white lily

[by john]

this drink, the white lily, has two amazing virtues.

first, its ingredients are readily found at any fratty house party (hosted, presumably, by some dude who smuggled absinthe back from europe after spring break '07), and their combination in a single drink just amplifies the frattiness ('look bro, a shot each of rum, gin, triple sex [sic], and some of the green fairy. race you to the bottom!), but that blend yields a refined, fruity, crisp, and flipping tasty result.

second, like the pegu club, the eensy bit of modifier (absinthe for the lily, bitters for the pegu) transforms the drink like a necklace of pearls around an otherwise fine neckline of a black dress.

i won't forgive myself for keeping this one on my to-make list for so long.

the white lily

equal parts of:

gin

white rum

triple sec

&

a dash of absinthe

stir with ice and strain

hot jupiter

[by john]

a few weeks back, elisabeth, one of my friends, defended her thesis on transiting exoplanets. the after-after-party was at our place, and i had been hemming and hawing for days on whether or not to make a special drink for the occasion. i ended up on the hawing (?) end, opting for the easy champagne route, when, with no more than an hour to spare before the first guests showed up, my roommate (a very good friend of elisabeth's) decreed that a special drink be made. being a good physicist, he prescribed well defined boundary conditions:

• the drink shall be named the hot jupiter,
• the said drink shall contain rum,
• thai chili tincture shall be used,
• and it shall require an orange and (transiting) maraschino cherry garnish.

well constrained, indeed, but there was still a lot of parameter space to explore! i first tried the boozy route...spirits-based...several rums...maybe vermouth...then turned to herbal...chartreuse, benedictine, becherovka...yet all with limited success. stressing out, with only half an hour left, i took a step back.

this drink needs to appeal to a wide audience, i figured. not just cocktail junkies with a taste for the herbal edge. what about citrusy and sweet? a classic 4:2:1?! a classic 4:2:1 turned out just great, in fact. satisfied, i measured out a large batch, making a large dent in a bottle of cuban rum for the 4, splitting the 2 between grapefruit and lime juice, then syrup for the 1. damn palatable. and just in time to start a round of congratulations and toasts to ephemerides.

hot jupiter

4 parts rum (havana club reserva)

2 parts citrus (2:1 grapefruit:lime)

1 part syrup

few drops of thai chili tincture per glass

shake and strain. garnish with a central star (orange slice) and transiting planet (maraschino cherry).

the spicy tincture was obviously just for novelty, but it added a curious afterthought to each sip. the hot jupiter proved versatile, as it also worked with dashes of bitters or a champagne float.

i don't have any pictures of the drink, but it looked something like this:

drink to haiti

[by john]

drink is the last place in the world i expect to be handed a cocktail menu. but extraordinary events can lead to extraordinary measures. they're now offering a menu of barbancourt (a haitian rum) based cocktails, proceeds of which will go to doctors without borders.

my guy and i stopped in for two drinks off that menu after 'in the heights'. we were ready for some rum cocktails anyway after all the caribbean themes running rampant through the musical. but of course, this being drink, we had to order off the menu - my guy got a milk & honey creation, a 'right hand' (rum, campari, italian vermouth, xocolatl mole bitters), and i got a yellow chartreuse rum swizzle.

our barkeep even had to laugh about how strange it was to be pushing menu creations. stranger things have happened, though - like a rap musical winning a tony.

two down, two hundred to go

[by john]

i've been doing a lot of traveling lately, which means a lot of new bars to visit. rough, i know.

in my latest trip to nyc, i practically had to drag my guy to two cocktail bars. (with cheap happy hour specials and gimmicks like 5 shots for $10, why pay the equivalent of 75 dumplings for a drink? which is a valid point - despite all the cheap food and booze establishments in new york, why are cocktails 50% more expensive than in boston? suffer on, drink geeks.)

pegu club

'man, i had no idea how asian this place was.' i uttered this to te and steven at some point after noting in the geometric wooden window screens, the waitresses' kimono-esque dresses, and, uh, our bartender. apparently, the place is inspired by an old officer's club in burma.

i got a kill devil (rhum agricole, green chartreuse, sugar, bitters), which was agreed to be 'odd'. my guy got an improved strawberry daiquiri with thai basil (it came through great) and an omniscient-third-person view of a first date. steven stuck with a little italy (rye, sweet vermouth, cynar), which was solid, and apparently a pegu original - surprising since i've seen it elsewhere.

the bartending was slow. inefficient, i would say. we were sitting at the half empty bar, so we saw the slow assembly, one restart (cardinal sin of adding the liquor first and then messing up on the syrup amount), stirring one drink at a time, even though he was using wide beaker mixing glasses, and then letting the stirred drinks sit with ice while the citrus one got shaken. eek! if it weren't for the name on the door, i wouldn't know this is one of the top bars in the world.

overall, unimpressed with the skill and the tepid drink list.

mayahuel

after a wtf moment outside death & co (closed for a private event? on a saturday?!), we rallied and got some vegetarian banh mi before heading to the tequila mecca, mayahuel.

the kitschy (yet somehow believable) glazed tile and wrought iron decor felt cozy, minus the icy blasts of snow whenever someone new entered.

i got a red ant river swizzle (mezcal, sugar cane, absinthe, lime), and my guy continued his variation on a theme with a fresa brava (muddled strawberries, jalepeño-infused tequila, and yellow chartreuse). both fine, but not transcendent. no significant complaints, except for the enormous menu, which is almost necessary with such an unfamiliar family of ingredients (except to mike).

but the hipster bartenders commented on my hipster moleskine, so that made it worth the trip.

a not-so-dry history of boston

[by john]

mike and i were treated last night to a history lesson like no other by lauren of drinkboston and adam of the boston shaker. the topic: drinking in boston through the ages. surprisingly, the lecture couldn't be summed up into 'the puritans frowned upon it and that dour streak continues to this day.' rather, lauren was able to spin a winding tale of intrigue, ups and down, colorful characters and...what's the word...hooch.

no offense to any of my past history teachers, but i have never been so absorbed with dates and dead people than with a drink in my hand. yes indeed, while lauren was serving up her narrative, adam was shaking ward eights and maharaja's revenges for all of the students. an apropos pair, too - the ward eight is boston's most famous cocktail invention, and the maharaja's revenge represents the new wave of cocktails (and uses rum, hearkening back on boston's huge rum trade).

here's the gossip column rundown of four centuries:

the early-bird puritans hit the scene, starting a church in 1632, the first tavern in '35 and some silly school in '36. priorities, people! taverns multiply like drunk rabbits, and function as inn-cum-courthouse-cum-post-office-cum-banks. the red lion is founded in the north end. george monk of the anchor embodies to the hospitable, community pillar image. women are seen behind the stick but not tippling, except for prostitutes! people drank ~6 gallons of pure alcohol per year, compared to modern day's measly ~3. applejack is the new it! just skim the ice off your cider... no wait, madeira is the new it! it ages well under harsh conditions... no no, rum is the new darling, yes rum has the title! boston gets the rum bug big because of the great shipping center. proto-cocktails form...punches and flips, but no ice yet.

we're just getting started - on to the 18th century! halfway through, there are 25 rum distilleries in the area, with medford's being best by far (what a little quality control does, folks). drink it and be seen with paul revere, that rabble-rouser. speaking of which, the beginnings of revolution get goin' when the brits want to tax the sugar we're using for allllll that rum. rebel! all the colonies meet for a photo-op saying they hate the brits, together. some little tea party (you didn't hear about it? very exclusive.) goes down with help from tavern owners. the first masons lodge is founded at the bunch of grapes. the royal exchange sees bostons first sword duel, and then the boston massacre on its steps. talk about bad press!

the 19th century hits boston hard, with growing pains, immigration, and (egad!) statewide prohibition. yes, prohibition swept massachusetts like a 23 year fad starting in 1852, with a little two year break where people could drink beer. underground drinking (in private club$ for the rich, and tenement jug rooms for the po' folk) drove crime and social ills underground with it. afterward (phew) taverns have windows, so you can see the debauchery. much better, ahh. the concept of a 'free lunch' with a drink starts up, but has nothing to do with the anti-happy hour laws today. liquor license numbers are limited, and still so today. doyle's starts up in jp. the new england society for the suppression of vice (new blog name coming!), aka the watch & ward society starts in 1884. basically beer 'n' burlesque hatin' busybodies. oh burlesque! boston had lots. believe it. fancy grand hotels like the parker house and the (now merged) locke ober open doors. the ward eight gets itself invented there. a hot ice craze hits, and ice begins export from new england ponds to britain, martinique, wherever! proper cocktails get invented in new england, joy!

the 1900's see the great molasses flood (not an onion headline - a humongous tank broke and killed 21 people), national prohibition (old hat by now, right, boston?), bohemia in beacon hill, creative bootlegging, and the rise of women visiting bars. finally. tragedy strikes again with the conflagration of the glitzy coconut grove. modern fire codes ensue. tiki was huge in boston in the 50's, fine dining catches on in the 80's, then wine, then craft beer, then cocktails at last when the b-side opens in 1998. and observational gastrophysics was founded in 2009.

whew, you would think i took notes! the audience, i should mention, was also rather knowledgeable with medford rum and speakeasy trivia.

i have a tad more respect for this town, now. not bad, boston. just fix the t schedule already.

how to throw a cocktail bash in four easy steps

[by john]

this past weekend, i threw a two night cocktail fête. it was perhaps the closest i will come to opening a bar, with different guests every night, waves of drink orders, and gourmet bar food. (mad props to mike and andy for the crispy shredded pork awesomeness, gravlax, and bone marrow.) i had tremendous amounts of fun without drinking anything, save for a few dozen milliliters from test-straws. homing in on each guest's taste proved to be a delightful challenge. i will certainly do this again.

now, easily:

create a menu

i put up my menu last time, but gave no indication of how hard it was to make. i tested tens of drinks over the course of a week to see which would appeal to a wide sample of palates. and, in addition to the pet pet, i created two originals - a st. germain/applejack marriage (la pomme rouge), and a constantly varying - popular, too, it turned out - tequila cocktail (the ho[a]rfrost).

everything on the menu got great attention and compliments, except for the poor martinez. being the oldest drink on there, maybe it couldn't hang with this hip crowd. noted. but otherwise, i am elated for converting many guests to the wonders of sloe gin, regular gin, spicy finishes, and flamed chartreuse.

go into debt

having settled on a menu, i then biked around boston/cambridge for another week trying to gather the necessary ingredients. the word is out on rittenhouse, quality bourbon, and old monk rum, apparently, because i had to discover several new liquor stores to hunt them all down.

after all my shopping, i went (a predicted) $200 over my normal budget for the month. i calculated the cost of each drink: usually around $3, and $4 for the tipperary. i figured each guest would go through ~3 rounds, so asked for $10 donations. in the end, i recouped exactly $200, perfect!

for the nth time, i'd like to reiterate how cheap home bartending is, compared to going out.

focus on the freezer

at some point, maybe 10 days before the party, i realized with growing dread that i would need a lot of ice. like, 200 cubes per night. only the brute force solution was viable: i bought two more tovolo trays and pushed out batches each day and night into ziploc bags. by friday morning, i was satisfied with five gallon bags, four trays in reserve, and five non-cubical trays in super-reserve.

some further creative maneuvering allowed me to fit cocktail glasses in there, too, so they could chill before service. good thing we weren't serving gelato or something.

stand around

the hard parts are done. now you only need to stand in one place for three hours and shake or stir the shit out of lots of drinks. stand, and also listen, steer, cajole, charm, engage, introduce, rinse, muddle, crack, and pour.

i had not expected the rush i got from bartending. it's like being on a kitchen line, but colder and solo. some hardcore multitasking - remembering orders, mixing, chatting people up, and monitoring the glassware situation all at once, with outward aplomb. and the repeated delight on guests' faces with the first sip made it even better.

pet pet

[by john]

thailand, perhaps realizing the current cocktail craze might pass them up uncrazed, has unveiled a new national cocktail (the guardian via drinkhacker):

At the very least the drink's ingredients are far from bland: a shot of vodka, coconut liqueur, a dash of chilli pepper and sugar, lime juice, a few slivers of lemongrass and ginger, with the whole mixture shaken then strained into a glass with ice and soda water.

by the looks of it, it's an alcoholic tom yum. personally, though, i'm turned off by the blank canvas vodka-and-soda combo.

having tried my hand with thai cookies, why not a thai drink? my endeavor was purely inspired by this post on homemade thai chili tincture, and the fact that i had lots of leftover thai chilies from the market.

so here it is, the pet pet (thai for 'really spicy'):

pet pet

1 1/2 oz old monk rum (no substitute for this kind of rum)

1/2 oz green chartreuse

2 barspoons thai basil syrup (homemade: equal parts raw sugar and water, steep with thai basil leaves)

7 drops thai chili tincture

stir and strain. garnish with basil leaf.

i like this drink. it has three parts: a fragrant smell which belies the spiciness, then a roiling combination of flavors, and finally a long, slow burn.

the only problem is that it's just half thai. the rum is indian, and the chartreuse is french. i'm willing to say 'oh well', but then that would be giving up on the idea of a truly thai cocktail. apparently, there are, uh, indigenous liquors distilled from rice. they have, however, have been likened to nail polish...which will make this challenge even more challenging.

well, until i get my hands on some genuine spirits, this will definitely be my go-to thai drink.

rum, in all its forms

[by john]

andy and i stopped by the latest sip & shop to taste some elderflower drinks and inquire with adam of the boston shaker about what bitters he'll be stocking next. as a very unexpected bonus, he told us about an event at the intercontinental celebrating their 100th rum at the bar.

not ones to pass up free/cheap alcohol, we put on fancy summer duds and headed downtown. we were greeted with free pernod absinthe and crêpes, and a gorgeous sunset view of the fort point channel.

there were about a dozen tables being set up around the posh lobby for rum tasting while we chatted up the guys from ragged mountain rum (including, again, adam, who is their boston rep). this is the same local distillery that made my new bottle of greylock. chris, the founder, was eager to tell us about forthcoming batches of bourbon, corn whiskey, and 'scotch'. i'm rather excited for those. oh, and their rum was nice - a surprisingly flavorful nose, with butterscotch and sharper spices, which belied the thinner flavors on the tongue (the burn of alcohol hit too quickly, but that'll change as they release more aged barrels).

far too many other brands to mention them all, but there were some standouts. i liked the oronoco, a light rum good for daiquiris, since it was a smoother version of the 10 cane in my own bar. gosling's old rum (23 y.o.?) tasted like bermudan nectar. their rep told us about their new product, dark and stormy in a can, which, apparently drinkhacker has gotten ahold of. the rhum clément products tasted entirely like brandy.

overall, the wide spectrum surprised me, a rum novitiate, the most. from light to dark, from cocktail-worthy to sipping, from whiskey wannabes to cognac wannabes, from brazil to nicaragua... other spirits just don't have that kind of spread.

talking to the reps was also enjoyable, since it's their job to be gregarious. one woman, at the pyrat table, was especially awesome. she complimented us on being the most sociable mit students she'd met (not hard), we talked about med school and surfing, then parted with some swag bags (featuring the folkloric hotei character [think laughing fat buddha], which immediately transported me back to japanese art history class).

well, random alcohol outing, until next time...

Daring

[by Mike]

When making drinks at home, experimentation is a mostly slow and deliberate process.  Usually I'll start with an established recipe and build, substituting spirits or tweaking flavors until the drink has become something entirely.  Spontaneity is left for when a great bartender can be responsible for the challenge of bringing an idea to fruition within minutes.

While making drinks for some friends tonight, I was given my first challenge when a friend requested a something with the bottle of Domaine de Canton sitting on my shelf.  Now I haven't had much time to play with the spirit since picking it up last month, and for a second I just stood there looking flustered.  Eventually my gaze drifted to the orange that was out for a previously made Old Fashioned and some serendipitous decisions were made.

The Domaine de Canton was paired with a fresh squeeze of orange juice, while Sailor Jerry provided a spicy base and vanilla note that complemented both the citrus and the ginger.  A dash of Regan's orange bitters finished everything off.  I might want to experiment with the choice of bitters, but overall I was quite pleased how everything came together.  

Feshbach Resonance

1.5 oz Sailor Jerry spiced rum

1.0 oz orange juice

0.75 oz Domaine de Canton ginger liqueur

1 dash Regan's orange bitters

The drink was christened a "Feshbach Resonance" to honor the friend who brought the initial challenge.  I think some of my compatriots may be less than pleased in my resorting to physics for a name, but sometimes it just has to happen.  Sometimes, in fact, you have a scientific name so good that a drink must be designed around it.  At least I have a little time to work with that challenge.

tiki!

[by john]

(conga room via flickr)

my former self knew nothing about tiki. about the island culture that can flavor your drink beyond the falernum and tiki bitters. about the music, the forget-the-weather-outside vibe, and the crazy carved demigods. that former self is, well, still drunk on three kinds of rum, leaving me to tell the tale.

eastern standard held a tiki bash this weekend that only eastern standard could throw. jackson cannon greeted mike and i with trader vic's punch (rum, more rum, even more rum, orgeat, orange and lemon juice) from a flower-laden tropical punch bowl. that knocked us into our seats, where we played bobby's captive audience.

bobby mccoy is a bartender at e.s. who caught the tiki bug, and taught us a bit about the rise(s) and fall(s) of tiki culture in the states. tiki apparently got big in the early 1900's, when travel by sea (to, say, polynesia) became easier. it was revived during prohibition when peopled traveled to drink, then re-revived after prohibition when (unaged) rum was easier to come by than (aged) whiskies, by the enterprising don the beachcomber, then re-re-revived in the '80s, and currently re-re-re....revived due to the focus on fresh citrus and complex spice flavors.

he made a zombie punch, with FOUR (count 'em) ounces of different rums. smooth sailing from then on, needless to say. paired with a coconut shrimp salad.

brother cleve was next up, and detailed a rambling musical history of tikification, including the necessary cocaine use. he presented his drink from the last tales of the cocktail, the cactus flower. eleven ingredients (including prickly pear puree - ask mike about it) later, i had a tasty drink and part of a roasted pig in front of me. i was starting to understand this tiki thing...

sugar-crusted donuts and a wild, spicy batavia arrack-based non-standard tiki drink rounded out the polynesian afternoon (did i mention it was still light out?).

before i stepped back into the cold, bostonian real world, i had come to realize that the flavors weren't the whole tiki story; a large part was the other fun people sitting at the long table, enjoying the alternate world they had entered and agreeing, 'yeah, this drink is a strong one!'. tiki transports to a -state-, more than a place, and that is why it is alive and well in new england.