FrogPrincesse

I tried the Havana Club 7 last night and although it was not mind-blowing (and I did not expect it to be), it was pretty good for the price. I can't wait to try the añejo 3 años in a Daiquiri.

More cocktails with champagne. I found the Moon Walk (on the left) in Gary Regan's Joy of Mixology. It was created in 1969 by Joe Gilmore from the Savoy and contains champagne, grapefruit juice, Grand Marnier and rose water. Light and delicate but still a solid cocktail. The Donizetti is from the PDT cocktail book and was created by David Slape. It has champagne, gin, Amaro CioCiaro (I used Picon) and apricot liqueur. I feared that it would be on the sweet side with the apricot liqueur, but it had enough bitterness from the Picon to balance it out. It is more or less an orange version of the French 75.

Going through the duty free shop in Heathrow the other day I picked up a couple of bottles of Havana Club which I've never had a chance to try. I saw that they had a bar inside the store and quite a few samples (cognac, scotch, etc) but I was short for time and was not able to take advantage of this. Maybe another time. And yesterday I was doing my grocery shopping at TJ's and saw Wild Turkey 101 for $17 so I had to get it.

Sorry for the typo upthread- it should have read "I miss YOUR posts". Anyway, it's good to see you both again on this thread and I will be following your adventures with sloe gin as it's not something I have had a chance to try yet.

I have both. Bulleit is a little spicier while Rittenhouse is smoother and deeper/ more complex. I prefer Rittenhouse but it's good to have both for different purposes.

I miss you posts! How do you like the sloe gin (and the applejack)?

It's funny but after all this talk about Rittenhouse it's finally back in stock at my local Bristol Farms (they were out for at least 6 months). I grabbed a bottle last night ($27.99).

Yes! It is a great recipe. That is simply whole milk, simmered and frothed with a Bamix. Thanks! I need to get that book. It looks like it has recipes that have great flavor combinations while not being overly complicated.

That's a shame: I've made the home-cured Sauerkraut and really enjoyed it. The texture was much better than canned or jarred products, and you have a lot more control over the level of sourness. Did you keep it properly submerged in the brine? What temperature were you fermenting at? Submerged in brine, room temperature, protected from light (in a cupboard).

Lovely. Is that from the Art of Cooking with Vegetables? And can you describe the foam on top? Thanks!

Here is the Roasted Celery Soup from food52. This is the unstrained version which was a little stringy. Much better texture after passing it through a sieve.

Champagne versions of two classic cocktails the other night as we were working on finishing a half-empty bottle of Cremant brut rosé. For me, the Famiglia Regale (Sam Ross), which is a Negroni with champagne. It's equal parts gin, sweet vermouth, Campari and champagne; grapefruit twist. For my husband, a Chicago Cocktail which is a Manhattan with an extra ounce of Champagne plus a dash of orange bitters (I used one dash each of Fee and Regan's). Also (not pictured), I got a delicious Bee's Knees with Aviation gin topped with champagne last week at the Noble Experiment.

Excellent. I happen to have all of the ingredients, including an aging bunch of celery I did not know what to do with, so I am making this right now! Bruce's corn and chicken soup looks fabulous too.

Other than the Sazerac, other cocktails that immediately come to mind are the Improved Whiskey Cocktail, the Corpse Reviver No. 2, the Rattlesnake, the French Pearl and also tiki cocktails with the Test Pilot or the 1934 Zombie. See the Absinthe topic or MxMo XLVI (roundup part I and II) for more ideas. You could also make absinthe cakes, absinthe ice cream, etc.

The correct spelling is choucroute. Someone posted a recipe in RecipeGullet that looks pretty good. It's an excellent way to include pork in many of its forms: sausage (two or three kinds are typical - frankfurters or strasbourg plus a smoked sausage such as montbeliard), belly (unsmoked, smoked and salt pork), hocks, etc. A few (boiled) new potatoes are nice with the sauerkraut, also some mustard "a l'ancienne" for the sausage. It's a fun dish to make for a crowd as you can incorporate a greater variety of pork products.

Here is the Halibut in Cartoccio from Babbo that I posted in the Dinner thread some time ago. It's a good weeknight recipe. The principle is simple. You place your fish fillet together with thyme, grapefruit segments and puntarella (a variety of chicory, which I omitted) in a papillote and add some white wine before sealing it. This was a local halibut. It stays very moist with this preparation and the grapefruit and thyme just highlight the flavor of the fish. I used foil but parchment paper works too. I served it with acorn squash and kale that I prepared separately, but if you include the chicory or some other type of greens in the papillote, then you have a complete dish with no pot/pan cleaning necessary. I decided to plate the dish but you can also just bring the sealed papillotes to the table and have each person open their own.

I used to be able to find Rittenhouse locally but recently I have not seen it anywhere in SD. It's a shame because I really like it. It looks like this is a result of the new surge in the popularity of rye whiskey in the past few years (see article here).

Here are a couple of links to photos where the topping is more visible. The legend below the second photo says that it is nougatine. I haven't tried the eclairs but Pierre Marcolini makes wonderful chocolates!

It looks like a plaque of nougatine.

I tried a White Hook last night, a Red Hook variation that substitutes genever gin for the rye and dry vermouth for the Punt e Mes. 2 oz genever 1/2 oz maraschino 1/2 oz dry vermouth dash orange bitters It highlighted quite well the flavor of the genever.

I was hoping to find details about the composition and manufacturing process for Lillet in the book Lillet, 1862-1985 by Olivier Londeix but unfortunately it does not include much information. To summarize, it's a Sauternais wine base mixed with wine eau de vie (before 1914 they were using armagnac). The bittering agent is cinchona bark making it a kina (aka quinquina). It's a mix of infusions, alcohol, sugar syrup and distilled water, which is pretty much a generic description for a liqueur. Other flavoring agents are not discussed in the book as far as I could find, and citrus is not even mentioned which is a little odd. In other sources it is reported that peels of sweet, green and bitter oranges are used. The information about Cocchi Americano is fairly similar. The base is Moscato di Asti with a touch of brandy, and citrus peel as a flavoring agent. There is a difference in bittering agent though - Cocchi uses a combination of cinchona bark and gentian. The difference in bittering agents was noted earlier by one of Lillet's brand ambassador (quote below) and also on this thread.

Another one from the Savoy Cocktail Book, the Hoots Mon: scotch, sweet vermouth, Lillet. I decided to try Lillet and Cocchi Americano versions side by side. I preferred the Lillet version and felt that it was more harmonious. I tried very hard to like the Cocchi version but I really could not; it had too much bitterness in the finish for me and did not come together. Interestingly enough, my husband thought that Cocchi produced a more balanced drink. In any case, this is a very good cocktail as Erik already pointed out in the Savoy thread.

Another vote for Trader Joe's. I use the grade B in the glass bottle which is indeed from Canada.

Montenegro - no. See above. Regarding Aperol, I can't detect bitter orange in there. Orange but more like an orange candy. Very sweet. Campari on the other hand tastes like bitter orange and grapefruit to me.

Musk stick lollies- must be an Australian specialty, never heard of it! I can't detect orange in Montenegro. Muscat, lemon, maybe some fennel, bitter finish.