FrogPrincesse

Jane, Regarding the Zombie, there is some excellent information at the beginning of this thread (see here for example). I also recommend reading this article from the New York Times which summarizes the history of the drink and also provides Don the Beachcomber's "Zombie Punch" 1934 recipe (my favorite), together with a few other variations.

Yes, something like that could work. I would like to try it with the Coruba as well - just another excuse to buy more rum!

Someone I know is looking for a "pirate punch" recipe so yesterday I decided to test drive Stephen Remsberg's Planter's Punch recipe from Beachbum Berry Remixed. It's just dark rum (he specifies Coruba), lime juice, simple syrup and Angostura bitters. I did not have any Coruba but based on a tasting at Tiki Oasis last year I remembered that it was roughly in the same family as the Cruzan Black Strap that I bought fairly recently, so I just used that instead. The drink is build directly in the glass and swizzled. It was rich and quite smooth. The strong maple syrup flavor of the black strap takes a few sips to get used to, but once you do it's a really enjoyable drink.

I went to Craft and Commerce this weekend and asked for a daiquiri-type cocktail with rhum agricole after spotting La Favorite blanc on their shelf. They made an excellent Last Word variation that used to be on their cocktail menu when they opened a few years ago. They call it Enough Said. Lots of funky flavors in that drink, very nice as a last drink to finish a pleasant evening - even though I am still shocked that they close their doors at 1 am on a weekend. Then last night I decided to continue on the same track and prepared Michael McIlroy's Thumbs Up! It's a slightly tweaked version of the Last Word with a touch of aperol and less maraschino. It's very good; I found it more subtle than the original and the color is a nice salmon.

Next up was Captain Vadrna's Grog, also from Beachbum Berry Remixed. This drink was apparently created with Captain Morgan spiced rum. I am not a huge fan of that rum but happen to have a few bottles of it so I decided to try this drink. I did not expect too much from it between the Captain Morgan and the pretty straightforward list of ingredients (lime juice, white grapefruit juice, demerara syrup, Angostura bitters). I also snuck in a few drops of grapefruit bitters (also from my friend). This was really good despite its simplicity. It had a lot of flavor and spice. I will make it again for sure.

I made a couple of tiki drinks recently in preparation for an upcoming event. First the Bum Barrel from Beachbum Berry Remixed. It's Jeff Berry's twist on the rum barrel. It's from the later portion of the book which contains new/modernized creations. The recommended rums were dark Jamaican and gold Virgin Island rums. I substituted what I have available in large quantities: Whaler's rum (which lacks the depth of Appleton) and Flor de Cana gold. The other ingredients are lime juice, white grapefruit juice, orange juice, passion fruit syrup, honey mix, Angostura bitters and soda water. Quite good, but felt a little watered down with the soda water. Was improved by a few drops of passion fruit bitters (made by a friend) which added depth. This wasn't especially memorable (at least not with this rum combo) but would still make a very decent punch.

My husband was out last night so I made PDT's version of the Rosita - I seem to always go for the Campari when he is out (no wonder, he abhors Campari despite all my attempts at converting him). This version of Gary Regan's creation has the particularity of including a dash of Angostura bitters. The cocktail is really gorgeous in the glass; a beautiful color. It was bitter (as expected) and quite boozy (as expected). It was also intensely herbal with some weird notes that I did not especially enjoy. Maybe it was my selection of brands that was not optimal, I am not sure. It just did not really come together in a harmonious way for me.

After a Kentucky Maid a few days ago with bourbon as the base liquor (from the Drinks thread)... This Jalisco Maid created by Anthony Schmidt from Noble Experiment with tequila, lime juice, simple syrup, cucumber, mint, salt. These are excellent summer drinks.

Oh wow. Beautiful and could not be better timing. I have a bag of gorgeous dates that I just bought and was looking for something special to do with them. Thanks Kerry, I can't wait to try it!

Part 2 - La Super Rica There was a fairly long line when we got there for lunch - we waited about 20 minutes before placing our order. We watched them making the tortillas as we were waiting which was fun. We got the Rajas and the Super Rica Especial. The Rajas are chiles and onions with a lot of melted cheese. The Super Rica Especial has roasted pasilla peppers, cheese and pork. Not super photogenic but definitely delicious. We also got some horchata which was nicely spiced (mostly cinnamon), a little on the sweet side. Overall we liked this little taqueria a lot. It's completely unpretentious and everything was flavorful.

It looks like I forgot to post this excellent Onglet Gascon that I made a few weeks ago. It's a hanger steak served with a marrow bone. A rich sauce for a cut of beef that is flavorful and a little livery (it's a good thing). The sauce is obtained by deglazing the pan with white wine, reducing, adding stock and demi-glace, reducing further, adding the juices from the meat (which is resting at this point) together with plenty of butter and some Dijon mustard. The sauce sticks to your teeth and is pure umami. Note that I had run out of parsley so I used chives instead, but parsley would be my first choice.

This thread continues to be a great source of inspiration! Beautiful meals from everyone. A few recent meals. Roasted scallops with potatoes, leeks, bacon. The vegetables were roasted in the oven and developed a ton of flavor. The recipe is from Tom Colicchio's Think Like a Chef. Opah with fennel puree. The opah (moonfish) is a fish I've discovered in Hawaii. It seems a little dense on the picture, but it's actually quite delicate and very moist. For the puree (which is really a thick sauce) I used this simple recipe created by Richard Blais for Food and Wine magazine. The fennel and green garlic were from my CSA. A little snack to nibble on before dinner - cherry tomatoes and mini cucumbers from Suzie's Farms. Another night we had this amazing 3-inch Delmonico steak from my favorite butcher shop. It was grilled and devoured by three very hungry people. I served the steak with grilled baby eggplants from Schaner Farms with zahtar and feta. Then a few nights ago, as we were watching the opening ceremony for the Olympics, we had a salad of lettuce, cucumber and tomato with zahtar and mint, together with a canary melon (extremely sweet) and jambon de pays (a rustic cured ham from France). The main course was a local white fish with red core Chantenay carrots and bagna cauda, toasted breadcrumbs - recipe from Lucques. The carrots were really the standout in this dish as they were very sweet and flavorful.

That's great. Hopefully it will be open by next year's TOTC!

B.G. Reynolds (formerly known as Trader Tiki). I bought it last summer with a bunch of other syrups, and they are still good. I keep them in the fridge.

What kind are these? Golden or red delicious? My mom used to make a nice apple tart with golden delicious apples.

An excess of citrus and a freshly-made batch of orgeat were my motivation for deciding to make a tiki drink last night - usually I look for less involved recipes for Monday nights! Looking up recipes using orgeat, I came up with Kelbo's Scorpion in Sippin' Safari. It's an eclectic mix of dark Jamaican rum, brandy and gin, plus orange juice, lime juice, passion fruit syrup and orgeat. As with a lot of tiki drinks, with so many ingredients it's hard to know based on the recipe alone what it is going to taste like. It was very tasty, a little spicy, definitely on the boozy side but smooth (and therefore dangerous), with the creamy orgeat tying up everything together. Quite impressive. For reference, stickyii posted the recipe while back on the Drinks! thread.

I made Sam Ross' Kentucky Maid last week that everyone loved (bourbon, lime juice, simple syrup, cucumber, mint). A great summer drink. Then the following day I got a request for a Margarita. To have fun, I decided to do a side-by-side tasting with various orange liqueurs. My favorite has always been Cointreau. My husband thought he preferred Grand Marnier but is now a Cointreau convert after doing this little test. The dry curaçao, which is great in other applications (daiquiri, etc), was a little out of place here. Note that I did not try to adjust for the sugar content and used the same recipe for all 3 versions (1.5 oz tequila, 1 oz orange liqueur, 0.75 oz lime juice). They were all good options but everyone preferred Cointreau in the end.

Okanagancook, You are very welcome, let me know how you like this recipe. SobaAddict70, I don't find the recipe for the basic tomato sauce in Babbo to be very complicated. I tried a bunch of other tomato sauce recipes before settling on this one that I really like because it is straightforward and has a good flavor. The recipe does not call for celery by the way, just onions, garlic, a little bit of shredded carrot, fresh thyme, and canned tomatoes. Making it takes about 10-15 min of active time and 30 min of simmering on the stove. As for Marcella's sauce, it is indeed very simple but different from what some might expect from a tomato sauce due to the amount of butter used. I like it though, and think that both sauces have their use. Lastly, I am not sure that I would consider Babbo as a good book for beginners. Most recipes are relatively involved or require hard-to-find ingredients. I actually bought it years ago and only started cooking from it fairly recently for these reasons. I am sure there are plenty of other great Italian cookbooks out there, but that is probably off-topic.

Great looking Mai Tai, Hassouni! I am in the process of making a batch of orgeat so a Mai Tai is in my near future. I will have to try one with S&C one of these days for a change. Usually I go aged agricole + Appleton 12.

I've had the beef cheek ravioli dish and it has a fantastic flavor, very rich! Speaking about ravioli, I made the "Love Letters" a while back (the recipe is available here). The filling is peas and mint, with a robust spicy lamb/merguez sauce which is based on the basic tomato sauce. The flavor was phenomenal, well worth the effort. I also made the asparagus and ricotta ravioli last year for Easter using homemade ricotta (sadly, no picture). I prepared them ahead of time and froze them between sheets of parchment paper sprinkled with cornmeal. They were very delicate and delicious.

Rye and cynar are great together - see the Little Italy. The Teenage Riot sounds like a good cocktail but I don't have the sherry so I am not able to try it for the time being. You might like the Transatlantic Giant if you haven't tried it already and have the components. It is bourbon rather than rye but is another interesting use of Cynar. Sherry is a pain as you don't use much and it won't last long once opened which is why I went for a smaller bottle. But in the grand scheme of things basic sherry is usually pretty cheap so it is not a wallet buster to buy even if you don't use it all. While I spend a lot of money on spirits (too much probably!) I tend to be a bit of a tight wad in other ways and will try to finish something off even if I don't like it. So there is a good chance I am going to drink the rest of that sherry! To waste it would be alcohol abuse... Thanks for your suggestion. For the Transatlantic Giant, I am unfortunately missing both the sloe gin - which is on my list of things to buy - and the crème de cacao, which I refuse to buy because it does not look like something I would enjoy or use very much. So I will have to pass on that one, unless someone decides to make one for me! Does sherry degrade faster than sweet vermouth if you keep it in the fridge? So far I've only used it for cooking and have not been very picky about its quality.

I tried David Lebovitz's banana bread/cake from his website. The little back specks are cocoa nibs. There is also a touch of cinnamon. It's very moist and not dense or overly sweet as some recipes are. Excellent with a cup of coffee.

jayt90 mentioned upthread cooking seafood in the pressure cooker so when I made risotto last night, I just added a few frozen shrimp as an experiment. I ran some water over them for about a minute or two so they were partially defrosted when I added them. I was afraid that they would be overdone but in the end they were just right and had a good texture. In addition to the shrimp, the risotto had onion & shallots, lemon confit, dry vermouth, arugula, parsley and plenty of Parmigiano Reggiano. The rice was a mixture of arborio, carnaroli, and a third variety, in an effort to clean up my pantry. Probably a heresy, but it came out great.

There was also this dish from the Dinner thread that I made a few weeks ago. It's a fresh locally made pasta (lemon roasted black pepper linguine) with Babbo's basic tomato sauce (recipe here). I added homemade whole milk ricotta, arugula, and parmesan. The shredded carrot in the tomato sauce is such a nice addition. You can't really detect it but it adds a little bit of sweetness.

I bought duck eggs from my favorite vendor at the farmers' market, Schaner Farms, and got a bunch of pencil asparagus in my CSA bag yesterday, so I made the Asparagus Milanese with parmigiano and a duck egg from Babbo. The duck egg yolk makes a wonderful "sauce" that coats the asparagus - it's richer than a regular egg. I love it.