Mmminty Cocktails

Before the bottom of my first bottle, Creme de Menthe has become an ingredient I should have bought long ago. After drunkenly adding it to a shot of brandy a few nights back because I wanted a stinger to go, I decided I should go ahead and try out a few good looking recipes that make different uses of Creme de Menthe.

First off is the Consolation Cocktail. I chose this to start because of my love for gin and the simple ingredients. With ingredients only a step removed from a Gin Cocktail or a Gin Sour, the Consolation does a great job of smoothing over a bunch of pretty strong tastes.

Consolation Cocktail
1 1/2 oz Gin
1/2 oz Creme de Menthe
1/2 oz Lemon Juice
Dash Angostura Bitters

I thought the lemon was a little too much, so I lowered it to only 1/4 oz the second time around. I think this is a better balance of the four, but whatever you prefer. The refreshing quality of the mint goes well with the juniper taste of good strong gin. I'd drink one of these again!

Image from Absolut website recipe

Although I'm fairly certain it is not a problem too many men encounter, I'm sure there are times when your ladyfriend needs to be reminded not to be a bad girl? Anyway, I can't seem to find any information on where this cocktail comes from or what gives it its name. The base of brandy and sweet vermouth is such a palate pleaser that there are dozens of variations you can add to them to make a suave-tasting cocktail.

Lady be Good
1 1/2 oz Brandy
1/2 oz Sweet Vermouth
1/2 oz Creme de Menthe

The Lady be Good did not surprise me. It tasted like a Stinger with sweet vermouth, and I'll gladly try this one again.

A Day of Rosiness - Midday Tincture

That's right, it's time for the second installment of rosy drinks to get you through the day. Hopefully your Morning Effusion has put you in a perfect place to appreciate your very own Midday Tincture:

This drink started its life as a Rosy Deacon, but quickly morphed into something different. At first taste, the Rosy Deacon is a little jarring to me. The gin and grapefruit juice certainly pair nicely, but the sloe gin is too sweet and thick in your mouth and throat. Instead of leaving you hungry for more, it almost makes you want to - gasp - clear your mouth with some water.

Rosy Deacon
3/4 oz Gin
3/4 oz Sloe Gin
1 oz Grapefruit Juice
Sugar to Taste

Rosy Deacon (Try 2)
1 oz gin
1/2 oz Sloe Gin
1 oz Grapefruit Juice
Sugar

For the second try, I went with frosting the glass with sugar rather than actually mixing any into the drink, as the original was more than a little too sweet. This one was better, but still not a cocktail I'd recommend. I liked the dryness of the grapefruit juice, but since I know I won't usually have grapefruit juice on hand, I tried out a new recipe that substitutes vermouth for the fruit juice. The result is a cocktail I could happily drink to keep me Rosy.

Rosy Layman
1 oz Gin
1/2 oz Dry Vermouth
1/2 oz Sloe Gin
1/4 oz Grenadine Syrup
Sugar

Once again, I frosted the glass with sugar, which was very successful. The Rosy Layman has a sour taste, but the sugar from the rim sweetens it up just a little bit. The combination of dry vermouth and gin are crisp enough that they cut through both the sloe and the grenadine. I was a little afraid that this would be little more than a gin martini, as the scent when I make it is very similar. That ended up being a totally unnecessary worry, and the Layman is its own beast.

Until Alpenglow, stay rosy.

Satanic Cocktails - Demon of Destiny

A vortex of taste greets your pallet - the scent is undefined, but crisp and fiesty. You get a feeling like there is someone waiting behind you, or is that just the hair on the back of your neck standing up as your tongue goes numb with the next sip?

The effervescent cocktail before you beckons you with riches, it's golden shade mocking your impoverished soul, daring you to dream of the riches your hellish desires contain.

You may have just been shown your demonic destiny.

Demon of Destiny
1.5 oz. Gin
.75 oz Sweet Vermouth
.5 oz Absinthe
.25 oz Tequila
.25 oz Agave Syrup

Add all ingredients into a shaker half full with ice. Shake like you want the minions of hell to break out of their fiery (icy) tombs. Double strain to remove all of the small ice chunks - you want this cocktail to glisten. Let the demonic struggle begin as the tequila, absinthe, agave, and gin all fight tooth and horn to be the last taste left in your mouth.

Progenitor: Destiny Cocktail

White Dog

According to my research, the bottle of White Dog Whiskey I just picked up is a sign of the new small distilleries coming to the whiskey scene.  I have to make a stunning confession - I've never had moonshine.  I know, shocking, right.  Well, this is a 62.5% bomb that will burn your taste buds like a flask of 151º at Hallomass

Recipe attempts:

2 oz white dog
3/4 oz lemon juice
spoonful sweet vermouth
1/2 oz agave syrup (or simple syrup)
1 dash orange bitters

Taste not complete, strong white dog finish


2 oz white dog
3/4 oz lemon juice
1/2 oz sweet vermouth
1/2 oz agave (or simple syrup)
2 dash angustura bitters

Taste still not complete


1 1/2 oz white dog
1 1/2 oz london dry gin
1/2 oz sweet vermouth
1 oz lime juice
1 egg white
1/2 oz agave (or simple syrup)
2 dash angustura bitters


1 1/2 oz white dog
1 1/2 oz london dry gin
1/2 oz sweet vermouth
1/2 oz dry vermouth
1/2 oz agave
2 dash angustura
1 egg

I wrote down these recipes months and months ago when I first bought White Dog. I got drunk making this post and never finished it. I decided to post it despite not having a complete recipe to present. At some point I plan on finishing it and presenting a Redface Original.  TBA.

Palative Potables - Outraged

Now, to be perfectly honest, I turn to the Dry Gin Martini frequently, for a variety of reasons, and even when I have no particular reason.  However, there is at least one occasion in particular when I turn to the dry gin martini - when I am pissed off.

A dry martini doesn't mess around.  It doesn't compromise, and it doesn't hide.  A dry martini has few ingredients - and they are both easy to find.  You can make as many different dry martinis as there are gins, dry vermouths, and ratios between the two.  When you drink a dry martini, it takes about as much from you as you take from it.

A Martini Moment

When I am angry and need to clear my head, I often turn to a dry martini.  It's no-nonsense complexion demands my attention at the same time that it oils my gears.  No matter how sour the thoughts on my mind, the cutting combination of dry spiced wine and London Dry Gin will force me to grimace and grin in a way that only the martini-drinkers of the world will understand.

My personal dry gin martini recipe (I am playing around with the classic touch of adding orange bitters, give it a try)

Redface's Personal Dry Gin Martini
5 parts London Dry Gin
1 part dry vermouth

Place 4-5 ice cubes in shaker, 3-4 cubes in a small cocktail glass.  Add the dry vermouth (or add a full shot and then strain it, your call) and the gin.  Shake three times lightly.  Slowly and deliberately double strain the martini into the cocktail glass (discard the ice obviously from the glass).  Add no garnish.  Gripping the glass fervently by its stem, think angry thoughts and then snarl into the glass as you suck in a full first sip.

You Always Thought You Were Smarter For Loving Booze.... Now You Know

The beauty in this new report on "Why Intelligent People Drink More Alcohol" is that it defines things so methodically that I couldn't find a single hole in the logic in two full reads (one sober as a monk at matins, the other a few degrees in).  Evolutionarily speaking, smarter individuals try new things - and alcohol is new.

I love it!  Plus, that zinger that finished off the third paragraph had me laughing my ass off.

The final paragraph also had a tidbit of sense that I find refreshing: 

That such behavior [binge drinking and getting druuunk] is detrimental to health and has few, if any, positive consequences, is irrelevant for the Hypothesis.  [The hypothesis] does not predict that more intelligent individuals are more likely to engage in healthy and beneficial behavior.  Instead, it predicts that more intelligent individuals are more likely to engage in evolutionarily novel behavior.  

 Intelligent people are not, ceteris paribus, more likely to make good (healthy, moral, salacious) decisions, they are just more apt to do novel evolutionary things.  Brilliant!  This means I can still plausibly claim to be intelligent while also explaining why I am ombibulous and spent the whole day Sunday feeling like crap.

From the Lab

At a party, most people see a bunch of liquor bottles and immediately clam up.  They resort quickly to shorthand recipes that taste mediocre no matter the quality of the ingredients.  Rum and Coke, Jack and Coke, Gin and Juice, Screwdriver, you get the idea.  None of these drinks will ever win a cocktail competition, but they will rule a party. 

Last weekend - before I sang a raucous ballad to the porcelain goddess - I was happy to observe this phenomenon in action.  With a beautiful menu, and a quite good spread of liquors at the party, I watched people prepare exclusively comfort cocktails that they knew.  I think most people would be much happier behind the bar if they just relaxed and realized that they can never make a drink as bad as the bankers drinks they had freshman year of college.  If people realized that - they might be a little less risk adverse when faced with the difficult task of constructing a cocktail given an unfamiliar liquor spread. 

With that in mind, here is a drink I just came up with a few minutes ago.  It stinks.

Curdled Juice:
Muddled Mango Pieces That Need to be Eaten Before They Go Bad
3 oz English Dry Gin
1 Dash Fee Brothers Orange Bitters
1/2 Tsp Raw Agave Syrup
1 1/2 oz Dubonnet Blanc

Shake and strain into small snifter.

Yuck.  The muddled mango and bitters gives it the complexion of curdled orange juice, while the dry gin and dubonnet are sour together without any positive interactions.  While I surmise the drink might have been less bad with a half ounce or so of fresh lemon juice,  I think I'll be inventing a new category of failed drinks to accompany "Dishwater" - "Curdled."

For every moderately good recipe someone comes up with, there are usually a half a dozen ones that rate only a hair above "double shot of bankers with a pilfered fountain drink chaser."  So next time you see a party spread, take heart, pour a crappy but creative drink, and if worst comes to worst, pawn it off on the drunkest guy in the room, they'll appreciate the kindness of a delivered cocktail as they swill it down.

A Shark's Tooth

Some days I find that every drink I mix comes out exactly as I imagined.  Whether it's an ingredient I've never used before, or one I'm deeply familiar with, there are days where I could plow through half a dozen new recipes without a bad one popping up.  Last week I had one of those days with margaritas and Sloe Gin. 

Those of you who know me are well aware that I love browsing in a liquor store.  I always feel I can get a sense both of the expected clientele, and the personality of the manager/owner of a store based on the layout and wares.  The "Wine Bazaar" a block from my house is a little confusing that way.  The guy who runs it is exceptional at pairing wines with housewives - most of their clientele is mothers coming in straight after buying groceries at the Stop & Shop next door.  I've been disappointed multiple times before at their liquor options, as the liquor seems to cater to the young and trendy crowd rather than the crotchety old man crowd that likes my kind of amber nectar. 

One thing they do always have is Eagle Rare at sale prices.  If you get a chance, it's buffalo trace's bigger, more mature older brother.

Back to the Sloe Gin - After asking several nicer liquor stores if they had some sloe gin in the last six months, I happened upon it in the "Wine Bazaar" purely by accident.  I'd listened to a podcast on midori and was willing to buy a bottle to try it, and right next to the midori was some sloe gin. 

After that successful night making a few sloe cocktails - expect a Satanic Cocktail coming soon with sloe gin - including improvising several delicious margaritas with sloe gin, tonight I decided to try the Shark's Tooth. 

Shark's Tooth
1.5 oz Dark Rum
.25 oz Lemon Juice
.25 oz Rose's Sweetened Lime
.25 oz Sweet Vermouth
.25 oz Sloe Gin
1 Dash Angostura Bitters

Shake and pour into snifter or cocktail glass

I found the original version to be way too sweet (admittedly, I don't have passion fruit syrup, so I substituted Rose's, and I didn't have gold rum, so I went with some Bacardi Select).  It had a nice taste, but way too much sugar.  Looking at the alternate version, I can see that someone else must have had that same opinion, as it switches out the sweet vermouth for dry vermouth.  I refuse to drop the bitters though...

Shark's Tooth Variation

1.5 oz Dark Rum

.25 oz Lemon Juice
.25 oz Rose's Sweetened Lime
.25 oz Dry Vermouth
.25 oz Sloe Gin
1 Dash Angostura Bitters

Talk about a transformation.  From a 'nice taste' but too sweet, to just plain colored dishwater.  I'm done with the Shark's Tooth.

Sloe Gin, however, I will keep sampling.

Sloe Gin - Not The Gin I Expected

You'd think with a name that included "Gin" there would be some simularity between gin and sloe gin.  Well, if you did think that (if, in the unlikely case, you'd ever heard of sloe gin before), you'd be wrong.

Sloe comes from sloeberry, but even with the 'berry' added in, Sloe Gin still sounds kinda like a mix of the sugar from candy-wrappers and bathtub gin.  I figured it would be brutal like bai jiu.

Well, it's not at all the gin I expected.  It took only one whiff of the 5$ bottle to determine that it was a sweet liqueur and not a hoary liquor.

As a replacement to sugar in my bourbon cocktails, it is changing things up.  It also plays a starring role in the last few margaritas I've had in the last two weeks.


If you're interested, take a look at the CocktailDB note on it or the Wikipedia article, both are useful.  At some point in the future, expect a detailed post where I make some homemade sloe gin!

Satanic Cocktails, Diabolo Part II

I try to give each drink I make for the first time a fair chance.  I've long since discovered that some tastes build on you, and it may take until the second or third try on a cocktail to appreciate the taste.  I'm going to do that for the Diabolo - yesterday I made two of them, and was quite unimpressed, so today I am making several more.

My first impression yesterday was that the 2:1 dubonnet rouge to gin was way off.  Too much dubonnet, and not enough chance to taste the orgeat.  So after the first one, I tweaked the recipe - lowered the dubonnet, increased the gin until it was 1:1.  I added a dash or so of peychaud's bitters just for kicks (and because the color without the peychaud's had been close to crimson, and I thought it only fair to make a cocktail named diabolo a more hell-and-brimfire hue.

Diabolo #1 (Cocktaildb.com)                  Diabolo #2 (Dubonnet Correction)
1 1/4 oz Gin                                               1 3/4 oz Gin
2 1/4 oz Dubonnet Rouge                          1 3/4 oz Dubonnet Rouge
1/2 oz Orgeat                                             1/2 oz Orgeat
                                                                   2 Dashes Peychauds Bitters

Yesterday's second try had the distinction of no longer tasting only of dubonnet.  However, it also tasted like a dishwater cocktail - no distinct flavor or direction.  So, today I decided to try it first with the 1:1 ratio without the peychauds, to see if I could stick to the spirit of the drink, but fix the problem from the first try.  The first sip was great, but I soon noticed what the peychauds had covered up on the second try - too much bitter gin flavor.

Diabolo #3 (A New Look)
1 1/2 oz Gin
1 1/2 oz Dubonnet Rouge
1/2 oz Orgeat

Well, next up I decided to push a little more towards the original, but to increase the orgeat presence.  So I went with:

Diabolo #4
1 1/4 oz Gin
1 1/2 oz Dubonnet Rouge
2/3 oz Orgeat

This combination did for me what a decent drink often does - it slipped by without note.  I fairly slopped it back without hesitation or remark.  Almost as though I might have gotten the mixture right.  I'm guessing that my orgeat is less sweet than what is usually used.  Or, using brown sugar instead of regular sugar changed things up.  Either way, this seems to embody what the cocktail was originally.

Just to keep things fresh though, I'm trying it one more time, this time back to the 1:1, but with a spoonful of ouzo floated on the top.

Diabolo #5 (EU Bailout Special)
1 1/2 oz Gin
1 1/2 oz Dubonnet Rouge
1/2 oz orgeat
1/4 oz Ouzo

If only I had a particularly German ingredient in there... Add everything but the ouzo, shake and twirl, strain, then float the ouzo.

Well, that's one good drink with which to finish this installment of Satanic Cocktails.  The ouzo completely takes over the scent, and adds a distinctive burn at the end, but the strength of the dubonnet and the gin preserves the Diabolo's original flavor. 

A Night of Vermouths

Last night was a night of exploring different recipes - I decided to drink only drinks that had both sweet and dry vermouths.  I expected it to be an interesting limitation in ingredients, and it did not disappoint.

My first drink under this rule was an Alfonso Special.  I'm not knocking it, and I'd totally drink it again, but it was far too bland to get a 'special' attached to its name.  I had planed on starting with a Beachcomber's Gold, but seemed to have misplaced my bottle of rum in my stomach - I'll have to get a new one before I can try that recipe.

Next came the Duchess.  As a 8:1 or more gin martini guy, I have been shocked recently to enjoy cocktails with strong dry vermouth components.  Though I will still not be increasing my vermouth ration in the martini, I do begrudgingly accept that dry vermouth can add significantly to a cocktail.

The Duchess

1/3 Dry Vermouth

1/3 Sweet Vermouth

1/3 Absinthe

(Use Redface's "Shake and Twirl" method for reddest results)

Next up came the Honorable Cocktail.  Finishing up the before-dinner cocktails, this was a solid pick.  I think I put a touch too much dry vermouth in it, but that could just be my sensitivity to the dry vermouth.  After a bland cocktail (Alfonso) and a complex if muddy cocktail (Duchess), the familiar warmth of bourbon was welcome.

The Honorable Cocktail

1 1/2 oz Bourbon

1/2 oz Sweet Vermouth

1/2 oz Dry Vermouth

(Shake and Twirl, then strain)

The Honorable Cocktail was surprisingly smooth, I'm beginning to buy into the whole mixing the sweet and dry vermouths.  Though they both have very powerful tastes, they seem to consistently allow their liquor companions to shine through. 

To finish it off, I came across a recipe that filled the gap I've been having for quite some time.  I haven't had a whiskey sour in a while, and the Manhasset more than fixes that.  

Manhasset

1 1/4 oz Bourbon

1/2 oz lemon juice

1/2 oz dry vermouth

1/4 oz sweet vermouth

Without any of the throat-sticky-sweetness of most bar's whiskey sours, and without the sugar component, the Manhasset does away with most of what makes me get tired of whiskey sours after one or two.  Instead, this one packs the bourbon taste down to make room for the vermouths, and finishes with the way sour lemon aftertaste.  It's not until after the lemon that you get the whiskey heat, and even then, it's fully tempered by the sour, sweet, and dry ingredients.

The Elephant's Ear

Who has the Elephant's Ear these days?  With Rush Limbaugh jumping off the deep end as often as possible, Glen Beck coming in remarkably high on Time's 100 Most Influential People in the world, and just slightly edged out by Sarah Palin at that (!), predicting the direction of the GOP is nebulous.

Well, I sat down today to puzzle over just that.  With no answers forthcoming, I slurped down a few Elephant's Ear Cocktails, turned off Fox News, and went to do something productive.  With no clear leaders, or even people willing to put forward an accomplishment (Think McCain and Immigration, or Romney and Health Care, Palin and ??????), I can't imagine the GOP coming up with any sort of victory in 2012.  But that's just me.

 I found it a little difficult to take a good picture of the drink - I kept having the problem of too little drink left, because who wouldn't want a sip or two in between frames?

1oz Gin
3/4oz Dry Vermouth
3/4oz Dubonnet Rouge

It says stir, but as usual, I found the 'Two shakes and then swirl" method more tasty.  Enjoy!

The taste was interesting, but I suggest you make your own if you'd like to know what it is.