bostonapothecary

8.5 oz. flaked rye aromatized evan williams bourbon (centrifuged to clarify) yep. i drank it all straight and didn't even make a cocktail. this technique works really well. the aroma from grains is very economical and there are lots of newly available boutique options. the infusion at first is sort of creamy in the way risotto is, but the centrifuge clears it right up. curiously whatever is in the grains also strips a decent amount of color. i only centrifuged for 20 minutes @ 4000 rpm's, but i think it will need more time to maximize the yield. all of the tasters were really impressed with the "richness" which i think had nothing to do with a change in texture, but only the additional dissolved aroma. i eventually envision "Octoberfest" aromatized whiskey where an octoberfest grain bill is infused and then spun. next up "chocolate rye" aromatized rye!

No Punt e Mes? Is it to late for you to jump into the Niagara River at Goat Island? I haven't tried it, but I think I'd try a dry, fruity red wine with Bianco Vermouth, or absent that, maybe a mix of sweet and dry vermouth. I'm sure either would work well enough to enjoy the cocktail, even if it might be different than intended. punt y mes and the vergano americano are tricky to approximate. regular sweet vermouths typically have a sugar content of 165g/l while i measured punt y mes to be well over 200+g/l and i'm sure the vergano product matches the punt y mes. all this sugar is to contrast their extra bitterness. i just had to fake some vergano the other day when my order didn't come in (it was only lost in the warehouse and not dropped by the distributor!). i mixed equal parts M&R rose and M&R sweet and then added extra sugar and a few dashes of a quinine tincture i keep around. in the resultant cocktail i also took out a small fraction of the scotch and replaced it with yellow plum eau-de-vie. the drink definitely has sensory beauty, but it loses a lot of symbolic beauty when parts get faked.

Vergano Americano is the jam. My esteemed colleague Josh Loving employed it to great effect in the Campari Swizzle, which is 3/4 oz each of Americano, Rhum JM Blanc, Campari, Velvet Falernum, and lemon swizzled over crushed or finely cracked ice. One of the fast movers at Fino in the warmer months, and woe to us who had to crush ice to order in a Lewis Bag. Edit for punctuation and to add that the stuff is unfortunately not cost-friendly, which I'm sure has hindered its popularity. we are paying about $1.10 an ounce wholesale for the vergano. their spectacular lillet clone "luli" was close to $2 an ounce. i used it for a while years ago with seagram's gin to offset the cost. the cocchi lillet clone "aperitivo americano" is a much better deal. my bobby burns recipe has a fairly high cost basis but it is well subsidized by other drinks. in the future i'd like to trade the expensive single malt for a affordable blended scotch aromatized with extra boutique grains. you can either redistill the scotch and grains or centrifuge them. i bet you can get the spirit part of the drink down below .75 an ounce while maintaining some serious aroma. i just got a three liter centrifuge, but i'm still learning to use it.

.75 oz. cognac (maison surrenne) .75 oz. m&r rose vermouth .75 oz. danzig goldwasser .75 oz. lime juice dash peychaud's bitters most excellent. i hold danzig goldwasser in very high regard. the aroma is very similar to yellow chartreuse but trades the acacia honeyed quality of the chartreuse for an orange expression. most importantly goldwasser is half the price of chartreuse. i have used a similar pattern in the past where pommeau was used in place of the rose vermouth. in that case extra aromatic tension can be added by trading cognac for its invert; mezcal.

This is a great drink with a confounding comment. BA didn't name it, so I called it Boston Apothecary 2. (BA, if you want to name it, I'll gladly update the name on Kindred Cocktails.) I lack the M&R Rosato, so I used a 50:50 mix of Carpano Antica and M&R Bianco. The resulting drink is tart, but pleasingly so. I don't often add acid to wine-based cocktails, but based on this cocktail, I will more. The comment that confounds me is mixing acid with bitter. I find that acid balances bitter + sweet, simultaneously taming the sugar and tempering the bitter. I absolutely love this 3-way combo. The Paper Airplane is another great example of this template. I have a somewhat harder time liking bittersweet cocktails, but then I don't care for sweet cocktails with odd exceptions (like a Manhattan). this ended up being named "antihero". i'm glad you liked it. i recommend picking up M&R rosato. i toyed for years with making versions of the chamberyzette strawberry aromatized vermouth, but have just happily settled on the readily available and affordable M&R rosato. has anyone else enjoyed the aromatized wine by vergano: "americano"? i just tried to order more for work and was told it was dropped. bars never seemed to pick up on how brilliant it was. if my rep can't do a liquor store buy-back i'm going to have to ride around the city and buy the rest of the bottles retail myself. i was using it most notably in a rendering of the bobby burns: 2 oz. glen fiddich 1 oz. vergano americano bar spoonful chestnut flower honey (cut 1:1 with vodka) the wine base of the americano is grignolino from monferrato and was used in many red colored aromatized wines early in the 20th century. the tonal effect of adding chestnut flower honey is really spectacular and juxtaposing it with glen fiddich really pushes it over the top.

Alexander 2 oz. pineau des charentes (brillet) 1 oz. organic heavy cream 1 oz. cocoa aromatized "whitened" whiskey (evan williams bourbon) my favorite of the recent series of alexanders. even better than the 1997 port wood panama rum version.

alexander 1.5 oz. brillet pineau des charentes .75 oz. organic heavy cream .75 oz. del maguay vida mezcal grated nutmeg most excellent. 1.5 oz. brillet pineau des charentes .75 oz. organic heavy cream .75 oz. lemon heart 151 grated nutmeg completely exceptable 1.5 oz. brillet pineau des charentes .75 oz. organic heavy cream .75 oz. 1997 panama rum finished by renegade rum co. in port wine casks grated nutmeg righteous!

1 oz. cascade mountain gin from bendistillery, oregon .5 oz. jalinek kosher slivovitz 1 oz. m&r bianco vermouth .5 oz. brandymel 3 drops acid phosphate cascade mountain gin is my new favorite. it has an elegant brashness. the tonality of their juniper is superbly extraordinary. and the price, $24 retail for a craft spirit. amazing. i've made iterations of this before, but never with acid phosphate. i though some unobtrusive acidity would help an otherwise sweet leaning drink. everything worked out nicely.

love the bitter sours. i made this last night for a few friends: .75 oz. hop aromatized gin (local cascade hops) .75 oz. cynar .75 oz. M&R rose vermouth .75 oz. lime juice i avoid aromatic cocktail bitters in these because the drink already has enough aroma. in general i feel cocktail bitters are a bit over hyped. over use turns many drinks into the california wines of cocktails... too dense in aroma. when i make a bitter sour with either cynar or campari i try to partner it with another liqueur that has under 200g/l of sugar. my most successful partners have been the aromatized wines and the delicious but easily forgotten stuff like pineau des charents and pomeau. if you want to use a dense overshadowing liqueur like sloe gin, i've found that you need to switch the spirit and acid to options that have more aggressive and penetrating aromas. lime instead of lemon. and mezcal, arrack or potent agricole's instead of ryes & gins. bitter sours read ferocious, but it is surprising how many people enjoy them.

"intuition" 1 oz. hispaniola mamajuana "the original" 1 oz. danzig goldwasser 1 oz. mezcal vida 1 oz. lime juice most excellent. hispaniola is the first commercial mamajuana i've ever seen. usually i think you buy it as a collection of herbs in a bottle that you add your own spirits and sugar to. the aroma with "natural and artificial flavors" is reminiscent of root beer tastefully overshadowed with vanilla acompanied by the gently penetrating piquancy of chilies. the very low sugar content of this mamajuana when partnered with the mid range sugar content of the goldwasser is an awesome contrast to the lime juice.

bubble gum eau-de-vie. i've found the only way to enjoy peach brandy is in a high acid cocktail. the acidity will help define the flavor and eradicate all negative connotations. somewhere way up thread i have a few recipes for it. i've been experiencing a similar phenomenon with white dogs made from certain grains. white wheat also ends up smelling like bubble gum and it is hard to enjoy in sweet leaning cocktails like an old fashioned or manhattan. in tart cocktails where you create intense tension between the aroma and acidity white wheat is quite lovely.

I.P.A. ---> I.P.C. (imperial pegu club) 1.5 oz. cascade hop aromatized seagram's gin .75 oz. triple-sec .75 oz. lime juice dash angostura bitters quite lovely.

how much is it? if i saw it, i'd shoot in the dark and buy it. but because they leave the proof so high which obscures a lot of the aroma i'd bet it could be in the style of wray & nephews over proof. the price might hint at the style.

1.5 oz. cocoa aromatized formerly bourbon (hershey's brand, evan williams) 1 oz. la cigarrera manzanilla pasada .25 oz. fernet branca .25 oz. green chartreuse 3 g. non aromatic white sugar i was remembering a drink i had long ago with both cocoa powder and green chartreuse as well as hot chocolate i've enjoy with fernet. i thought my cocoa aromatized formerly bourbon would be as enhancement. it was okay. i should have picked one or the other and definitely not both. 3:2:1 lion's tale! 1.5 oz. cocoa aromatized formerly bourbon (100 proof) 1 oz. wray & nephews berry hill allspice liqueur .5 oz. lime juice the aroma of the cocoa is a welcome addition to this classic. believe it or not the weight of the aroma and piquancy is elegant enough in the wray & nephews bottling to make a 3:2:1

this is too easy. "black dog" 2 oz. belgium aromatic malt aromatized white wheat whiskey 4 g. non aromatic white sugar 4 dashes peychaud's bitters rinse of raki-prunelle-sauvage-yerba-mate "absinthe" the 2 grams per ounce method works wonderfully to create "simplified gustation" style aroma driven drinks. the cohesion here is spectacular. the tonality and gentle contrasts are epic.

sometimes they are just obvious... 1 oz. belgium aromatic malt aromatized white wheat whiskey 1 oz. m&r rose vermouth 1 oz. cynar dash peychaud's bitters sinister.

2 oz. belgium aromatic malt aromatized white wheat whiskey 1 oz. carpano antica formula bitter like the best espresso, but it is probably an illusion of aroma. if i used another vermouth i could probably sneak in a spoonful of maraschino. at first i thought this grain was too brash to use, but then i just went for it. now i'm in love.

.5 oz. kaffir lime juice 4 grams non aromatic white sugar .25 oz. r. jalinek kosher slivovitz 1.5 oz. vale d'paul unaged cape verdean rum i found some kaffirs today at formaggio kitchen. i intended to make a simple daiquiri, but upon realizing the juice smelt like pine sol floor cleaner i opted to add some slivovitz for a contrasting aroma in hopes it would break the negative association. i have a feeling it saved the day, but even using cape verdean rum, anyone blind tasting this would think it a gimlet over a daiquiri. i think i like it enough to finish the rest of the kaffirs. i know people think my drinks are getting boring and predictable, but have no fear, i just found a vast repository of new ingredients.

i have a 3/4 full bottle of the nardini amaro if you want it. i bought it at cirace in the north end. it is one of my least favorite amaros. really boring with simplistic aromas. menthe-caramelized sugar. i lent out my beta cocktails book. what is the recipe that calls for it?

Yerba mate? As in what seemingly everybody in Montevideo drinks 24/7? Didn't even know it was readily available in the US. What was the Turkish raki that you used? I acquired a bottle of Yeni raki on a whim a few months ago after a trip to the Middle East. Was looking for Lebanese arak (I have since seen some at drinkupny) but this was the closest I could find at the time. Haven't really figured out what to do with it other than mixing with water and sipping as is more or less done in the Middle East. there are some excellent tea shops in my area. yerba mate is fairly common around here. you can even get it smoked. i can't remember what raki i used. i bought it miss priced at $11.00 for a 750ml. my theory in selecting raki's is that if you buy that oldest most dated looking label that doesn't say raisin, you're more likely to get a rougher more fun sort of spirit base. some of the varietals they use, i'm pretty sure, are cousins of moscat, and therefore produce aromas similar to a pisco. the strange blend of exoticisms reminds me of gene wolfe's "book of the new sun".

2 oz. E&J XO california brandy (who brought this to my house?) 4 g. non aromatic white sugar 4 dashes peychaud's bitters rinse of special absinthe** the tonality of everything was too dark for a lemon twist. **the special absinthe is turkish raki "aromatized" with sloe berry eau-de-vie to boost the alcohol and add aroma plus yerba mate instead of wormwood for its darker aromas. E&J XO is interesting but kind of lame relative to cognac. full of very ordinary chocolatey aromas. i have no clue how it ended up at the house. very tootsie roll. in drinking the remainder of the rinse i was really impressed with how the sloeberry complemented the anise. the aromas was really stretched out. yerba mate pulls on those aromas in the same was as wormwood, but darker.

pisco faux "mosto verde" 2 oz. macchu pisco aromatized with extra moscat from a mistelle 1 oz. lemon juice 8 grams non aromatic white sugar egg white dash of angostura bitters on the froth mosto verde is a pisco production technique where the wine isn't fermented to dryness before it is distilled so that an exaggerated amount of aroma to alcohol can be produced. i've never encountered one, but really loved the idea so i decided to try and synthesize it by getting extra aroma from a mistelle of moscat grapes. for comparisons i had unaromatized macchu pisco, the aromatized version, and the epic cesar pisco "italia". macchu pisco doesn't have as much aroma as the cesar and the aromatized version increased the amount of aroma to about as much as the cesar but the tonality was not as pretty. the technique for faking mosto verde is a nice idea, but i think i need a better source of moscat aroma. i need to move to the wine country.

i wonder why they ditched the color? in my interpretation, the color is supposed to correspond to the tonality of the aromas. picon exhibits a dark shade of orange. the tonal effect is probably achieved by combining the orange peels which an aromatic sugar source (raw sugar or malt). when you add picon to a lager you should also stain the beer with a color that compares to a belgium like chimay rouge. picon & beer is a poor man's chimay. regardless, i really look forward to their version.

So it is indeed, at the heart of it, ritual rather than function... but suggesting that the ritual is simply for entertainment purposes could lead me down a road I may not want to travel with the dedicated? the ritual has a function. absinthe is such an acquired taste that a ritual is often needed to give the uninitiated a motivational drive to like the sensory side of the experience. susceptibility varies. rene redzepi uses similar principles to get people to pay top dollar for barnicles at noma. it is known that we have a hard time parsing sensory experiences. you cannot easily divide the line between smell & taste (olfaction and gustation) when you are eating. believe it or not we also have a hard time separating the symbolic and sensory sides of experiences and that is why art can be so persuasive. do i like that wine because it tastes good or because it is a first growth of Bordeaux? if people completely understood the mechanisms of these things they could teach an entire nation to prefer their coffee black and save it a massive amount of calories.

the ritual is largely symbolic. all of these experiences (like all art) have a symbolic side and a sensory side. you can manipulate both (and you should!). the sensory side is all that anise & alcohol while the symbolic side is all those rituals, history, hallucinogenic myths, etc. everything your brain does to juggle the two sides is covered in the theory of cognitive dissonance. people get hung up on the symbolic side of their experiences, but symbolism often stands in the way of sustainability and that is one of the greatest problems we face. you can start with a simple question about an absinthe ritual and open a big can of worms.