davicus

Chris (and anyone else), I'd love to hear your step by step to making the toast bitters. I've been making bitters for a few months, and I've had mixed results. I started out by loosely following Jamie Boudreau's recipe for Cherry Bitters. His idea is to make several different infusions, and add them together to get the desired flavor profile, so one flavor doesn't overpower the whole batch. To that end, I started out with: 1 bottle 100* rye + 1 tbsp. wormwood + 1 tbsp. calmus root + 1 tbsp. black walnut leaf + 1 gentian root 1 bottle 151* everclear + 4 oz. dried seville orange peel 1 bottle 100* bourbon + 6 oz. espresso beans 1 bottle 100* bourbon + 1 vanilla bean + 1 cinnamon stick + 1 nutmeg + 1 tbsp clove + 4 star anise Now if you're thinking to yourself, sweet jesus, that seems like a lot of bittering agent, you are right. The rye, after about two weeks, was insanely bitter, but also had a really unpleasant earthy flavor (by which I mean it tasted like dirt). Not having done this before, my unwillingness to scrap that bottle pretty much ruined the first batch. I ended up making another bottle of rye with 1/2 tbsp. of wormwood, calmus and gentian, and dropped black walnut leaf (which was only there for flavor). Once this bottle was done, I mixed them up in a ratio of about 1 part bitter blend 1 part orange blend 4 parts flavor (coffee) blend 2 parts spice blend The resulting bitters are good, if maybe a little timid. They lack the complexity of an Angostura, but maybe that's the point when doing a single flavor bitter. At this point, I've got plenty of the bitter, orange and spice blends left over and am working on a few more flavoring blends (walnut, peanut butter) that I will mix up. If anyone has any thoughts or comments I'd love to hear them. Thanks!

The resulting bourbon is not cloudy at all... it's a darker brown than the original bourbon but still clear. Well, clear brown, anyways. I’ve been making the following with it: The Chesterfield 1.5 oz. walnut bourbon 1.5 oz. bourbon .75 oz. carpano antica 1 tsp. coffee bitters Dash of simple syrup (to cut the bitterness of the walnuts) Stir, serve up in a rocks glass with an orange peel squeezed over it. Fat washing is a really good technique. When you filter the end result, all the fat gets removed and just the flavor remains. I think the important thing is that you try and just put the fat (no solids) in the liquor. I've made some bacon flavored bourbon and some butter flavored rum, and in both instances there was only fat to skim, so I had very little loss of liquor. However, with the walnuts I used 1 bottle to 2lbs walnuts (probably way more nuts than I needed) and about 1/3 of the liquor was absorbed in the nuts (bummer). Perhaps I could have strained out the fat from the nuts before I froze it, but I wasn’t sure so I added it all. Either way, it seems to me this is an excellent way to add flavor from any sort of fat to liquor. If my next plan works, La Tourangelle makes so many excellent looking oils I’m sure I’ll have to do pistachio rye… Pics forthcoming.

I made a batch of toasted walnut bourbon (and bitters) using the fat washing method…. Got the idea from Mike at VH. I used 2 lbs. of walnuts to one bottle of Old Fitzgerald bourbon. I started out by cracking the walnuts and toasting them in the oven to get them fragrant. I then added Crisco (about a half a cup) and heated it all up in a sauce pan for about a half an hour. After that, I threw the whole mixture in a tall Tupperware container (hoping the nuts would float to the top – they didn’t really) and stuck it in the freezer for two days. I put it first through a mesh strainer, and then took the remaining mixture and squeezed the juices out through a cheese cloth. I then ground the nuts up, and squeezed the juices out again through the cheese cloth. The, I filtered all this thru a Britta. Apparently I toasted the nuts a little too much, as the liquor has a very intense walnut taste (my wife says it tastes a bit burnt), but it’s still pretty good… very fragrant and sweet. I am hoping the walnut taste comes through on the bitters, which are currently aging. I’m planning on trying this again with La Tourangelle toasted walnut oil… It will allow me to skip the first few messy steps, but I’m a little concerned with the final taste. I’ll post my results when complete.

Most of the liquor stores in Chicago have Wild Turkey Rye 101* and Jim Beam Rye 80* - the Wild Turkey is the better of the two IMO. The good stores carry Rittenhouse Bonded 100* which is my favorite for the money - around $13 if you can believe it. Old Olverholt 80* also works for a nice Sazerac (as does the Rittenhouse 80*) but I like a higher proof spirit for my old fashioneds and manhattans. Then there are a host of more expensive choices like Sazerac and Ri... these are fine spirits, but I can't help feeling like more money is being spent on the bottle than the contents. I know there are others out there, but these are the only ones I've purchased.

I've seen teeny tiny bottles of bitters. Comes with 4 or 5 bottles to a pack. Can't remember where or what brand, though, but if you konw it exists, you can look out for it. ← Tabasco makes tiny little bottles of their hot sauce... you can get them at World Market. I use these bottles, filled with bitters, for my travel set. Although recently I've just been carrying around a bottle of Angostura...

My dad gave me this a few years back. I've never employed it, but it would certainly fit the bill for the thirsty traveler. What appears to be an ordinary attaché... So it's got two large decanters for spirits, two smaller ones for mixers, four cups, a shaker, a funnel, a spoon, wine key / bottle opener and a small box which I assume is for garnish...

Toby, have you tried doing a fat wash with anything other than bacon? I recently did a fat wash with toasted walnuts and bourbon with very pleasing results. It was much quicker and tastier than a regular infusion I tried a few months back. I did have to add Crisco, which admittedly freaked me out, but after filtration the bourbon is fat free. Great post... I'm a big fan of VH.

This is my first post and I'm not a pro, just a fanatic, so please take this comment for what it's worth... I have found when making a fizz a better emulsion is achieved when I use a sharp cracked ice. It seems the many varied surfaces of the cracked ice agitate the egg whites and create a better emulsion. I tried using some of the larger cubes but haven't had much luck. This works especially well with a Ramos, where the cream, egg white and citrus have to emulsify. I also usually only use 1oz. of egg white (which I keep in a bottle) and do a dry shake. Also, the diameter of the glass itself seems to have a big effect on the foam. If the glass is too wide, the foam dissipates quicker. When a narrow glass is used there seems to be a greater amount of surface tension which keeps the foam tighter and is more likely to allow you to float a straw in it (which I was told is the proper measure of a foam’s success). Davicus