slkinsey

I tried it in a Gilroy. 1 oz Junipero; 1 oz Sangue Morlacco; 1/2 oz Noilly Pratt dry; 1/2 fresh lemon; 1 dash orange bitters. Good drink, but not revelatory. And it doesn't allow the liqueur a chance to shine. I find that the winey-ness of the vermouth interferes with the full expression of the cherry flavor. Not that this is necessarily a bad thing, but it makes the Gilroy a less than satisfactory drink for showing off Sangue Morlacco.

Right. The Blood and Sand strikes me as having too many strong-flavored ingredients to be a good choice. Something simple is better. Perhaps the Elephants Sometimes Forget or Kiss in the Dark.

I thought this could use its own thread. Luxardo describes Sangue Morlacco as: Have you had a chance to try the Sangue Morlacco yet, and how do you think it compares to Cherry Heering? I ask because this weekend is the maiden Singapore Grand Prix, and as a rabid food/cocktails/Formula 1 fan I always try to match a meal and/or beverage to the race venue. A Singapore Sling seems appropriate, especially given that one section of the street course runs right down Raffles Blvd. I've only tasted about a half-ounce of Sangue Morlacco, late last night after a long flight. My initial impression is that it tastes like the liqueur version of Luxardo Cherries. If you've ever had Luxardo Cherries, they're awesome. I haven't tasted it alongside Cherry Heering, so I can't make much of a comparison as yet. Perhaps I'll try that this evening. Any ideas as to a good cocktail to evaluate differences among cherry brandies?

I've found that pistacheat works well in any context that might call for orgeat.

Seriously, y'all... try making it with pistachio nuts instead of almonds.

For thermodynamic reasons, water is much better at cooling your drink than rock.

Do you still like the place ( Lenny's?) you mentioned upthread? I compare all bagels to my favorite bagel place in S. Florida. I'm pretty picky when it comes to bagels. I like a chewy crust and not too doughy( I most often scoop them anyway) Absolute is definitely better. But you have to get the mini-bagels, which are the pinnacle of NYC bagelry. The large bagels at Absolute aren't as good as the ones at Lenny's. ETA: Mitch's point about the whitefish salad at R&D is well taken.

Get the mini-bagels at Absolute on Broadway and 107th Street.

Just picked up a bottle of Perla Dry. Haven't tried it, but wanted to clear up one thing: It does not appear to be extra high proof, or at least that is not the case of the bottling that is available in the States. Mine is 40% alcohol. When I get home I'll crack it open and give it a try. Also picked up a bottle of Sangue Morlacco which, besides having a really cool name, seems promising.

I don't know. Having seen some busy nights at PDT, I can say that Don is pretty fast.I know he is. I'm just saying that Friday night at a place like Flatiron Lounge is PDT times about 10, starting at 6:00 and staying that way until the wee hours. I don't know how they do it. It's not just banging out all those drinks, but also servicing that many checks, keeping track of that many customers, making time for those who want a more cocktailian experience, etc. This isn't taking anything away from the guys at PDT, it's giving the proper credit to the guys at FL.

Toby's on to something. I think the intensity of the grenadine makes a huge difference in this drink. In general, I think that 1:1 POM:sugar just doesn't make a good substitute for grenadine. Rather, it's a weak "pomegranate syrup." IMO, what you want in a grenadine is a backbone of the intense "cooked" pomegranate flavor, with a little acidic kick from the fresh side. To make mine, I do a four-fold reduction of POM, then make a hot supersaturated syrup (put in as much sugar as it can possibly hold -- at least 4:1). Then, after that cools down, I dilute it to approximately 2:1 strength with fresh POM. I have found this to have a sweetening power and intensity of flavor that works just about perfectly in the amounts normally called for in classic recipes. Anyway, I find that the Monkey Gland works and balances perfectly with 1 1/2 ounces each of gin and fresh squeezed orange juice, with a half-teaspoon of absinthe and a half-teaspoon to a teaspoon of grenadine, depending on the sourness of the orange juice.

Absolutely! Which is why Ted Breaux's Nouvelle-Orléans is a great choice. But this has a lot more in common with Pernod than it does Herbsaint, IMO.

In most recipes (much as is the case with "apricot brandy") they are asking for a cherry-flavored, sweetened brandy such as Cherry Heering. This is especially true of cherry brandy, in consideration of the fact that "kirschwasser" has been a commonly-used term one would use to describe cherry eau de vie for a long time.

Yea, that's what makes me wonder if they're using a lower gluten flour. Honestly, I think a more pliable crust would probably be an improvement at Franny's.

That pizza was extremely thin! If you look slightly North of center, you can actually see that the crust is so thin that you can see the green topping through the pizza. I don't remember how I took that picture, exactly, but it wasn't like he was holding up a stiff, entirely stable crust. That said, I'm not surprised that it's different now. One thing I think is cool about Franny's is that they are continually evolving. Possibly they are using a more tender flour now?

That's where the bartender/mixologist comparison comes into play. It is perfectly possible for someone to have relatively advanced knowledge about cocktail history and formulae, to be able to create good cocktail recipes, and to be able to mix great cocktails in one's home. Doing this in a busy bar is another matter entirely. PDT has been a somewhat unique opportuinity for some advanced home mixologists (and, again, one that Julie touches upon upthread) in allowing them to grow bartending skills out of their mixological skills when the opposite is normally the case. This is made possible, of course, by the relatively low volume and relatively high bartender-to-customer ratio at PDT. Needless to say, their bartending skills have grown tremendously due to their experience at PDT (as have their mixological skills, due to increased flexing of those muscles over their time there). That said, whether or not this particular kind of experience would prepare a PDT bartender for something like Friday night at Flatiron Lounge with four times the volume and still only two or three bartenders is another story.

Was there some proto bar where all three of them worked, or are those three separate roots? No. But the three of them are fairly close, have a good professional relationship, work together on projects, tend to draw from a similar pool of talent (it's not unusual for a bartender to work/have worked at multiple bars in this group -- e.g., both Pegu and M&H), etc. All three have collaborated and/or partnered on projects, etc. More to the point, and this is something that Julie touches on above, these three owner/manager/bartender/mixologists are the ones who really have a strong and well-developed training and mentoring system in place. This is especially true of Julie's and Audrey's bars, simply because they are so large. As Julie aludes to in her post, these places are known for taking people in as barbacks and, if they have the talent and drive, training and mentoring them into the City's cocktail superstars of tomorrow. Just like musicians or writers or athletes, cocktailian bartenders don't spring from Jerry Thomas's forehead fully-formed and armed with a shaker and spoon -- they have to be born and made. These three have done most of the making, and they're seem to be the only places that are training people from the bottom up.

Thanks. That's good to know. I couldn't remember if Herbsaint had been used from the beginning or if that came later. As much as some would like you to think that Herbsaint is necessary or "traditional" for a Sazerac, in fact Herbsaint only dates to 1935. The Sazerac is around a hundred years older.

Heering did stop distributing to the US for a while, but that was so they could change bottle designs (the old bottle looked like this and the new bottle looks like this). That was a while ago, however.

The Sazerac absolutely calls for absinthe.

NY Metromix has a nice roundup of cocktails in the city with elderflower flavor. Some that we may know:

I always make my pecan pies with Steen's Syrup, which I bet would be awesome in a drink like this.

Well, find it and post it! I have been finding mirto and scotch a good combination, although they have to be balanced carefully lest one take over from the other.

Don't worry too much. If you get grease on the inside of the bag near where you want to seal it, just wipe it off with a paper towel.

So, do it like they do it at the deli: Put a square of wax paper on your scale; start cutting slices of bacon; lay them out on the wax paper side-by-side; when you cover one sheet, put another sheet on top and continue; when you reach twelve ounces, set that stack aside and put a new sheet on the scale; continue until you have used up all the bacon. Mainly, though, I think you'd save yourself a lot of time by cutting out all the extra hand-washing. Start with clean hands and have a fresh, clean kitchen towel handy to wipe grease off your fingers. After all, this stuff has been preserved with salt and smoke, and you're going to be cooking it through anyway.