Culinary Cocktails

[eje]

Based on some discussion over in the Scott Beattie topic, I got to thinking about culinary cocktails.

Where does the bar end and the kitchen begin?

For example, if I peel and puree some cucumbers, ice and vermouth, salt it, and serve it in a bowl with a dollop of yoghurt and a sprinkling of dill, I am obviously making soup.

If I make cucumber juice and measure 2 parts cucumber juice, 1 part vermouth, 12 parts vodka into a tin, shake them with ice, and strain into a cocktail glass, I am obviously making a "Lucky Jim" cocktail.

But if I peel and puree cucumbers, muddle lemon peel in a collings glass, top with ice, add a shot of aquavit, 2 shots of cucumber puree, stir, top up with soda, and garnish with a sprig of basil, is it a drink or soup? If I serve it in a bowl with a spoon, it could be soup, in a bar glass with a straw, it could be a drink.

Obviously, there are traditional drinks which skirt the borders. I think the Bloody Mary, Snapper, Caesar, and Bellini all are borderline culinary creations.

One person I talked to said, "I'd thought once to add vodka to Hungarian Sour Cherry Soup, mighty tasty for summer, but it's still soup."

Is it the ingredients, the glass, or the setting which makes something a drink instead of a cold soup?

[slkinsey]

I'll likely have more to say about this later, but to begin will offer this: if it is a cocktail, it should be primarily about the spirit. A cocktail is, after all, an alcoholic libation.

[eje]

I'm not sure what you mean.

There are plenty of things to get intoxicated upon in the world.

Some of them are cocktails and some are not.

Not to mention that there are mixed drinks that involve little to no spirits at all.

The Bellini, for example, or the Sherry Cobbler.

[bostonapothecary]

I'm not sure what you mean.

There are plenty of things to get intoxicated upon in the world.

Some of them are cocktails and some are not.

Not to mention that there are mixed drinks that involve little to no spirits at all.

The Bellini, for example, or the Sherry Cobbler.

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i think he means that many drinks from the "culinary cocktail" realm use the philosophy of hide the booze and lets use alcohol as a drug.... the proper cocktail is for the flavor addict where alcohol content high or low is important to defining flavor and the buzz is just an awsome side effect....

[slkinsey]

Right. I think there is a certain concentration of alcohol or in some situations a certain presence of an alcoholic ingredient (e.g., wine, champagne, sherry, whatever), that represents the dividing line between "alcoholic libation" and "cold soup." And, most often, cocktails on one side and cold soups on the other don't get all that close to the dividing line.

To make a few examples: If you start with 8 ounces of finely pureed, relatively thin gaspacho and add a half ounce of pepper vodka, you have soup. If, on the other hand, you take 3 ounces of the same gaspacho, add 3 ounces of pepper vodka and serve it over ice, you have a kind of Bloody Mary -- a cocktail. Or, if you take 2 ounces of white peach puree and add 4 ounces of prosecco, you have a Bellini -- a cocktail. If you take 5 ounces of white peach puree and add 1 ounce of prosecco, you have a fruit soup (or perhaps a non-cocktail libation).

With both of those examples, I think you will find that as one gradually reduces or increases the proportion or presence of the alcoholic ingredient, tasters will begin saying "this is no longer a soup . . . now it's a drink" (or vice-versa). And there will be some (not particularly appealing, IMO) point there in the middle where it is neither fish nor fowl -- it's either a weak drink or an overly boozey cold soup, or both or neither.

Edited August 9, 2007 by slkinsey (log)

[freshherbs]

if it's in a glass, it's a cocktail. if it's in a bowl it's a soup.

if you choose to serve me a cocktail as a soup (or vice versa0, that is your prerogative.

[slkinsey]

Mmmm, I don't think so. A Manhattan served in a bowl is still a cocktail, and vichyssoise served in a "V glass" is still a soup. The question, in my mind, is how much booze do you have to put in the vichyssoise in order to make a "leek and potato cocktail."

[eje]

I was thinking about this and reminded of an episode in my youth.

There was a Sicilian family who ran a small restaurant in the town I grew up in.

Decent home made style food.

Once my parents asked them to cater my sister's birthday.

They made authentic lasagna and various other dishes. I was probably the only one there happy with the food. I think my parents and sister were expecting Italian American type food.

But, when we got to dessert, they brought out a tiramisu.

I'm not usually over fond of tiramisu, as it is usually more or less chocolate cheesecake. Too sweet and too cheesy.

This tiramisu was completely different. Not very sweet. Only enough cheese to hold the cake pieces together. And the cake was completely soaked in booze and espresso.

You could have squeezed it out and gotten an espresso/rum shooter, it was so potent.

Frankly, that tiramisu was constructed like a well made cocktail. The bitterness of the espresso just held in check by the light sweetness, the power of the rum slightly mellowed by the cheese and cake.

I wonder if that was where my obsession with drinky desserts started?

[eje]

Interesting quote from Camper English' article in today's SF Chronicle.

Drink menus explore virgin territory with alcohol-free cocktails

Even for a special night out, some patrons are abstaining from the hard stuff. At Cyrus, in Healdsburg, bar manager Scott Beattie has tried to adapt his drink menu accordingly. "We do so many wine pairings, it kind of sucks when one person is doing a pairing dinner and someone else is drinking iced tea all night," he says.

Beattie says he can create an alcohol-free version of any of his seasonal cocktails, and offers a nonalcoholic cocktail pairing with meals.

Whereas more traditional drinks like the cosmopolitan and martini don't work in a booze-free format, Beattie's complex libations are usually based on relatively neutral spirits like flavored vodkas or rum, then layered with fresh seasonal herbs, spices and juices.

His adaptation then is easy. "Instead of adding alcohol you add a little bit of sugar and fill it up with seltzer and/or natural soda," he says.

[natter]

I think that dileniating between soup or cocktail is all about expectations. Both the expectations of the preparer and the consumer.

I think that it would be pretty easy to perform an experiment to find out. Basically whip something up that could go either way. Give one portion to someone as a soup, to another as a cocktail, on two separate occasions, of course. Each person will have an expectation of what they are consuming based on how you present it.

I would guess that the more times you did this, the more times the test subject agreed with your expectations of how you presented it. I think that the most important part of the experiment is your confidence in presenting it. If you just tossed it up in a bowl/glass and asked, "what do you think?" it probably would not yield the same result as really planting in their head the expectation of soup/cocktail.

[phlip]

Something no ones mentioned. If the question is where does the bar end and kitchen begin the answer is sometimes the bartender kicks the kitchen door open and the bar doesn't end at the bar. What is to be said of all the work the bartender does in the kitchen? Homemade everything thats what we preach and for alot of syrups, ginger beers, some infusions, etc... one needs a stove and even sometimes an oven. What I'm trying to say is the kitchen ends in the kitchen, the bar utilizes the kitchen.

You eat soup with a spoon

Cocktails call for straws or no utensil at all

[Fat Guy]

Shrimp cocktail

[Alex]

Shrimp cocktail

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How about this appetizer from The Heritage Restaurant, run by our local (Grand Rapids Community College) culinary/hospitality program:

Shaken Shrimp Cocktail: shrimp, cilantro, garlic, lime juice, vodka, tomatoes

Last year -- and I may not be remembering all the ingredients correctly -- they did it with shrimp, scallions, vodka, Cointreau, orange segments, and a dash of Tabasco or some other hot sauce.

[eje]

Something no ones mentioned. If the question is where does the bar end and kitchen begin the answer is sometimes the bartender kicks the kitchen door open and the bar doesn't end at the bar. What is to be said of all the work the bartender does in the kitchen? Homemade everything thats what we preach and for alot of syrups, ginger beers, some infusions, etc... one needs a stove and even sometimes an oven. What I'm trying to say is the kitchen ends in the kitchen, the bar utilizes the kitchen.

You eat soup with a spoon

Cocktails call for straws or no utensil at all

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I've been served soup in shot or martini glasses at more than one fancy restaurant, so I don't know that that distinction exactly holds!

Besides, I really like the tapas type tradition, where little snacks are presented to drinkers for their enjoyment. Happy hour food doesn't have to suck.

So, aside from needing drinks after a long shift, maybe the kitchen also can be said to utilize the bar!

[jmfangio]

Here's a little tidbit from the Sunday New York Times Magazine:

Dave Arnold, the head of culinary technology at the French Culinary Institute in Manhattan, is by training not a chef but a sculptor. He worked with metals and machinery as an art student and once battled a fire-breathing dragon. (It was a modified air blower that spit flaming kerosene; he wore a welding jacket and carried a lance.)

These days Arnold’s fits of ingenuity, though tame in comparison, are no less creative. Consider a recent offering from his kitchen laboratory: The edible cocktail.

The premise is simple: Make a “pickle” with alcohol instead of salt and brine. The execution is more complicated. Arnold cuts peeled cucumbers into spears and puts them in a Mason jar filled with an 8-to-1 mixture of gin and vermouth. He also adds a touch of simple syrup to counteract the cucumbers’ inherent bitterness. The Mason jar is then placed into a vacuum machine, which removes the air, collapsing the cucumbers’ air pockets. This is a process similar to that used in sous-vide cooking, in which food is vacuum-sealed in a pouch and heated. Thanks to the Mason jar, the cucumbers keep their consistency. (If they were sealed in the usual plastic bag, they would lose their crunchiness.)

When the vacuum seal is broken, the martini mixture rushes in to fill the spaces in the cucumber where the air used to be. The resulting spears have the smooth, crisp texture of pickles. Arnold calls this kind of cucumber a “flash pickle,” as the changes in texture and flavor that can take days to produce with salt and brine take about two minutes in the vacuum machine. Each spear has roughly the same amount of alcohol as a standard martini. To serve, he sprinkles the spears with celery seed, grated lime zest and flaky Maldon sea salt.

I'm wondering if my Foodsaver has the juice to pull this off...

[jduncan81]

Here's a little tidbit from the Sunday New York Times Magazine:

Dave Arnold, the head of culinary technology at the French Culinary Institute in Manhattan, is by training not a chef but a sculptor. He worked with metals and machinery as an art student and once battled a fire-breathing dragon. (It was a modified air blower that spit flaming kerosene; he wore a welding jacket and carried a lance.)

These days Arnold’s fits of ingenuity, though tame in comparison, are no less creative. Consider a recent offering from his kitchen laboratory: The edible cocktail.

The premise is simple: Make a “pickle” with alcohol instead of salt and brine. The execution is more complicated. Arnold cuts peeled cucumbers into spears and puts them in a Mason jar filled with an 8-to-1 mixture of gin and vermouth. He also adds a touch of simple syrup to counteract the cucumbers’ inherent bitterness. The Mason jar is then placed into a vacuum machine, which removes the air, collapsing the cucumbers’ air pockets. This is a process similar to that used in sous-vide cooking, in which food is vacuum-sealed in a pouch and heated. Thanks to the Mason jar, the cucumbers keep their consistency. (If they were sealed in the usual plastic bag, they would lose their crunchiness.)

When the vacuum seal is broken, the martini mixture rushes in to fill the spaces in the cucumber where the air used to be. The resulting spears have the smooth, crisp texture of pickles. Arnold calls this kind of cucumber a “flash pickle,” as the changes in texture and flavor that can take days to produce with salt and brine take about two minutes in the vacuum machine. Each spear has roughly the same amount of alcohol as a standard martini. To serve, he sprinkles the spears with celery seed, grated lime zest and flaky Maldon sea salt.

I'm wondering if my Foodsaver has the juice to pull this off...

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Any luck?

[Provocachic]

Actually, 'culinary' is the direction that cocktails are moving into. For example, in London there are now "style bars" which are more like a kitchen-style of bar, with each barman to a very specific task. Of course, there's the fresh produce aspect, and of late there's quite abit of interests in the revival of classics. Perhaps with a slight modern touch to it in terms of palate adjustments.

I myself have been using ingredients more familiar in the kitchen for cocktail recipe designs - eg, parmigiano-regianno, salmon sashimi (garnish), kewra essence, hungarian 'noble sweet' paprika, etc. (check out www.gildedfork.com/provocachic/ if you're curious to find out more)

Based on some discussion over in the Scott Beattie topic, I got to thinking about culinary cocktails.

Where does the bar end and the kitchen begin?

For example, if I peel and puree some cucumbers, ice and vermouth, salt it, and serve it in a bowl with a dollop of yoghurt and a sprinkling of dill, I am obviously making soup.

If I make cucumber juice and measure 2 parts cucumber juice, 1 part vermouth, 12 parts vodka into a tin, shake them with ice, and strain into a cocktail glass, I am obviously making a "Lucky Jim" cocktail.

But if I peel and puree cucumbers, muddle lemon peel in a collings glass, top with ice, add a shot of aquavit, 2 shots of cucumber puree, stir, top up with soda, and garnish with a sprig of basil, is it a drink or soup?  If I serve it in a bowl with a spoon, it could be soup, in a bar glass with a straw, it could be a drink.

Obviously, there are traditional drinks which skirt the borders.  I think the Bloody Mary, Snapper, Caesar, and Bellini all are borderline culinary creations.

One person I talked to said, "I'd thought once to add vodka to Hungarian Sour Cherry Soup, mighty tasty for summer, but it's still soup."

Is it the ingredients, the glass, or the setting which makes something a drink instead of a cold soup?

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