in the 2k10 i am learning to make cocktails. this is my mixology thread

yeah I love stuff like that. it's why I like to use the one big ice cube, slowly changes/opens up the drink as you sip on it

Yeah big cubes are great.

I think an OF with a hunk of orange and even a cherry is drinkable, and I have drunk them including recently. I just think it interferes with the balance of the drink, which is delicate when done well. A small piece may be less intrusive, obviously.

Orange is interesting as a cocktail fruit because orange bitters and peels are important to lots of drinks, but actual orange juice is mostly useless except in glass-of-OJ drinks like screwdrivers. (Or mimosas I suppose, but let's just not talk about those.) It's just too mild, you need the boosted sour blast of lemon or lime to stand up to spirits. Grapefruit can add a nice layer, but it usually needs help — like in the siesta, where the grapefruit sits on top of lime juice.

Even a cynar julep, which is very grapefruit forward, uses an ounce of grapefruit juice revved up with a quarter-ounce of lemon.

Just to be clear, I'm for orange peel, not orange wedges.

Yeah a nice orange twist is great. I just object to pulp.

Anybody ever do flaming/sparking orange peels? It's fun, adds a little theater and a little caramelized flavor.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Fc6WEdQjZiQ

Cynar negronis are the best.

xp yes that technique is delicious, I am usually too lazy but love it in a bar setting

and yes to Cygronis

Our little cocktail service worked a corporate thing a few years ago, pre-COVID, and we calculated that the state sales managers would be less impressed by carefully balanced drinks than by burning shit. So we did old fashioneds with the burnt orange, then some drink I don't even remember that we smoked with a cedar chip under a glass bowl, and the best was margaritas with flaming lime halves on top. They loved it.

Fire good.

Until it sets the bar on fire, catching various spilled spirits and menus ablaze - which happened in the presence of a former ILXor a few months back. The Instagram looked intense but apparently the bar and waitstaff got things under control fairly quickly.

We had an incident with Flaming Dr. Pepper shots last year but I put the spill out before the bar top or any people took damage.

Yeah you don't want to accidentally end up in the molotov cocktail thread.

OK, I'm back. Sorry for being tetchy the other day. I love reading about cocktails and cocktail history and was excited to share some of what I've come across while waiting for my Sunday morning bagel order to be ready.

I agree that a lot of it is hard to pin down, though I do tend to trust someone like David Wondrich simply because he does so much exhaustive historical research and brings a scholarly skepticism to his work. So if he says that he's "almost positive" about something cocktail-related, I figure that's the closest we're going to the truth. (I think his research on the origin of the word "cocktail" was done in the service of The Oxford Companion to Spirits & Cocktails, which he compiled and finally published last year. Back in 2017 or so, I'd invited him to write a new "cocktail" article for Encyclopaedia Britannica, and he declined, citing the demands of the Oxford project.) Btw, he also has a fun podcast called "Fix Me a Drink" that delves into some of the mysteries he's investigated.

I guess wasn't aware that drink snobs ever looked down on the old-fashioned, maybe because I didn't get into cocktails until after the 21st-century renaissance was in full swing and it wasn't difficult to find a well-made old-fashioned at a decent bar. It's never been a favorite drink of mine, though I certainly respect it. If I roll my eyes at the dudes who order it as a default, it's only because it seems unadventurous (and boringly gendered). It is, however, a good way to taste liquor in a way that's relatively unadulterated. If I ever bought some really good bourbon (instead of whatever's decent enough to mix with), I'd probably drink them more often.

I had a classic Wisconsin supper club brandy old fashioned the other night and it was excellent.

xp FWIW, I also quoted Wondrich's "cocktail" definition in an article I wrote a few years ago, so I suppose I'm a little invested in it. :)

there's no better source on cocktail history than wondrich, idk why that would even be a point of debate.

i guess i'm still looking for a source on who was looking down on old fashioneds? i acknowledge that they went through a fruit-forward phase but it's not as though there were all these other incredible drinks around while that was happening.

I had a classic Wisconsin supper club brandy old fashioned the other night and it was excellent.

That sounds great. Yeah, I think there's a place for the Wisconsin brandy old-fashioned. The NYT drinks writer Robert Simonson, who's originally from Wisconsin, has written approvingly about it. And if you're at a supper club in the state, it seems like a real when-in-Rome situation.

Wondrich is great, I meant no impugnment. I don't feel like he totally cinched the "cocktail" case, but that may be because it's not as fun as other theories. Or maybe it's plenty fun, I don't know. The horse's ass part has resonance at least.

On the old fashioned, I just meant that wherever it was first documented, which Wondrich is probably right about, it was a drink long in circulation. It was a baseline mixed drink.

I was in Mexico and we went to a really nice restaurant that had old fashioneds on the menu. I was pretty astonished by it. Wound up ordering it because, if I didn't, who would? Anyway...it was okay

I actually just had a rum old-fashioned earlier tonight. That's practically dessert, but delicious.

OK this is pretty fascinating as the recorded history of angostura predates the Jerry Thomas book

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Angostura_bitters

I mean

Originally used to help with upset stomachs of the soldiers in Simón Bolívar's army,

I love how many spirits and the like were issued for "health" reasons, or, at the least, hangover cures. Drinkers must have been drunk all the fucking time, no wonder they outlawed it.

The amount that average people drank during the day and often while laboring in the pre-modern era is kind of astonishing.

Before the Second Great Awakening just about every man, woman, and child in America was drunk. Water was uh rather unsafe.

What was drank so heavily in the old days was usually small beer (near beer, basiclly) or other very low proof alcohols.

unless you lived in the South

ok so I'm doing Woodford Reserve + bitters + a little simple syrup + a splash of water + 6 oz Squirt + some green olives and a little bit of the juice from the olive jar. oh and a big ice cube. dunno what it is but its good

Godspeed

The sugar-free beverages thread gave me an idea for a low-ABV long drink that really has to be called "Safe/Fake Grapefruit Soda" -- Aperol, lemon juice, club soda. Maybe a little simple syrup.

They say the sbagliato was the drink of the summer, bc apparently some tosser said so on a reality TV show.

I say it's a classic, and shouldn't be linked to a passing trend, like say the cosmopolitan. What do you think about this drink? (Prosecco, sweet vermouth, Campari).

would drink, imo that would be even better subbing Cynar for Campari

lemon twist either way

It's clearly a Negroni subbing Prosecco for gin, but I think that switch makes it a lot more refreshing and more aperitif-like

Hmm. For a more refreshing take on the Negroni I'd probably just offer Aperol spritz, though I suppose that's just one more step removed/simplified from the sbagliato. And lots of people find Aperol less bitter than Campari.

Aperol is definitely less bitter than Campari, but the problem is it's too sweet. There are Aperol substitutes like Select that are slightly less sweet but for me sweet vermouth fixes that problem conclusively.

Or rather the combination of Campari & sweet vermouth

cosmopolitans are classic

One of my favorite summer cocktails is similar:

Take 3 by Zachary Gelnaw-Rubin
2 oz Cynar
.75 oz St-Germain
.75 oz lemon juice
seltzer to top

Add the Cynar, St-Germain and lemon juice to a shaker with ice. Shake to chill, then strain into an ice-filled Collins glass. Top with club soda and garnish with an orange wedge.

It tastes like the best iced coca-cola you have ever had on a hot summer day.

Love a sbagliato.

My favorite spritz is a half-half combo of Aperol and Campari, cuts the sweetness but not as bitter as a Campari spritz. (I like all these spritzes tho.)

Tonight we made French 75s with cognac, a house favorite.

A couple of successes from Punch this week: banana peel "oleosaccharum" subbed in for most of the simple syrup in a Daiquiri. Probably going to have another one later today with all the simple subbed out. The banana peel syrup is banana-y but also tannic, really delicious.

Second was an Alpine Negroni, a riff I prefer over the original. Equal parts standard Negroni ingredients plus Amaro Braulio, plus 1/4 oz. of "champagne acid," a solution of tartaric and lactic acids in water. It really makes the vermouth pop, so use a good one.

A friend of mine was looking for a bottle of something I've never encountered: China-China. Is this an amaro? Is it used in any drinks? I'm not even sure where it's made, or why it's called that.

Technically, it's an amer (French amaro):
https://www.giffard.com/en/bigallet-liqueurs/546-bigallet-china-china.html

I think it's a common substitute for Amer Picon, which isn't available in the U.S.

Here are some recipes that use it:
https://kindredcocktails.com/cocktail?scope=0&index_type=2&output_type=1&ingredient%5B0%5D=Bigallet%20China-China

I had a Soleggiato last week, which is a spritz with Amaro Angeleno, dry vermouth, Manzanilla sherry, and soda. I love anything with dry sherry in it, but this was one refreshing cocktail. Need to find a bottle of Amaro Angeleno.

I am very excited that I have gathered all the ingredients to duplicate local foodie bar cocktail "THE BRAIN", the bartender kindly gave me the recipe

1 oz dry gin
1 oz Angostura Amaro
1/4 oz cocchi di torino
1/4 oz Cruzan Black Strap rum

stir w/ice in glass

add orange AND lemon peel, float with clear overproof rum (Wray & Sons)

only one mention of the boulevardier itt. for shame

― cozen, Monday, 18 November 2013 03:55 (ten years ago) bookmarkflaglink

Bumping those numbers rn. Currently trying everything Negroni adjacent after having a cocktail awakening. Never been a straight spirits guy, never been down for all the fruity nonsense most of those around me drink (just give me beer!). But the Negroni, Manhattan, Old Fashioned, Brooklyn and now the Boulevardier have been an awakening. Please recommend more in this category to a mixology novice

little italian:

2 oz rye
1/2 oz red vermouth
1/2 oz cynar (cynar 70 is best but regular will do)

stire w/ice, orange peel garnish

not campari-related, but delicious