Professor Cocktail

Vote for the 21st Century Harvey!

Martin Miller's Gin is running a contest to choose the best new cocktail that "trades up" on a maligned classic drink from the 1970s and '80s. My entry is called the 21st Century Harvey and is an updated twist on the Harvey Wallbanger.

It's made using Martin Miller's gin, Cointreau, Licor 43 and Orange Bitters. It's pretty darn tasty, if you ask me.

You don't need to like it, though. You just need to vote for it!

Please visit the Facebook page for my entry and click on "Like." Your vote is appreciated!

 Vote for 21st Century Harvey

 

Book Review: "The American Cocktail" by The Editors of Imbibe Magazine

Some cocktail books are intended for the casual mixologist, some are intended for the advanced user, and some are a mixture of both. Jim Meehan's The PDT Cocktail Book is an excellent example of the last category, as it's accessible to the inexperienced, yet valuable to the pro as well.

The American Cocktail, a new book put together by the editors of Imbibe Magazine, is definitely in the middle category. Although a novice cocktail fan would probably enjoy flipping through it, the recipes are really intended for those seeking a higher level of mixology.

When putting together this book, the editors did something very smart: they polled 50 of the best bartenders around the country, those men and women who are really dedicated to the craft of high-end cocktails, and asked them to submit a recipe.

The results are fascinating and unique, with a strong emphasis on bold flavors, local ingredients, and drinks that truly capture the essence of the bar/restaurant where they are served. This is cutting-edge mixology that is still, for the most part, accessible.

True, many of the recipes aren't going to be things that you can easily whip up at home. Several of them call for bespoke ingredients, complicated preparations, or obscure spirits, but by no means all of them. Here's an easy recipe that I tried, which made a delicious drink.

 

Dixie Cup

by Timothy Victor Faulkner, Sauced (Atlanta)

Ingredients:

2 oz Four Roses Yellow Label Bourbon
1 1/2 oz Red Rock Ginger Ale (or other Spicy Ginger Ale)
1/2 oz Sugarcane Syrup

Combine the bourbon, ginger ale, and syrup in an ice-filled mixing glass and stir gently. Strain into an ice-filled highball glass. Rub a lime twist around the rim of the glass before dropping it into the cocktail. 

 

As you can see in the photo, I used Four Roses Small Batch Bourbon and Reed's Extra Ginger Brew. My, my, this is one tasty drink.

Several of the bartenders I admire have drinks featured here, including Todd Thrasher from PX (Alexandria, VA), Jim Meehan from PDT (New York), Robert Heugel from Anvil (Houston), and Jeffrey Morgenthaler from Clyde Common (Portland). Having recipes from such experts makes this collection all the more valuable.

Readers looking for an introduction to cocktails or a list of simple recipes won't find much joy in The American Cocktail. But more experienced mixologists -- or those who want to up their game a little -- should definitely give this a look.

Recipe: A Day at the Races

The Wall Street Journal ran a piece recently on Tiki drinks for the fall season. The article included three recipes, one of which immediately caught my eye. Naturally I had to try it out, and my instinct was correct: it's a very tasty cocktail.

The drink is called A Day at the Races and it was created by mixologist Bill Codman of Storyville in Boston. Tiki drinks get an often justified rap as being sweet, but this one isn't. The use of gin instead of rum, and the small amount of syrup (in this case, grenadine), take care of that.

Here's the recipe:

 

A Day at the Races

Ingredients:

1 1/2 ounces Beefeater 24 Gin
1/2 ounce Velvet Falernum
1/2 ounce Grenadine
1/2 ounce Lemon Juice
Champagne

Shake all ingredients except Champagne with ice. Strain into a highball glass filled with crushed ice. Top with Champagne. Garnish with an orange twist.

 

The flavors blend together nicely in this drink. It has excellent balance and is very refreshing -- the Champagne topper is a great touch. Gin doesn't appear in very many Tiki drinks -- the best known exception being the Singapore Sling -- but it works well here.

A definite keeper!

Recipe: The Antioxidant Cocktail - Award Winner!

A while back the Portland Craft Cocktails blog and Northwest Food and Wine Festival sponsored a contest for "casual mixologists" to create a new cocktail. I submitted a drink I created recently, with a little inspiration from my sister, Deborah Graff.

I selected ingredients that were rich in antioxidants -- that way, you can fight cancer while enjoying a tasty cocktail.

Much to my surprise, I won! Here's the recipe:

 

The Antioxidant Cocktail

1 1/2 oz White Rum
8-10 Fresh blueberries
1 oz Pomegranate Juice
1/2 oz Maraschino Liqueur
1/2 oz Fresh Lime Juice

In a mixing glass, muddle the blueberries with the rum. Next add the remaining ingredients. Shake with ice, then double strain into a chilled cocktail glass.

 

When I started making this back in the summer I used fresh blueberries, but since then I've also made it with the frozen kind and it still came out good. Please note that Maraschino Liqueur is not the red syrup that Maraschino Cherries come bottled in. It's this stuff.

Cheers!

Liqueur/Whiskey Review: Evan Williams Cherry Reserve

Evan Williams Cherry Reserve
Liqueur/Whiskey
Final Grade: B+
Price: $15 (750ml)

One of the most popular new sectors of the spirits business is a somewhat unusual one. Building on the popularity of the ubiquitous flavored vodkas, several distillers have started introducing flavored whiskeys.

According to the production information, Evan Williams Cherry Reserve combines aged bourbon with "natural cherry flavor." The distiller can't legally call this bourbon, so you won't find that word anywhere on the bottle. But that's what it is, albeit with the addition of cherry and some other stuff as well, like caramel coloring. Presumably sugar, too, considering how sweet it is.

On the nose, it's all sweet cherries. Very nice if you like cherries -- and I love them. So I enjoyed the aroma very much. The cherries come across strong in the taste as well, along with a little nutty bitterness and a modest alcohol kick. There's a hint of almonds, which made me think of Amaretto.

It's nice stuff. Sweet -- you'll notice I keep mentioning that -- but with a pleasing flavor. The cherry is more authentic than you usually find in spirits like this. It thankfully avoids that cough syrup taste that plagues a lot of the competitors.

This liqueur is 35% alcohol, making it almost as strong as standard spirits, which are generally 40%. So be careful. Even with the high alcohol content (for a liqueur), it still goes down pretty easily and could sneak up on you.

After drinking it on the rocks, which I liked, I tried Cherry Reserve with Diet Coke. That was too sweet and cloying, however. (It would probably be really bad with regular Coke.) So I tried out one of the recipes on the Evan Williams website to see how the spirit would taste in a cocktail.

 

Cherry Cooler

1 1/2 oz Evan Williams Cherry Reserve
1/2 oz Dry White Rum
1/2 oz Triple Sec
2 oz Pineapple Juice
1 oz Orange Juice

Shake ingredients with ice. Strain into a Collins glass with ice.

 

A tasty, pseudo-Tiki cocktail. Sweet for sure, but I liked it. (If I were to make it again, I'd probably eliminate the OJ and replace it with 1/2 oz of Lime Juice to see if that balances it out a little better.) If you like fruity drinks, it's worth giving a try. Just don't have more than one, or the sugar will kill you.

Evan Williams Cherry Reserve is a spirit that will find most of its audience among younger drinkers, and others who enjoy things on the sweet side. It is not a sophisticated spirit, so those looking for complexity should look elsewhere.

It does, however, present a nice opportunity to introduce bourbon (in an "enhanced" form, of course) to those drinkers who aren't yet fans of whiskey's charms. I have not yet had the opportunity to taste Evan Williams' regular bourbon, but I look forward to doing so.

Report Card

Quality Grade: B
Value Grade: A
Final Grade: B+

The World's 50 Best Bars

A poll was taken of 100 bar professionals from around the world to produce a list of the world's 50 best bars. Obviously lists like this are a little silly. Such things are subjective and prone to cronyism, and also vary depending on the respondent’s criteria and state of inebriation. Still, I love a good list, so I'm sharing it with you.

Note: I haven't been to any of these bars. And that makes me sad.

Here are the Top 10:

1. PDT, New York
2. Connaught, London
3. Artesian, London
4. Death & Co, New York
5. Milk & Honey, London
6. American Bar at the Savoy, London
7. 69 Colebrooke Row, London
8. Drink, Boston US
9. Harry’s New York Bar, Paris
10. Black Pearl, Melbourne, Australia

See the rest of the list.