Spirited Cocktails

I’m not a terribly spiritual person, but I try as best I can to believe in the power of positive thought. If nothing else, thinking about good stuff tends to distract you from all the crappy stuff. Well, we’ve had a pretty hefty winter here in New York (February 2010 was the snowiest month on record), and as much as I like the change in seasons, I’m ready for spring. So I’m invoking the power of positive thought by way of a good cocktail, because, well, what better way is there?

In thinking about what cocktail would help make a smooth transition, and get the power of positive thought moving, I turned to the Gold Rush. This cocktail is essentially a cold version of a hot toddy, just without the wintery spices (which, as I try to channel warmer weather, is fine by me.)

Here’s what you’re going to need:

2oz bourbon
3/4oz fresh lemon juice
3/4oz honey syrup

The honey syrup is very easy. My friend Meaghan Dorman, who has made this cocktail for me at Raines Law Room, suggests a ratio of 3:1 honey to hot water. To make a small bottle of honey syrup, I added 9oz of wildflower honey to 3oz hot water and just shook really hard. Worked like a charm.

Once you have the honey syrup ready, combine it with the bourbon and lemon juice in a shaker with ice. Shake hard, and strain into a rocks glass over fresh ice.

Here’s to spring – it couldn’t come soon enough!

Cheers,

-Josh

Last week I told you about my trip to Rye House to celebrate Mardi Gras, New Orleans-style. I mentioned some of the cocktails we sampled, including the Sazarac and the Vieux Carre. I’d like to share one more staple of the Mardi Gras celebration – or any celebration for that matter – The French 75.

This cocktail is actually named after the French 75-mm field gun; a commonplace piece of artillery during World War I. Apparently this particular gun was known for its recoil system, which allowed for much smoother operation than had previously been possible. Once you try the cocktail, you’ll understand how appropriate that is. (History once again courtesy of Ted Haigh’s Vintage Spirits and Forgotten Cocktails; a must-have for any bartender’s bookshelf.)

Here’s what you’re going to need:

2oz gin
1oz fresh lemon juice
1/4oz simple syrup
Champagne

Combine the gin, lemon juice and simple syrup with ice and shake well. Strain into a tall glass – either a Collins glass, or ideally, a champagne flute – and top with champagne (or other high-quality sparkling wine). Stir gently, and garnish with a long lemon peel. Some like to add a cherry as well, but I generally prefer to skip it. The choice is entirely yours.

This cocktail offers one of the more surprising combinations in the bartending world – gin and champagne. But with the lemon and sugar to balance things out, it works beautifully. And as Ted points out in talking about the appropriateness of the cocktail’s name, “….smooth, yet packs a wallop.” So true.

Cheers!

-Josh

Earlier this week, I was fortunate to join many of New York’s cocktail twitterati for a celebration of Mardi Gras at one of my favorite new bars, Rye House. At an event hosted by the Time Out Dining & Libation Society, we were lucky to find proprietor and master mixologist Lynette Marrero behind the bar furiously shaking and stirring the classic cocktails of New Orleans, including the Sazarac, the French 75, and my favorite of the evening – the Vieux Carre.

I was introduced to this cocktail during my trip down to New Orleans last year for Tales of the Cocktail – it’s a mainstay at the Carousel Bar in the Hotel Moteleone (which is where Tales takes place).  As Ted Haigh tells it in his book Vintage Spirits and Forgotten Cocktails, the name comes from the local term for the French Quarter – le Vieux Carre, meaning “the Old Square.” The cocktail was invented sometime prior to the 1937 publication of Famous New Orleans Drinks and How to Mix Them, by Walter Bergeron, who worked behind what would eventually become the Carousel Bar. It fell out of favor for years, but I loved the one I had in New Orleans last year, and I really loved the… let’s just say more than one… I had at Rye House this past week.

Here’s what you’re going to need:

1oz rye whiskey
1oz cognac
1oz sweet vermouth
1/4oz Benedictine
2 dashes Angostura Bitters
2 dashes Peychaud Bitters

The preparation is simple: combine all the ingredients in a mixing glass with ice, stir well, and strain over fresh ice in a rocks glass. Garnish with a simple lemon twist.

The result is a smooth yet complex cocktail, sure to transport you directly to Bourbon Street.

Cheers!

-Josh

Another cocktail courtesy of Rachel Maddow. Isn’t she the best?

This excellent holiday punch actually comes by way of Josey Packard of the bar Drink in Boston. You can watch Josey make the punch via this video from Rachel Maddow’s show:

Here’s the recipe (you can find the full details on Rachel’s website). Heed their advice – when playing with alcohol and fire, caution is the word of the day. Have a fire extinguisher handy.

Prep:

Acquire a pyrex bowl or other heat-treated (or otherwise fire resistant bowl).
Stud 3 oranges with cloves.
Roast them for 20-30 minutes at 350 degrees, until softened.

Warm the alcohol for the punch (immerse a container of it in hot water).
Set the spices aside, for the pyrotechnics.
Also warm the diluting ingredients.
Have some sugar on-hand.

Spices for pyrotechnics:

Ground cinnamon
Ground allspice
Ground nutmeg

Alcohol:

1 pint dark rum
1 pint brandy

Diluting ingredients:

Juice of 3 oranges
Juice of 2 lemons
Pint of apple cider
Pint of water

On-hand, for continued extinguishing:

Pint of apple cider
Pint of water

Procedure:

Pre-heat punch bowl with hot water from the tap.
Put roasted oranges in hot, newly emptied bowl.
Pour heated alcohol mixture over oranges.
Use a match to ignite alcohol.
Be aware at all times of how hot the bowl is by touching the outside of it frequently.
Toss pinches of the spices at the flame carefully.

Extinguish the flame by pouring the heated juice/cider mix over the punch.

If the punch doesn’t completely extinguish, pour more cider or water over the mixture.

Cheers!

-Josh

There’s only one thing I pay more attention to than spirits and cocktails, and that’s politics. I’m a total politics geek. Election night is my Super Bowl. I know – it’s sad. But it’s who I am.

Standing at the intersection of politics and cocktails is one of my favorite people – Rachel Maddow. Host of the Rachel Maddow Show on MSNBC, she is a former Rhodes Scholar who holds a DPhil in politics from Oxford. She also happens to be an absolute connoisseur of classic cocktail culture.  For nearly a year now, Rachel has been seeking a breakthrough on one of the closely held secrets of the Obama White House: What kind of cocktails are the Obama’s serving at their infamous cocktail parties!? Finally, that breakthrough came this past week when Rachel herself attended a White House holiday party.

Rachel reported this momentous news in the Cocktail Moment section of her show this past Friday:

At this particular cocktail party, cocktails were mixed by Derek Brown – bartender at my favorite DC cocktail bar, The Gibson.

The menu:

The Emerson
Old Tom Gin
Sweet Vermouth
Lime Juice
Luxardo Maraschino

The Stone Fence
Laird’s Applejack
Apple Cider
Fee Brothers Aromatic Bitters
Mint

The Robert Frost Cocktail
Sherry
White Port
Bourbon
Sugar
Orange Bitters

Rachel ended this segment with a quote that demonstrates why she’s so awesome. “Remember, martinis do not contain vodka.”

Cheers,

Josh

As the holidays hurl towards us at breakneck speed, deciding what to get for that special someone (or your parents, your siblings, your boss, your co-worker, your doorman, your super, your postman, and so on, and so on) becomes a challenge. I’m here to help, though mainly just by way of taking advantage of other people’s hard work.

First – let me talk briefly about scotch. To be honest, I’m not entirely sure how scotch became the quintessential non-threatening, no meaning implied gift, but there it is. For some reason, Johnnie Walker Blue has taken hold as the guaranteed-to-impress brand. I actually do like Johnnie Blue, but let’s be honest – it’s a bit pricey, no? (At $150 per bottle, I’d say yes.) The folks at Chivas sent me a sample of Chivas Regal 18 to taste, as well as a sample of Johnnie Walker Blue for the sake of comparison. From my vantage point, they’re actually tough to compare, as they have very different flavor profiles. I find Chivas to be generally sweeter (in a caramel sort of way), with a nice smoky finish. With Johnnie Blue, the smokiness is more up front, and the sweetness that follows tastes more like bittersweet chocolate to me. 

Don’t get me wrong – both Chivas Regal 18 and Johnnie Walker Blue are fine blended scotches. But with Chivas 18 averaging $55 per bottle vs. Johnnie Blue at $150, I think Chivas 18 might give you a bit more bang for the buck. Just my two cents though.

As for other holiday gifts, for those not particularly inclined towards scotch (who are you, anyway?), there are many other options. I’d thought about pulling together a boozer’s gift guide, but so many of my friends have beat me to it, I thought I’d just go ahead and share some of my favorites:

-Hal Wolin of A Muddled Thought has been publishing an ongoing series on good gift ideas for the spirited individual in your life.
-Selena Ricks of The Dizzy Fizz has a two part gift guide: Part 1 with excellent DIY ideas, and Part 2 with a selected list of educational materials (you can never know too much about booze).
-Our friend James over at NY Barfly has a great list of places to drink over the holidays (we’re working our way through the list one by one!)
-Paul Clarke at Serious Eats has a very comprehensive list for the budding mixologist.

If you’re looking for something to buy the overworked and underpaid Spirited Cocktails staff (you know, me), I wouldn’t turn down my very own Meehan Bar Bag from Moore & Giles. Just sayin.

Happy holidays!

Cheers,

Josh

The best part of writing a blog about spirits and cocktails is the opportunity that it creates to taste lots of new spirits and cocktails! Seems obvious, I suppose, but it means more than you might think. The opportunity to try something new is great, but the opportunity to do so along with other people whose company you enjoy and whose opinion you respect – that’s much more meaningful.

This past week, I joined some of my favorite people – fellow bloggers @nybarfly, @lincolnwrites, @selenawrites, and @sweetblogomine – to taste Harlem, a new spirit distilled in Holland (named after the Dutch town Haarlem), and based on an herbal blend that the Dutch call Kruiden. At first blush, one might notice some similarities to Jagermeister, in that Harlem is definitely a dark, herbal spirit, intended to be poured as a shot, and definitely best served ice cold.

However, while I’m not really a “shot person” either way, I found Harlem to be much smoother than Jager; certainly herbal, but more well rounded with a nice citrus finish (the result of a strong presence of mandarin in the blend.) We tried Harlem in a few different combinations, include as a straight shot, on the rocks, and blended with common mixers like Cola and Ginger Ale. (I actually found the Harlem and Ginger Ale to be my favorite!) These mixed variations could be served either as shots (1oz Harlem and .5oz cola, for example), or over ice as a tall drink.

While Harlem has been a closely held family recipe for decades, they’re just in the process of launching in the US now. It has started to show up in major markets, and will be rolled out across the country in the coming months. The suggested retail price is around $22 for a 750ml bottle.

Unfortunately, our resident blogger/mad scientist @halw (of amuddledthought.com) wasn’t able to join us for the tasting, but I’m looking forward to seeing what kind of cocktails he can whip up with Harlem. Stay tuned.

Cheers!

Josh