bostonapothecary

all summer at the bar we've served the "john daly" whom is the alcoholic counterpart to arnold palmer on the course and in the glass.... 2 oz. black tea rum* 3 oz. lemonaide *to make the black tea rum.... put black tea in rum and try to keep small quickly used quantities so the tea doesn't oxidize too much.... 45 minutes of steeping works nicely. newmans own lemonaide is far superior to anything made by hand and really captures the essence of the man in the drink.... as far as a tobacco pairing.... menthol cigarettes are the perfect foil for the drink....

saterday night some bartenders from across the city were in and just wanted to be surprised.... i reached for mount gay because it looked lonely and hadn't been used in a while.... manhatan's were on my mind and rye was getting too much spotlight.... 2 oz. mount gay rum 1 oz. my own sweet vermouth (its sorta like punt y mes) the particular rum had a similar effect of apry in the park slope.... the fruit character of the drink was lightened and with the bitter component of the vermouth sexy flavors of roasted coffee came into focus to create something very unique....

flowers are really cool in booze. i love hearing about the experimentation. i just saw some elderflower tea at the coffee shop. i bought a pound of the flowers a while ago. i think i'm gonna play with them.... i'm gonna finally buy a bottle of st. germain. taste it. measure the brix.... i'm really curious to weather it has a particular PH as well. and then start sample infusions to see if the flowers will yield anything good through infusion. hibiscus flowers 15 minutes in alcohol. black tea 45 minutes. damiana 4 hours. hot cloves 1 hour. chamomile 24 hours. rooibos 24 hours. we will see where elderflowers lie.... i remember reading the marolo's disgusting chamomile grappa steeped for months in the flowers.... and then they add cloying amounts of sugar.... it was probably overkill.... taste the sample every hour or so. and maybe add a little simple syrup to the taste because otherwise your flavors might be really dull and hard to gauge the success of.... if you really like your results you could match another products sugar ethic exactly but i personally like to peg nearly everything to sweet vermouth.... alpenz ethic seems to be even less sweet than that.... happy imbibing....

stock makes a "rosolio" and it looks nasty.... the scent of roses reminds me of retirement homes.... and strangely they are really in vogue these days as a mens fragrance.... rose syrup in milk is popular in india.... each flower is definitely unique.... i go through huge amounts of damiana flower tequila.... they definitely have unique properties....

are they the same as red pinks? there is a classic "ratafia of red pinks" some of that stuff is more perfumology than liqueur because if you don't distill you often pick up more bitter principles.... try the infusion in alcohol.... pony up the money and let us know how it turns out.... it could be horrible, it could be beautiful.... some flavors are more soluble in alchohol than in water.... sometines you get alot of bitter sometimes you don't.... make sure you journal the whole things.... if you have any questions about steeping times.... sugar content.... be sure to ask....

you are only on the verge or "wretched excess" .... i want one of those....

mcdowell, do you cut your bookers with water? i can intuitively think of great wine and food pairings because their are more rules to guide you and experience can take you a long way. this cigar business is quite the challenge because the level of nuance is intense. i don't have an intimate knowledge and memory of brown spirits because i mainly drink cocktails. this is gonna take some serious research.... the mechanics of the pairing are pretty strange. different reviews claimed certain cigars had the effect of making a spirit seem hotter which was a negative.... but no rule of thumb could be assertained as to how it could be predicted.... in food and wine, the comparative pairing is usually the easiest while the contrast which is IMO the most rewarding is usually the hardest to make work and should be done only out of exact experience.... in my limited experience cigar pairing seems the opposite.... will report back with some findings....

inspired by how delicious tboner's last cocktail sounded i put together something of my own.... i really wanted to contrast three star barrelito with clear creak's blue plum eau de vie...intensely cool roasted coffee flavors in the rum against a great expression of late summer fruit.... i probably should have used dry vermouth to really show off the spirits but alas i had none.... (that will never happen again if i'm gonna sacrifice barrelito) i settled for rosso antico and to it added a spoonful of amer picon. (as in a "creole variation" that i really want to try) then one dash of peychaud's bitters.... 1 oz. ron del barrelito three star 1 oz. clear creek blue plum 3/4 oz. rosso antico 1/4 oz. amer picon 1 dash peychaud's integrated and very good but the vermouthy portions steal the show from what i though would be a cool spirits comparison.... life is short and the art is long....

i'm missing some inegredients to try that myself but it sounds like a really good time....

i've always wanted to spend time experiencing cigar and spirits / cocktail parings.... i was asked to do a cigar event for our patio closing in september and was looking for ideas.... i've always been huge into cigar box the flavor as found in benedictine.... red wines.... brown spirits etc.... tonight i smoked a lighter bodied dominican cigar and had a large flight of things to taste it with.... rosso antico sweet vermouth my damiana flower flavored anejo tequila (slightly sweetened by agave nectar) 1992 plantation venezuala black maple hills small batch bourbon my favorite was the rum and then the vermouth my brothers favorite was the vermouth and then the tequila what are some rules of thumb on parings....?? sweet things go with what.... fuller bodied cigars go with what.... etc. is a contrasting pairing much more fun than a comparative? previous posts from apparently long ago said beautiful things about coffee.... i would love to hear some experiences and some recommendations. i have about a month to experience as much of it as possible.... i'm kinda also interested in any lore of famous cigar smokers and their opinions on what to smoke with what you drink.... anyone know any churchill, hemingway lore? your own grandfather? what exactly did pappy van winkle smoke?

you are right.... i didn't articulate that the best.... as i stated i was drinking and loving the eau de vie....

as i was drinking some clear creek blue plum eau de vie.... i stumbled upon eric asimov's column in the times this week.... http://www.nytimes.com/2007/08/15/dining/1...r=1&oref=slogin he simply explains the state of the american eau de vie business and gives some reference to mixologists.... he didn't have the nicest things to say about mixing with eau de vie. oh well.... i'm having lots of fun with it.... i wonder if asimov is an egullet reader. many food writers i know have confessed to lurking here.... the blue plum is delicous....

i had the cocktail made for me this afternoon at eastern standard.... 2/1/2 oz. overholt... 3/4 oz. punt y mes... 1/2 oz. apry because the alpenz apricot isn't available here yet...(though i did land some creme de violette) the drink is cool because the apry lightens the flavors as opposed to swopping it out for things like maraschino that make it heavier in things like a read hook or like bourbon that is heavier than rye or like benedictine which is pretty heavy. all these heavy things get bunched up and only taste like chocolate.... which to me is like a flaw due to over mixing. the slope makes things lighter and with patience you get notes in there of coffee which is a maillard flavor lighter than chocolate.... divine. a super sexy cocktail due to be timeless....

the coffee cocktail was my first egg drink and i had found it in the bon vivants companion.... it appealed to me because the ingredients were all things i consumed in the morning.... port, cognac, and egg.... they formed like voltron to rival the greatest morning beverage.... coffee! to me it compares not in flavor or anything but in spirit. a very nice pick me up....

maybe i can come up with something origional but i'm really tired.... orange never really excited me even though i'm a leo and all.... my favorite orange cocktail is something that i read about in a blog so long ago that i've forgotten where.... maybe i can be reunited with the owner to thank them because i've enjoyed it so many times.... sunset gun.... 2 oz. clove whiskey (rye perhaps... infused with cloves) 1/2 oz. creole shrub (my opinions of orange liqueurs are well known) a couple dashes of reagan's orange bitters. served on the rocks the clove whiskey on its own is so dull...but then the sugars of the shrub awaken it... and with so little fuss you get a cocktail that is real serious.... my favorite marriage with orange.... which sign rules clove? maybe thats where i should be looking for compatability....

i've got to try this cocktail tomarrow.... i wonder what the brix of R&W apricot is because their creme de violette is far lower than average for a liqueur.... only 20 brix.... the low sweetness is an interesting ethic but give a tiny learning curve to fitting into classic proportions of classic recipes....

what is Suze? and elaborate on the white negroni plz... sounds tasty....

sounds pretty cool. did you like the eau de vie with rye? i really want to try some eau de vie contrasted against tequila....a reposado perhaps. i will have to pick some up tomarrow....

i think you omitted the title... "clover club" a beautiful drink.... was it your first time having it? serious props to eastern standard for putting it on their cocktail list. and every time i'm in there i see them serving quite a few of them.... hmm. actaully i think they have it on as a pink lady. in anycase its flawlessly executed there.

i think he means that many drinks from the "culinary cocktail" realm use the philosophy of hide the booze and lets use alcohol as a drug.... the proper cocktail is for the flavor addict where alcohol content high or low is important to defining flavor and the buzz is just an awsome side effect....

i drink a huge amout of kola nut tonic.... and i've given many bottles away to many bars.... i mainly mix it with over proof rum like lemon heart demerara 151 which unfortunately very few people have realized the virtues of.... bat eyes (to represent the sugarcane shanty towns and the back end of the carribiean flavor profile) 1 oz. lemonheart 151 1 oz. kola nut tonic 1/2 oz. cynar flamed orange twist swahili cocktail (named by patrons and not by me....) 1/1/2 oz. wray and nephews overproof 1 oz. kola nut tonic 1 oz. granadilla juice (similar acidity to lemonjuice...another name for passion fruit) 1/4 oz. simple syrup (to make the brix a croud pleaser) closest twist at hand.... grizzly (for the lunch croud) 1 oz. kola nut tonic 1 oz. lime juice 4 oz. ginger beer its just fun.... because us roughneck cacos can't drink clairin all day long....

i diced up the rubarb and put it in a blender with a little pit of water to get it going... i think i peeled the tougher outer fibers off too to make it easier on the blender.... it surprisingly broak down pretty well. then i just ran it across a coarse sieve. what i ended up with was a big lump of pink lint and alot of tart juice.... i think the chef at petit robert did the same but then he put the juice into a mold and froze it to further clarify it.... impurities floated to the top or sank to the bottom as it froze.... he just then cut the bad parts off his frozen rubarb. the freezing might be over kill. just going from the coarse sieve to a finer one did a really good job and the whole process sounds like a pain in the ass but didn't take very long at all. delicious stuff.

we just added a couple drops of the aged balsamic....to make it like a subliminal flavor.... last summer i made alot of rubarb juice.... it was trendy so you could find it around the city easily.... this year i have seen very little rubarb.... i think its pretty timeless stuff and makes a pretty cool acid for a drink. now i'm thirsty again.... i remember a couple years ago a boston chef was making the juice and adding it to coffee liqueur (dirty french chef i think it was called).... i never tried it but he may know something i don't.... rubarb juice, dry vermouth, coffee liqueur perhaps? sparkling wine that isn't too dry like a prosecco because you are gonna add acid... rubarb juice and then a spoonful of tia maria.... now i'm thirsty again....

someone needs to give that kid some raw eggs. he might churn out something cool....

somebody on egullet private messaged me and told me it was available at brix through ideal wines and spirits.... it wasn't but she called right away and tried to get half a case.... all that they sent was three bottles that she sold me.... its now back ordered.... but they will get more as soon as possible.... 23$ a 750ml. i highly recommend brix on washington ave for their general awsomeness.... you can get amer picon, black maple hill, rare rums.... all sorts of goodness.