Author: Brian

Friday Happy Hour: Jitters Cocktail

Brian

Last year for my birthday my brother gave me a copy of Famous New Orleans Drinks & How to Mix ‘Em by Stanley Clisby Arthur. The history of cocktails is inextricably linked to New Orleans, and by most accounts, the very origin of the word “cocktail” comes from the city where A.A. Peychaud first started serving drinks in a double-ended egg-cup called a coquetier.  Cocktails like the Sazerac, the Ramos Gin Fizz and the Vieux Carré (to name a few) were all invented in NOLA.

The book was first published in 1937, and this tiny time-machine is packed with recipes, their histories, lots of random anecdotes, and few silly poems about the merits of drinking. There are also several references to Prohibition as “the Great Mistake.”

Looking for inspiration, I stumbled upon Arthur’s recipe for a Jitters Cocktail. Recounting it will not do it justice, so here is a photo of the page:

I couldn’t help but laugh at the description of Anis del Mono since it is made just outside of Barcelona and is simply a brand name of a type of anis, much like Ojen. (Side note: Ojen was originally made in a Southern Spain town by the same name. They shut down production in the 1990s, which apparently made people in New Orleans freak out. The Sazerac Company resurrected the liquor, and it’s now made in Kentucky. More on that here).

Not sure what monkeyshines means? Me neither. I had to look it up, apparently it is “mischievous or playful activity : prank —usually used in plural.”

This cocktail was a pleasant surprise because we’re not generally fans of anis. Its typical anise/licorice flavor is less intense because of the gin and the vermouth, yet its herbal notes complement the botanicals in the gin. Nothing fancy, but super easy and quick to make. Like the Negroni and the Boulevardier, it is a three-ingredient cocktail with equal parts of everything.

Cheers and enjoy, monkeys!

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Friday Happy Hour: Jitters Cocktail

Ingredients

  • 1 oz (30 ml) Corpen Gin
  • 1 oz (30 ml) Anis del Mono (Dulce)
  • 1 oz (30 ml) Vermouth (White)

Instructions

  1. Pour all ingredients into a mixing glass full of ice.
  2. Stir vigorously with barspoon until cold.
  3. Pour into a chilled cocktail glass.
  4. Let the monkeyshines begin.
https://www.travelingtotaste.com/2017/08/11/friday-happy-hour-jitters-cocktail/

 

 

 

Friday Happy Hour: Ginger Watermelon Cooler

Brian

I don’t always come up with the best ideas from scratch, but sometimes I’m pretty good with making stuff out of what we already have in the house. This cocktail came around because that was the situation last weekend.

It’s summertime, so watermelons are everywhere, including in our CSA basket. Don’t get me wrong, I love watermelon, but as a drink, I find it needs something more. Enter ginger syrup.

Living here in Barcelona, we have not been able to find ginger ale, so we’ve taken to making it ourselves, which first requires making a ginger syrup. Thus, we had some sitting in the refrigerator. It adds a nice spiciness to pair with the subtle sweetness of the watermelon. Add a little rum, a squeeze of lime and voilà! a tasty, summery and refreshing beverage.

And because it’s summertime, this is a great batch drink to make for a party. Mix everything ahead of time, put in a glass bottle, and keep in the fridge until you’re ready to start the party. Work your ratios off of the size of watermelon you have, and enjoy!

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Friday Happy Hour: Ginger Watermelon Cooler

Ingredients

  • 150-160 ml (5 - 5.5 oz) watermelon purée
  • 50-60 ml (1.5- 2 oz) ginger syrup*
  • 45 ml (1.5 oz) dark rum
  • Squeeze of lime
  • Lime wheel for garnish

Instructions

  1. Cut your watermelon (seedless is easier) into cubes, discard the rind.
  2. In a blender, food processor or using a hand blender, blend watermelon cubes into a smooth liquid.
  3. Run liquid through a sieve or strainer and discard the pulp.
  4. Combine the watermelon purée, ginger syrup, squeeze of lime and rum into a shaker full of ice.
  5. Shake until cold.
  6. Serve over ice in a highball glass.
  7. Garnish with lime wheel.
  8. Kick your feet back and chill.
https://www.travelingtotaste.com/2017/07/28/friday-happy-hour-ginger-watermelon-cooler/

—————————————
To make ginger syrup:

Take 200 grams (7oz) of fresh peeled ginger and cut into slices.
Simmer in 240 ml (2 cups) of water for 40 minutes.
Turn heat off, let rest for another 20 minutes.
Strain ginger water through a fine strainer or coffee filter.
Return back to heat. Dissolve 180 ml (3/4 cup) of sugar into ginger water.
Remove from heat. Keep in sealed container in the refrigerator.

Friday Happy Hour: Chin Up Cocktail

Brian

If you don’t know David Lebovitz, now is the time to check him out. He’s a Chez Panisse alumni and his accolades are numerous and impressive (for example: Named Top Five Pastry Chefs in the Bay Area by the San Francisco Chronicle).

He’s written a number of cookbooks, and though his credentials are intimidating, his recipes and style of cooking are not. In his words:

“I use basic, honest ingredients; fresh fruit, good quality chocolate, real vanilla, and pure butter. I don’t believe that baking (or cooking) should be out of reach to people and strive to share recipes that are do-able for a majority of cooks and home bakers.”

In 2006 he packed up and moved to Paris, where he’s been doing his thing and writing yet another cookbook called My Paris Kitchen. As fellow Americans abroad, his observations on life and food are not only insightful, but often witty and hilarious.

Anyway, his blog is also really impressive, and though being a pastry chef, he clearly loves cocktails too, and I was pumped to find this recipe for a Chin Up.

We’re building a distillery here in Barcelona and have been playing with barrel aging our gins, so when I read this recipe, I simply had to try it 🙂

Cheers!

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Friday Happy Hour: Chin Up Cocktail via David Lebovitz

Ingredients

  • 2 slices of cucumber
  • Tiny pinch of kosher or sea salt
  • 60 ml (2 oz) Corpen Barrel Aged gin
  • 15 ml (1/2 oz) Cynar
  • 15 ml (1/2 oz) dry white vermouth (we used Murcarols)

Instructions

  1. Muddle one slice of cucumber with the salt in a mixing glass.
  2. Add the gin, Cynar and vermouth, and fill the mixing glass full of ice. Stir until cold.
  3. Strain into a chilled stemmed cocktail glass and float a VERY thin slice of cucumber slice on top (too thick and it will sink).
  4. Drink and enjoy!
https://www.travelingtotaste.com/2017/07/14/friday-happy-hour-chin-up-cocktail/

Friday Happy Hour: Shrub Bramble – I guess that makes it a “Schramble?”

Brian


We’ve gone off the deep end with shrubs. I’ve talked about this once already, and now we’ve got about six in the refrigerator, with many more on the way. They really are lovely with just ice and sparkling water, but it’s Friday, and we’d like a little something that’s appropriate for happy hour.

So here we present you with a Shrub Bramble, which lends itself to being called a “Shramble” if you like silly names. This recipe replaces the lemon juice that is normally in a Bramble with a lemon shrub. The shrub we used is mostly lemon with bit of lime and uses white wine vinegar, which is subtle and allows the citrus to shine though. Like any shrub in a cocktail, this lemon adds a depth and complexity to one of the main flavors.

The Bramble has a whole history that goes along with it, that I won’t do justice if I attempt to recount. If you want more info, check out the explanation from the guys at Gin Foundry and Dillford’s Guide. We started with the Dillford’s recipe and adjusted to our taste.

With that said, drink up!

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Friday Happy Hour: Shrub Bramble- I guess that makes it a “Schramble?”

Ingredients

  • - 60ml (2 oz) Corpen Gin
  • - 20-30ml (1 oz) Lemon Shrub (use your judgment based on how strong/bitter your shrub is)
  • - 15ml (1/2 oz) Simple Syrup
  • - 15ml (1/2 oz) Crème de Mûre or Crème de Cassis

Instructions

  1. Add gin, lemon shrub and simple syrup to a shaker full of ice.
  2. Shake until cold
  3. Fill old fashioned glass with crushed ice
  4. Pour contents of shaker over ice
  5. Retop with crushed ice and drizzle with crème de mûre or crème de cassis
  6. Garnish with a lemon wedge, blackberry and/or mint sprig.

Notes

- Every shrub is a little different, feel free to tone up and the shrub and tone down the simple syrup for more bitterness.

https://www.travelingtotaste.com/2017/05/26/friday-happy-hour-shrub-bramble-i-guess-that-makes-it-a-schramble/

Friday Happy Hour: Pomegranate Shrub Vodka Soda

Brian

It’s official. I’m in love with shrubs.

What is a shrub, you ask? Well, there are certainly others who can explain it better than I can, but the basics are this: fruit + sugar + vinegar. Sounds strange, yes, but the roots of this drink go all the way back to the Romans who used it as a way to preserve fresh fruit. It’s a really interesting combination of sweet and sour, and even if you are skeptical, worth a try.

Anyway, a friend made some pomegranate shrub and gave us a small bottle when we were in New Orleans in December. We hadn’t really done much with it until recently when the weather started getting nice.

Shrubs can be used to make both alcoholic and non-alcoholic drinks, which makes them pretty versatile in application, and there are TONS of recipes online about how to make them (our friend referenced this one).  Most of these recipes say they are “fantastic additions to cocktails” but don’t really go into the details about what cocktails, what proportions or anything really.

So we started with the most basic recipe. The pomegranate shrub we have is delicious when added to sparkling water, so why hide that amazing flavor with something fancy? This a a simple vodka soda with shrub added. Vodka is the definition of neutral, so try ANY flavor shrub with this recipe.

Cheers!

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Friday Happy Hour: Pomegranate Shrub Vodka Soda

Ingredients

  • - 45 ml (1.5 oz) Pomegranate shrub
  • - 60 ml (2 oz) Vodka
  • - Squeeze of lime
  • - Slice of lime for garnish

Instructions

  1. Fill a highball glass with ice
  2. Squeeze lime into glass
  3. Add vodka and shrub
  4. Stir
  5. Garnish with lime wheel and enjoy!
  6. (wasn't that easy?)
https://www.travelingtotaste.com/2017/04/28/friday-happy-hour-pomegranate-shrub-vodka-soda/

Friday Happy Hour: Oaked Negroni

Brian

We love a good Negroni. It’s a classic, and it’s one of those simple recipes that uses equal parts of three ingredients; in this case gin, Campari and vermouth. Add an orange peel as garnish and you’re done. So simple.

Some die-hard Negroni fans feel like any departure from the classic proportions is sacrilege, but that hasn’t stopped an endless number of variations. I’ll be the first to admit that Campari is an acquired taste, and not everyone’s cup of tea. Equal parts of everything usually ends up leading to a Campari-forward cocktail. While many love this bitterness, there are many variations out there that tone it down by dialing back the Campari.

In the interest of full disclosure, I must admit that I love anything that has been put in a barrel, so when I started seeing barrel-aged Negronis, I had to try them. What can I say, they are also delicious.

My one criticism is that the barrel treats all of the ingredients equally, and depending on your gin, may end up muting some of the botanicals that make it unique. So we ran some tests using oak on the Campari only.

We used toasted wood chips, not a barrel (yet) and a ratio of 1g to 100ml. We tried a light toast and a heavy toast, and four days was plenty to get some of the nice oak characteristics and a hint of sweetness from the caramelized sugars in the wood.

Between the two, we preferred the light toast, but the possibilities are endless, so check your local homebrew store and experiment for yourself to find the combination you like. As a rule of thumb, the more surface area the wood has (chips vs. chunks vs. larger pieces of oak, aka “dominos”), the faster it will impart those oak flavors. It is possible to “over-oak,” so you’ll just have to taste it every day or two.

Enjoy!

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Friday Happy Hour: Oaked Negroni

Ingredients

  • - 45 ml (1.5 oz) Corpen Gin
  • - 45 ml (1.5 oz) Oaked Campari *
  • - 45 ml (1.5 oz) Vermouth
  • - Orange peel for garnish

Instructions

  1. Mix all ingredients in a mixing glass full of ice.
  2. Pour into old-fashioned glass, over ice.
  3. Garnish with orange peel.
  4. Enjoy!

Notes

* = Use toasted oak chips of your preference in ratio of 1g:100ml for 2-4 days.

https://www.travelingtotaste.com/2017/04/21/friday-happy-hour-oaked-negroni/

Friday Happy Hour: Cherry-Infused Brandy Manhattan

Brian

This recipe is a bit of a happy accident. Last year I was experimenting with cherries to make our own garnishes for cocktails. Someone had left some brandy at our place after a party, and I thought I’d play with this forgotten bottle.

The process was simple: Buy some fresh cherries (the sweet kind, not the bitter/sour kind), remove the stems and the pits, put them in a jar, and fill the jar with brandy so the cherries are completely submerged.

Leave the jar in the refrigerator for some period of time (days, weeks, months), and that’s it. Super easy.

The problem was when I tried the cherries after a few weeks. WAY too strong with brandy and not enjoyable as a garnish for anything. The alcohol in the brandy had also pulled the color out, so they resembled green olives more than cherries. Again, not good for a garnish.

Honestly, then I forgot about them. They lived in the back of the refrigerator for months. It was only recently that I realized what I did have was a nice cherry-infused brandy, which was much more interesting than the cherries themselves.

So, what to make with cherry-infused brandy? How about a Brandy Manhattan?  It is sometimes also called a Metropolitan, which causes some confusion. There is another version of a Metropolitan cocktail out there, that is a cousin of the Cosmopolitan and includes vodka, lime juice and cranberry juice. I am not talking about this drink.

As the name would imply, this lovely drink uses the same ratios of a regular Manhattan, but with brandy in the place of Rye.

Cheers!

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Friday Happy Hour: Cherry-Infused Brandy Manhattan

Ingredients

  • 60 ml (2 oz) Cherry-infused brandy
  • 30 ml (1 oz) Sweet vermouth
  • 3-4 dashes Angostura bitters (or other savory bitters)
  • Garnish with a Maraschino cherry (the real kind, like Luxardo or Amarena)

Instructions

  1. Chill glass
  2. Mix all ingredients in a mixing glass full of ice for 20-30 seconds
  3. Pour into chilled glass, add garnish.
  4. Enjoy!

Notes

If this is too much brandy for you, you can tone it back to 45 ml (1.5 oz).

https://www.travelingtotaste.com/2017/03/24/friday-happy-hour-cherry-infused-brandy-manhattan/

Friday Happy Hour: Bijou Cocktail

Brian

A couple of weeks ago we went on a green Chartreuse kick, and did some experimenting with a variety of cocktails. One that stood out was the Bijou (“jewel” in French), which combines gin, green Chartreuse, sweet vermouth and a dash of orange bitters.

I’ll credit this Esquire article for our original inspiration, and pointing us to the original, very old recipe by Harry Johnson, first documented in the late 1800s. (Here’s a link to digital version of  Harry Johnson’s 1882 New and Improved (Illustrated) Bartender’s Manual and a Guide for Hotels and Restaurants. This recipe is on page 129).

The original recipe has equal parts of the principal ingredients, but most modern versions have tweaked the ratios. A couple of days later we played with these ratios ourselves and definitely preferred ours more gin-heavy and dialed-back on the Chartreuse. The one we settled on was closer to this version from Imbibe Magazine.

Chartreuse is a lovely and complex liqueur that touts 130 different plants and flowers. In laymen’s terms, this means it will likely overpower an herbal/flowery gin. We used one of our Corpen gins that is more earthy to complement, rather that compete with, the herby flavor of the Chartreuse.

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Friday Happy Hour: Bijou Cocktail

Ingredients

  • 45 ml (1½ oz) Corpen gin
  • 22 ml (¾ oz) green Chartreuse
  • 30 ml (1 oz) sweet vermouth (white)
  • 2-3 dashes orange bitters
  • Lemon peel

Instructions

  1. Mix all ingredients in an ice-filled mixing glass.
  2. Strain into a chilled martini glass.
  3. Squeeze lemon peel express the oils and discard.
  4. Garnish with a cherry.
  5. Enjoy!
https://www.travelingtotaste.com/2017/03/17/friday-happy-hour-bijou-cocktail/

Friday Happy Hour: Boulevardier Cocktail

Brian

We’re trying something new here. I’ve been working on building a craft distillery here in Barcelona, and in the interest of professional development, we’ve kicked our cocktail game into high gear over the last couple of years.

Here’s the first installment in what will become a recurring theme: Cocktails we love, we are experimenting with, and/or have made up ourselves.

Our first installment in this series is the lovely Boulevardier, which we recently had at Mark’s Bar in London (downstairs in HIX Soho). Upon ordering this, the bartender said “Ah yes, a whiskey negroni.”

Yep, that’s about right, and exactly why we love it.

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Friday Happy Hour: Boulevardier

Ingredients

  • 1 oz (30 ml) Rye Whiskey
  • 1 oz (30 ml) Campari
  • 1 oz (30 ml) Sweet Vermouth (we use Casa Mariol's Vermut Negre)
  • Garnish: Orange twist or Maraschino Cherry (the real kind, like Luxardo or Amarena)

Instructions

  1. Chill an Old Fashioned glass
  2. Mix all ingredients in a mixing glass full of ice for 20-30 seconds
  3. Pour into chilled glass, add garnish.

Notes

- We like to over-pour on the whiskey here, but that's us, about 1.5 oz (45ml).

- Bourbon can be used in place of rye if you wish, but we prefer the spiciness the rye adds to this drink.

https://www.travelingtotaste.com/2017/03/10/friday-happy-hour-boulevardier-cocktail/