Frederic

My bad. She uses apricot kernels themselves (which is the flavoring in almond extract) and recommended others to use almond extract in addition to the real almond aspect. From my question in a Reddit Cocktails AMA: https://www.reddit.com/r/cocktails/comments/5wpw47/cocktails_ama_5_jennifer_colliau_founder_of_small/

GrandTen here in Boston makes an aged peach brandy that got a bronze medal in the spirits competition that I worked (I volunteered to do the back end to support the tasters in the brandy/fruit brandy category). Also, I agree with the cheap orgeat -- it's water, sugar/corn syrup, bitter almond flavoring (made from peach or apricot kernels), and preservative. The real stuff is earthier and nuttier (without being marzipan-y with a texture from the ground up almond bits). Some manufacturers like Small Hand Foods use the extract on top of the natural process to mimic old school recipes that included some bitter almonds (which are poisonous but tasty).

Wondrich gave a talk at Tales the summer before that article and it probably spawned that piece. My notes from that talk (which cover different points of the drink's evolution including Italian business reports about how their products were being utilized in America) https://cocktailvirgin.blogspot.com/2016/08/all-americano-italy-and-cocktail.html

Most of the bars that I work at do not carry flavored vodka save for gin, so no. At home, I do have a bottle of Ketel One Citron that I bought for my New Years Eve 2003 party. I was lured in by the Cobbler shaker that it was packaged with. I still have that bottle and the shaker has held true after 15 years. The original Cosmo would have been made with random bar ingredients like vodka, Rose's Lime, triple sec, and a splash of grenadine (most like Rose's) as a pink Kamikaze. Toby Cecchini took credit for upgrading it to Absolut Citron, cranberry, and fresh lime juice. A lot of competing stories out there but his seems to hold the most weight (and he wrote a book called Cosmopolitan to lock it in).

My guests generally prefer drier drinks so I go with the one below (not too dissimilar to Hess'). I recently went to an USBG event that was sponsored by a vodka company (we went on a field trip capped off by a bar visit that served the sponsor's product); two of us went with Cosmos, and the squirt of lime juice versus the ounce of triple sec made the thing an undrinkable candy bomb to me. My go-to recipe at work is: 1 1/2 oz Vodka 1/2 oz Clement Creole Shrubb (or similar orange liqueur) 1/2 oz lime juice 1/2 oz Cranberry Juice Shake with ice, strain into a cocktail coupe, and garnish with an orange twist.

One thing I noted when I was on a Brooklyn kick was that the more mellow the rye, the better the Brooklyn since it allowed the Picon to shine. Rittenhouse makes a great Manhattan, but it overpowers this drink, whereas a softer rye such as Old Overholt lets other things shine a bit more. Upping the Picon is an answer (I saw many with a 1/2 oz, I usually stick with a 1/4 oz in a 1.5/1/.25/.25 ratio) but my bottle of Picon needs to last.

Also, if you have the first one and complained that there was no index by ingredient, fear not: this one has _both_ books indexed by ingredient followed by bar/restaurant. Plus, a philosophical treatise on the Daiquiri Time Out via an interview with the DTO founder, Andrew Deitz!

For syrups, I found that adding 1 oz of 80 proof to every 12-15 oz syrup (add the vodka to the bottle to sterilize it as you shake it around) helps to stretch syrups out to a year or so (as long as they're kept refrigerated and the cap isn't off for more than a moment each time). Otherwise, I usually skip recipes that require specialty ingredients that have single or few uses. Most of the bars providing those recipes have barbacks or bartenders who make it as part of their regular prep work (or some cases of produce-driven ingredients, the kitchen already has it prepped for another use and they give out their excess to the bar) and are perhaps doing it for hundreds of guests each week.

A little self-promotion, but I just put out the follow up to the 2012 Drink & Tell: A Boston Cocktail Book with Boston Cocktails: Drunk & Told! 850+ recipes, over a dozen essays on hospitality and drink trends, and bartender tributes.

Cheers!

After seeing this thread here after seeing the traffic on the blog, I went back and researched and updated my blog post. Embury had a tendency of upping the base spirit and decreasing the sweetener so his recipes match his preference for tart booze bombs. Perhaps a middle ground of 1 1/4 oz each rum and sweet vermouth, 1/2 oz lime juice, 1 dash Ango + optional barspoon of simple syrup would split the difference between the Angostura one and Embury. Don't know if I'm going to finish 100 Drinks v2.0. I made a resolution to finish v1.0 in 2009 and made it by the last week of the year. I'm at 79 on the 2nd version.

We put a Drambuie-containing Scaffa (room temperature cocktail) on the menu for a Women of the Wild West-themed night last week at the Blue Room in Cambridge, MA. It was originally created for a someone's birthday (who loves rhum agricole) and I figured that it would not get much traffic on the menu. Surprisingly, it was one of the top 2 or 3 drinks of the night and we came a jigger away from clearing a freshly opened bottle of Drambuie during the 4 hours of service. Madame Mustache 1 1/2 oz Aged Rhum Agricole (*) 1 oz Drambuie 1/2 oz Cynar 1 dash Angostura Bitters Build in a rocks glass, give a quick stir (no ice), and garnish with a grapefruit twist. (*) The drink was developed originally with aged cachaça, so feel free to substitute for a funkier drink. More 4-1-1 (including history of Madame Mustache herself): http://cocktailvirgin.blogspot.com/2013/02/madame-mustache.html

The company had an Unicum release party at Portland Cocktail Week last week. They also were heavily promoting there plum-infused Szilva. Not sure when it will be out, but so much more complex than Zwack which is heavily sweetened to dull the herbal notes.

I just wrote up the offical MxMo announcement that can be found at the link below, but Ed's description says it all. Should be a good one! http://mixologymonday.com/2012/10/01/mxmo-lxvi-october-15-2012-its-not-easy-bein-green/

As of today, the Drink & Tell: A Boston Cocktail Book is available at Amazon, Barnes and Noble, and soon elsewhere. Working on the Kindle and Nook versions. And it should be in some brick & mortar stores like the Boston Shaker! Here's the Amazon link: http://www.amazon.co...k/dp/0988281805

We still cannot get Suze in Massachusetts (other than smuggled bottles). Luckily, we have two other choices -- both equally as classic, French, and made from wild yellow gentian. Salers - Haus Alpenz noticed the need and brought this in to the country. It is cheaper, more flavorful, and less flat tasting than Suze. Avèze - not sure who imports this and I have not seen it on a shelf yet, but two bars in town have it in stock (which means we should see it in stores in a month or two). I have had it in cocktails but have not tasted it neat to get an idea of how it compares to Suze or Salers. Apparently, Suze has a massive market share in France with Avèze being almost a 1/10th of that and Salers being 1/25th of Suze (based on decade old statistics, but the liqueurs have been around for probably a century plus). Best drink I've had in Boston with any of these was made by WIll Thompson of Drink in a 20th Century sort of style: Copper Canyon 1 1/2 oz El Tesoro Reposado Tequila 1/2 oz Marie Brizard Crème de Cacao 1/2 oz Salers Gentiane Liqueur 1/2 oz Lemon Juice 1 barspoon Long Pepper Tincture (*) Shake with ice and strain into a rocks glass containing a big ice cube. Garnish the ice cube with a pinch of salt. (*) Will said that any hot tincture or perhaps a dash of hot sauce or Bittermens Hellfire Shrub would work well here. More about this drink: http://cocktailvirgin.blogspot.com/2012/07/copper-canyon.html

Charles: 19 from Brick & Mortar FrogPrincesse: I haven't considered an app yet, but you are not the first person to mention it. There will be eBook versions (which is more asked about) since that is a more simple conversion from regular book file to eBook file. I know that the software I'm using (QuarkXpress) will do web pages, but I don't see anything about apps.

Fred Yarm (Cocktail Virgin Slut) noted on his fackbook page that he's completed the writing and editing of his "Drink & Tell: A Boston Cocktail Book". It's a guide to 4-5 years of sampling craft cocktails at Boston top (famous or not) cocktail bars. I'm sure it was painful research. I'm looking forward to seeing it in print http://www.facebook....151012526313458 That would be me. It's over 500 cocktails with most created between 2007-2012 with a few older. There are no classics other than specific Boston variations for I did not want to take up space re-creating the wheel when people like DeGroff, Hess, and Regan do it with such panache. I removed all infusions and shrubs, but kept a handful of syrups that could not be purchased (I provide the recipes at the end) -- I tried to make the collection home bartender-friendly. Attributions given to bar (always) and bartender (when known) with back story provided when it was available. The response so far has been pretty great, from the general concept to people flipping through the actual book proof. Mid-September is the target date.

Some from Boston: Snap Point 1 1/2 oz Ransom Old Tom Gin 1 1/2 oz Bonal 1 barspoon Yellow Chartreuse 1 dash Regan's Orange Bitters Stir with ice and strain into a cocktail coupe. Garnish with a lemon twist. More info: http://cocktailvirgin.blogspot.com/2011/01/snap-point.html No. 65 2 oz Sazerac 6 Year Rye 3/4 oz Bonal 1/2 oz Velvet Falernum 1 dash Fee Brothers' Orange Bitters 1 dash Angostura Bitters Stir with ice and strain into a rocks glass. Garnish with a Luxardo Maraschino Cherry. More info: http://cocktailvirgin.blogspot.com/2010/12/no-65.html One of my favorite swaps with sweet vermouth is in the Hanky Panky (1.5 oz gin, 1.5 oz Bonal, barspoon Fernet Branca, stir with ice, strain into cocktail or rocks glass, orange twist).

Crème de Rose (such as Crispin's made at Germain Robin's distillery. I have gone so far as to contact the distiller and am willing to pay the $85 for the 375mL). Essential for many of the drinks in William Schmidt's The Flowing Bowl. Barrel-aged peach brandy (as was stated above) would be glorious. I did get to taste one at Tales of the Cocktail a few months back which makes me want my own bottle even more.

Spirytus also comes in 151 for states that cannot buy high proof spirits such as Massachusetts (high being anything over 80% ABV or so since we can get Stroh 80 rum). I know this is what the Bittermens were using when they were producing here in Massachusetts. It is not widely available on shelves though and I have only seen it in a store or two in state. I get my Everclear (190/195 proof or so) from Rhode Island for about $20 per 750.

I do not recall it in Approved, but in the 1934 UK 1,700 Cocktails for the Man Behind the Bar, I did spot a few Pimms drinks including the Pimmeron. I found this thread in hopes that any one had information to the cities & dates on the front of the label. there are 14 including two American cities (Chicago & New Orleans) that fall within the years of Prohibition (190, 1925). Any clue what these cities and dates mean?

So are the two camps best summed up as this? 1) math and chemistry. the final number of molecules in your drink determines the flavor perception 2) initial dilution means everything. molecules are perceived differently even if the math in the glass adds up in the end. it just is.

Not perfect as it calls for an orange twist, but you could easily sub for a lemon one in a pinch: Campari "Marini" from Beta Cocktails. 3 oz Campari Heavy Pinch of Salt (or use a 3 parts water:1 part salt tincture) Stir with ice and strain into a coupe glass. Garnish with an orange twist. Not perfectly fitting into your equation due to lime and cassis but: Teresa from Gary Regan's Joy of Mixology 2 oz Campari 3/4 oz Crème de Cassis 1 oz Lime Juice Shake with ice and strain into a cocktail glass. Maybe 1/2 lemon would sub here for lime: Camparinha from the Big Bartenders Book 2 oz Campari 1 Lime 1/2 oz Sugar Cut lime into eights. Muddle lime wedges and sugar in a rocks glass until most of the sugar is dissolved. Add Campari and stir. Fill with crushed ice and stir again. A lime wedge or wheel garnish might make a good addition.

If nothing is lost by adding water (and I have had compounds crash out of solution during dilution akin to anise in absinthe or raki), then 2 dashes of the half strength should pretty much taste the same as 1 dash of full strength given a relatively excessively large volume of cocktail.100+1 part full strength will pretty much equal 100+2 part half strength as far as your palate can detect. We are not sensitive enough to detect the differences between 0.00990 to 0.00980 (final concentration). Your argument about has changed to 100+1 part full strength versus 100+1 part half strength. Which was not what you were arguing before. Or what Sam or Dan are arguing now. And if the extra water is an issue, keep in mind that 25% of most post-stirred/shaken cocktails is ice melt so the additional water would be negligible.