Alchemist
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Posts posted by Alchemist
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Nicely done. That looks like a troubleshooting guide for some incomprehensible bit of technology. The only thing I would add is this.
1.) Make simple syrup for the love of god. It’s…um, simple. Take ½ cup of white/demarara or turbinado sugar mixed with respectively ½ and ¼ cup of water. Filtered water please, room temp and shaken hard. This will make drinking cocktails so fast it’s like main lining instead of suppositories, much less messy or frustrating as well.
2.) Taste the cocktail at every step (until you have it nailed). I like to combine the liquor and the simple first, taste to make sure that that balance is right. Then add the bitters a dash at a time until it tastes good but is way too boozy. Add the ice and stir. There will be no grittiness like with sugar. (Erik there is nothing personal here, promise) Stir until the heat of the rye is tamed. Then taste again. Correct seasoning. Then have another good snort of that.
3.) Write down EXACTLY what you have done while the drink cooks for a second or two and you can still write.
4.) Now take a fresh lemon and using a vegetable peeler pull a strip from nipple to…Ahem..brown star. Squeeze the peel over the drink, and note the difference. Without the lemon the drink is like a warm summer night, with fireflies winking seductively at you. With the lemon a cloud moves and the sky is reveled in all its awesome glory.
5.) Repeat for a loved one, DO NOT MENTION how much grueling expermintation went into this cocktail.
Toby
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I spend as much time as humanly possible in Chicago. I have been there every 3-4 weeks for a week for the last few months. I am in perpetual communication with my bar manager, who himself is from NYC and moved out there to work closely with me, and my partner Jason also is in constant contact with the other owners. This is how we are keeping quality control. The cornerstone of a successful business is staff that is well trained, (while constantly reupping the education) and enthusiastic, who stay for a long time. One of the reasons I am so excited when eGuleeteers go to The Violet Hour is I get feedback without having to relay on Yelp and Metromix.
We patterned this model on how chefs run multiple restaurants. With someone at the helm translating your vision, and tasting lots of cocktails (food) you try to sleep at night. There are very few bars that can be like Masa, closing when the Head Mixologist catches a bug, is out of town, or needs a well deserved vacation.
I am devoting quite a bit here in NYC right now, running Alchemy Consulting. We at Alchemy have a consulting project running in Manhattan, a couple in the pipeline, and looking for more. Alchemy Consulting is 3 years old and expanding, but it is like a baby, it needs constant attention, and occasionally pees or pukes on you. But it is a very rewarding, really, oh F*%k, I hear wailing from my e-mail inbox.
Toby
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T&J&T is a Tom & Jerry (&Toby) I know they are making them when the snow starts piling up, we should expand that to when it's that cold.
Toby
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Well, we had a great, great time there on the 17th & 18th. Kyle took really good care of us both nights. Thank you, Kyle!
He made me a killer drink with some kind of rye. Could it have been Thomas Handy? That's what is on my receipt. It was, I believe, a version of a Manhattan. But maybe I'm wrong. Any idea? It was his suggestion so maybe he'll know. He stirred it all up in a bucket with ice until it was the right proof. It was absolutely perfect. I want to know what it was!
What a beautiful space and concept. We'd be regulars if we weren't 2,000 miles away.
And the deviled eggs rocked!
Interested in opening something in SF?
I am honored that you made it into The Violet Hour on both nights you were there. How was the weather there? Were there T&J&T’s that night?
I am so glad to hear that the service was so pleasing to you. The staff at TVH is still so enthusiastic and professional; they are the perfect showcase for the cocktails.
Toby
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I like the Red to work with in cocktails. It is sweeter and less smoky than black thereby making it "play better with others" than the Black, Green or Blue. I love making cocktails with the Gold,, it is smooth and bold with fantastic honey notes. Yes it seems a little pricey, but if you wanna be a playa...
Toby
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Rob Roy sat astride his massive black stallion looking down on Shirley Temple with a haughtiness that just made her blood boil. She had first seen it when he brought her, against her will!, to this horrible little town so far west of her beloved Madison Ave.
She stomped her foot petulantly. “I will not, ever, in this lifetime work in that saloon of yours!” Arms akimbo, and lower lip stuck out as her exclamation point.
“Well” Rob Roy countered, “We’ll just see about that.” His strong cowboy hands caressed the saddle horn between his legs, furrowing Shirley's brow a little more because she couldn’t understand why her belly went all gooey sometimes around this man she so disliked.
“Just because you won me in that poker game against my dear sweet Pa-Pa, does not mean you own me.”
“Why yes Miss Temple that is exactly what it does mean. I am truly sorry your dear, sweet pa-pa is a degenerate gambler who can’t hold his licker, ’sept if he hired her from one of those Bowery brothels.” He chuckled, enjoying being lewd in front of Miss Fancy Knickers.
Shirley stomped her little foot again, turned on her heel and stormed off with Rob Roy’s laughter ringing in her crimson ears. “I’ll get him for this, and for every other humiliation he has put me through.” She vowed.
All through the night she tossed and turned plotting vengeance, dreaming of revenge, figuring how to give that mean Rob Roy his come-uppance.”
The next morning she was behind the stick, a phrase she had heard Rob Roy use many times that she couldn’t think of let alone utter without going all pink around the cheeks. She was Polishing glasses, organizing liquor bottles, Wiping down the beautiful Mahogany bar when Rob Roy came down the stairs, shirtless no-less, a cat who just ate the canary grin on his face.
From an open door on the second floor came the sleepy voice of Marta Ini, a half Mexican half Italian whore, who had recently taken to Rob Roy’s bed for free. “Carino, Please you bring me some coffee of the Irish?”
“You’re gonna get some black coffee, and a second helping of Scotch, and you’re gonna like it.” He called back, followed by her titters.
He bellied up to the bar his powerful shoulders blocking out the sun coming in from the window, Rock hard abs slashed this way And that with knife wounds, and love bites that were as fresh as the cream that had just been delivered and was sitting on the bar perspiring slightly in the gentle morning heat.
“You’re gonna make me two Ramos gin fizzes right now, fast and hard, and every morning here after I expect four of them to be on the bar, just shaken, the bubbles from the seltzer still jumping enough too tickle my nose. And the head better be spectacular. Every morning, awesome, stellar head is what I expect. If you aren’t hot, and glistening then the head is no good.” He was trying to make her blush, trying to make her squirm and bite her lip with em- bare assed- ment.
She smiled prettily, and put her plan into effect. Her plan was to become the best darn barkeep west of the Hudson, Squirrel away some cash, to buy her freedom, and then get back to her beloved little brownstone on Grammercy Park.
“Mr. Roy,” She began, fluttering her eyelashes and putting a little western lilt in her voice so as to be pleasing to the ear of this savage who had no more manners than a guttersnipe from the Five-Points.
“I’m new at this so if you wouldn’t mind walking me through this gin fit thing today I will have it ready for you tomorrow.”
Rob Roy, who everyone called Roy, looked with suspicion at this purring kitten before him, who just yesterday was as wild as a puma caught in a trap.
“It’s a Gin Fizz, a Ramos Gin Fizz, Elixir of the gods, a blessing to all have woken up after a night of whiskey and women to a head full of bumble bees, and a stomach as delicate as the skull of a baby chick. Jeeze woman you sure don’t know squat for a girl who went through collage. Take that there shaker and put it open side up in front of you.” He began, wondering where this was going and getting up on the balls of his feet ready to duck in case any eggs, gin or orange flower water came sailing his way.
“Now with one hand crack one of those eggs that Farmer Macdonald just brought us, getting only the white in the shaker.” As she struggled not to get in any shell into the tin, Roy continued. “That Old Macdonald, he has a chicken on his farm.” He hummed a little diddy (da-da-da-da-da-da-Duh) to himself and decided he should make a song out of it sometime. “So I first had the Gin Fizz of the Ramos coupla years back when I was down in N’awlenz. It was hot, hot as the hinges of hell… Good work, now donate an ounce of that fresh Macdonald cream to the shaker… When I was walking around looking for some liquid refreshment. I stumbled upon this tavern in a rather seedy part of the crescent city, a bar that still to this day brings joy to my heart when I think about it…OK, now contribute 2 ponies of that Old Tom Gin, the juice of half a lemon and half a lime, a spoon of powered sugar...”
“You getting all this?” Roy fired at Shirley who was running around looking for things, dropping things, sometimes spinning in one place. “Now supply 7 drops of orange flower water. You don’t know what orange flower water is? It smells as good as a Parisian Trollop, and is as strong as her pimp, so be careful, 7 drops, no more no less. So I walk into this bar, and belly up, my shiny boot on a brass foot-rail, a Black Cherry Royal Roll to brace my elbow. I was going to order a whiskey but then I noticed everybody in the bar had these long thin drinks that looked like they could satisfy the thirst of a man 2 weeks out in the desert. The drink was as pale and white a ladies thigh. I ordered one up, asking his barkeeps pardon, but what was this concoction called? The saloon master said it was a Ramos, that’s all he called it, like everyone in the world should know what it was and it’s name.”
Shirley stood before him her bosom heaving, a shaker in one hand a big lump of ice in the other. She closed her eyes, brought the tin to her nose and inhaled heaven. Fireworks went off behind her eyes. Images of languorous picnics in warm butterfly filled meadows, and slow deep kisses on that plaid blanket filled her brain. She dropped the lump of ice in the shaker, placed the other, smaller tin on top and brought the heel of her hand down on the edge to create a seal.
Even though she had never been a saloon, or tavern, never stepped foot in a bar or a blind tiger, she knew what to do. She brought the cocktail to shoulder height and started rocking in slowly; slow and steady like a hansom cab containing a dandy and his mistress, hidden in central park after the opera. She speeded the motion up, gradually building, reminding sweet Shirley of the bonnets of the workingwomen in the alleys near W .11th Street. The sound of the ice reached a cacophony, like a team of horses, barreling down on you, their hooves sparking on the cobblestones. The sound itself intoxicating, the clatter of danger, the ice chips whispering against the inside of the shaker with the joy of lover’s sweet nothings.
Roy stood there gob smacked. He beheld this little whipper-snap of a thing behind his bar; panting and wobbly, dew drops of perspiration trickling down her décolleté. Her hair was coming out in wisps giving her the freshly f#!ked look.
She snapped the shakers with the suddenness and force of a public knee-trembler. She grabbed a tall thin highball glass, and strained the Ramos into it. With the patience of a professional she wrung the last drops of espuma from the bottom of the tin. She added spurts of soda water until the creamy head stood 8 turgid inches from the bottom of the glass. Her eyes were far away and dreamy as she reached for her first cocktail. Roy stood stock still in his tracks, watching the proceedings in slow motion.
She grasped the glass around its base, feeling the heft and girth hard in her hand. As she hoisted the fizz all got quiet for Shirley. The bouquet hit her when it was half way to her hungry lips. Her eyes closed partially, the glass came to her lips and ecstasy crashed on her tongue. Cool silky Ramos shot across her taste buds, electrifying them, and slid down her throat. In her haste, her longing, her need she had brought the glass up a little to fast. The creamy, perfumed head stuck to her upper lip, and just a few drops snuck out from both sides of her mouth. The drops stuck in her hair and rivulets down her long swan neck and into her cleavage.
Her vixen eyes bored into Roy, and she daintily wiped the corners of her lips in a no-nonsense gesture. She cocked her head, and with confidence and drawled.
“I think I’m gonna be just fine behind your stick Mr. Roy.”
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Eisenstiens has killer chopped liver sandwiches. I like mine with turkey and mustard.
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We could compare tiki drinks to a stew and a cocktail to the classic Meat/starch/veg combo with the bitters being the sauce. This is an Obvious oversimplification. But someone slightly more sober than I could run with it. Fat meets acid meets strong with a Bernaise to pull it all together. Simple meets citrus meets booze, with bitters to pull it all together.
Toby
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The 2-3 ingredient (not including Bitters) cocktail is where it’s at. I think that the serious east coast bartenders are all about trying to figure out the least amount of components to put in a drink. I think that is why there are so many riffs on the Old Fashion and Manhattan out here. And the Gimlet and Daiquri or Champagne Cocktail are many bartenders drink of choice.
I don’t know how to answer the “Have cocktails changed your life” querry, since at this point cocktails are my life. To paraphrase somebody on the “you might be a cocktail geek if…”
“If I’m not making cocktails, I’m either thinking about them, reading about them, writing about them, drinking them or talking about them, over them with people who do nothing but think/read/write/and consume them.”
Edit: Somehow read the topic wrong. How Have cocktails changed the way I drink? I probably drink less cocktails today than I used to because it is hard to find a bar with the ingredients and the tequnique to make a great cocktail. So I am more likely to order a beer, glass of wine/champange than a martini/manhattan.
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hmm. i've never really been exposed to caraway and didn't realize it was an anise...
I wouldn't necessarily say that caroway is "an anise" -- which carries the implication that it is a type of anise, which it isn't.
Caroway and aniseed are in the same family (Apiaceae -- hollow stemmed plants including parsley, fennel, carrot, etc.) but not in the same genus. Caraway is in the genus Carum (species: C. carvi) and aniseed is in the genus Pimpinella (species: P. anisum).
Personally, I can't say that I think caraway has a particularly liquorice-like flavor and aroma. I think it's pretty uniquely "caraway-like" in flavor (think of the seeds in traditional caraway rye bread).
Anyway... if you want to expose yourself to caraway, pick up a bottle of akvavit. If you can still find any Aalborg brand in the US (they have apparently stopped importing it), it has a particularly notable caraway flavor.
If you can't find the Aalborg try Gilka Kaiser-Kummel Liqueur, esoteric as it is it is still being imported. It's unique caraway flavor is stronger than the Aalborg. Try a rinse of the Kummel on your next Manhattan, with rye of course. Maybe with ham rolls with spicy mustard to nibble on.
1.5 Rittenhouse rye
1.5 Michters rye
1.0 Carpano Antica
.50 Noilly Prat dry vermouth
1 dash Angostura
3 dash Peychaud's
Rinse glass with Kummel.
S,S,SU. garnish with a cherry.
Hopefully tastes a bit like pumpernickle bread.
Toby
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3 oz Famous Grouse,
1 oz M&R sweet vermouth
1/2 oz Noilly Prat Dry,
Rinse of Peat Monster,
3 dash orange bitters,
2 dash Peychaud's
S,S,SU. Twist of lemon.
or
1.5 oz Famous Grouse
1.5 oz Mac 12
.75 oz Carpano Antica
.75 oz NP dry vermouth
3 dash Angostura
S,S,SU. 1 dash orange bitters. Twist of lemon.
These are both riffs on my 222 Manhattan.
Toby
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Maybe with these proportions the drink name changes to A Parisian Bordello.
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Cocktail Porn. Graphic content, to be consumed by cocktail geeks 21 years of age and older ONLY. There are no graphics, but it's graphic.
That's quite the cocktail of erotic double- entendres and euphemsim, Toby.
Damn, I was going for erotic cocktail double-entendre.
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Your bitters should be fine after a few months, it’s when they get a yearish old that they start to get flat. To check put 1 big, or three small dashes (see dashes and how to measure them in the spirit & libations forum http://forums.egullet.org/index.php?showtopic=104153) in the palm of your hand. Rub hands together quickly for 5 seconds, until friction makes them warm. Hold hands palms up- they will feel cool as the alcohol evaporates. Put hands together as if in prayer, then open them like a book, and stick your nose in the book. The smell should be complex and popping. If it smells muddy or flat go splurge on another bottle.
Demerrarra sugar, or turbano (Sugar In The Raw) syrup is usually 2 parts sugar to one part filtered water (heated). Once that is done if you want to test the components in their sleekest form, try Dave Wondrich’s Tombstone.
2.0 oz rye
1/8 oz Dem syrup
3 dash Angostura.
Shake the hell out of it. Serve up. Taste. Add lemon twist.
Cocktails don’t get any simpler or tastier.
Cheers
Toby
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I have also marked off those dates, and am very excited to spend a weekend eating, and drinking. Wait, wait, let’s be honest, reveling in gluttony and debauchery with a group of professional hedonists.
Head Intoxologist, The Violet Hour
Toby Maloney
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Mia Francesca on Clark and School (just north of Belmont) has the best Carpaccio I've ever had. The Pastas are great, and the fish always perfectly cooked.
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Is this necrophillia?
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The stage is a time-honored tradition in the culinary world. The point of it is not to get free labor for a couple of days -that's what externs are for- but for everyone to work side by side and then share a few tricks, tips, and beers at the end of a long day. There must be the sharing/passing down/ along of knowledge or each generation would have the Sisyphean task of reinventing the wheel.
And this bartender exchange is like a stage on steroids. Soon you will be able to go into The Violet Hour, and if you are having a jones for a particular D & C, drink get it if we have all the components. We of course will give credit to whom and from whence it originated. And if the bartender doesn’t have the ingredients they will be able to make you something very similar. That’s tough to do at a restaurant. Can you imagine sitting in one restaurant and ordering another’s food? Bartenders have no problem making each other’s drinks as long as they are also allowed to play a bit themselves with the customers drink choices.
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I haven't tried Jim's version, but I'm sure it is amazing. His cocktails are always so well balanced and interesting.
The Tequila Old Fashioned has been a standard cocktail for a few years. Depending on the tequila you use depends on what you use to sweeten it. The Crema de Mescal is wonderful because it is so smoky. The agave nectar is great as is cane syrup. Bitters can be used to echo the garnish or to compliment the complexity of the tequila. Garnish can be lemon, lime orange or grapefruit.
Toby
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Cooking in the home bar context there is a trick we use at closing time for staff drinks that can be utilized. You build your drink in the glass, add requisite amount of ice, stir a little and then stick it in the freezer. This slows down dilution, re-chills the glass, and chills liquid at the same time. The drink will come out too cold. But then you have a couple of minutes to get everything ready before you pour off your cocktails. And when they hit your guest’s hands they will be the perfect temp.
Another thing that we haven’t spoken about is too cold ice. I don’t want my ice below 15* F because if you drop it in room temp liquid, it shatters and you have some crushed, come cracked and some chunk ice all of a sudden, as well as a sliver in your eye most probably. I prefer to add ice by hand to control what size and shape goes into the mixing glass to get proper dilution as well as stack the ice so stirring is easier. It is very difficult to stir with one big chunk in the glass, so crack that chunk down and add the pieces in a different, chaotic order to facilitate stirring.
Toby
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I hope that every old fashioned at The Violet Hour is surprising, memorable and one of the best drinks you’ve ever had. The Old fashioned and the Manhattan are 2 drinks that can do that, as there are virtually infinite riffs by each and every bartender who makes them. If you find that there is one variation in particular that you can’t live without, ask the bartender the specs, and then write them down, and keep them in your wallet. Bust them out on slow nights in bars that have all the components. This never offended me but there might be someone who is. If they are tuck the card back in your wallet and order a Cuba Libre.
What was your technique? And how long have you had your bottle of Angostura? I have found that after a while it gets flat and mealy. Try getting a new one and smell them back-to-back. Did you use 2x1 demmerarra syrup? and a nice thick skinned Sunkist orange. Drinks with the fewest components are the hardest to make. Any help I can give is surely yours.
Toby
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This post is in reply to a post in the Averna comp. thread.
This "cooking" time is why you see bartenders build stirred cocktails over ice and shaken cocktails with out ice. Every type of ice or ice plus chilling method can be equated with a piece of cooking equipment.
We'll go from littlest to biggest.
Crushed ice.= Salamander. Browns things fast, but doesn’t get deep heat into item. Good quick dillution, poor chilling.
Cheater= The Microwave. Sure it heats stuff up but rarely evenly, and can ruin a texture. Cheater ice won't chill a drink much, and it will most probably over dilute it but it'll get done quick.
Kold-Draft=An industrial range. Good browning/deep heat but can take a while. You can get excellent chilling and dillution with proper stirring tecnique.
Chunks(out of 18*F freezer)=Convection oven. Gets drinks really cold but usually need to flash it in the Salamander to get dilution.
This is a little simplistic but I choose an ice or a combonation, depending on cooking times, how weeded I am, what I need from my ice (dillution, airation, chilling, impression) and how much my elbow hurts.
Toby
Edited for clarification on what this is in response to.
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He mentioned back in Nov. at a book signing that he quit because of "a set of seven month old lungs in the house" in a voice still yearning for a Marlboro.
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At The Violet we treat the old fashioned as more of a style of cocktail. We take the original idea-a spirit slightly sweetened, with bitters and a citrus garnish-and then riff from there. The drink is so very different with the smallest changes. I can belive that there were some House Orange Bitters in there. But, say if it was really cold the bartender could have donated some Winter Bitters, if it was a nice day out maybe the Autumn Bitters might have been contributed. Maybe the bartender wanted to showcase the lemon that was going to be part of the garnish, and used some House Lemon bitters. Maybe the bartender went down south and made a tequila old fashioned with agave syrup and grapefruit bitters. Maybe tsg20 had a cocktail earlier in the evening with an element they really enjoyed, and so the bartender echoed that.
I guess you could say I’m not sure but I’m so very glad that tsg20 was not let down by us despite such high expectations.
Toby
The Violet Hour
in The Heartland: Dining
Posted
All the syrups at TVH are with room temp twice filtered water. The Demerara 2x1 takes more shaking but it will incorparate.
Toby