thirtyoneknots

Not that this is the drink I would necessarily recommend it for, but if you've never made a cocktail with Thomas Handy you are missing out, good sir.

The Fiancee had never seen Band of Brothers before, so we watched the first episode together tonight...Old Grand-Dad BIB and water seemed the only real option to go with.

We've been enjoying a Corpse Reviver type thing lately; equal parts Blanco Tequila, Dolin Blanc, lime, and Cointreau with two drops of absinthe (Lucid at work). Unlike the CR#2 it doesn't obscure the spirit, but mutes it to a nice accent.

I just got a small sample and have yet to play around with it that much. First impressions - definitely more intense than the R&W, but not quite as sweet as the Hermes violet. Very nice in an Aviation, but now I want to try it in the famously finicky Atty, which I've only been able to get right with the Hermes. It's a bit early for me to render a final verdict, but if it works in the Atty as well as the Hermes, I'd say it's worth the price difference. The ATTY is one of my favorites; with the weird stuff I ordered from France back in 06, I made it literally as written, 3 dashes from an empty Peychauds bottle to the same of Jade Edouard and the other ingredients totalling 2 oz. With the R&W I like to do 2 oz Plymouth, 3/4 oz Dolin Dry, bsp Violette, 3 dashes Lucid (what we have at work) and I think its fab. I'm pretty sure that drink has its own thread but I've never really understood the difficulty with it. While I'm on the subject, does anyone know if that drink has an earlier citation than the Savoy?

Saw an email today from Hi-Time Wines that Creme Yvette is now available, which is very cool though I was a bit dismayed by the price ($44). I know some don't consider it in the same category as regular Creme de Violette, but I was curious if anybody had tried it and had opinions. I love the Rothman & Winter, and it's a bit difficult to wrap my mind around the idea that the Yvette could be twice as good (why are so many of the new products on the market so expensive? geez).

Do tell...I'll be visiting the area this spring and would be happy to do some research. Well I remember reading several years back that Chartreuse potentially does have a relatively high level of thujone, though I don't have a source for it. Could be nothing. At any rate I doubt its the kind of thing you learn by knocking on the door of the distillery.

I confess I've had more umm...remarkable experiences with Chartreuse than Absinthe, with no expectation of such from either. I've since heard it hinted that some of the secrets in the monastery are more interesting than it would seem, but of course I have nothing to back this up with. It's been several years since I've consumed enough Chartreuse in one sitting to experience the effects again...hard to handle that much sugar nowadays (and the price tag...ouch).

So the publication of Imbibe! of course had a profound impact on the drinking habits of a good number of the types of folks who participate in boards like this, and one place where thie impact was most radically felt was in the realm of communal drinking. I've been eagerly awaiting Dr. Wondrich's sequel on punches...in the meantime I figured this would be a good opportunity to try what I think are the last two recipes from Imbibe!'s chapter on Punches, but first I had to locate something that was not easy to find: On the right you see a bottle of authentic Catawba wine, brought from Illinois by a friend and regular who travels there regularly to visit family. I admit that as a wine I didn't expect much from it though I was surprised at how decent it was, probably about as good as one could expect from a grape like that. Watermelon candy, overripe canteloupe, interesting midpalate, ok finish...quite sweet though--half a glass is plenty, and makes clear why it is recommended as an ingredient in mixed beverages. What kind of mixed beverages? Why punch of course: National Guard 7th Regiment Punch as per Imbibe! 2 tsp sugar (caster) 1/2 lemon wineglass of Brandy (2 oz Hardy VS) wineglass of Catawba (2 oz) generous tsp 1883 raspberry syrup Shaken well with glass of crushed ice and poured back into glass, float of Smith & Cross rum, fruit, straw, porch. Having not had any JT Punches in many months, this was a great wa to enjoy the nice weather we've (mostly) been having in this part of TX lately. The watermelon character of the wine is really accentuated, funny to me how "girly" some of those old drinks would be deemed if they were created today, this one named for a military unit no less! Ok but what if I want to have people over? I don't want to make a half-dozen of those... Chatham Artillery Punch Ok so this one took some interpretation. First, the amount the recipe makes as written is huge, well over 2 gallons without an ice block. I had two bottles of the wine so I quartered the recipe, resulting in a manageable quantity. Second, the recipe offered requires some modifications which I took a few further liberties with. Here's more or less what I came up with: 1 qt Catawba 1 cup St. Croix Rum (Cruzan Single Barrel) 1 cup rye (Old Overholt) 1/2 a pineapple in chunks (incidentally one of the best pineapples I've ever had) 1 lb (or whatever that standard box holds) of strawberries, hulled and diced. 1 cup strong green tea 1 cup lemon juice 1/2 cup sugar Cut up all the fruit, muddle the peel of a few lemons with the sugar, and add the tea while hot to dissolve the sugar. Add booze, wine, fruit, and lemon juice. This is then supposed to be aged for at least two days, which I cut awfully close. Then when ready to serve pour into punchbowl with an ice block, add some orange slices and a bottle of Champagne, or in my case "champagne" (Francois Montand Blanc de Blancs, pictured above, works awesome for this kind of thing for $10). Few observations: one, if I were to have occasion to make this again, I would definitely strain all or most of the fruit out before serving. The strawberries, which were good but not particularly noteworthy, had given up most of their flavor even after 2 days (really about 41 hours). Also, since there is a fairly high ratio of fruit to liquid, you end up trying to eat a lot of fruit while drinking, which for my part resulted in premature fullness. Second, I think this kind of thing really does need more time sitting around getting happy and infusing before being drank. Verdict? I don't know...this Catawba stuff isn't cheap for what it is, something like $13/btl...but it isn't radically expensive by any means. If you are in to wine and punch and the effort involved isn't too great, its a fun novelty and well worth trying. As far as which recipe is better...I have to say that as I made them, definitely the 7th Reg't Punch--and far less effort. The big lesson for me though is that while Catawba has perhaps justifiably fallen by the wayside, its greatest value is probably as an ingredient in a mixed drink. The last few ounces I have saved to try a Catawba Cobbler later this week, which I actually think should be pretty tasty.

Does anybody happen to know offhand who the importer or distributor is for Royer?

I can say they are not very similar at all...to grossly oversimplify the issue, Zirbenz tastes more like a pine cone and Clear Creek tastes more like a pine needle. edit: formatting

Yeah that combo with fig is what looks like the offender, without having tried it.

My Spanish isn't what I'd like it to be, but shouldn't this be 'Quatras Naranjas'? Can anybody confirm or deny? I believe it should be Cuatro Naranjas...unless the interlingua 'quatro' was intentional based on the various ingredient sources. Four is not an adjective, thus making it feminine would not be appropriate. Er...cuatro, right. Too early in the morning to be bilingual. Used in a sentence (eg, There are four oranges) it could be an adjective, no? (Hay cuatras naranjas). Hmm...google translator goes both ways. Guess I should have studied more in that class, then I would know for sure. Looks like a good drink at any rate.

My Spanish isn't what I'd like it to be, but shouldn't this be 'Quatras Naranjas'? Can anybody confirm or deny?

That looks very strange, to say the least. Seems like fig stuff might work with brandy though, using it sort of like the marmalade in an Omar Bradley. If I was being charged to make a citrus-free drink with fig jam thats where I would start. Still, you go first.

Put me down as a fan of the #5 recipe above as well, though I'll also muddy things up even more by mentioning that Imbibe! lists a Ward 8 recipe that is almost completely unlike that one. My copy is loaned out right now but I do recall it had Creme de Menthe, among other highly peculiar additions (Absinthe, maybe?). From any less esteemed a source I wouldn't have even given it a second thought, but even as it stands I haven't tried it myself--too far removed from what I consider a Ward 8 to be.

Also, be sure in that 1806 cock-tail to use extremely minimally aged whiskey (or gin) and garnish it with nutmeg, not citrus peel. Oh yeah, no cheating by using ice, either

Red beans and rice, Sausages of most kinds, stewed/braised dishes of most varieties. Jambalaya. Fried chicken. To me, comfort food should almost by definition be high in those two items that the pre-agricultural Homo sapiens craved (and still do): salt and fat. It's comforting because there's a hardwired reaction to those things in your mouth that signals a chance at survival (I think a recent Daily Gullet feature touched on this). If you've got a fair (but not ott) amount of those two things it's going to strike a chord for most people I think. Few things are more comforting than survival.

I'm sure there are people who like a good cocktail more than I do, though I haven't met any of them yet. Even still, there are places where whiskey alone, or with a splash or three of water, are more appropriate...like when you are trying to sneak drinks into a music festival. I confess I have brought mixed drinks into places I wasn't supposed to before, but never in a flask. For that purpose, only a 44 oz Whataburger cup will do. Less conspicuous, more voluminous. edited to clarify

If you don't like drinking it on the rocks with a twist enough to use the bottle up quickly it is also fabulous as a cooking wine, try steaming mussels in it sometime.

I've never been to Texas, but from what I've seen and heard, that's quite a formidable task you've set for yourself, there! Safe to say you don't work at Billy Bob's? Yeah, it's not easy--Texans are generally quite set in their ways. We've made excellent progress though, I think. In three years open we've gone from going through about a case of Crown Royal a month to a reasonable rate of about 3 bottles a month, and our cocktails, including Old Fashioneds, have a modest but loyal following. We recently had a dinner with Buffalo Trace, tasting through 7 of their offerings including 3 of the '09 Antique Collection releases. I view having had a tasting for American Whiskey, which lacks the cachet of Scotch and the 'smoothness' of Canadian whisky, sell out with a standby list, to be a huge success in the mission to get people to drink better. Long way to go yet.

I think you're giving him a bit too much credit, but we'll just leave it at that

This is interesting to me because that is always how I have understood the meaning of the word in the booze context, and yet a regular at work will often say that he is "rectifying" his glass of Scotch by adding miniscule amounts of ice or water until the alcoholic heat has been reduced. The guy is a world-class bloviator and talks out of his six more often than not but when this topic came up I wondered if maybe he knew a definition of the word I did not. I should add that the guy is a university professor--in Chemistry. Yes, he has a PhD. No, he doesn't normally really know what he is talking about (but is very opinionated nonetheless). Where does this alternate usage come from?

Just to clarify, my thoughts on the construction of this cocktail are not intended as an affront to anyone's professionalism or dedication to the craft--just my opinions. I confess that here in Texas the drinking public is only vaguely aware of a drink called the Old Fashioned, without much idea of what it is or why it is significant. If I am to introduce it to them properly, I feel like I have to do it The Hard Way, to drive home the higher significance the drink has to history. This is not the kind of thing that is ordered very often by people at tables in the dining room, it is normally the kind of thing that I am pushing on people sitting at the bar, trying my damnedest to wean them off of Crown and Coke. I am enthusiastic user of syrups of all kind, which I can make in creative flavors and concentrations to expand the palette I have to work with. They also have limitations, though, and it seems to me that the OF mix outlined above would make a much sweeter drink than I am accustomed to but this is a matter of taste, of course. As I typically don't include fruit unless requested by the customer, sugar is the only thing I am muddling anyway. Ms. Loeb, I hope that you are not as offended by my remarks as it seems. I think that this is actually a good example of what I was trying to say about philosphies--you have a clear and laudible emphasis on making sure that everyone has a drink, and that it has been made in a unique way, with items that you have made ahead of time (Cherries) with great thought and care. I am more likely to make the next person wait their turn while I perform as much "show" as time allows while making someone's drink in front of them. When the next person gets their turn, they get the same treatment. Neither way is better, it is just a different philosophy. It was certainly not my intent to imply a lack of seriousness on anyone's part, especially yours. Clearly during the midweek dinner rush when I am by myself and have 14 people sitting at my bar and the restaraunt is on a wait and the printer is buzzing incessantly, folks aren't going to get the full 20 min shpiel on the Old Fashioned's place in American history

There isn't one, except that it is a precisely measured amount of sugar. For me though, placating my inner purist is reason enough. I used to make OFs exclusively with syrup. About a year and a half ago I rediscovered the joys of making them from scratch and it was a sort of return to basics time for me in the craft anyways so it has a sort of existential level of significance to me personally. An Old-Fashioned is I think as good a test as any for any bartender who takes drink-making seriously. There's not only one way to do it correctly, or even deliciously, but I think you can gain significant insight into a bartender's philosophy from how they make an Old Fashioned.

When I was weeded at the service well tonight (at around 9) I made the concession of using rich syrup in OFs rather than crushing a cube each time. Not saying the syrup doesn't have merits, but I just don't think it is a worthwhile shortcut to take. Premixing things to save time is a dangerous path that breeds things like sour mix.