Posted by Anita on 03.17.08 8:29 PM
In his introduction to this month’s Mixology Monday festivities, our genial host Rick describes how he came up with the idea for his theme of “Limit One“:
“Exotic cocktail spots would often advertise their potent potions by limiting a customer to one per evening. It wasn’t all gimmick, however; some recipes like the Zombie contained up to 5oz of 80-proof spirit! This phenomenon isn’t limited to just tiki drinks; in fact, many locales even have laws that forbid a bartender to create a drink with more than a specified quantity of liquor.”
Well, these sorts of potent potations may not necessarily be limited to tropical concoctions, but it’s hard to avoid the correlation: If the bar name includes an island locale and/or the word “Trader” in its name, the chances are pretty good that you’ll find some pretty strong stuff at the bottom of the menu.
Mercifully, many of these voluminous drinks come equipped with two or more straws, and most are expressly designed to be shared by gregarious group of cocktail hounds. Among this genre, the best known — and possibly the most confusingly varied — is the Scorpion Bowl. Back in the tiki heyday of the 1950s, it seemed like every bartender had his own scorpion style; some stuck with the arguably original rum and brandy; others went straight for the jugular with gin and/or vodka, and still others just threw together any random combination of high-proof booze in a bowl with sweet syrups, colorful liqueurs, and a tropical fruit garnish. With bartenders like these, it’s a miracle that anyone survived to tell the tale, much less that the Scorpion Bowl is remembered — and reinvented — so fondly in the modern mixology world.
At Alameda’s Forbidden Island, there’s no shortage of high-octane cocktails. Yes, you’ll even find a Scorpion Bowl: Show up on Sundays, and you can share one with your friends for a mere $15. Theirs is a potent elixir, and quite the show to boot: A flaming crouton simulates lava spewing forth from the crater of the bowl’s volcano centerpiece. True to its origins, this scorpion’s sting will surely make you — and, hopefully, three of your closest friends — forget all of your cares… and maybe your name.
But for my money, the tastier option is a Forbidden Island exclusive known as the Fugu for Two. Even though it’s served in an adorable Munktiki fish-bowl, it’s hard to imagine how anyone other than a tiki fanatic would think that a couples’ cocktail served from the belly of a ceramic pufferfish is romantic. (‘Til death do us part, anyone?) But the drink itself is as delicious as it is strong: Fruity and tropical, but not sickly sweet. It’s as potent as its Scorpion sibiling, yes, but it’s more than a little civilized.
For those of you who can’t make it to Alameda, the Fugu tastes just as nice when served in a regular bowl — or even a pair of double Old Fashioned glasses, in a pinch — as it does when it’s poured into a jumbo collectible mug. And unlike its aquatic namesake, you don’t even need a special license to prepare this Fugu.
Fugu for Two
3 oz amber rum
1 oz vodka
1 oz apricot brandy
2 oz pineapple juice
1-1/2 oz fresh lemon juice
1 oz passion fruit syrup (preferably Monin)
1 oz orgeat
sparkling wine
Combine all ingredients in a blender with two cups of cracked ice and pulse twice, very quickly. Pour into a tall bowl. and add more cracked ice to fill. Top with a float of sparkling wine, and serve with two straws.
bar culture, drinks, East Bay, Mixology Monday, recipes
14 Comments »
Posted by Anita on 03.14.08 7:07 AM
Happy St. Paddy’s Day!
A wee bit early, you say? Nae, says I.
Although St. Patrick’s Day is usually observed on March 17, this year — with Easter coming so early — a bit of liturgical arcana has moved mountains. Because Catholic rules prohibit the celebration of saint’s feasts during Holy Week, the Church has actually moved St. Patrick’s Day to March 14. (For those of you keeping score at home, the last time this ecclesiastic clash occurred was 1940, and the next time will be 2160… so we’ve got a few years to plan.)
Most bishops are none too happy about drunken revelry during the holiest week of the year, and the clever ones are supporting the official shift by offering dispensation to their flocks, absolving them of the sin of carousing on a Lenten Friday, which is traditionally a day of abstinence. As you might expect, this once-in-most-lifetimes rescheduling has plenty of civic celebration-mavens in a tizzy — apparently, not everyone got the memo, and most cities (and nearly every bartender I’ve asked) will still be trotting out barrels of green beer on Monday.
But regardless of when you’re celebrating, there’s got to be a better glass to raise than watery, shamrock-colored beer. Please, I implore you: Grab yourself a snoot of Jameson (or Bushmills, if you’re of a Protestant sort), a pint of Guinness, a Black Velvet, or something else — anything else! — that reminds you of the Land of Saints and Scholars.
One of the best of your options, Irish Coffee was brought to America in the early 1950s by the then-owner of San Francisco’s Buena Vista Cafe, Jack Koeppler. Haunted by the drink he’d enjoyed at Shannon Airport before a seaplane flight home from the Emerald Isle, Koeppler and his friend Stanton Delaplane, a travel writer for the San Francisco Chronicle, tinkered and experimented for months to replicate the formula. Koeppler even made a return trip to Ireland — all in the name of “research”, of course — and brought back the official recipe from Joe Sheridan, the bartender who (by most accounts) invented the drink. Even today, enjoying an Irish Coffee at the Buena Vista remains one of the few legitimate reasons for a trip to Fisherman’s Wharf, an otherwise benighted stretch of The City best left to the socks-and-sandals set.
The cafe caused a tempest in a coffee cup last year when word leaked that the recipe had — gasp! — been altered. Although the current owner claims that cost was not a factor, the fact of the matter is that the Buena Vista abandoned their private-label whiskey in favor of off-the-shelf Tullamore Dew. The subtle change is lost on most customers, and the ol’ BV still turns out more than 2,000 Irish Coffees a day to windswept tourists as they toddle off the cable cars at the end of the line. I assure you that, Tullamore Dew or no, it tastes a heck of a lot better than green beer.
Irish Coffee
4oz fresh, hot coffee
2oz Irish whiskey
whipping cream
sugar cubes
Pour hot water into a footed coffee glass to bring it to temperature. Meanwhile, whip the cream lightly, just enough so that it will be able to float atop the drink, but not until peaks form. Pour the hot water out of the glass, and add two sugar cubes. Fill the glass about 3/4 full with hot coffee, and stir to dissolve the sugar cubes. Add the shot of whiskey, and top with the lightly whipped cream, pouring over a spoon to keep the layers distinct.
bar culture, coffee & tea, Drink of the Week, drinks, holidays & occasions
11 Comments »
Posted by Anita on 03.07.08 7:07 AM
What is it about ginger-beer drinks that brings together unlikely bedfellows? The Moscow Mule, for example: Two guys sitting around a Hollywood bar, trying to come up with a novel way to slog their middlebrow vodka and their slow-moving sodapop, combine their bevvies in a novelty copper cup. Somehow, this unholy alliance actually resulted in a fabulous drink, one of the few vodka cocktails I’ll actually admit to liking.
Likewise, here’s our friend the Dark & Stormy. Or, I should say, the Dark n’ Stormy®. Yup — some wily bastard had the gall to trademark this classic island refresher. Worse yet, the corporate overlords who own the name actually go around telling people that it’s unlawful (!) to build your beverage with any other rum besides Gosling’s Black Seal.
However you punctuate the damn thing, it’s another product of oddball circumstance: During the late 1800s, the British Navy either bought or built (depending on who you ask) a ginger-beer plant on the island of Bermuda. Your guess is as good as mine as to what prompted Her Majesty’s finest to get into the soft-drinks line, but there you have it. It didn’t take long for the boys in blue to add their daily tot of rum to the spicy soda, and a beverage was born.
Now, I’m not entirely certain that the bartenders of my fair City are acquainted with the attorneys representing the interests of Gosling’s Export (Bermuda) Ltd, because — just between us kids — I’ve seen them pouring pretty much any dark rum that comes to hand. And trust me, I’ve watched a lot of these being made this winter: It seems like every Dom, Duggan, and Harry in SF has added this golden tipple to their cocktail list. Bars of some fame have hosted entire evenings devoted to the drink (Dark n’ Stormy night, har har). There’s no denying it: San Francisco’s pros may be knocking back Fernet, but the paying stiffs out front are guzzling rum-spiked ginger beer like it’s never going out of style.
Contrarian though I am, I’ll grudgingly admit that the best Dark and Stormys we sampled were indeed made with the legally prescribed brand. But I think it’s safe to say that your choice of ginger brew — and please, don’t use that supermarket crap, or even the fabulously subtle Fever-Tree here — will have a much more dramatic effect on the end result than any small variations in rum labels.
Given the drink’s naval origins, it’s a fair bet that Pusser’s wouldn’t be far off the traditional mark, for example. And I’ll vouch that the drink’s awfully good when made with a quality gold rum — like Appleton VX — and a sassy Southern ginger ale like Blenheim… although this turns it into something more like a “Fair n’ Breezy”. Cameron, lover of all things molasses, prefers his Stormys on the Extra Dark side, made with Cruzan Blackstrap and Bunda from Down Undah.
So, go ahead: Experiment, and find your own favorite combination. We promise not to sic the laywers on you.
Dark & Stormy
2 oz dark rum, preferably Gosling’s Black Seal
6 oz ginger beer (or quality ginger ale)
limes
Fill a highball glass with ice, and pour the rum over the rocks. Add the ginger beer to fill, and garnish with a healthy wedge of lime.
Drink of the Week, drinks, recipes
7 Comments »
Posted by Cameron on 02.22.08 7:01 AM
While trying to untangle the history of the Martinez, I started to feel like Jack Nicholson trying to get a straight answer out of Faye Dunaway in “Chinatown”. Built primarily from gin and sweet vermouth, the Martinez looks like the love child of the Martini and the Manhattan.
In the annals of cocktail lore, the Martinez is often cited as the parent of the Martini. Sister? Daughter? Both? Aw hell, Jake. I guess you can add cocktails to the list of things that get respectable if they last long enough.
Like many classic cocktails, the Martinez mutated over the years in response to changing tastes and available ingredients. Originally made with Old Tom Gin and a larger vermouth-to-gin ratio, the modern Martinez is a much drier tipple.
Martinez
— adapted from Gary Regan’s The Joy of Mixology
2 oz gin
1 oz sweet vermouth
2 to 3 dashes, or up to 1/4 oz Maraschino liqueur
1 dash bitters (typically Angostura, but Peychaud’s for an interesting variation)
lemon or orange twist
Combine liquid ingredients in cocktail shaker over ice. Stir until well chilled, and strain into a cocktail glass. Garnish with twist.
Drink of the Week, drinks, recipes
7 Comments »
Posted by Anita on 02.15.08 9:31 PM
I know Valentine’s Day is officially over, but I’m not quite ready to leave the smooches and sweet-nothings behind quite yet. Like many of our friends, this year we’ve shifted our romantic celebration to the weekend. We’ve learned the hard way that being rushed through an overpriced set menu at a crowded restaurant, or scrambling to make a memorable meal at home on a weeknight, is no great recipe for romance.
Although it’s not quite as bad as going to a bar on New Year’s Eve, trying to find a suitable sip for your sweetheart is perilous at best. I get a headache just thinking about the insipid sea of sickly-sweet Cosmos and cheap Champagne that’s floated out in poor Saint Valentine’s name each year. Bleh.
Even if you already celebrated your amorous occasion last night, you might fancy a taste of Royal Romance this weekend. According to CocktailDB, this faintly exotic drink won first prize in the British Empire Cocktail Competition of 1934. Curious about which particular liaison might have captured the creator’s fancy, I did a little digging.
It turns out that the alliance in question was quite the fashionable one. In September of 1934, England’s Prince George, the Duke of Kent, proposed to Princess Marina of Greece and Denmark. According to royal-watchers, the bride was “an accomplished linguist and skillful dressmaker … also widely renowned for her style and beauty.” The groom was no slouch, himself. “Cheerful, popular and handsome” Time magazine said of the Duke in reporting his betrothal, tactfully glossing over a social life that would exhaust Bertie Wooster, including a long history of affairs with glittering celebrities, socialites, and entertainers of both genders, and some dabbling in pharmaceutical recreation.
These two glamorous royals made headlines during their brief courtship, and had all London in their thrall in the run-up to the wedding — just the sort of hubbub that leads to the christening of a cocktail. Perhaps the Grand Mariner was a pun on the bride’s name, the gin a nod to Jolly Old England. Add some passion fruit juice for its allusions to ardent love, and grenadine for a bridal blush, and voilá: a cocktail worthy of the crown.
Royal Romance
1 1/2oz dry gin
3/4oz Grand Marnier
3/4oz passion fruit juice
grenadine
Shake the gin, Grand Marnier, and juice with ice and strain into a cocktail glass. Drop the grenadine from a bar spoon into the bottom of the glass as a garnish.
Drink of the Week, drinks, holidays & occasions, recipes
6 Comments »
Posted by Anita on 02.08.08 12:01 PM
The fall that Cameron and I started dating was a brutal season. Everyone we knew seemed to have one of those colds that catches you in its grip and refuses to let go. The sound of coughing and sneezing was everywhere, and it seemed like the whole city of San Francisco had a red nose and bags under its eyes.
That was the first time — though certainly not the last — that I heard Cameron describe his favorite cold remedy, the Two-Hat Cure: “Grab a bottle of whiskey and put your hat at the foot of the bed. Get into bed, pile the blankets high, and take a good long pull of whiskey. Keep drinking until you see two hats.” It may not cure your cold, exactly, but you definitely won’t care.
In all seriousness, medical experts tell us to exercise caution when drinking while under the weather: Alcohol can dehydrate your already overtaxed system, and many over-the-counter medications are downright dangerous with booze. But even our grandmothers knew that there’s definitely a time and a place for the medicinal powers of whiskey. Especially when combined with sugar or honey, it has the power to calm coughs and soothe raspy throats. Adding warm water or juice helps adjust for the dehydration factor and alleviate sinus congestion. And its sedative effects can give over-exhausted bodies the push they need to get some much-needed Z’s.
In short, a Hot Toddy is just the ticket when you’re feeling under the weather. It’s one of those highly adaptable recipes — CocktailDB alone lists more than 20 variations — but nearly every Toddy follows a simple formula: Combine a shot of (usually brown) liquor and a sweetener (sugar, honey); fill the glass with warm water (or cider, juice, etc.), and garnish with complementary aromatics; traditional choices include lemon wedges, orange peel, and warm spices like cinnamon, nutmeg, or cloves. The less-commonly-seen cold toddy follows the same basic model, but is served in a rocks glass over ice.
While spending the last two-plus weeks battling a world-class cold and its aftereffects — and in the spirit of month’s edition of Mixology Monday hosted by the fine Mr. Patrick at Jimmy’s Cocktail Hour — I’ve been exploring a number of variations in the key of Toddy. I started with bourbon, honey, and orange peel; I sampled brandy, lemon juice, and sugar; I tried rum with brown sugar, cloves, and nutmeg. But my favorite flavor combo includes a strong slug of 100-proof applejack, sweetened with unbleached sugar cubes and garnished with a stick of Mexican cinnamon and star anise. After all, if an apple a day keeps the doctor away, I’m all for it.
Hot Apple Toddy
1oz to 2oz applejack (or brandy, whiskey, etc.)
1 to 2 natural sugarcubes
hot water
Garnishes: cinnamon stick (preferrably Mexican canela), star anise, or other warm spices; lemon wedge, apple slice, orange peel, etc.
Place the sugar and applejack in the bottom of an Irish coffee mug. Add hot water to fill, stir to dissolve sugar, and garnish as desired.
Drink of the Week, drinks, Mixology Monday, recipes
11 Comments »
Posted by Anita on 02.01.08 6:54 AM
My friend Sam brought us the most fabulous hostess gift: A vintage copy of Robert Vermiere’s Cocktails – How to Mix Them. It’s a little pocket-sized gem of a book, best known as one of the first sources for the Sidecar. (It’s possible Harry MacElhone’s ABCs of Mixing Cocktails beat Vermiere to the punch, but both sport a 1922 publication date so I’m content to call it a draw.)
I spent a happy afternoon flipping through the book’s age-darkened pages, amusing myself by deciphering the spidery notes in its margins scribbled by some long-ago drinker. It’s a treasure trove of possibilities.
Alas, the spirit is willing, but the flesh is weak.
I’ve had no desire whatsoever to experiment, much less to imbibe. Like nearly everyone else in my area code, I’ve been slammed by the bug that doctors are calling the Super Cold. I’ll spare you the litany of disgusting symptoms and secondary infections, but I feel compelled to brag that I made a nurse say “Eeeww!”
After a trip to the emergency room and enough prescriptions to supply a small pharmacy, I’m finally back among the living. I even managed to have a drink or two last night. But frankly, the idea of tinkering with proportions or doing a lot of in-depth historical research is still making me a little woozy. Luckily, there were enough great bubbly-based drinks flowing at the Cockails and Canapes party that I won’t have to leave you in the lurch this week. Here’s one of my favorites:
Le Mistral Mauve
1/2oz to 1oz creme de violette
1/2oz rosemary-infused simple syrup, or to taste
Brut Champagne or other dry sparkling wine
Measure the violette and rosemary syrup into a Champagne flute. Top with a dry bubbly, and garnish with a blossoming herb. (We used rosemary, but any pretty sprig will do.)
To make rosemary syrup, measure equal parts water and sugar into a saucepan. Bring to a simmer over medium-low heat, and stir occasionally until sugar is completely dissolved. Add a large bunch of rosemary to the pan, and remove from the heat. Allow the rosemary to steep in the syrup until its flavor is very pronounced. Remove the rosemary, and strain the syrup through a fine sieve (or a coffee filter, if you want to be fancy).
I usually add a fresh sprig of rosemary to the syrup bottle; it reminds me what’s inside, and has the side effect of looking rather charming. Flavored syrup keeps in the refrigerator for at least a week. Other drinks that use rosemary syrup include the Gin-Gin Cooler and the Rosemary Five; It’s also lovely in sparkling water as a homemade soda.
EDITED TO ADD: If you can’t find creme violette in your area, Monin makes a lovely non-alcoholic violet syrup that you can use in its place. Lots of restaurant supply stores sell these syrups, or you can buy them on Amazon.
Drink of the Week, drinks, recipes, wine & bubbly
9 Comments »
Posted by Anita on 01.25.08 7:03 AM
Last weekend’s do-it-yourself bubbly bar was a source of great amusement for our guests. Aided by a handy cheat-sheet, the crew whipped up Kir Royales and Champagne Cocktails and Death in the Afternoons aplenty. For the teetotalers, we also offered an assortment of homemade syrups and alternative sparklers — Seltzer Sisters soda water and two kinds of ginger ale — along with suggestions for non-alcoholic spritzers.
One of my favorites in this category is the venerable Horse’s Neck, a deceptively simple combination of a ginger ale and long strip of lemon zest that dates to the late 1800s. Popular though the soft drink was, it didn’t take long for clever barkeeps to fortify it. As early as 1897, columnists allowed that “a dash of whisky is said not to interfere with the agreeable taste of this drink.” By the turn of the century, the once-optional shot was nearly a foregone conclusion, although the original recipe enjoyed a revival of sorts during the temperance years.
The boozed-up version — known as a “Horse’s Neck with a Kick” or a “Stiff Horse’s Neck”, depending on which mixology manual you consult — adds an ounce or two of your favorite brown liquor to the glass. Most recipes call for whiskey of some sort, but you find occasional mentions of brandy or even gin. Wander a little further afield, and it’s not too hard to see the hoofprints in similar beverages: Swap rum for whiskey and a lime wedge in place of the lemon twist, and you’ve got a Dark & Stormy. Substitute vodka, and you’re 2/3 of the way to a Moscow Mule — even the name is a clue!
Horse’s Neck with a Kick
1-1/2 to 2oz bourbon or rye
ginger ale
bitters
lemon zest
Place a long, continuous spiral of lemon zest in a Collins glass, hooking one end over the rim to keep it from sinking. Fill the glass with ice, add the bourbon and a few shakes of bitters, and top with ginger ale.
1 Year Ago — DOTW: Bobby Burns
Drink of the Week, drinks, recipes
6 Comments »
Posted by Anita on 01.18.08 7:09 AM
In the pantheon of sparkling cocktails, there are a thousand lesser gods, and then there are the titans: the bright Mimosa, the elegant Champagne cocktail, the tart French 75, and the dusky Kir Royale. They’re generally a subtle lot, and so simple to make that you hardly need a recipe. They’re all lovely in their own ways and moods — Mimosas at brunch, Champagne cocktails at weddings, French 75s when you want to get into an argument about gin vs. brandy — but the Kir Royale is perhaps the most adaptable.
Until it was popularized by Catholic priest Félix Kir, the simple aperitif of white wine and blackcurrant liqueur was known quite aptly as blanc-cassis throughout its native Burgundy. But then, history intervened. An active organizer in the Resistance during World War II, Monsieur Kir helped plan the escape of more than 5,000 prisoners of war. After the Liberation, Kir was elected mayor of Dijon — the Burgundian capital — and eventually took his place in the French national assembly. He was the last clergy member to wear the habit in the halls of the Palais Bourbon, and he always toasted delegations visiting Dijon with the aperitif that perfectly marries two of the town’s best tipples.
The original Kir is made by dosing white wine — not, as some would say, Burgundy’s reknowned Chablis, but rather the slightly sour Aligoté — with Dijon’s equally famous blackcurrant liqueur, creme de cassis. The Kir Royale makes things a bit more festive by replacing the white wine with Champagne, an inspired substitution that moves an everyday apero into the realm of celebratory cocktail.
The Kir Royale also makes a perfect party drink, as it’s low in alcohol — best for guests who may not be accustomed to knocking back a few high-octane libations in an evening — and quite forgiving of measurement-free mixing. After all, what host wants to spend time fiddling with precisely a half-ounce of this and exactly three shakes of that when there are guests to greet, coats to hang, conversation to encourage, and appetizers to primp?
We’re having a few friends over for cocktails and canapés tomorrow night, and one of the ways we’re planning to keep things simple is by setting up a do-it-yourself Champagne bar. We’ll put a case of bubbly on ice, line up a couple dozen flutes, and gather a gaggle of colorful liqueurs — cassis, St-Germain, absinthe, violette, Chartreuse — for guests to customize their drinks. We’ll have syrups, garnishes, and bitters, too, plus a sheet with ideas on how to mix and match. It’ll be fun to see an assortment of pastel sparklers in the hands of our pals; I can’t wait to see what our clever friends concoct.
Kir Royale
1/4 to 1/2 ounce crème de cassis (or to taste)
Champagne or other dry sparkling wine
Pour the cassis into the flute, and top with the bubbly.
Garnish with a lemon twist, if desired.
Drink of the Week, drinks, entertaining, recipes, wine & bubbly
20 Comments »
Posted by Anita on 01.11.08 9:27 PM
Our fave spot Range has been closed for a post-New Year holiday break so we had no idea anything was amiss. But, tonight we read on 7×7’s Buzzed blog that head bartender Brooke Arthur has been hospitalized since New Year’s Eve due to severe smoke inhalation and burns, the result of a fire in her apartment.
Although she probably wouldn’t know us from Adam, Brooke’s amazing cocktail program is one of the many reasons we spend an inordinate amount of our dining budget at Range every month; we even featured one of her creations on Drink of the Week last summer.
In addition to some mind-bending hospital bills — she’s in an intensive burn unit, and unable to breathe on her own at this point, according to the page her family’s updating — Brooke also lost most everything in her apartment to the fire. Duggan and the boys at Cantina are hosting a benefit for Brooke’s expenses this coming Monday night. If you’re a fan of Range’s bar program, or even if you need a worthy excuse for an early-in-the-week cocktail, please join us there.
If you’re unable to come, or simply prefer to donate to Brooke’s family directly, please visit Brooke’s site.
—–
UPDATE 1/15: Last night’s benefit at Cantina was a jam-packed success. Even better news from Marcia at Tablehopper: A star-studded cast of Range alums — including Dominic and Camber — are picking up Brooke’s shifts while she’s convalescing. On Tuesdays and Thursdays (yay, our regular nights!) the restaurant will match all bar tips, donating them to a fund for Brooke’s medical bills and lost income.
bar culture, giving back, other stuff
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