmer’s market and go nuts.

Now let’s do something unusual with the basic lemonade recipe.  I came across this a while back and although I don’t make it as often as I’d like (due to my aforementioned lazy bastardness), it is filled with deliciousness and in its way reminds me of the beloved sno-balls I grew up with in New Orleans, thanks to a Secret Ingredient.

In Brazil they take a different approach toward making lemonade, whizzing together not only juice but skin and even pith.  (Plus, there’s that Secret Ingredient.)  Brazilian lemons are also quite a lot like limes, so for this recipe we’ll be using the largest limes we can find.  I usually have an easy time finding them in local Latin or other ethnic markets or supermarkets; otherwise use one-and-a-half to two smaller limes for one big one.

BRAZILIAN LEMONADE

4 large or 6-8 small limes
1 cup simple syrup
5 cups cold water
3 ounces sweetened condensed milk (i.e., The Secret Ingredient)

Unless you have a really huge blender, you’ll need do this first step in two batches as described.

Wash the limes well.  Trim the ends off the limes, then cut into eighths.

Place half of the limes, simple syrup and water into the blender and give it five one-second pulses. Pour into a large fine-mesh strainer over a pitcher and strain the mixture, stirring and pressing with a wooden spoon to squeeze all the liquid out of the resulting pulp.  (Discard the pulp.)  Repeat wtih the other half.

Add the sweetened condensed milk, and serve in tall glasses over ice.

Now … add a jigger of good cachaça or white rum to that.  Oba!

You can also make your lemonades into more complex cocktails by adding more ingredients, such as liqueurs or bitters.  Ted “Dr. Cocktail” Haigh, who is a not-so-mild-mannered graphic designer for movies when he’s not in his not-so-secret identity as our planet’s pre-eminent cocktail archaeologist, has created a number of superb cocktails in his day.  One of these was in honor of the author Daniel Handler, specifically in his guise as Lemony Snicket, creator of the series of children’s books A Series of Unfortunate Events.  Doc was the graphic designer on the film version of the first couple of books, and created the Lemony Snicket Cocktail using gin, lemon juice, limoncello and yellow Chartreuse.  While cogitating over my lemonade article, I thought this powerful but tasty cocktail might make a nice lemonade-based tall drink too.

THE FIZZY SNICKET, or THE SNICKETY FIZZ
(unfortunately adapted by Chuck from Ted’s original)

1-1/2 ounces Beefeater gin.
1 ounce fresh lemon juice.
1/2 ounce limoncello.
1/2 ounce yellow Chartreuse.
1/4 ounce simple syrup (optional, if you like it sweeter).
Sparkling water.

Build in a Collins glass over ice, adding the soda last.  Give it a brief stir and garnish with a shrunken head, or a lemon slice if the former is not handy.

(By the way, to make Ted’s original Lemony Snicket cocktail, up the gin to 2-1/2 ounces, lower the lemon juice to 1/2 ounce and omit the simple and fizzy water.  Garnish with a curly lemon twist.)

I think by now you’ve got a good idea where you can go with this, which is almost anywhere.  Before we finish I’ll toss out one more lemonade (actually, technically a limeade) that I came up with a few years ago, with two slightly different versions.

SCHMILSSON

2 ounces white rum or cachaça.
1 ounce fresh lime juice.
3/4 ounce rich Demerara syrup.
2-3 dashes Angostura bitters.
3 ounces coconut water.

Build in a Collins glass over ice and stir.

Or, if you don’t have coconut water handy …

NILSSON FIZZ

2 ounces white rum or cachaça.
1 ounce fresh lime juice.
1 ounce coconut syrup.
2-3 dashes Angostura bitters.
Sparkling water.

Build first four ingredients in a Collins glass over ice, top with fizzy water and stir.

If only they made sparkling coconut water.  I’m tempted by put some into my soda siphon and charge it up and see how that works, using the first recipe, and then we’d have just one Nilsson Fizz.  Both of these drinks are named for that great singer and songwriter who put de lime in de coconut and drank ‘em both up.  (It relieve de bellyache.)

Enjoy!  And have a bitchin’ summer!

One of the great joys of cocktail mixing and drinking is deciding to give a moldy oldie that you’ve never tried a runabout, and discovering (yet again) that Granddad and the Boys knew what the heck they were doing. To paraphrase the favorite smack talk of oldsters everywhere, for all the creative achievements of today’s bartenders, I think the old guys may have forgotten as much or more about cocktails than we know now.
Witness the subject of this little excursion, the Rickey. If you are a Baby Boomer or older, you’ve probably heard of a Rickey. And if you are a Baby Boomer or younger, you’ve probably never had one. First off, the Rickey is actually an entire class of drinks, rather than a specific one, just like the Sour, or the Julep… or the Cocktail for that matter. And like most of the base classes, it is dead bone simple on the face of it.
The one disappointing aspect of the Rickey, to my own taste, is that its origin is shrouded in neither mystery nor controversy. It’s pretty well documented, which is no fun at all. Esquire’s cocktail historian does manage to make the story itself entertaining. He details who Colonel Rickey was, and how cocktails made him an influential lobbyist. This is how the Rickey itself came to be:

Anyway, one day in the 1890s, a bartender at Shoemaker’s handed the colonel a little something he was working on — perhaps the one drink known to mixology that can cut through the Precambrian swamp that is the capital in summer. We don’t know the bartender’s name. The colonel went into the lime-importing business. Washington.

My only problem with this story is the last word. It should read, America. For this to be a Washington story, the colonel would have established a domestic lime plantation, then gotten his congressbuddies to pass massive import tariffs on foreign limes. Washington.
Sadly, we still wouldn’t know the bartender’s name.
To make a base Rickey, you take some liquor, some lime juice, and some sparkling water, and serve it in a tall glass over the rocks. Tradition would indicate you leave the squeezed lime half in the glass as garnish. The ratios between ingredients are fungible, of course, but a good rule of thumb to work with is

• 1 part lime juice
• 3 parts liquor
• 8 parts soda water

That’s really all you need for the blueprint, and you can run off to experiment right now. But there are lots of choices to make within this framework, lots of ways to stray outside of it, and lots of my under-edited, purple prose to enjoy, so stick around.
Your first choice to make is what spirit to employ. The two great classics are gin and whiskey. Either bourbon or rye is likely the booze used in the first Rickey served, but gin is perhaps the most famous star. I’ve tried both in recent days, and while I adore the gin version, a Bourbon Rickey made with Bulleit is a heckuva way to take the edge off of a hot, angry, frustrating day. Other common liquors to Rickey-fy are rum and applejack.
Lots of people think you should sweeten a Rickey with a half part of simple syrup or even some grenadine or orgeat (depending on the spirit used). I think sweetening is unnecessary in this drink, even for more timid drinkers, and it removes a little of the bracing refreshment that makes the Rickey such a great summer drink.
If you do want a little sweeter drink, take the advice of David Embury, in his The Fine Art of Mixing Drinks, and modify the liquor to a liqueur.

…and liqueurs, perhaps, make the most palatable Rickeys of all. I have introduced dozens of people … to the Apricot Rickey, and each and every one has pronounced it one of the most delicious beverages he has ever tasted.

If you don’t know Embury’s work, 1) Go buy the book. Now. And 2) Listen to him. He knew his stuff, even if he did prefer his Rickeys sweetened a bit.
Embury’s apricot fascination aside (I don’t have any around now, or I’d report on how it works here), the most traditional liqueur for Rickey’s is sloe gin, if you can find a quality one (which I can’t).
The one immutable element of a Rickey is the lime. You can make a drink with lemon instead, but it ain’t a Rickey. Thoroughly squeezing half a modern lime will give you just about the right amount of juice, and plopping the crushed fruit in the drink makes for a garnish that’s just a bit different.
The sparkling water could be just about anything. I usually eschew club soda, in favor of my handy dandy soda siphon. But since Ol’ Spitsky is broken here at Pegu Blog Headquarters, I picked up a six-pack of Perrier to use. The only problem with this is now I’m going to have to keep Perrier on hand in the summer months. It really works well.
You could also sweeten your Rickey by using a soft drink instead of sparkling water. Whip up a Vodka Rickey using ginger beer, and you’ve stumbled onto the Moscow Mule!
As a final note, Embury also steered me to another valuable application of the Rickey. It makes a super Preggatini, sports drink, or kid’s drink. Treat your kids (either indirectly while still under construction, or in their tweens) to a Welch’s Rickey, or a grenadine one. We had a good time last night using fresh watermelon juice for the kid’s drinks. As an aside, pouring Perrier into watermelon juice produces an interesting result. You get a very stable, large bubbled head on the drink. Unfortunately, they were consumed before I could get the camera.
As I said at the outset, the Rickey is a really wonderful drink. It’s hot right now. And if it ain’t humid, it’s really hot. The Rickey can take care of that. Moreover, it’s another source of endless experimentation for the cocktail hound. You can bend it to the whims of lots of different guests with a pretty limited collection of supplies, so it’s a great application for which to set up your traveling cocktail kit.
Cheers!

Once, many ages ago, a mixologist didn’t have quite as many choices in Gin as they do today.  There was once only one spirit, Genever.  Genever was the original juniper-flavored spirit, originating in Holland, and traditionally distilled from various malts in a copper pot still.

Over hundreds of years, a few wars, and the invention of the continuous still, Imitations and recreations found the category branching into three or four, or more separate styles, depending on who you ask.  The chaos eventually settled down, and London Dry Gin came out as the spirit on top in the U.S., leaving Old Tom and Genever in its wake.

But, with the recent reinvigoration of classic mixology comes a keen interest in classic spirits.  Nowadays, you can get Plymouth, London Dry, a few of what are being called New World Gins, recreations of Old Tom, and that most anticipated authentic spirit, Genever.

Surprisingly enough, for a rum guy, I found a few recently bottled Genevers or Genever style gins down in the galley.  I thought I’d share a few thoughts on what I found there.

Boomsma is imported from Holland, and is available in two varieties, Oude and Jounge.  These can describe age or method, depending on who you ask it seems.  Boomsma Jounge is bottled at 80 proof, and is quite rich in texture, with a very light floral flavor. The Oude is aged for a year in oak barrels, and carries the straw color and slightly tannic flavor of the young barrels.  The year of aging gives it a pleasingly light palate entry, and definitely feels to be from the same stock as the Jounge.  It’s a treat if you can get your hands on it, and another to add to the collection of barrel-aged gin/genever.

Anchor Distilling’s Genevieve earned them some regard a few years back.  It is a Genever style gin bottled at around 95 proof, and is a thin but powerfully flavored gin.  So much of a knockout is the flavor, I’m not sure it could be particularly useful in drinks calling for the rich texture and grain and flora flavor in traditional Genevers.

Bols has recently relaunched their Genever in the U.S., using a classic recipe, slightly modified for the modern mixologist. Bols Genever is, of the availalable Genevers, certainly the richest in texture.  Bottled at 84 proof, it’s so thick in feel one could almost chew on it.  It’s great for bringing texture into flavorful but texture-lacking spirits, as some Amaro can be.  The flavors are very light, but there is some definite malt and juniper to it.  For my take, the flavor almost takes a back note to the rather amazing texture.

Bols has been launched in San Francisco and New York, and will likely continue to spread.  Genevieve is available just about everywhere, and Boomsma is available in California, or from what we like to call “Fight Club liquors”.  (here’s a hint, you’re in the arena right now)

I hope you get a chance to find some Genever ar your local liquor store, and can join us tonight in the Mixoloseum Chat Room for this TDN Bols Genever!  Get your mixological thinking caps on, and we’ll see you there!

The BarSol Pisco TDN was a great success, with 22 original cocktails created featuring this grape brandy spirit. We really enjoyed the participation of Diego Loret de Mola, who shared his knowledge and passion for pisco with us.

Here’s the contenders for this week’s prize, a bottle of Peruvian bitters, courtesy of Mud Puddle Books. Be sure to vote!

Que Lastima

• 2 oz Barsol Quebranta
• 0.75 oz lime juice
• 0.5 oz cinnamon syrup
• 0.25 oz Falernum
• 1 dash Fees Old Fashioned Bitters
• 1 dash Pimento Dram

Shake briefly with crushed ice and spent lime half, pour into old fashioned glass

Viejo Peruano

• 2 oz pisco
• 0.25 oz Galliano
• 1 tsp simple syrup
• 3 dashes celery bitters
• Orange peel

Gently muddle orange peel with celery bitters. Add Galliano and simple syrup and stir with an ice cube. Add Pisco and more ice and stir again.

Mental Roulette

• 1.5 oz pisco
• 0.75 oz Campari
• 0.5 oz lemon juice
• 0.5 oz falernum

Shake with full concentration, strain into a glass filled with crushed ice.

Industrial Sex

• 1oz pisco
• 1oz cachaca
• 0.5 oz Averna
• 0.5 oz vanilla syrup
• 0.5 oz lime juice
• 1 dash whiskey barrel-aged bitters

Shake like a paint mixer, strain into a cocktail glass

La Fineza

• 1.5oz BarSol Quebranta
• 1 oz dry vermouth
• 0.5 oz Aperol
• 0.25 oz Domaine de Canton ginger liqueur
• 1 teaspoon rich simple syrup (to taste)
• 1 green apple slice for garnish

Stir with a smooth, flowing motion, strain into your most elegant cocktail glass, and garnish with green apple slice

South American Flip

• 1 whole egg
• 0.75 oz falernum
• 2 oz pisco
• 0.5 oz Cynar
• 0.5 oz simple syrup
• 0.75 oz lime juice
• nutmeg

Shake your money maker and strain into glass

Now it’s your turn. Vote for the best Pisco drink! Polls will stay open through midnight Tuesday, just in case you’re taking Monday off to enjoy Memorial Day.

View the Beefeater 24 Live TDN event at the Quarter Bar here or at BlogTV and join in the fun at the Mixoloseum Bar. Dan Warner, Rick Stutz, the Pernod-Ricard team, Greg Boehm, and David Wondrich should all make an appearance. Don’t miss the fun!

Beefeater London dry gin has long been a go-to gin in my collection. Now Desmond Payne, the Master Distiller, is bringing us a premium take on the standard recipe, Beefeater 24. I had already heard great things when I received not one, but two full bottles for review in preparation for this week’s Beefeater 24 sponsored Thursday Drink Night.

Fizzing Sands with Beefeater 24

The 24 references the 24 hours that Beefeater steeps its botanicals in neutral grain spirits (24 hours) before distillation. Payne was supposedly inspired by the fact that Beefeater founder James Burrough was the grandson of a tea merchant. In addition to Japanese sencha and Chinese green tea, Beefeater 24 is flavored with Seville orange peels, grapefruit peel, lemon peel, coriander seed, licorice, angelica root, angelica seed, almond, orris root, and of course, juniper. After steeping, the gin is distilled in copper pot stills, and finally finished at 90 proof (45% ABV).

The resulting gin provides far stronger citrus on the nose and the tongue than regular Beefeater. The influence of the tea is, to my taste, fairly subtle but provides a nice acrid roundness. Despite the higher proof, I find this to be a slightly sweeter gin than than the regular Beefeater. Perhaps that’s because the peppery notes are far less dominant, and the higher proof creates a richer mouthfeel.

Overall, I’m really impressed with this gin. The suggested retail price is in the $28 range. At that price, I think it’s an excellent choice in the premium gin range, and I expect to keep it in rotation in my home bar.

The suggested 24 martini is 3:1 Beefeater 24 to Lillet, with three dashes of Regan’s orange bitters. While I do like the Regan’s, I’m still having a love affair with Angostura orange bitters, so I made mine like this:

Astoria 24

2 oz Beefeater 24
1 oz Lillet
2 dashes Angostura orange bitters

Stir until well chilled, strain into cocktail glass, garnish with lemon twist.

Beefeater 24 and Lillet blanc work exceptionally well together. I haven’t been using as much Lillet lately, and this drink has given me a whole new appreciation for it.

Glancing through the Beefeater 24 recipes, another caught my eye, the Shifting Sands. Credited to Sasha Petraske, this take on Milk & Honey’s Sands cocktail pairs 24 with maraschino liqueur, lemon juice, and grapefruit juice. I didn’t have a fresh grapefruit on hand, but I did have a bottle of Fizzy Lizzy Lonestar grapefruit soda, which tastes remarkably fresh, so I modified the recipe.

Fizzing Sands

1.75 ounces London dry gin (Beefeater 24)
0.25 ounces maraschino liqueur
0.25 ounces lemon juice
2 ounces Fizzy Lizzy Lonestar grapefruit soda

Shake first three ingredients, strain into ice-filled collins glass. Top with grapefruit soda. Garnish with spring of mint.

This is a great summer refresher. I never realized maraschino and grapefruit would pair quite so well as flavors. I’ll definitely return to this combination in the future. Honestly, this may not be the best way to experience all that Beefeater 24 has to offer. It does mix well with the citrus flavors, as I had expected from the gin’s flavor profile.

I’m happy to help welcome this new gin to the market. I’m even more excited at the chance to see what the collective cocktail consciousness comes up with at TDN.