I arrived yesterday, and was lucky enough to kick off the event with two amazing parties – a welcome reception hosted by Beefeater Gin at the New Orleans Contemporary Arts Center, and a classic New Orleans garden fete at the Elma Mansion hosted by William Grant & Sons (the group that brings you Hendricks Gin, Glenfiddich, The Balvenie, Sailor Jerry and more). Once again, a pretty good time! Many thanks to Beefeater and William Grant & Sons for a warm (very, very warm) welcome to New Orleans.

My first session of the conference was this morning – a guide to tasting spirits with the true master of the craft, F. Paul Pacult. I’ll admit right from the start – I kinda suck at tasting spirits. I mean, I can drink ‘em with no trouble at all, but my ability (and particularly my vocabulary) to describe what I’m tasting is severely limited (and limiting). All the more reason why I was excite for this session.

Paul took us through the 49 – yes 49 – criteria he uses to evaluate spirits, including the visual (clarity, sediment, color), olfactory (dryness/sweetness, aromatic intensity, acid intensity, base materials, fruits, nuts, spices, etc.), and gustatory (flavors and intensity on entry, midpalate, and aftertaste). It’s an intense experience to say the least, but by breaking down the process into categories, then into individual attributes (with choices), the difficulty involved in expressing what you’re tasting fades away.

To get us started, we tasted six different spirits: Absolut 100 vodka, Plymouth gin, Jameson Gold irish whisky, Chivas 12 blended scotch, Scappa 14 single malt, and Martel XO cognac. This provided a great framework for tasting different types of spirits, and would make for a great self-guided tasting at home.

To benefit from Paul’s expertise on your own, be sure to order his latest book, Kindred Spirits 2, which includes Paul’s review of over 2,400 different brands and varieties of spirits. 

Stay tuned for more updates from NOLA. For more in real-time, be sure to follow me on Twitter (@cocktailspirit).

Cheers!

-Josh

Let’s start, though, with a quick recap of the Manhattan Cocktail Classic. Described as “part festival, part fête, part conference, part cocktail party,” the Manhattan Cocktail Classic included five days of seminars, parties, tastings, and other assorted revelry with some of my favorite people in all of New York City.

Due to a previously scheduled trip this past week (which I’ll tell you about very soon in an upcoming post), I was only able to enjoy the first few days of the MCC. Yet I still managed to enjoy a plethora of amazing cocktails, and great times with great friends. My weekend included the following:

-The Manhattan Cocktail Classic Gala: An evening of music, dancing, performance art, food, and of course, a slew of cocktails prepared by some of the countries top mixologists.  Among my favorite cocktails that evening were a South Side (using gin, lime, cucumber and mint) prepared by the good folks at Tanqueray, and a very refreshing mint julep prepared by the team at Bulliet bourbon. But of course, the best part was getting all decked out to spend the evening in a beautiful space with my fellow cocktail connoisseurs.

-Behind the Bar at Death & Co.: I’ll make no secret of the fact that one of my favorite bars in the country is Death & Co., located on 6th Street in Manhattan’s East Village. Of course, I’m hardly alone in that opinion. Death & Co. is consistently listed among the best cocktail bars in the world, and with good reason. So along with my fellow twitterati @sweetblogomine and @daisy17, I spent last Saturday afternoon learning everything there is to know about one of my favorite haunts, directly from owner David Kaplan, Head bartender Thomas Waugh, and bartenders Joaquin Simo, Brian Miller, Jessica Gonzalez, and (briefly :-p) Jason Littrell. Of course, as they shared their stories from behind the bar, they also introduced us to the new summer menu, which is going to keep me busy for quite some time.

-The Three Hour Tour: Organized by The Tippling Point crew (Jason Littrell, Gianfranco Verga, Paul Tanguay, and Tad Carducci), this was easily my favorite event of the weekend; in part because we were lucky enough to have simply perfect weather for a cruise around Manhattan. Of course, the cocktails didn’t hurt eaither. Two cocktails in particular stuck out:

The Scotch Fix prepared by Jackie Patterson of Heaven’s Dog in San Francsico:

-1.5 oz Ardbeg 10 year old scotch
-1oz 1:1 honey syrup
-3/4oz Fresh lemon juice

The Landing Strip prepared by John Lermayer of The Florida Room in Miami:

-1.5oz 10 Cane rum
-1.5oz fresh pineapple juice
-1oz coconut water
-1 dash of lime juice
-1 dash simple syrup
-2 dashes Angostura bitters
-4 sage leaves

Of course, this was just a sampling of the events that took place over the course of five days. You can find the full list at http://manhattancocktailclassic.com/events.

Many thanks to all of the amazing bartenders, brands, and enthusiasts who made the first annual Manhattan Cocktail Classic a resounding success. And thanks especially to Lesley Townsend, director of MCC, for bringing this wonderful event to New York. And special thanks as well to my wonderful friends from the cocktail world: Lindsey Johnson, Dave Harrison, Laren Spirer, Karen Nachbar, Leo Borovskiy, Lincoln Chinnery, Kathleen Reynolds, Selena Ricks, Hal Wolin, Emily Malinowski, Jenean Chapman, Jordana Rothman, and everyone else who made the weekend so much fun.

Cheers!

-Josh

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

It’s relatively safe to say that those of us mixing drinks at home will generally chill those drinks with ice. Not Nils and Dave – they use liquid nitrogen. At home we might make a hot drink on the stove. Nils and Dave use a device they call the “Red Hot Poker”, which heats up to 1,750 degrees Fahrenheit. They have great tools, inquisitive minds, and the courage to experiment and discover new and fascinating ways to make our beloved art more interesting.

As Dave was quick to point out, though, home bartenders aren’t subject to the constraints that professionals must confront. A professional bartender must be able to mix a wide variety of cocktails, using any number of ingredients and techniques. When entertaining at home, we have the ability to remove those constraints, and chose to focus on a specific cocktail or two. That frees us up to spend a bit more time, and maybe bring some of these more exciting techniques into our own homes.

Here are just a few of the topics we discussed:

Shaking

Nils and Dave have spoken prolifically on the subject of shaking. In fact, Dave presented on the topic in one of my favorite seminars at Tales of the Cocktail last year. But during our interview, Dave noted that while those of us more familiar with mixing our own drinks know how long to shake out of habit, many at home just aren’t sure. Their solution: shaking to completion. Rather than building a cocktail using juices and spirits then adding ice, Nils and Dave made ice out of their juice. As a result, you simply combine your ingredients and shake until the “ice” is completely incorporated into the drink. The cocktail they made to demonstrate used ice cubes made of clarified apple juice combined with Tanqueray gin (2:1 apple juice to gin).

Clarification

Speaking of clarified juice, these guys are not fans of juices that make their cocktails cloudy. Nils also feels that clarifying ingredients like juices gives a cocktail a better mouthfeel (and is also better if you plan to carbonate your cocktail, which we’ll talk more about soon.) As a result, they incorporate the use of additives such as ascorbic acid (which prevents the juice from oxidizing) and Pectinex, which is an enzyme that breaks down the pectin in apples and allows the juice to clarify. Dave talks more about this on their blog, Cooking Issues.

Liquid Nitrogen

This is just plain cool. Nils and Dave like to play with liquid nitrogen for a few reasons. Naturally, it’s fun, but as they point out, it also lets you chill a cocktail very quickly, and without any dilution. This can be a huge help if you’re batching large quantities of cocktails, as you might for a party. It also makes for some great cocktail theatre!

Hopefully it goes without saying, but just in case, it’s worth pointing out that Nils and Dave are experts and handling volatile substance like liquid nitrogen, and they’re able to do so in controlled conditions. Liquid nitrogen can be dangerous, so you should avoid trying this at home unless you are properly trained to do so.

Carbonation

Who doesn’t like a little bubbly now and then? We’re used to finding those bubbles in champagne, or the occasional splash of club soda or tonic, but Nils and Dave – as you should know by now – like to get a bit more creative. From the pages of a recent class they taught at FCI on Holiday Cocktails, they prepared a traditional mulled wine called Glögg. Glögg is a red wine, sugar, and spices like cinnamon, cardamom, ginger, cloves, and so on. And if I had to make a guess, I’d venture to say that Nils added a bit of aquavit as well! But rather than serve this cocktail warm, as is traditional, they decided to add carbonation, and serve the drink cold.

This is actually something you can try at home, with many of the carbonation systems now available to consumers. Dave advises, though, that with mixed drinks, you generally need to use a higher pressure setting than you would for normal soda water. He suggests 40psi (as opposed to the 30psi you’d use for seltzer), as the sugar in mixed drinks has a tendency to absorb more of the carbon dioxide.

Emulsification

Dave Arnold is an expert on hydrocolloids (he teaches a class on the subject at FCJ). These ingredients – such as Xanthan, carrageen, alginate, gellan, and pectin – allow for adding texture and shape to ingredients that aren’t normally friendly towards that sort of manipulation. Case in point: butter. Butter shows up in a few cocktails; most notably, the Hot Buttered Rum. But the challenge is that it tends to separate quickly, so you get a layer of butter on top, and the rest of the cocktail below. Not the ideal experience. The solution: a butter syrup, made with an emulsifier called TIC Pretested Ticaloid 210S (a mix of Gum Arabic and xanthan gum). The butter syrup will mix evenly throughout the cocktail, and never separate. The demo cocktail was the Cold Buttered Rum, which is served at FCI’s restaurant, L’Ecole. (Complete recipe for Cold Buttered Rum)

The Red Hot Poker

Once again, this is just plain cool. The Red Hot Poker is really just that – a long stick that gets very, very hot (1.750 F to be exact). It’s really meant to be a modern day substitute for the now forgotten Loggerhead (which was basically a fireplace poker that was used to heat drinks way back when.)

The advantage of the red hot poker is not only the speed and uniformity with which the drinks are heated, but at that temperature, you basically get instant beverage ignition, resulting is some lovely caramelization of sugars and citrus. It’s a taste you simply can’t get by heating your drink on the stove. Nils and Dave talk more about the Red Hot Poker on their blog.

Needless to say, you don’t want to try this at home (or maybe you want to, but you shouldn’t). Dave did suggest a solution for those at home, though: Lava Rocks. By heating stone over an open flame, then adding it to your beverage, you’ll get as close as possible to the red hot poker effect as you can without actually having a red hot poker. Dave got his set by purchasing a stone bowl – the kind used often in Korean cuisine, and breaking it into pieces!

Rotary Evaporation

Have you ever tried a scotch infused with dry roasted peanuts? Or an aquavit infused with Douglas Fir (which absolutely tastes like a Christmas tree)? The key to creating such things is rotary evaporation, which allows for distillation at low temperatures. To be honest, the topic is far to complex to describe here, but fortunately the guys have written an entire primer on the subject.

Wrapping Up

I can’t thank Nils and Dave enough for taking the time to demonstrate these cutting edge techniques for me. As I mentioned earlier, Nils and Dave teach classes at the French Culinary Institute – if you ever have the opportunity, go! You can find more about their upcoming schedule on their website, or by calling 888-FCI-CHEF. You can also partake of some of their work at the FCI restaurant, L’Ecole.

Skål! (Cheers!)

Cheers,

Josh

From the class description:

See innovative techniques, such as carbonation, rotary evaporation, and vacuum infusion, in action. And pick up handy low-tech bartender tricks to help you maximize cocktail taste and texture at home. On the agenda for the night: Nils’ take on traditional Swedish Glögg, a cutting-edge hot buttered rum, and cocktails flamed with the Red Hot Poker (a turbocharged electric rod Dave built for beverage ignition), along with festive snacks for the cocktail hour and a few other surprises.

Dave’s going to ignite cocktails with something called the Red Hot Poker. What other excuse could you possibly need?

Holiday Cocktails with Nils & Dave
December 2, 2009 6:30-8:30pm
462 Broadway at the corner of Grand Street in New York City

Hope to see you there!

Cheers,

-Josh

The course is broken up into five parts: four self-paced modules completed at home with a book, DVDs, and online quizzes, and a one-day live session which includes seminars, a written exam, and a practical exam.

The four self-paced modules included:

1. Spirits Basics
How fermented liquids become the “spirits” that we love How to taste and evaluate spirits like a professional

2. Spirits Categories
Using your tasting skills to understand how fine brandies, whiskeys, liqueurs and white spirits should best be enjoyed in all service applications

3. Cocktails and Mixology
History of mixology and of the seminal cocktails that influence mixology today
Knowing the mandatory bar tools and their uses
Knowing the fundamental ingredients, glassware, garnishes and their usages

4. Practical Application and Service
The 25 classic drinks every bartender should know
Creating new cocktails, creating cocktail menus
Preparation, service basics, ordering, inventory, customer relations, cash handling
Advancing your career by applying all these skill refinements

The content delivered through the book, DVDs, and the live session was exemplary, particularly due to the fact that it was presented by the folks behind BAR (Beverage Alcohol Resource). If you have cocktail books in your collection at home, chances are they were written by the BAR crew: Dale DeGroff, Steve Olson, Doug Frost, F. Paul Pacult, Andy Seymour and David Wondrich. And just when you thought it couldn’t get any better, the practical exam (in which each student is asked to prepare 3 drinks from a list of “25 essential cocktails”) was judged by the countries leading mixologists: the members of the BAR crew, as well as folks like Jim Meehan and Don Lee of PDT (my favorite NYC bar) and bartenders from famous institutions around the country.

The exams, I’ll admit, were not easy. The written exam was comprised of 100 questions, 85 of which focused on details from the BarSmarts text and DVDs. The remaining 15 were based on a blind tasting of three different spirits. For my practical exam, I was asked to prepare a Manhattan (using bourbon – I asked), a Margarita, and a Caprioska (a Caipirinha made with vodka instead of cachaca). I received some wonderful input and feedback from my judge – a very talented bartender name Alex, who traveled all the way from Cure in New Orleans.

My understanding is that an online version of the program (called BarSmarts Wired) will open to the public early next year. From my experience, I would strongly encourage anyone with an interest in learning more about the preparation of classic cocktails (as well as the foundations of how spirits are made, etc.) to keep an eye out for that opportunity.

In the meantime (while I anxiously await the results of my exams!) here’s the complete list of the “25 essential cocktails every bartender should know.” I’d suggest you get to work on learning the recipes now :-)

Cheers,

Josh

25 Cocktails Every Bartender Should Know

Aviation Cocktail
Bellini
Blood & Sand
Bloody Mary
Caipirinha
Cosmopolitan
Collins (Tom, John or Vodka)
Daiquiri
Gimlet
Gin Fizz
Irish Coffee
Mai Thai
Manhattan
Margarita
Martini (Dry or Extra Dry)
Mint Julep
Mojito
Negroni
Old Fashioned (Classic or Muddled)
Pisco Sour
Rob Roy
Sazerac
Stinger
Whiskey Sour

Moving on: SxSW picks their panels by popular acclaim, so Lindsey needs your votes. Please head over to the SxSW PanelPicker and give Lindsey’s panel a big ol’ thumbs up. We need to carry the message of cocktail culture (and also our thoughts about building an audience, ethical blogging, etc.) to the masses.

Vote early. Vote often.

Cheers,

Josh

Last night, we were lucky to have two amazing tweetups back-to-back. The first was the evolution of what has become our awesome monthly event (which began with our brown liquor tweetup in Brooklyn, followed by our clear liquor tweetup at Double Crown last month). This month’s tweetup focused on Rum – Tiki-style cocktails in particular. @Sweetblogomine was kind enough to get things organized at Elettaria in the West Village, which has a Mahalo Monday tiki special. My favorite of the evening was the Black Pearl – a twist on the Old Fashioned which includes Old Forester bourbon, Curzan black strap rum, demerara sugar and bitters. Outstanding.

As the tiki tweetup started to wind down, it was time to move on to Keen’s Chophouse for a tasting of The Dalmore, an excellent Highland single malt scotch. Organized by our good friend @livethelushlife and hosted by whiskey expert @the_nose, we were fortunate to receive an expert education on the proper way to taste scotch. Turns out I’ve been doing it wrong this whole time. We tasted both the Dalmore Gran Reserva and the Dalmore 15, both of which are outstanding single malts. The Gran Reserva spends time in both sherry and bourbon barrels, and turns out a bright, intense flavor with a sweet finish. The 15 year spends its time exclusively in sherry barrels, resulting in a more rounded, balanced flavor with a beautiful aroma.

Our good friend @halw also received an exclusive taste of a 1936 single malt, said to be one of the most expensive scotchs on the planet (at around $160,000 per bottle). He seemed to enjoy it :-)

You can read all of our tweets about the event by searching for #TheDalmore on Twitter.

Thanks again to @sweetblogomine, @livethelushlife, and @the_nose for hosting wonderful events! It was also great to see (and in some cases, finally meet!) so many Twitter friends, including @brooklynwino, @shotsandcuts, @halw, @daisy17, @meredithmo, @csmcbride, @paystyle and @selenawrites.

Cheers!

Here’s what you’re going to need:

2oz gin (Erin used Hendricks)
3/4oz fresh lemon juice
1/2oz simple syrup
1/2oz Cointreau
2 slices of cucumber
1 sprig of rosemary (plus another for garnish)

In the bottom of a mixing glass, muddle the rosemary and cucumber with the lemon juice and simple syrup. Add the gin, Cointreau, and plenty of ice, and shake well. Strain into a tall glass over fresh ice, and garnish with a fresh sprig of rosemary.

Many thanks to Erin Williams from Cointreau for mixing up my favorite drink at Tales of the Cocktail! Cheers!