The Tiki Drink Discussion Topic

[JoNorvelleWalker]

It was through an heroic effort that I got a potable drink.  Don't ask me to list the ingredients.

 

Still thinking of a zombie.

[KD1191]

Last night's Three Dots and a Dash with Clement VSOP, El Dorado 8, orange & lime, homemade falernum, allspice dram, honey syrup, Angostura bitters.

I forgot to try the McGee version so I will have to make another one again soon.

 

Or, you could try the eponymous cocktail for his new spot, Lost Lake:

 

2 oz Appleton V/X

3/4 oz Passion Fruit Syrup (B.G. Reynolds’)

3/4 oz lime juice

1/2 oz pineapple juice

1/4 oz Maraschino

1/4 oz Campari

 

Shake with ice, strain over crushed ice.

[JoNorvelleWalker]

Tonight I took my zombie into my own hands.  Rather than the traditional three rums I went with:

 

1 oz Neisson Reserve Speciale

1 oz S&C

1 oz Lost Spirits Navy Style

1 oz Lemon Hart 151

 

 

Not only did this make the zombie closer to my mai tai (which is good), it made the measuring far easier.  I also up the lime and grapefruit while I can.

[Tri2Cook]

Tonight I took my zombie into my own hands.  Rather than the traditional three rums I went with:

 

1 oz Neisson Reserve Speciale

1 oz S&C

1 oz Lost Spirits Navy Style

1 oz Lemon Hart 151

 

 

Not only did this make the zombie closer to my mai tai (which is good), it made the measuring far easier.  I also up the lime and grapefruit while I can.

[Hassouni]

Fuck this winter shit, I need some rum and lime drinks up in here. I'll turn the heat up to compensate.

 

I haven't really made any cocktails at home for myself since doing my pop-up bar...

[Czequershuus]

Winter does seem to inspire a certain desire for the tropically tacky, especially when accompanied by a heavy does of the spice element. The Lizard King fit the bill nicely. I subbed Appleton V/X for the rum here, and used my homemade allspice dram and cinnamon syrup. Delicious drink, very focused on the cinnamon/allspice flavors. Nothing to complex, but there is enough going on to keep on interested to the bottom of the glass. I would repeat this one.

[Hassouni]

Ancient Mariners cos I GOT WHITE GRAPEFRUITS...but I didn't have cinnamon syrup, so Jet pilots and Zombies and the like were out. Will be making some cinnamon syrup ASAP because I'm tired of winter and I want more fun rum and citrus drinks.

 

I used the standard Beachbum recipe, using Woods 100 (100 English...) for the Demerara, and Smith & Cross for the "Dark Jamaican" - unorthodox, but better (2 oz at Navy Proof, cap'n). I should never doubt the Bum's ratios, I skimped on the simple syrup and the drinks were a bit too dry.

 

I was lacking a purple straw so a magenta one had to suffice.

 

Also, I tried to see how my newish Blendtec would fare at crushing ice for drinks. It sucks. It turns ice into pure snow in about 2 seconds even on the slowest/weakest setting (not the "Crush Ice" button).  If anybody has a trick for getting tiny chunks of ice rather than snow out of a Blendtec or other high-powered blender, I'd love to hear it.

[JoNorvelleWalker]

Welcome to white grapefruits!  I use an eighth of a white grapefruit per zombie, possibly more juice than Don intended, but tough.  Rather than cinnamon syrup may I suggest tincture of cinnamon?  (Unless you are really, really into sugar.)

 

http://forums.egullet.org/topic/94621-flavouring-essences-and-tinctures/

 

For my solvent I use W&N, and of course I don't use cassia.  My zombie tonight has a magenta straw.  Do you have a source for a true purple zombie straw?

[FrogPrincesse]

Cobra's Fang (Don the Beachcomber) for Valentine's Day, with Lost Spirits 151 Cuban-inspired rum, B.G. Reynolds' passion fruit syrup, homemade falernum, lime & orange juice, St George absinthe, Angostura bitters

 

The banana in this rum is insane. Banana-passion fruit smoothie.

 

 

[FrogPrincesse]

via PUNCH:

1 ounce rhum agricole (preferably Duquesne Agricole Eleve Sous Bois)

1 ounce rum, Guyanese (preferably El Dorado 5 Year)

1/2 ounce dry curaçao

1/2 ounce falernum

1/4 ounce St. Elizabeth Allspice Dram

1 ounce lime juice

1/2 ounce honey syrup (2:1, honey:water)

3 dashes Angostura bitters

 

I finally tried Paul McGee's version of the Three Dots and a Dash on Sunday, to celebrate Don the Beachcomber's birthday. My rum combo was pretty outstanding with La Favorite vieux rhum + El Dorado 8. The dry curaçao was very nice indeed. It's such a great cocktail.

 

[Hassouni]

Cobra's Fang (Don the Beachcomber) for Valentine's Day, with Lost Spirits 151 Cuban-inspired rum, B.G. Reynolds' passion fruit syrup, homemade falernum, lime & orange juice, St George absinthe, Angostura bitters

 

The banana in this rum is insane. Banana-passion fruit smoothie.

 

 

I made one of these the other day, quite coincidentally. Different brands, but it didn't quite do it for me...

[FrogPrincesse]

Homemade falernum? It's one of the keys I think.

[Hassouni]

Bien sûr! I used your preferred Cara Cara oranges too, as well as the 1883 passion fruit syrup and LH151, as called for in the recipe. 

 

It wasn't bad at all, but it didn't have that tiki magic, for whatever reason.

[Fernet-Bronco]

How essential are tiki bitters? What is different from regular Angostura? Bittermans says the main characteristics of theirs are cinnamon and allspice. Not really sure that's different enough from Ango to merit pulling the $19 trigger.

[Hassouni]

I just bought the Bittermens Tiki Bitters yesterday in fact. They're certainly similar to Angostura, but less bitter and more forward on the clove and spices. Overall they have a "lighter" flavor profile - I wouldn't use them in a Manhattan, for example, but it seems like they'd play well in Don the Beachcomber drinks calling for Angostura.

[Rafa]

Not essential at all, but fun if you've got them. They taste lighter/brighter than Angostura to me, with a stale cola flavor I actually find works really well. I like them in soda, in stirred drinks, and as aromatic garnishes in punches and cups (I use them in my house white sangria and wine cooler, for example).

[Hassouni]

Also I'd like to add that my bottle has particulate matter in it, which makes me feel a lot better about my own half-assed bitters filtering attempts 

Edited March 5, 2015 by Hassouni (log)

[Craig E]

Sounds like those are flavors that some allspice dram could contribute in the absence of tiki bitters?

[Rafa]

Much lighter than allspice dram, closer to falernum I think... but Angostura bitters are still the standard in old tiki drinks; after all, they're called for by name.

[FrogPrincesse]

From yesterday - Jeff Berry's Blackbeard's Ghost with light Virgin Islands rum (Plantation 3 Stars), Demerara rum (El Dorado 8),  falernum (homemade), apricot brandy (Briottet wild peach liqueur), orange & lemon juice, Angostura bitters. The key in this drink is the falernum. I made the falernum some time ago and I think it's improving over time.

 

[pto]

Test Pilot

 

[post='']

[JoNorvelleWalker]

For the past few months I've been making my zombies with more juice than what Don calls for.  I know that's a girly drink, so tonight to reset my palate I'm trying one with just 3/4 oz lime and more or less a half oz white grapefruit.  This tastes overly boozy to me, if such a thing were possible.  (And before anybody asks, no more than the called for four ounces of rum -- though perhaps rather higher proof rums than what Don originally envisioned.)

 

One difference is I'm drinking out of my beloved mai tai tumbler rather than a proper zombie vessel but I doubt that that was it.  The advantage of the tumbler is that I can cut my purple (disclaimer, actually magenta) straws in half.  The magenta straws always run out first.

 

I could simply have prepared a second zombie.  But in my experience that never ends well at all.  Besides I have work in the morning...assuming I remember to get up.  So I squeezed more lime and white grapefruit, and compensated with a bit more tincture of cinnamon and Jade 1901, and as I recall an additional dash of falernum, Angostura, and S&C.

 

Much better.

 

 

So the recipe is approximately:

 

1 oz Neisson Reserve Speciale

1 1/4 oz S&C

1 oz Lost Spirits Navy Style

1 oz Lemon Hart 151

3/4 oz Velvet Falernum

24 drops Jade 1901

4 eyedroppers full tincture of cinnamon (Ceylon cinnamon and W&N overproof)

2 dashes Angostura

1 teaspoon Small Hand grenadine

1 1/2 oz fresh squeezed lime juice

1 oz fresh squeezed white grapefruit juice

 

 

Don't forget the purple straw.

 

 

 

Edit:  plus two drops saline, per Dave Arnold.

Edited April 4, 2015 by JoNorvelleWalker (log)

[brinza]

1 teaspoon Small Hand grenadine

I read that as "1 small hand grenade"

[FrogPrincesse]

For the #jetpilotchallenge2015 - Jet Pilot (Steve Crane via Jeff Berry) with Denizen Merchant's Reserve, Plantation Barbados 5, Lemon Hart 151, lime & white grapefruit juice, homemade falernum & cinnamon syrup, Angostura bitters, St. George absinthe.

 

Jeff Berry's recipe is too sweet with my homemade syrups, so I had to cut down their amount by half approximately.

 

 

[Hassouni]

For the #jetpilotchallenge2015 - Jet Pilot (Steve Crane via Jeff Berry) with Denizen Merchant's Reserve, Plantation Barbados 5, Lemon Hart 151, lime & white grapefruit juice, homemade falernum & cinnamon syrup, Angostura bitters, St. George absinthe.

 

Jeff Berry's recipe is too sweet with my homemade syrups, so I had to cut down their amount by half approximately.

 

 

Hell yes. I wish it was warm enough here to truly appreciate such drinks