Drinks (2009–2011)

[bostonapothecary]

.75 oz. sour orange juice

.75 oz. green chartreuse

.75 oz. cinzano bianco vermouth

.75 oz. 1997 panama renegade rum finished in port wine barrels

dash peychaud's bitters

we wanted a simple four part collage but lost it when we couldn't find anything but vermouth to hold down the low sugar content quotient of our formula (vermouth is orange peel aromatized). i searched in vain for the pommeau, pineau des chartents or even the rose vermouth, but alas it was all gone...

the drink was very successful. comforting gustatory structure. ambitious aromatic tension. epic spatial effect!

[haresfur]

.75 oz. sour orange juice

.75 oz. green chartreuse

.75 oz. cinzano bianco vermouth

.75 oz. 1997 panama renegade rum finished in port wine barrels

dash peychaud's bitters

we wanted a simple four part collage but lost it when we couldn't find anything but vermouth to hold down the low sugar content quotient of our formula (vermouth is orange peel aromatized). i searched in vain for the pommeau, pineau des chartents or even the rose vermouth, but alas it was all gone...

the drink was very successful. comforting gustatory structure. ambitious aromatic tension. epic spatial effect!

What's panama renegade rum like? Comparable to anything I might recognize? Oh, and what do you mean by "spatial effect"?

[Yojimbo]

Something unnamed I got off the St. Germain thread:

1.5 oz. rye (Rittenhouse)

.5 oz. St. Germain

.5 oz. Dolin dry vermouth

2 dashes orange bitters

shaken and poured over ice

Tasty, but I wasn't exact with the measurements; if I made it again I'd dial back on the elderflower and up the vermouth a bit.

[bostonapothecary]

What's panama renegade rum like? Comparable to anything I might recognize? Oh, and what do you mean by "spatial effect"?

the panama rum is pretty cool. i'm not sure if its typical of anything else from panama. the rum is hard to put into words. fiery and dry. there is not much density to the aromas and everything is fairly light on its feet. the dryness is also subtly contrasted by sweet port wood aromas, but they are not exactly glaringly obvious.

i'm not in love with it, but i really don't like rums with ordinary aromas like vanilla or caramel. this rum lies solidly in "extraordinary" territory.

"spatial effect" implies that the drink was composed with the aesthetic, sensory, side of beauty in mind as opposed to the symbolic, exemplary side and it was also composed using spatial intelligence instead of linguistic.

i was just in a bar where the bartender was trying to make a drink with scotch bonnet peppers. he was thinking of composing the drink of the peppers, scotch, and honey. the logic of the creative linkage was that "scotch" and "scotch bonnets" go together symbolically because of the play on words as well as "bees in a bonnet". he didn't start with any aesthetic considerations like what sort of tension should the drink feature between sweetness and acidity. nothing is wrong with this approach, its just one way of doing things.

as an exercise, i went to the opposite extreme. i thought only aesthetically and had no regard for any symbolic aspects of the ingredients (two ingredients from italy wouldn't break the collage). i tried to render the aesthetic points of tension of my ingredient choices within the minds eye to find some pleasurable shape.. this shape was based on my other favorite shapes (sour drinks). what i wanted the drink to be had to match what i actually ended up with and i think i succeeded fairly well.

the aesthetic-spatial approach has many benefits. for starters its more sustainable. you can work effectively with ingredients that might not be from classic cocktail books. they can either be brand new or from foreign countries that weren't a part of cocktail culture.

you likely only have a comparative advantage with a product when it has no tradition of use. these fringe products are very important with the escalating prices of traditional products. in preserving fragile traditions it is also beneficial to make a market for them.

you also can effectively produce beauty among a variety of perception strategies. not everyone will be literate enough to understand the play on words from the symbolic drink example, but whether they know the names, provenance, and lore of their drink's inputs or not, they will find solace in their favorite aesthetic tensions. you can avoid the symbolic aspects of beauty, not the sensory-aesthetic.

of course you can compose beauty out of both the symbolic and the aesthetic. the symbolic should never be overlooked because it is the main catalyst for acquiring aesthetic acquired tastes (very important to sustainability!)

most bartenders and most chefs use lots of spatial thinking. the problem is that they use it without the spatial vocabulary to translate it into linguistic communication. this is part of why so many chefs yell in the kitchen. they feel things they cannot say when trying to teach.

the divide between the symbolic and the aesthetic can also be used to explain most of the new cooking that is happening. what we call things like "molecular gastronomy" or "modern cuisine" could very usefully be called "aesthetic cuisine". this new cuisine can be undeniably delicious and beautiful, but is detached from traditional techniques (sometimes no longer economically viable) and "if it grows together, it goes together" juxtaposition. this new cooking is mostly powered by spatial thinking.

hopefully i did the idea justice?

Edited March 5, 2011 by bostonapothecary (log)

[campus five]

In honor of fat tuesday (which totally snuck up on me), a Sazerac.

Rittenhouse BIB, 2:1 Demerara syrup, Bitter Truth Creole Bitters, 1/2 Vieux Pontalier 1/2 St. George spritz.

I'm really warming to the Creole Bitters. They're noticeably drier than Peycahuds,so I've been going just a tad heavier on the sugar.

Great depth of flavor, with much less superficial anise.

I could've gone with a spendier Rye, and I've got a few, but I've trying to really get to know the Creole Bitters.

[bostonapothecary]

.75 oz. seville sour orange juice

.75 oz. brandymel (algarve honey liqueur fortified with medronho)

.75 oz. mezcal (vida)

.75 oz. blanco tequila (agavales)

dash peychaud's

float of lemonhart 151

delicious, but quite "extracted" from so much dissolved aroma. i was really on the fence whether i should use an non-aromatic sugar source or not. all the orange peels of course are saved from making a triple-sec like shrubb that is fortified with unaged cape verdean rum.

[Tri2Cook]

The weather is finally beginning to warm up a bit here so to welcome it I decided to try a Mamie Taylor with Famous Grouse, fresh lime and homemade ginger beer. I liked it.

I made a batch of limoncello towards the end of the year. After straining out the zest and adding the syrup, I left it in a cool, dark place to mellow for a while. This morning I filtered and bottled it and I have ~2oz. left that wouldn't fit in the bottles. I'd like to use that to mix up something tasty today. Any suggestions or is this stuff best relegated to sipping and not mixing? I'm hoping it plays well in drinks because that's the main reason I made it, as another liqueur option for mixing.

[rarerollingobject]

A St Germain sidecar, which was perfect at the dusk of a brilliantly sunny Sydney weekend:

2 brandy

1 St Germain

1 lemon juice

1 Cointreau

Though next time I'll up the lemon or use lime.

[EvergreenDan]

rarerollingobject - Have you tried this with all St Germain? I haven't tried your version, but I think the Elderflower is nice with the other flavors without the support of the orange. My St Germain Sidecarversion is a simple 4:2:1 ratio.

Regardless, I think this is a fabulous drink, especially for those not overexposed to St Germain.

[haresfur]

What's panama renegade rum like? Comparable to anything I might recognize? Oh, and what do you mean by "spatial effect"?

snip...

"spatial effect" implies that the drink was composed with the aesthetic, sensory, side of beauty in mind as opposed to the symbolic, exemplary side and it was also composed using spatial intelligence instead of linguistic.

snip...

the divide between the symbolic and the aesthetic can also be used to explain most of the new cooking that is happening. what we call things like "molecular gastronomy" or "modern cuisine" could very usefully be called "aesthetic cuisine". this new cuisine can be undeniably delicious and beautiful, but is detached from traditional techniques (sometimes no longer economically viable) and "if it grows together, it goes together" juxtaposition. this new cooking is mostly powered by spatial thinking.

hopefully i did the idea justice?

Thanks. I had to read this a few times and let it simmer. I think I was with you up to the "molecular gastronomy" part. It seems to me that all that making food look like something else or have completely different texture from that we normally associate with the taste is much more symbolic than anything. I can see that the two aren't mutually exclusive but I would think that bacon flavoured bourbon is more about the (symbolic) surprise of the taste of breakfast in a glass than about the aesthetic that diner breakfast pairs well with with bourbon.

[rarerollingobject]

rarerollingobject - Have you tried this with all St Germain? I haven't tried your version, but I think the Elderflower is nice with the other flavors without the support of the orange. My St Germain Sidecarversion is a simple 4:2:1 ratio.

Regardless, I think this is a fabulous drink, especially for those not overexposed to St Germain.

Thanks for the idea, will try this tonight. I've long been a fan of elderflower cordial in gin and tonics and just with sparkling mineral water, but am new to tinkering with the liqueur in cocktails. I know I'd like anything that allows the taste of the elderflower to shine, so those ratios are very appealing.

[bostonapothecary]

What's panama renegade rum like? Comparable to anything I might recognize? Oh, and what do you mean by "spatial effect"?

snip...

"spatial effect" implies that the drink was composed with the aesthetic, sensory, side of beauty in mind as opposed to the symbolic, exemplary side and it was also composed using spatial intelligence instead of linguistic.

snip...

the divide between the symbolic and the aesthetic can also be used to explain most of the new cooking that is happening. what we call things like "molecular gastronomy" or "modern cuisine" could very usefully be called "aesthetic cuisine". this new cuisine can be undeniably delicious and beautiful, but is detached from traditional techniques (sometimes no longer economically viable) and "if it grows together, it goes together" juxtaposition. this new cooking is mostly powered by spatial thinking.

hopefully i did the idea justice?

Thanks. I had to read this a few times and let it simmer. I think I was with you up to the "molecular gastronomy" part. It seems to me that all that making food look like something else or have completely different texture from that we normally associate with the taste is much more symbolic than anything. I can see that the two aren't mutually exclusive but I would think that bacon flavoured bourbon is more about the (symbolic) surprise of the taste of breakfast in a glass than about the aesthetic that diner breakfast pairs well with with bourbon.

anytime you abstract food into something like a new texture you create both aesthetic and symbolic change. when you go so far as to make food look like something else (looks like a this, tastes like a that), you add elements of expectation/anticipation which makes the food "expressionistic". all food has expression, but when you label it "expressionistic", it just means that things are very loud, very deliberate, and you use every trick in the book.

that bacon aromatized bourbon can be thought of as poor man's single malt scotch. if you enjoy the aesthetic tensions of certain single malts, but cannot afford them, you can synthesize them somewhat with a little bacon fat in a bottle of bourbon.

i'd say the whole reason its worth attempting to classify things, even if you have to learn some basic art history jargon, is that it helps us to figure out what art does, and so when we create it, make it do more.

when you connect with people through the aesthetic side of beauty, you can encode subversive messages using beauty's other side and create change.

[campus five]

I'm not often by the K&L Wine in Hollywood, but I was in the neighborhood and ran out of Campari the night before.

I went in for Campari, and came out with Gran Classico, and some Jade Edouard Nouvelle Orleans Absinthe. Oh, and the Campari.

So in honor of spending way too much f-ing money at once, we made two cocktails last night:

1) A Sazerac with Rittenhouse/Creole Bitters/Nouvelle Orleans - possibly the longest finish on a drink ever. Amazing.

2) A Negroni's Loss (http://looka.gumbopages.com/2011/02/15/negronis-loss/) from Jason Schiffer at 320 Main.

It's basically a negroni with Bols Genever / Gran Classico / Antica / Lemon+Orange peel. Wow.

It was a delicious night. Expensive, but delicious.

[Kohai]

In love with this:

Red Sky At Night

1.5 oz. Sauza Tres Generaciones

1.5oz. Campari

2 dashes orange bitters

float cacao nib-infused mezcal

served on the rock.

One of my best.

[Chris Amirault]

Say more about this cacao-nib-infused mezcal.

[Tri2Cook]

Say more about this cacao-nib-infused mezcal.

I'm curious too. I like smokey chocolate so tossing a nice smokey mezcal and some cocoa nibs in the isi seems like a good idea to me. Unfortunately, there is no nice smokey mezcal available in Ontario that I'm aware of. I have the only one I can get semi-locally, Jaral de Berrio, and smoke is not really a characteristic I would attribute to it. In fact, I don't find much special about it at all. Still, it sounds like a good idea to me.

[Tri2Cook]

Being somewhat new to all of this and having missed the original wave of appreciation for this drink, I decided to give the Tantris Sidecar a try tonight. I did the traditional Sidecar a while back so comparing this modern variation seemed like fun. The good news: I liked this one... even the level of sweetness involved didn't bother me with all of the flavor going on. The bad news: I may never bother to mix up a traditional Sidecar again.

[jsmeeker]

Since maraschino has made it's long awaited return to my liquor stash, I am now having The Last Word.

[wc4572]

Don't remember reading about DRY Soda anywhere, so:

1 1/2 oz Hendricks

1/4 - 1/2 oz St. Germain

2 drops violet liquor

top with DRY Lavender Soda

Basically a gin and tonic variation, but pretty good none the less. I also tried this and a few other variations with DRY cucumber soda. I think I just don't like the cucumber.

[TAPrice]

Planned to make a Jack Rose with these measures:

1.25 Bonded Apple brandy
.75 lemon juice
.5 simple syrup
.25 grenadine

I had everything in the mixing glass except grenadine, but when I reached into my frig I found mold floating in my homemade batch. I admit that I consider forging ahead with the drink. After all, I was making it for myself. In the end, I substituted Hum for the grenadine (they're both red--I'm so sophisticated). You know, I probably like this drink better than the Jack Rose. Dry, tart and lots of complexity from the Hum. This mistake might be a keeper.

[Moderator note: This topic continues in Drinks! (2011–2012)]

Edited April 8, 2013 by Mjx (log)