sbumgarner

A recent experiment that wasn't horrible. 1.5 oz Sotol .5 Mezcal .75 amontillado .5 Giffard banana .25 Bigallet Dash mole bitters Stir, strain, coupe. I like this one. Could maybe use a small pinch of a fruity, moderately hot ground chili pepper on top?

Peaches have been really good in NJ this year so I threw a bunch in a liter of Rittenhouse for a few weeks, here's two drinks I've enjoyed from the results. 2.25 oz peach-infused rye .75 oz Dolin Blanc .25 oz Suze Stir, strain, up, lemon twist. Not bad, Suze is a natural pair with peach and helps give a dry, bitter backbone to a drink that could easily veer into too sweet territory. 1.5 oz peach-infused rye .5 oz El Dorado 8 1 oz Cynar 70 .75 oz Lustau Amontillado Stir, strain, OF glass with big rock, grapefruit twist. This one I really enjoyed, a perfect summer sipper.

I only meant comparing a 100% spirit-based "Donn's Mix" with a one containing juice, fresh-squeezed or not. A juice-based version is always going to taste different, but I have no problem bringing other flavors, especially from the Becherovka, into the fold to create something familiar but distinct from the traditional mix. I also would imagine once opened even the BG Reynolds version has a shelf-life, but agree it's a nice shortcut if you want that exact flavor.

Not yet, but that would be an interesting application, with perhaps some tinkering of the overall ABV to keep that drink from becoming even more lethal. But yeah, Donn's mix isn't terribly shelf stable with the fresh juice, it would be nice to have those flavors without having to always have cinnamon syrup and fresh grapefruit around, or if you want the flavor but less sugar. I'd like to tinker with ratios to see how close it could approximate the overall flavor (while knowing there's no real substitute for fresh juice). Adding some drops of that cinnamon tincture is a good thought.

Threw this together last night as a way to do something sort of tiki, liked it enough to put it on KC. The Gods Must Be Lazy 1 oz Hamilton Jamaican Black .5 oz reposado tequila (I used Arette) .75 oz lime juice .75 oz Giffard Pamplemousse .5 oz Becherovka 1 dash Bittermens Mole Bitters .5 tsp simple (optional, omit if you like drier drinks) Shake, strain, coupe. The Giffard/Becherovka subbed as a more potent (alcohol and flavor-wise) Donn's Mix.

The Pasubio is really interesting, a little menthol mixed with some dark, earthy notes in the background (not Novasalus dark by any stretch, but you are subtly reminded it's made by the same people), but still very "fresh" tasting, with some fruitier notes up front. I have not tried it in a Manhattan, but it added a really nice element to a Negroni when I split the vermouth portion 50:50 vermouth/Pasubio.

Yeah, it looks like recipes are all over the place for that drink, but with 3/4 oz of grenadine, you'd want the same amount of lemon juice to balance that out. You also might find half an ounce or less of grenadine would be better too.

I read in the URL that you thought the drink was too sweet, did you leave lemon juice out of the drink or was it just accidentally omitted from the ingredients list on the page?

I went ahead and tried augmenting this with my above suggestions: .5oz St George Dry Rye gin .5oz St George Terroir gin .5oz Campari .5oz Bruto Americano .5oz Punt E Mes .5oz Cappelletti Pasubio Bruto tends to be a dominant force in any drink it enters, and the same held true here, but it was pretty good if you like those bitter herbaceous flavors.

Two drinks from recent posts in this thread last night, first up: I liked this as well, but I was glad I happened to have both Beefeater and a white grapefruit on hand, it might have crossed the threshold into too sweet for my tastes otherwise. But the play between the grapefruit and maraschino is really nice. Next up was Dan's Traveling Scotsman: This is excellent. I used Black Bottle Blended in place of the single-malt non-peaty Scotch, but the aggressiveness of the other ingredients kept each other in check. A really good nightcap.

I've been focusing on making simpler drinks. And then last night happened: .5 oz Sotol .5 oz St George Raspberry Brandy .5 oz Hamilton Jamaican Pot Still Black .5 oz Lustau Amontillado .75 oz lime .5 oz orgeat 1/2 tsp Luxardo maraschino Dash Boker's bitters Dash Angostura Shake, strain, coupe. I think I wanted to see how many funky ingredients in my current inventory I could cram into a drink before it broke. It was like drinking a slightly sweet, creamy green banana or plantain. I liked it.

A slight riff I tried over the weekend that I enjoyed: 1 oz St. George Dry Rye gin 1 oz Campari .5 oz Carpano Antica .5 oz Cappelletti Pasubio The Pasubio (yet another amazing offering from Cappelletti, one that I was in the dark about until a recent Astor trip) gave some nice earthy/piney tones, as would be expected. I'd like to push this further into the herbal realm by splitting the Campari with Bruto Americano, and maybe using the Terroir instead of the Dry Rye.

I decided to try the updated Kaiser Penguin orgeat recipe (http://www.kaiserpenguin.com/the-perfect-orgeat-syrup-recipe/) over the weekend, because why not I guess. It's touted as being easy, but after toasting almonds and letting them cool, crushing by hand (though I see no reason to not use the food processor) and then letting it sit for 12 hours, the D&C or any number of other recipes are definitely easier. However, the syrup itself is a dark brown instead of the typical milky white due to using skin-on almonds, and it does seem to impart a slightly different flavor that I like. Plus it doesn't make every orgeat drink look like light and sweet Dunkin Donuts coffee, which typically doesn't bother me but sometimes is not as appealing. Long story short, glad I made it once but probably will go back to the D&C recipe, or try the one @FrogPrincesse posted about with the cardamon and macadamia, that looks great.

If you have a personal threshold for what you'll spend on a bottle to be used in cocktails that's perfectly fine, but I'm not missing the point. I don't mix with $100+ bottles of anything (and let's not pretend the $300 Mai Tai or any other big bucks cocktail is commonplace), but unless you drink nothing but Chartreuse Swizzles that $57 bottle is going to get you a lot farther as far as the number of cocktails it can contribute to than a $57 bottle of rye/rum/some other base spirit. Again, if it's a philosophical thing about not spending x amount on any cocktail ingredient then we'll probably never agree, but I'm trying to point out that it's not necessarily a 1:1 comparison.

Due to its strong flavor profile, Green Chartreuse is rarely used in quantities over an ounce in a drink, and usually considerably less. A $57 bottle will help you make more cocktails than a $57 bottle of a base spirit where you might be using 1-2 ounces each time, just as point of comparison.

I used smoke-bomb Sombra in the drink and the smokiness still wasn't over-powering, but you might be right, that sort of switch might better replicate the original intent.

I made the drink with Sfumato last night, it was damn good.

I think I've seen this mentioned on the board somewhere but memory loss and lack of initiative to find the thread is prevailing - is Sfumato a reasonable substitute for Zucca? Regardless this looks great, I'll have to try this.

Just grabbed a bottle of Sfumato for the first time, damn is it good. Gave this one a spin: 1.5 oz reposado tequila 1 oz Sfumato .5 oz Amontillado sherry Stir, strain, coupe, grapefruit twist. I'd make it again.

I agree with Dan and Craig, I find when you start getting much over the 3.5 oz mark pre-dilution (excluding Tiki or Collins style drinks obviously) you run the risk of overflowing the "standard" ~5oz coupe size. I prefer a little headroom in my drinks, it's more practical for spillage prevention and to my eye looks nicer, but that's clearly subjective. For shaken drinks especially, much bigger than that (again, excluding tiki or Collins-style drinks) and you also run the risk of the drink getting too warm before finishing.

A "Johan" Collins last night (a name that's surely been taken but I'm too lazy to both Google it or think of something different) 1 oz Tanqueray .75 oz Linie aquavit .75 oz lemon .5 oz 1:1 simple Dash of Boker's bitters Dash of Coastal Root Pine bitters (added for some "freshness", I'm sure there's plenty of more-available bitters that could be subbed in, absinthe maybe?) Short shake, strain into ice-filled Collins, top with club soda, lemon twist. A nice end-of-summer drink that looks in the direction of autumn.

My Paper Plane riff last night: .75 oz El Dorado 8 .75 oz Averna .75 oz Cappelleti .75 oz lime Shake/strain/coupe. An enjoyable variant of the formula.

8-3-2 Daiquiri with Owney's. Excellent. After hearing a few raves about Owney's on this site I finally grabbed a bottle, definitely will be my Daiquiri go-to for the foreseeable future.

Few Cask Strength Rye. Although I added water to get down to about 100 proof, I took a small sip at the 120 proof mark and it was still pretty damn good (my bottle of Thomas Handy rye, as a comparison, is mostly undrinkable to me at full proof, though also very good once diluted). Lots of baking spices, with a slightly sweet finish from the corn in the mashbill (I think I read it's about 70% rye, 20% corn, and 10% other stuff). I'll take more detailed tasting notes at some point but at $65 it's very nice for a cask-strength rye.

Here's what they wrote down for me that night, which I realize is a little different than what some articles online are saying (for instance, no cacao). .75 Cynar .75 Novasalus .5 lemon .5 simple .5 Jamaican rum (they used Hamilton Jamaican, he said S&C could work but not to use something like Coruba) Short shake, strain into Collins glass with ice, top with soda water. Bracingly bitter in a surprisingly pleasant way.