haresfur

I bought a bottle of Inner Circle 40%. Haven't quite made up my mind although it is infinitely better than the cheap Bundaberg. But I'll only try the more expensive B if I can get it in a mini-bottle or try someone else's. Still has a distinct estery? flavour that interestingly, seems to come through the ginger beer in a Dark and Stormy. Does anyone know if that is a feature of pot-still rum or where they make the cuts in the distillation? Any ideas of cocktails that will shine for this style of rum?

A lot of citrus are grafted onto dwarfing root-stock for growing in pots. Since this isn't the case with yours, you may end up with underground issues. Maybe you could re-pot frequently and clip roots back. I'm not much of a gardiner - I killed off dwarf Meyers lemon, lime, orange and calamondin trees but I mainly attribute that to them coming in with scale. I'm going to give lime and maybe lemon another go, but may try a full-size lemon since I have the climate for it now. So watch for pests. I did get rid of the scale with a systemic but it was pretty much too late.

Iodine-131 has a short half life - about 8 days. What that means is that it takes very little of it by mass to produce enough radioactivity for the procedure (in other words it has a high specific-activity). So for that reason it won't have any significant impact on your overall iodine level. Also, it decays to xenon-131 so between that, and excretion, it goes away without much unintended good or bad effect on your thyroid.

Agree totally about the Campari. As far as the runners-up go, I don't have access to many of them but Cassis is high on my list and I'd add some pastis or absenthe, a coffee liqueur, and probably Drambuie as being good to have. Amaretto, too, if only for making cheesecake.

I can't (and wouldn't want to) take credit for this one: light rum ginger beer vanilla ice cream Make a float. Actually this tames the ginger beer bringing out the rum and was quite tasty. Um, would that be called a "Stormy Whiteout"? On a related note, Starbucks coffee liqueur is really nice over ice cream.

So no egg yolks but whites are ok? What about pasta? You could make that at home if the commercial isn't allowed.

If you still have the cherries maybe try putting them in a bowl with sugar to make a syrup/cut the booziness? Seems like they could then be put into a dessert or maybe even some sausage or gallantine/terrine/whatever. I did pretty much the same thing - some in brandy and some in rum and the cherries were too "boozy". I was in the process of adding more and more sugar to the mix and sampling periodically when the experiment was terminated because of my move. I'm thinking of making some 2:1 sugar syrup with 80 proof spirits next time, throwing the cherries in the hot syrup, then letting them cool and sit in the cupboard for a couple of weeks or more.

With the price of liquor here??? I can't think of too many particularly Australian cocktails but I'm a newcomer. And as much as I hate to disparage anyone's local spirits, I can't deal with Bundaberg rum - the ginger beer is good, though. 1806 in Melbourne does a nice Australian variation on the blue blazer: Black Blazer Inner Circle dark rum with black chocolate This variation was created at 1806 by Stacy Field as a variation of the classic drink, using the old style of blazing the booze with modern ingredients that would not have been around an 1800s gold field. In honour of an Australian variation we use the award winning Inner Circle Navy Proof dark rum and organic black chocolate, all burnt in the traditional style.

Aldis had several varieties of "Single Origin Dark Chocolate" - a concept I hadn't seen before. The brand is "Choceur" (shouldn't that be "Chocoeur"?) and is made in Austria. I picked bars of Madagascar and Ecuador to compare. The Madagascar chocolate is described on the package, "Our premium dark chocolate is produced from cacao beans sourced exclusively from Madagascar to create and indulgent, luxurious chocolate. The flavours are unadulterated and exude fine characteristics of strong fruity flavours with hints of citrus and berries." It has 65% cacao. The Ecuador pack says "... The high cacao content produces a robust and complex dark chocolate full of spice and red berry flavours." It has 75% cacao. So the difference in content makes it kind of hard to compare, but I suppose they chose the recipe based on the supposed strengths of each region's product. The Ecuador did seem "earthier" to me, not just stronger, but I wouldn't say I have an educated palate. So anyone else encountered this concept? Does terroir matter for chocolate or was it just an extremely clever way to get me to buy 2 bars (and probably go back for more varieties in the interest of research )?

Maybe "bourbon" was too hard to spell or didn't fit on the glass

I'm not fond of Angostura bitters. I've never tried a Manhattan that I liked. I do plan on learning to like gin, even if it kills me. I like Canadian whiskey and think it's all right to call it rye. I sometimes like sweet drinks and am even willing to drink pink ones. And on the food front, my father always insisted that real cream be whipped with a hand mixer, not electric... maybe that's why I use the aerosol stuff. I dislike potatoes unless they are brown and crispy. I do like boxed mac & sleaze (but my home-made stuff is better - especially when I throw in some smoked salmon).

I think in Pennsylvania (or at least at Penn State) the small bottles of Rolling Rock are called "ponies".

Oh! I'd forgotten about Mickeys! And a really large bottle (3 L??) was a "Texas Mickey". Alcohol does seem to breed weird slang or units - magnum and all those other wine bottle sizes. And I've heard for a 24 bottle case of beer: a flat, a slab, a two-four, and I'm sure there are others. ETA: Is mickey a Winnipeg thing?

In the USA I like "Natural Brew" ginger beer. In Australia I like Cascade.

Personally, I was a little put off to go to a "serious" cocktail bar (not at all busy) and having to flag the bartender down to see what rhum agricole he used in my drink. Since he made it nearly in front of me, it would have been nice to see the label and I don't think it would need to be "in your face". Actually this whole thread has been bothering me but I haven't been able to completely gather my thoughts. I see the value in discussing other culture's crafts but it is kind of self-defeating to judge them from an external frame of reference. I see a lot of critical statements but think the open-minded attempts to understand the whole context get you further. From the bit of study I've done on Japanese pottery, I would hazard a guess that one might not understand Japanese cocktails without understanding tea ceremony, and won't understand tea ceremony without understanding pottery (and vice-versa), and likely won't understand Japanese pottery without some knowledge of sword polishing (e.g Honami Koetsu was a potter from a family of sword polishers). And my personal opinion is that a totally objective evaluation of any food/drink technique is essentially impossible. You can probably learn something from a blind tasting but that is a far cry from enjoying a nice drink.

Tim Tams and Hobnobs

No energy to shake after packing house all day 3 oz Havana Club (cus that was what was left in the flask) 1 oz Campari 1 oz Contreau juice 1/2 lime (like I'm going to take the effort to measure...) stir with ice, decide to take the effort to strain over the rocks and top with soda. Aah!

I remember my parents going to their bridge club in the 60s & 70s, complaining that they were going to have to eat that damn shrimp in tomato aspic again, whenever it was a certain couple's turn to host. I don't really remember what apps they served - they seemed to be more into main courses. Oh yeah, herring in sour cream sometimes, but usually that was put out with the corned beef, cheese, and rye bread for open face sandwiches (father's lapsed Jewish heritage). One thing I do remember was being in Sweden where the neighbors would squeeze all sorts of interesting things from tubes onto rye crisp.

I am mostly an improvisational cook. I like to throw things together, to make a nice meal out of whatever is in the house. I often can't leave recipes alone - except for baking and sometimes not even then. I try to cook relatively healthy food - vegetarian if I'm not too lazy, but at least low saturated fat. My father loved to cook, which was unusual for men of his generation. I cannot match him in his ability to mess up a kitchen (but he did it with flair). The family recipes are important to me but I don't feel bound by them. If I'm making up a dish I may tell people that it is an old family recipe so they don't dare criticize it !

I can understand this especially if it is code for "strong", but there are times you get a feeling... Like when I was a the bar in a restaurant and the bar tender gave me a kind of blank look when I ordered a Capirinha off their menu. I asked him if they made a pretty good one there and got a withering look. Then I watched him look up the recipe...

How do you milk a buffalo? Water buffalo maybe? Or maybe the question should be why would you milk a buffalo? Educate me please.

I'd lean towards either Fish House Punch or a milk punch, *real* egg nog (contrast with some store-bought?) and kir royale (just to show it isn't all about America).

Decided to open my new copy of the Savoy at random and make the first thing I had the ingredients for. This was it:-( As I was making it I thought, this is going to be way too sweet. Then I thought, I really should have checked what Eric had to say. I was right on both counts. I added started with 1/2 oz portions, added another oz of gin (Dry Fly), added another 1/2 oz of Clear Creek apple brandy, poured it down the sink eta: That's one way to use up the liquor before I move...

Sounds nice! Congratulations.

IMO I wouldn't call it a "success" except in the marketing sense, but Voodoo Donuts in Portland Oregon has a number of excessively sweet, cereal-topped donuts. Voodoo Donuts