November 20, 2009
Posted by Paul Clarke, November 20, 2009 at 5:30 PM
Let's start the weekend right--with a cocktail recipe from Paul Clarke (The Cocktail Chronicles). Need more than one? Hit up the archives. Cheers!
Cocktails can be rich and rugged like a Manhattan, or crisp and sharp like a martini, or bright and tangy like a daiquiri (they can also be sweet and murky like a Bahama Mama, but we won't go there right now). But with the holiday season approaching, your taste buds might feel the need for something with a little more elegance—that's where the French come in.
Composed of two great Gallic spirits (cognac and the herbal liqueur Chartreuse) along with some lemon juice and bitters, the Champs Elysees is the ne plus ultra of elegant cocktails. The Savoy Cocktail Book from 1930 lists a party-size recipe for this drink, which is good billing for its powers as a social lubricant. Fortunately the recipe is easily scaled-down. This one (from Food & Wine's 2008 cocktail guide) was adapted by bartenders at Zig Zag Café in Seattle, who deploy a Champs Élysées anytime a little elegance is needed.
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Posted by Paul Clarke, November 18, 2009 at 9:55 PM
Read more about this recipe here.
Ingredients
3 to 4 fresh quince at peak of ripeness
1 bottle cognac
3 to 4 whole cloves (optional)
1 cinnamon stick (optional)
Procedure
Wash and dry quince and either grate or finely chop. Fill quart-size canning jars approximately 3/4 full of quince, add spices and top with cognac. Seal and keep in a cool, dark place until well matured, a minimum of six weeks and anywhere up to a year (or more?). Strain before using, passing the liquid through fine mesh or a coffee filter to remove small particles. Enjoy.
Posted by Caroline Russock, November 16, 2009 at 1:15 PM
"The celery syrup was crisp, refreshing, and not at all too sweet, set off perfectly by the fresh lemon juice and earthy bourbon."
[Photograph: Caroline Russock]
Searching for the perfect Thanksgiving-themed cocktail is somewhat of a challenge. Cranberry, the obvious choice, seems a little too easy and frankly, boring. A pumpkin-flavored concoction crossed my mind, but even the smoothest pumpkin puree is a little too thick for an easy sipping drink. Some ideas crossed my mind that were just plain silly, like a green bean gimlet or a sweet potato-scented Manhattan (garnished with marshmallows, of course.)
My search came to a screeching halt when I came across this recipe for Celery Juleps in Simple Fresh Southern by Matt and Ted Lee. It was as if the Lee Brothers read my mind. Here is a cocktail that incorporated celery and celery seed, two of the primary ingredients in the stuffing I grew up eating, into a fantastic cocktail.
This unlikely combination draws inspiration from the Kentucky Derby classic, the mint julep, and from Dr. Brown's Cel-Ray soda. As you might imagine, Cel-Ray is a celery-flavored soda popular in Jewish delis, and the perfect foil for a fatty corned beef sandwich.
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Posted by Paul Clarke, November 13, 2009 at 5:30 PM
Let's start the weekend right--with a cocktail recipe from Paul Clarke (The Cocktail Chronicles). Need more than one? Hit up the archives. Cheers!
Pioneering 19th century bartender Jerry Thomas is such a towering figure in the cocktail world that over the years, his reputation has been adorned with many trinkets and baubles, many of them unearned. While Thomas was many things—world-renowned bartender, media celebrity, author of the first published bartender's guide—there are many things he was not. Creator of the Tom & Jerry? No, sorry. Inventor of the Manhattan and/or the martini? Wrong again.
Here's one drink, possibly the only drink from his 1862 bar guide, that Thomas did create: the Japanese Cocktail. Named to commemorate the 1860 visit to New York of the Japanese legation, the Japanese cocktail is smooth and sweet, and has a robust yet delicate character that still has plenty of allure almost 150 years after the drink was first created.
A rich combination of cognac and almond syrup, with bitters and lemon zest to give some depth and spice, the Japanese Cocktail is also an excellent drink for a chilly autumn evening.
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Posted by Paul Clarke, November 6, 2009 at 6:30 PM
Let's start the weekend right—with a cocktail recipe from Paul Clarke (The Cocktail Chronicles). Need more than one? Hit up the archives. Cheers!
It may not be as powerful as a flu shot or have the healing properties of the antibiotic it's named for, but the Penicillin Cocktail is a surefire cure for a chilly autumn night. Originally created by New York bartender Sam Ross, the Penicillin Cocktail takes the warming, soothing flavors of honey, lemon juice and fresh ginger, and fortifies them with a good dose of scotch whisky. And as if that isn't enough, the drink is topped with a thin pour of headily aromatic Islay malt, which gives the drink a fragrance as alluring as any woodsmoke-laced autumn breeze.
Other bartenders have taken Ross's formula and adapted it for drinks made with tequila, gin, and rum, all with great results, but the scotch-based original is always a good place to start. And one note on the preparation: the original drink uses a house-made ginger-honey syrup; since the spark of fresh ginger fades so quickly, home mixologists may be better served by simply muddling a few slices of fresh ginger in the drink, rather than mixing a batch of syrup that will likely lose its luster before the bottle is half gone. This adapted recipe is listed after the jump.
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Posted by Paul Clarke, October 30, 2009 at 6:30 PM
Let's start the weekend right--with a cocktail recipe from Paul Clarke (The Cocktail Chronicles). Need more than one? Hit up the archives. Cheers!
Perhaps the only thing more frightening than the idea of zombies roaming the city in search of fresh brains is the concoction you'll find in front of you when you say "Zombie" in your average bar.
Once the pinnacle drink of the mid-century Polynesian phenomenon, the Zombie has been mangled beyond recognition in the decades since its 1930s debut. This is primarily the fault of the drink's creator, Donn Beach, who had such success with the Zombie at his Don the Beachcomber bar that he jealously guarded the recipe from rivals, using unmarked bottles behind the bar and compiling some ingredients beforehand so that even staff members wouldn't know what was in them.
At Don the Beachcomber, you could get an authentic Zombie, a powerful yet balanced amalgam of rum, juice and sweeteners. At other bars, eager to capitalize on the Zombie's popularity, bartenders would throw whatever ingredients they had on hand together, creating drinks that were powerful, no doubt, but typically far from the quality of the original that launched a thousand tiki mugs.
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Posted by Paul Clarke, October 23, 2009 at 5:30 PM
"The Bloody Mary is open to almost any interpretation."
[Flickr: kthread]
I hesitate to even broach the topic of the Bloody Mary. For one thing, it's one of those ubiquitous drinks that absolutely everyone has their own way of preparing. So why even bring it up? Because everyone has their own way of preparing it, and I'm curious how you do it.
The Bloody Mary is, of course, a staple of the American brunch and a universal hangover cure. The drink's origins are oft-rumored and still open to the kind of disputed bickering that is absolutely painful on a weekend morning, so it's best to move onto the heart of the matter: what's essential in your Bloody Mary?
Me, I'm a spicy kind of guy (as long as it's not over the top): a little Tabasco, a little horseradish, and for extra complexity in what can otherwise be a top-heavy drink, I prefer to use gin.
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Posted by Paul Clarke, October 16, 2009 at 5:30 PM
Let's start the weekend right--with a cocktail recipe from Paul Clarke (The Cocktail Chronicles). Need more than one? Hit up the archives. Cheers!
Who knows for certain where or when this drink originated. Regardless, it's certainly made the rounds over the past century.
The San Martin first cropped up in bar manuals in 1922, when a slim volume called Cocktails: How to Mix Them listed it as "a well-known South American drink." While it appeared under a slightly altered name in the 1930s, it popped up again in 1951 in Charles H. Baker's South American Gentleman's Companion. After sleeping for much of the rest of the century, the San Martin eventually wandered into some of today's craft-cocktail bars, where it continues to hang out as a B-string classic cocktail.
It's not surprising that the San Martin made its reappearance as part of the cocktail revival—it's tasty enough and simple enough to satisfy most any classic-cocktail enthusiast. The question is why it hasn't played a bigger role.
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Posted by Paul Clarke, October 9, 2009 at 7:30 PM
Among the drinks that Gourmet selected from its archives to highlight the magazine's almost 70 years in print (now sadly cut short), one has a name as well as a character that spins the clock back to the early 20th century: Mary Pickford.
Appearing in Gourmet in 1943, the Mary Pickford was, obviously, named for the silent film star and co-founder of United Artists. Created by legendary Havana bartender Eddie Woelke, the Mary Pickford is a liquid tribute to this pioneering film actress.
While you might expect a drink named for America's Sweetheart (despite the fact that she was Canadian) to pack as much wallop as a Shirley Temple, the Mary Pickford is a curious sort of proto-exotic drink, made with rum, pineapple juice and grenadine, with a bit of mystery added through the inclusion of maraschino liqueur.
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Posted by Paul Clarke, October 2, 2009 at 7:15 PM
Let's start the weekend right--with a cocktail recipe from Paul Clarke (The Cocktail Chronicles). Need more than one? Hit up the archives. Cheers!
Early October is a challenging time to settle on a seasonal drink. The evenings are cool and crisp, and the onset of autumn sets the mood for rich, brooding flavors, but a clear sunny day can keep a taste for light, bright flavors alive.
Here's a good balancing-act drink: the Stone Fruit Sour. I wrote this drink up for the current issue of Imbibe, and it's become a welcome part of my early autumn cocktail arsenal.
Developed by Seattle bartender Zane Harris from Rob Roy and patterned on the venerable Corpse Reviver #2, the Stone Fruit Sour matches the crisp taste of gin and Lillet with lemon juice and the jammy fruitiness of apricot liqueur, with a touch of peach bitters to fill out the farmers' market flavor experience. Simultaneously light and rich, the Stone Fruit Sour is an easy-sipping way to kick back on an autumn evening.
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Posted by Paul Clarke, September 25, 2009 at 7:00 PM
Let's start the weekend right—with a cocktail recipe from Paul Clarke (The Cocktail Chronicles). Need more than one? Hit up the archives. Cheers!
[Flickr: Michael Dietsch]
Sometimes, at this time of the year, you want a drink that’s light and crisp. Something with a gentle character that's as soft and invigorating as a cool autumn breeze.
The Diamondback isn’t one of those drinks. With the assertive double-barreled flavor of rye whiskey and applejack and the robust herbaceous richness of green Chartreuse, the Diamondback isn’t a casual little tipple for a lazy afternoon. Bold, strong and deeply alluring, the Diamondback is a robust fortifier, the kind of drink well suited to capping the work week and getting the weekend started.
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Posted by Caroline Russock, September 21, 2009 at 1:00 PM
[Flickr: svanes]
After a beautifully written introduction by Ruth Reichl, Gourmet Today starts out, as most good things do, with cocktails. Cocktails are a great way to start a meal and as it turns out, to start a book too. The drinks section of Gourmet Today includes recipes for about 50 boozy libations and a dozen or so for the teetotalers out there. All of your mixology questions are answered and there's even a helpful guide to properly appointing your home bar.
With such an emphasis on cocktail culture in recent years, it seems only natural that a good home cook should be able to mix up a decent cocktail as well. I've decided to start out this week of recipes with a foolproof recipe for a crowd-pleasing cocktail, the Moscow Mule.
Vodka just might be the most commonly consumed spirit on the market today but there was a time when the Russian import wasn't so popular. Most great cocktails come with a great backstory and the Moscow Mule is no exception. Back in the 1940s, importer Jon Martin was trying to unload his stock of Smirnoff vodka. He joined forces with Jack Morgan, owner of the celebrity haunt the Cock N Bull Tavern in Los Angeles, and the Moscow Mule was born, thus kicking off the vodka craze in America.
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Posted by Paul Clarke, September 18, 2009 at 6:15 PM
A vodka cocktail for those who claim to hate vodka cocktails.
I suppose, technically, there are many drinks that could carry this moniker. Just witness the glasses of mysterious odds and ends passed into the living room a couple of hours into a rollicking weekend party. But this particular drink is worth remembering, even if the name doesn’t exactly trip off the tongue.
Developed by longtime bartender-turned-architect Paul Harrington and included in his (now sadly out of print) book, Cocktail: The Drinks Bible for the 21st Century, the Drink Without a Name is a vodka cocktail for those who claim to hate vodka cocktails. While vodka drinks all too often slink into the realm of blandness, the Drink Without a Name uses vodka's neutral character to soften the blow of its two other vibrantly flavored ingredients: the dry, orange-flavored Cointreau and the bombastic, herbaceously complex green Chartreuse.
A common topic of conversation among cocktail geeks is how to get vodka-drinking friends to try more interesting cocktails. The Drink Without a Name certainly falls into the “interesting” category, and it’s a good bridge drink for exploring more distinctive flavors.
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Posted by Paul Clarke, September 11, 2009 at 5:45 PM
Let's start the weekend right—with a cocktail recipe from Paul Clarke (The Cocktail Chronicles). Need more than one? Hit up the archives. Cheers!
When it comes to cocktail genealogy, the martini has a pedigree that's as murky as that of a stray dog. Nobody knows for sure when or where it was created (be suspicious of those who say they do) and the annals of late 19th and early 20th century mixology are full of assorted prototypes and variations that are part of the martini’s extensive family tree.
Here's one that's kind of fun: the Turf Club Cocktail. There are several versions of this drink floating around the old books, and it was certainly being mixed and poured before the dry martini settled into its identity.
This recipe is adapted from the one that appears in the Savoy Cocktail Book from 1930, and listed in an Imbibe feature about gin I wrote for the magazine's current issue. The drink was suggested to me by Eric Alperin from The Varnish in Los Angeles—it has a suave potency of flavor and rightly demonstrates gin’s appealing qualities. Not that a good gin needs any help in the lovability department.
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Posted by Kristen Swensson, September 7, 2009 at 11:00 AM
Note: On Mondays, Kristen Swensson of Cheap, Healthy, Good swings by these parts to share healthy and delicious recipes with us. Take it away, Kristen!
When you’re trying to lose weight or maintain a weight loss, one of the trickiest areas to navigate is alcohol. Beer, wine, liquor, and mixed drinks are a caloric minefield, and too many pints can sink a diet faster than a box of doughnuts. (Mmm, doughnuts.) Of course, a life without booze is nigh unthinkable for some of us. (Note: me.) So, how do we reconcile our desire to get healthy with our desire for a Mudslide?
Moderation is part of it, as is planning ahead, pacing ourselves, and quaffing water between drinks. Choosing lower-calorie mixers like diet soda, seltzer, and fruit purees helps as well. And of course, some beverages are naturally lighter than others. An average glass of red wine should only run you about 110 calories, while a full-size frozen margarita will cost you 750. (For more calorie counts, see here.)
Two of my favorite ways to imbibe intelligently are mimosas and bellinis. Usually served with breakfast, they mix small amounts of fruit juice or fruit purees with champagne or a sparkling white wine like Prosecco. Generally less than 100 calories a pop, you can nurse them for awhile without feeling guilty. Oh, and they’re delicious, too.
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Posted by Paul Clarke, September 4, 2009 at 6:30 PM
Let's start the weekend right—with a cocktail recipe from Paul Clarke (The Cocktail Chronicles). Need more than one? Hit up the archives. Cheers!
I can’t explain how I’ve managed to stay interested in mixology this long without ever getting around to mixing myself a drink as enticingly named as the Suffering Bastard. But when I was perusing Anvil’s 100 Cocktails list, the Bastard stood out as one I had yet to cross off my list.
The drink's genesis can be traced to the Long Bar at the Shepheard Hotel in Cairo. As the story goes, in the late 1940s, the Shepheard’s bar steward was Joe Scialom. One day in 1947, according to Esquire, Scialom was desperate for a hangover remedy and the Suffering Bar Steward (soon somewhat sloppily rechristened as the Suffering Bastard) was the result.
There are a number of recipes for the Suffering Bastard floating about. Some are merely Mai tai variations with extra rum, while some call for brandy instead of bourbon, and others for rum. Today’s drink historians generally settle on bourbon as one of the two base spirits, along with a shot of gin. The drink is then leavened with the healing powers of lime juice and bitters (the lime juice can range anywhere from a teaspoon to an ounce) and lengthened with a good dose of ginger ale.
Since I’m just now crossing it off my list, I can’t say if the Suffering Bastard lives up to its reputation as a hangover buster. I can say that on a lazy evening, with one of these in front of you, “suffering” is about the last word that comes to mind.
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Posted by Paul Clarke, August 28, 2009 at 6:30 PM
Let's start the weekend right—with a cocktail recipe from Paul Clarke (The Cocktail Chronicles). Need more than one? Hit up the archives. Cheers!
Things usually slow down during late summer. It seems like everyone’s on vacation—at least mentally, if not physically. At this point in the season, the powerful, refreshing mojitos and juleps may be growing old, but it’s too soon to start breaking out autumn's comforting brown-spirit drinks. Right now, go for something gentle and quiet, a sort of liquid hammock that's comfortable in the glass and not caught up on priming you for a party. This time of year is made for the Sherry Cobbler.
This gentle cooler is as old as the transcontinental railroad (if not older) and quite easy to make. A simple combination of good dry sherry—think of the rich nuttiness of amontillado or oloroso—touched with a little sugar and citrus, then stretched out with ice and adorned with late summer fruits. Lower in alcohol than the average cocktail, the sherry cobbler is something you can enjoy at your leisure without it taking over the evening.
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Posted by Paul Clarke, August 21, 2009 at 5:45 PM
Let's start the weekend right—with a cocktail recipe from Paul Clarke (The Cocktail Chronicles). Need more than one? Hit up the archives. Cheers!
First things first: I have no idea why this drink is called the Alaska Cocktail. The Savoy Cocktail Book, where this drink appeared in 1930, is less than helpful in illuminating the drink's origins: “So far as can be ascertained this delectable potion is NOT the staple diet of the Esquimaux. It was probably first thought of in South Carolina hence its name,” according to the book.
Alaska, at least, sounds cold and refreshing? This recipe is deceptively simple—just gin, yellow Chartreuse (a lower alcohol, slightly sweeter relative of the more common green variety) and, optionally, a dash of orange bitters. Yet the drink is energetically complex due to a vibrant mix of botanicals. Some bartenders use a floral gin like Hendrick's but I think an old-school classic London dry gin like Beefeater or Tanqueray works nicely.
However you mix the Alaska, proceed with caution. While it has the sweetness and mellowness of a liqueur, yellow Chartreuse is still 80-proof, so the drink packs a mighty wallop. Sip carefully, and think of glaciers and ice fields.
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Posted by Paul Clarke, August 14, 2009 at 5:30 PM
Let's start the weekend right—with a cocktail recipe from Paul Clarke (The Cocktail Chronicles). Need more than one? Hit up the archives. Cheers!
Ah, gin—how wonderfully versatile you are. While gin-based summer drinks typically utilize the spirit in fizzy, citrusy, minty mixtures, gin functions under another identity as the base for intensely flavorful drinks such as the Contessa and the Last Word. True, these are lovely year-round drinks, but sometimes a summer evening calls for something sharp and crisp. Whiskey and brandy won’t do in such situations, and rum is better built for the lounging-in-a-hammock style of summer drinks. For these moments, it's gin, and preferably in a mixture that has a flavor as potent as the spirit.
Introducing the Lucien Gaudin. Named for an early 20th century French Olympic fencer, the Lucien Gaudin starts off in the manner of a Negroni by combining gin with Campari. With the addition of Cointreau and dry vermouth the result is a pleasantly bitter drink that is simultaneously rich and dry—a challenging flavor to create which is all the more enjoyable because of its rarity.
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Posted by Paul Clarke, August 7, 2009 at 5:45 PM
Let's start the weekend right—with a cocktail recipe from Paul Clarke of The Cocktail Chronicles. Need more than one? Hit up the archives. Cheers!
In a recent diatribe against oppressive summer heat, I praised the class of crushed ice drinks known as swizzles. Originating in the Caribbean and typically made of rum, lime juice, and occasionally the lime-and-clove syrup called falernum, swizzles are among the most effective heat busters in the bibulous kingdom. But they’re not all based on rum. Here's a contemporary drink that takes the swizzle’s foundation and revamps it in a spectacularly flavorful way: the Chartreuse Swizzle.
Created by San Francisco bartender Marcovaldo Dionysos, the Chartreuse Swizzle takes the basic elements of a Caribbean swizzle and sends them to grad school. By swapping the rum for green Chartreuse—a French herbal liqueur with a recipe dating back centuries—the Chartreuse Swizzle takes a simple summer cooler and turns the complexity level up to the proverbial eleven. The mixture may seem odd but in the glass, it works wonders. If you're looking for a unique and stunning drink to cool off with this August weekend, the Chartreuse Swizzle would be a good place to start.
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