Entries tagged with 'alcohol'
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"One sip locks in so much apple flavor. It's as if you were drinking the juice from ten apples in one gulp—multiplied by alcohol." Apples need to reach popsicle temperatures before they're fermented for ice cider. [Flickr: rabasz] Ice cider, or cidre de glace as its known in its birth place of Quebec, is kind of a cross between ice wine and hard cider. Like ice wine, the fruit (apples, not grapes, in this case) are left on the vine during chilly winters until they shrivel up. This produces the sweetest nectar possible. The super-concentrated juices are then pressed and fermented to add a little zing. The alcohol content usually ranges between 7% and 13% per volume. Cryomalus ice cider....
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Fresh hops awaiting harvest. [Photograph: Deschutes Brewery] As Serious Eaters, you probably use a lot of fresh herbs in your cooking. Dried basil just doesn't have the aromatic sweetness of fresh basil. But have you considered whether there are dried or fresh hops are in your beer? Hop flowers provide the bitter backbone that makes beer taste the way it does. Some varieties of hops add a fruity citrus taste, while others give off a juniper-like scent. Most of the time, brewers use dried, compressed hop pellets to do the job. But once a year when hops are ready to be pulled from the vine, some brewers celebrate the season by heading out to local farms to harvest hops...
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"Secret passwords and exclusive policies be damned." [Photograph: Robyn Lee] In yesterday's Diner's Journal, Pete Wells writes that Pegu Club co-owner and bartender extraordinaire Audrey Saunders is opening a new place, the Tar Pit, with chef Mark Peel in Los Angeles next month. With this move, Saunders—one of the most talented and influential bartenders in the ongoing cocktail renaissance—becomes the latest New York bartender to spread the craft west of Weehawken. Sasha Petraske, whose New York bars Milk & Honey and Little Branch (among others) helped spur the trend of the now ubiquitous speakeasy-style cocktail bars, played a hand in opening The Varnish in Los Angeles earlier this year, as well as taking his skills to the nation's capitol, working...
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"The West Coast has hoppy IPAs, the Midwest has a strong tradition of pilsners and lagers, but the South has no real (craft) beer tradition." [Photograph: Carolyn Lilly Wilson] Sean Wilson has a vision for the beer scene in the American South. Using heirloom grains and other ingredients from North Carolina farms, he and his collaborator, Chris Davis, hope to create a distinctly Southern style of beer. They will open Fullsteam Brewery in Durham late this winter or early next spring. I chatted with Sean about the challenges he's faced and his plans for the brewery. Name: Sean Wilson Location: Durham, North Carolina Occupation: President of Fullsteam Brewery Tell us a little about Fullsteam and what you envision for your...
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[Photograph: Kerry Saretsky] When I was young, I spent Halloween night bobbing for apples with my hands behind my back. I remember thinking how silly it was, when I could get a perfectly delicious apple coated in caramel neatly perched on a stick. And now even that seems barbaric when I can drink my caramel apples from a beer bottle. Brothers Toffee Apple Cider tastes of sweet, alcoholic, bubbling apple cider with melted caramel stirred up inside, described quite correctly by the company as tasting something like "cream soda." It was originally developed for Halloween, but was so popular the company now bottles it year-round. For an American away from America during the all-American season from Halloween to Thanksgiving, the...
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We tasted ten brown ales—from bright, hoppy ones to the sweet and pruney. Whether you're looking for something bitter to see you through the World Series or a more warming, chocolately beer on a rainy night, we have favorites for both.
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A good brown ale is gentle, smooth, and wonderfully drinkable, pint after pint. Despite their low alcohol, these are flavorful malty beers. We tried five brown ales—check out our favorites.
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"Long before they were hallmarks of any cocktail geek's liquor cabinets, Gourmet ran recipes for homemade allspice liqueur (1977) and Cherry Bounce (1966)." [Flickr: lulubrooks] This news of Gourmet's shuttering has touched every food lover, and this sense of sadness and disappointment extends into the world of drinks. While the magazine's drinks coverage always seemed to feel more natural when the topic was wine, over the decades the editors occasionally gave spirits and cocktails a serious eye. Perhaps nowhere has this been more evident recently than on the magazine's website, which features drinks plumbed from Gourmet's archives arranged by decade, starting with the first issue in 1941. This series of drinks forms a curious liquid time capsule. While certain drinks...
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If you can't make it to Germany this year for Oktoberfest festivities, you can at least drink in solidarity. We tasted twelve beers—a few traditional German märzen beers head-to-head with some American interpretations from craft brewers.
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Serious Eats contributor Paul Clarke calls upon mixologists to make cocktails with vodka in his blog The Cocktail Chronicles. He says vodka works well "as a vehicle and softener for bold flavors, rather than simply as an alcohol-delivery device."...
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