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

some Campari classics:

Negroni is a super classic - equal parts gin, sweet vermouth, and campari, served up

Americano - equal parts sweet vermouth and campari, topped w/ club soda and served over ice

there's also the Negroni Sbagliato, the "wrong" negroni, with an ounce each of campari and sweet vermouth and 2oz prosecco, served over ice w/ an orange slice in a balloon glass - delicious!

Pretty much anything w/ campari should be garnished w/ a lemon twist or slice of orange.

Aperol is sort of a sweeter lightweight Campari, which can make it easier to mix with. I love it on the rocks w/ 1/4oz orgeat and 1/2oz lemon juice.

so my local paper's weekly bars/drinking column had a piece on the 500th anniversary of benedictine, featuring some local concoctions that use it. i had some good luck making a couple of them tonight:

RECIPE EIGHTEEN: king's yellow

(from eastern standard restaurant, a good place imo. i assume the name comes from the color of this one when you mix it up?)

1.5 oz. gin
.75 oz. dry vermouth
.75 oz. benedictine
1 dash orange bitters
apricot liqueur for rinsing

combine the gin, vermouth, benedictine, and orange bitters, add ice and stir. then grab a chilled cocktail glass and rinse it with some apricot liqueur, leaving a little pool in the bottom. strain your mixture into the glass. garnish with a generous lemon twist, making sure to get plenty of lemon oil on the surface.

i was never the biggest benedictine fan but this cocktail and the next one both offer pretty interesting uses of it. this is a full-bodied drink with strong fruit notes and good balance.

RECIPE NINETEEN: the chrysanthemum

this is from an excellent french/cuban restaurant called chez henri

1.5 oz. dry vermouth
.75 oz. benedictine
3 dashes (abt 3/8 tsp) pastis (i use herbsaint)

stir over ice and strain into a cocktail glass.

surprisingly complex for a drink with three ingredients, this is easy to make, light, and would be perfect before dinner.

RECIPE TWENTY: ride the pink horse

from the same article--only prob is the recipe is incomplete (in that they don't tell you what to do with everything). anyway, they're making it at noir bar, a hotel bar in harvard square. i will reproduce what the paper told me and my subs and interpretations.

1.5 oz. benedictine
22 dashes (!) angostura
.5 oz. peach brandy (sub apricot liqueur)
"2 lemon wedges" (sub .25 oz. fresh lemon juice)
"2 cinnamon sticks" (sub a couple shakes from my cinnamon spice jar)
"1 dash almond syrup" (sub .25 oz. maraschino)

combine in a rocks glass and stir with ice. the original garnish was a dehydrated orange slice, to which i say "lol"

from the photo accompanying the article we know it's a rocks drink. not clear what happened to the cinnamon sticks or lemon wedges in the original recipe, a problem i solved by liquidating and powdering everything. i'm not necessarily going to endorse this as a brilliant drink, but it is assuredly the most angostura you're going to consume anytime soon, and as i type this i find myself enjoying each sip of what is a truly strange concoction.

next boston fap = cocktai77 party imo

^^^wld support!

btw there is cause for celebration in the cad residence tonight, because over the weekend i got to purchase some COUPES!

http://farm5.static.flickr.com/4029/4357751005_63d3d6bc58.jpg

the coupe is appropriate any time a cocktail glass is called for. imo it's more attractive than the regular conical cocktail glass, it's a more manageable size and height, and it's easier to drink out of. <3 coupes.

nice!

so tonight i am attending gin cocktail class at the boston shaker. i leave you with these useful words i read recently:

"I like drinking. Not stinking drunk. Not mean drunk. Not out-of-control drunk. Not Mel Gibson, David Hasselhoff or Lindsay Lohan drunk. And certainly not college drunk (fill in your own room spinning, nauseating, swearing you'll never, ever drink again episode here). Unnecessary. Bad form. Mistake.

But how about just a little drunk. Laugh-out-loud-drunk. Who gives a crap? drunk. Let's-get-naked-and-jump-in-the-ocean drunk. Come to think of it, just drunk enough to briefly overlook the mountain of responsibility we face daily. Isn't that what alcohol was intended for?"

do you like rye? have you ever wanted to dress your rye up a bit, but not too much?

RECIPE TWENTY-ONE: the police gazette cocktail

.25 oz. rye (old overholt imo)
.25 oz. dolin blanc vermouth (sub noilly prat dry)
.25 oz. senior's orange curacao di curacao (sub cointreau)
.25 oz. maraschino liquor
1 maraschino cherry (uhhhhh optional)
1 dash angostura bitters
1 dash regans' orange bitters no. 6 (sub fee's orange)

stir the rye, maraschino, vermouth, and cointreau over ice and strain. add the cherry if you are weird, and then dash the bitters on top of the drink.

ok, with a name like that why wouldn't you make it? apparently the police gazette was a magazine with true crime stories, girlie pictures, and cocktail recipes (and quite possibly only those three things). like i said the rye is still at the forefront and the effect of everything else is one of v. subtle modification. still, would make again.

SORRY! 2.5 oz. rye

a little serendipity over the past two days--last night, in gin cocktail class, we were talking about flamed citrus zest and the dude who was running the class mentioned a cocktail called the camino, which was created at a restaurant around here called craigie on main. so today i did some idle googling and got the recipe, which is kind of intense:

RECIPE TWENTY-TWO: the camino

1.5 oz. rittenhouse rye (sub old overholt)
1 oz. housemade ambre vermouth (sub noilly ambre if you go to france, carpano antica if you have a lot of money, lillet blank if you're me)
.5 oz. tremontis mirto dell'isola di sardegna myrtle berry liqueur
2 dashes angostura
2 dashes orange bitters

stir over ice, strain into a chilled rocks glass, garnish with a flamed orange peel.

so anyway, i looked at that recipe and was like "ok, not happening anytime soon." then, on the way home from work, and accident caused me to get off the highway early and pass near a big liquor store i'd be meaning to go to for a while. what is there on a bottom shelf but a single bottle of tremontis mirto? i take it as a sign, spend more money than i intended to, and head home.

mirto is indeed made from myrtle berries--if this bottle is an indication of the overall "thing" it's sweet, dark, and somewhat herbal-y. nice stuff.

GENERAL ASIDE FOR THIS THREAD: in addition to (hopefully) encouraging participation, this thread is basically my personal recipe list (i check it all the time when i'm trying to remember stuff). i don't want to be weird posting a bunch of things that no one can make. that being said, this is a cool drink--sweet with a nice warming alcohol burn, VERY easy going down. if you find yourself in an appropriately equipped bar or just say "damn i should have some myrtle berry liqueur around" i would recommend this up there with anything i have ever made. and i did subs for the two most voluminous ingredients.

hey guys, i've been working hard mixing drinks and trying stuff, but wasn't positive anything deserved to be posted here until tonight.

RECIPE TWENTY-THREE: the periodista

1.5 oz. rum (white rum often specified, i got much better results with flor de cana gold rum)
.5 oz. lime juice
.25 oz. apricot liqueuer
.25 oz. triple sec

OPTIONAL: .5 tsp superfine sugar

shake all ingredients with ice and strain, garnish with lime.

this is a great drink--amazing how much just that splash of apricot transforms everything. tonight i made two versions back to back, one with no sugar and one with. sugar is usually specified in this recipe but i'd encourage you to try it both ways. i don't like things very sweet and my preference would run to the sugar-free, but i can certainly recognize the validity of the sweet version. may also depend on which apricot product you use; my rothman and winter is quite sweet imo and there could be drier ones out there.

I'm going to make this right now!

Actually, before I start, maybe you can offer advice. Which rum should I use? Here's what I have:

Dark Jamaican (Myers)
Light Puerto Rican (Bacardi)
Gold Puerto Rican (Bacardi)
Appleton Jamaican
Demerara (El Dorado 12 year)
Barbados (Mount Gay)
151 (Bacardi)

And I'm going to substitute Cointreau for Triple Sec, which I don't have.

ok well youre in luck on one thing--cointreau technically is triple sec; iirc they removed tripe sec from the label cause too many inferior products were using it

with the caveat that i really know fuck all about rums i'd try your gold bacardi. also which appleton do you have? i didn't get a great drink out of this with white appleton but if you have one of their aged ones that could work.

It's not a white. It's just Appleton Estate, and says "V/X Estate Distilled Hand Blended" at the top.

that might be good! for first attempt i'd prob still say bacardi gold and then experiment from there

fwiw i have been trying to figure out like "what is a sensible selection of rums to own" and it seems totally hopeless (i.e. i'm going to end up owning like 15 bottles)

My rums are completely based off of what I need to make tiki drinks. My gf is obsessed with them and I'm more than willing to oblige, so we always have a variety of rums on hand, along with all sorts of juices. I should post a picture of our tiki mugs here sometime, it's starting to get ridiculous!

*mixing*

I went with the Gold. This is GOOD!

glad you like it!

i have been trying to figure out like "what is a sensible selection of rums to own"

Pampero Aniversario
Flor De Cana at least 7 years
Matusalen maybe? so much of the better rum is only in other countries. anything from Nicaragua I've had has been good.

stay away from Pyrat unless you like heavy spicing

ok so i made the negroni this past weekend as CAD notated it at the top of the thread and thought it tasted horrid when using equal parts of the three liquors but a lot better with less campari/more vermouth. campari is maybe too bitter for my taste but now i have most of a bottle of it left over i'd like to try it in other things

i also made the coffee hopper, which calls for equal parts creme de menthe, coffee liqueur (i used kahlua) and cream (i used half and half), shaken w/ ice. imagine a peppermint patty that gets you a little buzzed.

campari's definitely an acquired taste, i think the more you have it, the more you like it

yeah, trying this out right now (the 'licia albanese' - build 3 pt gin:1 pt campari) - thinking this may grow on me yet

best way to get used to Campari is, I think, in weak Campari & sodas, once you take to it you're hooked but if not, no worries.

I had a good Bronx cocktail tonight, which I have pretty regularly - delicious! Used to be very popular.

2oz gin
1oz orange juice
1/2oz sweet vermouth
1/2oz dry vermouth

Followed it up with the much rarer Brooklyn cocktail:

2oz rye
1oz dry vermouth
Dash of maraschino liqueur
Dash of Amer Picon

also excellent, thank god Amer Picon is available again

i am actually going on a mission to find amer picon later today.

also glad you're sticking with it, donna rouge--you'll be drinking straight fernet branca in no time :)

I just came on this thread to post about the negroni but see that it's already been mentioned! Well done, fellows.

Manhattans have been ruling at my place lately. I went out to a bar in LA - the Edison, for those familiar - a few weeks ago, and they make their Manhattans with some sort of black cherry that was not a maraschino. It was amazing how much the taste changed without that small amount of the red sugar water!

at home, its been 3 parts Bookers (133 proof), 1 part sweet vermouth, three dashes Angostura, and a maraschino over crushed ice. So f-ing good.

hmm i wonder if it was a "real" maraschino as opposed to those gross mass-produced ones

possibly, but it appeared to be a black cherry. I am unaware of the difference b/t real and the mass-pro'd maraschinos.

a real one would be a cherry soaked in maraschino liqueur--no artificial color or sweetener or whathaveyou.

may have been one of these, if not housemade:

http://cn1.kaboodle.com/hi/img/2/0/0/15a/4/AAAAAl9BmaMAAAAAAVpKRQ.jpg

the excellent book Raising The Bar by Nick Mautone, published a few years ago, has a great recipe for making maraschino cherries - I make a big batch twice a year or so and keep them in armagnac, it's pretty easy and they last indefinitely.

I had the best Manhattan last night! Neat, half dry half sweet vermouth, with lemon twist instead of cherry.

Those were them! Maybe my Manhattan has been the pretender.

Ah well.

i have that book, i died. he has a lot of cool recipe-type stuff relating to drinks that i'm going to work on as soon as i have more space and a better kitchen.

related question for you: do you have any thoughts on the shelf life of homemade syrups and grenadines and stuff? mautone seems really conservative on this--i'm positive most of the stuff lasts longer than two weeks but am nervous about testing the outer limits.

Yeah, I've had stuff last months before w/ no problems - just give everything a taste before you use it. Different ingredients go off at different times, of course. If you plan on having something around longer, adding a little vodka to it is a great way to extend shelf like w/o affecting flavor.

tonight: fun with CARPANO ANTICA!

http://onthesauce.net/wp-content/uploads/2010/01/carpano_antica3.jpg

RECIPE TWENTY-FOUR: the supernova

an original from drink in boston, this is a hilarious performative recipe that also happens to be awesome.

1.75 oz. laird's bonded apple brandy
.75 oz. carpano antica
.5 oz. cardamom simple syrup (sub about half that amount agave nectar)
1 dash barrel-aged bitters
1 dash angostura bitters

stir all this stuff over ice

.25 oz. green chartreuse
lemon rind

pour the chartreuse into a rocks glass and carefully ignite it. squeeze the lemon peel over it and drop the peel in. after about 15 seconds strain the main mixture into the glass. serve carefully (the glass will cool off where the drink sits, but the whole top will be pretty hot)

i don't really know how to explain this but it's complex and quite good.

currently i'm taking the advice of numerous carpano antica stans and drinking it over ice with an orange twist. this stuff is completely delicious.

RECIPE TWENTY-FIVE: creole variation

the creole is an amer picon cocktail, and since it's still unavailable damn near anywhere afaict, we'll make this variation from the cure restaurant in new orleans.

1.5 oz. rye
1 oz. sweet vermouth
.25 oz. benedictine
.25 oz. luxarado amaro abano

stir with ice and strain, garnish w/lemon twist

it's going to be hard to go back to another sweet vermouth after finishing this carpano antica, that's all i can say. this is a very complex drink that i enjoyed a lot.

I know it'll be tough to find another vermouth, but Dolin is fantastic, and somewhat easier than Carpano to mix with as well.