Drinks! (2012, part 2)

[FrogPrincesse]

I love negronis. It's the perfect pre-dinner drink, it really gets your taste buds going.

I like adding a few dashes of orange bitters in mine (Regan's + Angostura orange bitters).

[Hassouni]

Tonight:

Japanese (using homemade orgeat and Landy VS at a 1:5 ratio...still too sweet)

Corn n Oil, with 2:3 Cruzan Blackstrap to homemade falernum:

Whoa lord, it's a falernum bomb! This is going to be a slow sipper for sure (just started on it as I type this)

[thirtyoneknots]

Word to the wise: The original Japanese cocktail works best to modern sensibilities as more of a digestif/nightcap type thing I think. Very rich. Heavy hand with the bitters helps.

[Hassouni]

Word to the wise: The original Japanese cocktail works best to modern sensibilities as more of a digestif/nightcap type thing I think. Very rich. Heavy hand with the bitters helps.

Yeah and no more than 1/4 of orgeat, say

[EvergreenDan]

Blow me down, this is a strong, viscous drink!

You mean in strong in flavor? It is not particularly high in alcohol. Viscous? I would agree with vicious. Did you like it? I think the Negroni it a tough introduction to Campari. Easier would be Campari and soda with a little lemon or lime, perhaps with a little gin.

[Hassouni]

Yeah, I meant flavor, and I did mean viscous with an S

[Jstern35]

Threw together a nice tiki'ish kind of drink to take in the perfect saturday with

1 1/2 oz light rum (Flor de Cana)

1 1/2 Goslings

3/4 oz triple sec

3/4 oz batavia arrack

1 oz lime juice

1/2 oz agave syrup

few dashes of reagans orange bitters

over crushed ice and topped with home-made carbonated raspberry lemonade

Edited May 19, 2012 by Jstern35 (log)

[ChrisTaylor]

Went to Der Raum last night. Der Raum is a cocktail bar in Melbourne that's highly-regarded and serves what you could describe, I guess, as modernist cocktails. The layout of the menu was inspired by the Alinea menu. The top, left, bottom and right sides of the page represent (respectively) sweet, sour, dry and spicy. And as you can see drinks are listed by flavour profile (note that it's just the flavour profile: the New York Minute might not actually contain anything coffee-related) rather than ingredients. The idea being that some people who think oh, I dislike the (cheap) tequila I've had, therefore I won't order drink x, y and z (looking at the menu, tho', I think tequila is a bit of a workhorse spirit for them). I figured I might be able to pick at least some of the ingredients based on the profile. With the caraway element of the Fuck the Subprime, for instance, I figured it'd be aquavit. Wrong. It was kummel, something I've never seen anyone else in Australia work with or even sell.

Anyway. Apologies for the hideous photos: phone camera in a very dark room.

I neglected to get a photo of the freebie 'appetiser': sweet vermouth infused with rooibos tea. It came in a little medicine jar from the top of which billowed smoke. I wasn't quite sure how they achieved this (I suspect dry ice), given the effect lasted pretty much until the beverage had been entirely consumed.

The Ben Shewry, inspired by the head chef of Attica, Melbourne's one entry into the San Pel. Top 100. The 'bits' at the bottom of the jar are star anise pods hit with a butane torch. The drinking vessel itself (the flask) is then placed inside the jar and the lid is closed. I couldn't quite figure out what was going on with this one--I haven't actually had absinthe before or indeed many other things in the aniseed-flavoured family (i.e. Herbsaint), so I couldn't tell you exactly what it was. The aniseed flavour was fairly subdued, tho'. It was there but it was far removed from the oft-overpowering addition of a bit of Pernod to a cocktail.

My partner ordered The Snows of Mt. Kilimanjaro. The powder was tea, I'm pretty sure, and the foam was quite lemony (but not overpoweringly so).

Fuck the Subprime and a Zombie. The Zombie seemed to be, simply, a very well-made version of the classic. The Subprime was really interesting. I'm glad I let one of the staff members steer me in that direction--I'd been leaning towards the coffee one. A nice touch was that both the Subprime and Zombie allowed the drinker to adjust the sweetness of the drink somewhat: in the case of the Zombie, my partner was directed to flip the piece of passionfruit half down (I didn't get a chance to see if it was just passionfruit pulp in there or some sort of mixture involving sugar before she flipped it over) and in my case I was told to move the orange twist around, which would take some of the sugar from the side of the glass and put it into the actual drink. I didn't attempt this as I found the Subprime already to my liking, so I can't tell you how well it would've worked.

[ChrisTaylor]

Something I found in one of the rum threads: a dark and orangey. 2 oz dark rum (I used Appleton 12), 1 oz Cointreau, 1/2 oz Domaine de Canton and 1/2 oz lemon juice. Not bad.

[EvergreenDan]

Something I found in one of the rum threads: a dark and orangey. 2 oz dark rum (I used Appleton 12), 1 oz Cointreau, 1/2 oz Domaine de Canton and 1/2 oz lemon juice. Not bad.

Glad you liked it. Orange bitters too. I need to try this again with King's Ginger. Was it too sweet? I made this three years ago, and today I would scale scale down the rum and triple sec a bit to make it a bit less sweet and a touch smaller.

Dark and Orangey

by Dan Chadwick

2 oz Dark rum

1 oz Triple sec, Cointreau

1/2 oz Ginger liqueur, Crème de Gingembre (or Canton or King's)

1/2 oz Lemon juice

3 ds Orange bitters, Angostura orange

1 twst Lemon peel (as garnish)

Shake, strain, rocks, lowball, garnish

[ChrisTaylor]

Yeah. I forgot to mention the bitters but I did use them. Fee's instead of Angostura, tho', purely because that's what I have on hand. I didn't think it was too sweet. I mean, I dislike overly sweet things.

[haresfur]

Yeah. I forgot to mention the bitters but I did use them. Fee's instead of Angostura, tho', purely because that's what I have on hand. I didn't think it was too sweet. I mean, I dislike overly sweet things.

Interesting, because it sounds sweet. I was thinking it might be interesting with ginger infused vodka instead of Canton. Not that I have any on hand.

[ChrisTaylor]

Just went to knock together a Kingston Negroni then, half way through the process, realised I didn't have any normal red vermouth. Only Punt e Mes. Oh well. In it goes. It's different but it's still okay.

[rod rock]

Here is something that me and friends enjoyed this weekend. It is called Kung Fu jegermaister coctail.

Simple and i have to admit, very good

How to:

1 can of cola

3 cl of jegermeister

2 cl of pisang ambon liqueur

All that mixed together with crushed ice in a glass and garnish with mint leaves. Very nice!

Enjoy people!

[ChrisTaylor]

A second attempt at the Don Draper: 40mL Rittenhouse rye, 20mL Perique, Peychaud's, Fee's Orange and brown sugar. Superior, I think, to the bourbon original.

[Hassouni]

Possibly invented something tonight:

1.5 oz Smith & Cross

1 oz homemade pimento dram

.5 oz lime

2-3 dashes Angostura

Shaken and served up

Very nice. Smooth, dry, warm, somewhat spicy, and tart at the same time

[ChrisTaylor]

I was all set to try a Corpse Reviver 2 for the first time. Then I saw that. I think it's time to open the Inner Circle again.

EDIT

I just made it with .5 oz Inner Circle Green and 1 oz Appleton. Ended up adding in an extra .5 oz of ICG as I thought the pimento dram dominated a bit too much. But that could just be because Appleton isn't as gutsy as IC: maybe next time I should use 100% IC or 1 oz IC and .5 oz Appleton. But, yeah, for something just knocked together, it's good. I mean, I like it. Let me know if you make any modifications to the formula, as I'm keen to try them out (obviously subbing IC for Smith and Cross due to the shittiness of geography--if it wasn't for customs, I'd offer to trade a [new, obviously] bottle of IC Green with one of you guys for some Smith).

Edited May 25, 2012 by ChrisTaylor (log)

[Jstern35]

1 1/2 oz Lairds apple brandy

1 oz Old Weller bourbon

1/2 oz Prunier Orange Cognac

1/2 oz Vya sweet vermouth

1/2 oz Luxardo amaretto

1/2 oz lemon juice

2 dashes old fashioned bitter

1 dash orange bitter

1/4 oz grade b maple syrup

Might be a keeper

[tanstaafl2]

Didn't get much chance last week while working the bar to sit down and enjoy any of the drinks I was making so tonight it was the Navy Grog.

A very nice drink that was surprisingly easy to drink despite the fairly considerable rum content. Although I can't help but think that perhaps just a splash of pimento dram would take this drink another step forward.

[bostonapothecary]

channeling the burmese pomello (it turned out to be an overripe one)

.75 oz. sour orange juice

.75 oz. sweet vermouth (cinzano)

.75 oz. pineau des charentes

.75 oz. mezcal vida

2 dashes deodorized angostura bitters**

**the angostura bitters were deodorized by dehydrating them then reconstituting them with the same volume of neutral spirits to the same proof.

i had made something similar yesterday as a very dry 2:1:1 mezcal-sour orange-bronx. i enjoyed mine, but my co-drinker was frightened by it. exploring a sweeter structure sounded like a good idea, but i guess i prefer the drier version. maybe it should be dry but have more aromatic contrast to the mezcal like mezcal-cognac.

the deodorized angostura bitters were the remnants of another project. a book i've been reading described the tendency for some elderly people to loose their ability to normally engage in retronasal olfaction. adding triggers like piquancy to food helped enable and turn on mouth smelling in those that lost it. i've seen the phenomenon happen with certain other senses and i think the pattern is that they are all trigeminal senses. the tannins of the bitters are received by our haptic sense which also happens to be a trigeminal sense. the tannins of red wines may help to turn on mouth smelling in those that do not function normally. the same may happen with cocktails that feature angostura bitters. the active ingredient of the bitters may not be their own aroma so much as their ability to turn on our ability to smell in general via their spectacular expression of astringency.

so recommend tannic reds for your elderly friends and when you make them manhattans, be sure to go heavy on the bitters.

[thirtyoneknots]

Although I can't help but think that perhaps just a splash of pimento dram would take this drink another step forward.

One of the very finest uses Pimento Dram is to add 1/4 oz to a Navy Grog.

[tanstaafl2]

Although I can't help but think that perhaps just a splash of pimento dram would take this drink another step forward.

One of the very finest uses Pimento Dram is to add 1/4 oz to a Navy Grog.

Excellent! Nice to have some confirmation. I shall try it that way next time and it seems likely it will become a regular addition to my Navy Grog in the future.

[tanstaafl2]

Decided not to do Tiki tonight and instead went with a drink I have been wanting to make for awhile called The Veiled Remnant. It is a creation from Gabe Bowen who runs the bar at Restaurant Eugene which I think is one of the nicer retaurants in town (others aparently agree as the chef just picked up a James Beard award this year).

It calls specifically for St. George Terrior gin along with Batavia Arrack, Bonal, PX Sherry, a barspoon of lime juice and a couple of dashes of Underberg built over ice and stirred.

It just so happens I have all that! The use of Bonal and Batavia Arrack in the drink interested me. Not sure my home version is quite as good as what I got at the restaurant but still enjoyable. You never loose the gin in this drink but it was nice and full on the tongue and perhaps almost a bit sweet. The sherry shining through perhaps. The finish was a bit short to me as I had expected it to linger a bit more.

One I will have to try again I think. Would love to compare my homemade concoction with the original by Gabe one evening,

[KD1191]

This one sprung into my head fully formed as I start to reach the point of the year where I would kill for some decent peaches. In my mind, the ultimate taste of summer is good black pepper cracked onto a fully ripe peach. This was extremely delicious, quite refined at the start with the last few sips packed with spice.

1.5 oz RinQuinQuin a la Peche

.75 oz Leopold's Navy Strength Gin

.5 Koval Ginger Liqueur

8 drops Bittercube Jamaican Bitters #1

Stirred, strained and garnished w/ freshly cracked Phu Quoc black pepper

[ChrisTaylor]

A DeGroff Sazerac: Martell VSOP and Rittenhouse rye. Still using Pernod. And finally thinking that maybe I just need to pony up and get some actual absinth(e). Any recommendations for a reasonably priced, fairly readily avaliable absinthe (given I live in an alcoholic backwater and all).