Summer with a Splash of Winter

I don't know about everyone else, but I tend to have a drink for each season. Yes, may strike you as weird, I know; but whatever. This summer I was introduced to the Icepick a refreshingly good mixed drink or Vodka and Iced Tea...very simple, this one is. I had the sudden urge to have one, but pondered creating something more seasonal with some warm spicy winteriness to it. Et voila, I created the Icicle! I had it cold, but without a doubt this would be awesome served hot as well.

2.0 ozs Bourbon
1.5 oz Domaine Du Canton Ginger Liquer
0.25 oz Honey
1 Pinch Ground Cloves
5.0 Tea, preferably well oxidized and unsweetened

For the cold version:
Dry stir the ingredients first to dissolve the honey, then add cracked ice, stir until chilled, pour into a glass. This is a fairly long boozy cocktail so use a big glass; and For garnish I think a lemonwheel would be ideal.

To heat things up a bit (this is where it gets tricky):
Use a THICK walled HEAVY glass preferably with a handle. Into the glass, place a METAL SPOON pour in hot water to fill. This step is important. The spoon will absorb the heat from the glass, thus decreasing the chances of the glass breaking; and the hot water will warm the glass so it won't chill the hot drink. Ever poured cold beer into a hot glass? Exactly, but it's the opposite. Dump the water from your glass, while leaving the spoon, pour in the heated tea and all the ingredients, give it a good stir, and serve.


I really like this one, it's got spice and complexity while being simple and easy. Hope you do, too. Down the hatch!

Really though, there's no A, B, or O. I promise.

So as usual, I had things lying around and after being summoned to a social situation; I arrived "bearing gifts" as the hostess yelled. Truly, I'd bought no gifts, just accents to embellish upon what was already present. In short, a friend had some gin and I thought "Self, we've got the perfect thing to mix with that!" That's how it all began.

Between the hosts and I we had, Tanqueray, Blood Orange Juice, Ground Coriander, and Dolin Dry. I played around a bit evaluating and taking note of what this and this did and what would happen if there was more of this; such is what mixology is about, the study of combining. Here were my findings...well actually, my findings by playing with four ingredients were numerous. Try it and figure it out yourself! In the end I found that:

2.0 ounces Tanqueray
0.5 ounces Dolin Dry
0.5 ounces Blood Orange Juice
Pinch Ground Coriander
Shaken & Served Up,

works just swimmingly! Cheers to the Bloody Martini, enjoy! Pictures to come!

The Lovechild

So I created a drink for a friend's Birthday Party. Turns out she didn't like it, everyone else did. What does she know? It's a mixture of the two or three drinks that I drew inspiration from in it's creation. I think it's an awesome recipe. I wouldn't say it's super simple to make, but it's not really too complex either. It'll really wow your friends.

1.5 ounce Amber Rum, like Mount Gay Refined Eclipse Barbados Rum
1.5 ounce Domaine Du Canton Ginger Liqueur
0.5 ounce Lime Juice
1.0 ounce unsweetened grapefruit juice
2 dashes Peychaud's bitters
1-2 sprigs of mint
0.5 ounce dry sparkling white wine, such as 1+1=3 Cava

In a shaker, add all the ingredients save for the Bitters, Mint, and Sparkling Wine.

Without removing the leaves from the stem, place a sprig of mint in the palm of your hand. Now, use your other hand to give the mint a good THWACK! This releases the oils and sufficiently bruises the mint without making it bitter. Add the mint to the shaker as well and top with ice.

Now shake like crazy to ensure that you impart the flavor of the mint into the drink, strain into a rocks glass over ice. If you have little flecks of mint in the drink that's just fine.

Now add one or two healthy dashes of Peychaud's Bitters.

Top with sparkling wine.

Garnish with lime as you wish. Some may want to go with a lime wedge, but I used my microplane grater and garnished the drink with grated lime zest. Be certain to not grate the pith, the white of the fruit, it's bitter and can be found unpleasant.

Enjoy!

POPular Demand!

In recent years many mixologist are taking on a healthy homegrown/do-it-yourself attitude; think of Martha Stewart, but thrown behind a bar. Bartenders seek out top-notch ingredients or they just make things themselves. The quality of each individual ingredient is paramount to creating a good cocktail, one ingredient that you'll sometimes want to utilize when creating your own is soda...or pop....or soda pop depending on where you're from. I love making soda! It's much quicker and easier than you would think it to be, but will improve your beverage exponentially. You can create simply carbonated water or you can stir up something far more complex! It's whatever's your pleasure.

So yesterday, I was laying around the house bored and thirsty. Then to top it off the cocktail party I was doing was cancelled so I have ingredients abound just laying around. For the cocktail party I was going to do a spin on a not so well known classic, the Buck. A buck is simply your base spirit, ginger ale to fill, and the juice of a quarter lemon; it's the Rickey's littler lesser known sibling. Actually some people already drink Bucks and just don't know it. Here it goes:

Step 1
You need a soda siphon. Mine is made by ISI, it's a one litre canister and it works well enough to suit my needs. When you make soda with this thing, don't expect to have carbonation like your coke from some chain, not happening; there are a few key things to making this work.
-Make sure the canister is cold. I put mine in the freezer before using
-Make sure the mixture going into the canister is cold. I put mine in the canister and put the whole thing in the freezer, BUT don't let it freeze.
Step 2
Make sure your mixture isn't too dense or the carbonation will not take as well. If your base is the consistency of Molasses it just may not work. For my last soda I made a Quince, Cardamom & Rosewater soda. It sounds pretty complex but it's not. I made Cardamom Spiced Quince Puree to which I added a scant amount of sugar and a small bit of rose water then I added to that plain old water!
Step 3
Pour your mixture into your canister, carbonate, let sit for a couple of minutes and chill.
Step 4
Make good use of it. Give it a shake and use as desired. Now you're bartending with gas...well not that way, but you all know what I mean!

Where to begin?

So I'm starting this blog specifically for my home shaken creations. I have a lot of friends that tell me they need recipes and I should make them drinks and etc., etc., etc.. So here it is.

You also don't have to solely rely on someone else to help you think of a good recipe. Read up, sample, and experiment and in no time you'll be concocting things of your own! A great book that explains it all, I believe, is "The Fine Art of Mixing Drinks" by David Embury. This book starts from the basics and goes into great details about what mixes and what doesn't, the construction of a cocktail, the categories of a cocktail, and a myriad of other things you need to know. I would say definitely invest in it. From it I drew lots of information that helped me to formulate rules and theories for my own mixing endeavours.

As you'll probably see more of my style as a bartender with the recipes I post, I have a few things that are pretty consistent such as:
-Weight for Weight
-Using certain acids with certain bases
-Keeping cocktails fairly dry
-Attractive garnish & presentation

and I'm sure there are plenty of other things that I do when making drinks that I can't think of at this time, but we'll see!

It's fall so this month I have Apples on the brain. Check back later to see what I'll mix up. There's so many possibilities! Calvados, Applejack, Apple Juice, Apples; I'm excited. Sidenote: I'm not to huge of a fan of sour apple puckers in cocktail. Don't get me wrong, I can do mixed drinks and Washington Apples are great shooters, but lets take it a little higher, LOL.