Mocktails

3 oz Kombucha
1 oz blackberry shrub
1/2 oz lemon

This doesn't have a name and its only sort of a recipe, more of a suggested guideline perhaps. The proportions really depend on the flavor and intensity of your ingredients. Over the winter I've been brewing kombucha until its super sour then cutting it with sweeter fruit juice or ginger beer or anything else I can find. On this occasion, I took some kombucha before it was fully fermented, so it was sour but also still sweet. I made a shrub over the winter with some random cheap out of season berries. I don't know what recipe I used or if I messed it up, but it is also sweet and sour. Shrubs should be but this one is really sweet with a hint of tartness. So this recipe works really well for the ingredients I had but may not be reproducible. 

Kombucha in mocktails works very well because it is so intensely flavored. It has the oomph that a soda or fruit juice is lacking. I've been using club soda to stretch out the flavors if I use other intense ingredients like lemon or lime. I'll also use sparkling wine if its for someone that drinks alcohol but doesnt want a big drink.

Moscow Mule

The Moscow Mule is a classic highball made fancier by having its own special glass. So far I have always made them in collins glasses but I finally got some copper moscow mule mugs and made them up properly. The copper mug is able to hold temperatures better than glass, resulting in a colder cocktail for a longer time with less dilution. They are certainly delicious in any glass but these mugs are gonna be a game changer in the summer.
 So before we get into the simple recipe, a mule and a buck are the same thing. They are both highballs involving ginger ale/ beer. The gin buck is what I am most familiar with although I have heard of gin gin mule as well and I dont know why the are different. Perhaps they are not and buck is classic terminology and it got renamed after the popularity of moscow mules? That popularity began in LA in the 50's as a bit of marketing for the new on the scene russian vodkas. You don't really need a recipe for this, you can do it to taste. Keep in mind, you don't want too much soda because there will be some dilution from the ice and the whole point of naming it a mule is that its got some kick to it. Here's how I usually do it, with some citrus adjustment based on brand of ginger beer. (Reeds is way more citrusy and requires less):::::::::::::

Moscow Mule


2oz vodka
3oz ginger beer
1/2oz lime juice

Fill copper mug with ice. Add vodka and lime and stir. Top with ginger beer. Add more lime wedges to taste. Unless I've already squeezed a lot of lime juice, I usually just ream half a lime into the glass then throw in the entire half peel.

Tequila also makes a fine substitute at the same proportions....

Grand Autumn

Here is my favorite new fall drink! I found it on St Germain's facebook page. It seems weird that they are a real company and dont have a website, just facebook. But whatevs, I learned this great recipe from them and saw a few more that looked promising.... I know this doesn't sound that autumnal but it does have a nice leaves-changing-colors kind of look to it.

Grand Autumn

2oz Rye (Russels Reserve)

1oz Elderflower liquer (St Germain)

3/4oz Lime juice

3oz Ginger Beer (Reeds)

2 dashes Angostura

Shake Rye, St Germain, lime with ice. Strain into a collins glass with ice. Add ginger beer to taste and bitters on top. The bitters are a great addition. Sweet/ sour/ floral/ spicy. Excellent.

{I do love all things involving ginger beer. I pretty much always use Reeds extra ginger. Its very spicy, pretty sweet, and very citrusy.}

Melancia

Melancia is Portuguese for watermelon. Agua fresca is Mexican. Cachaca is Brazilian, where they speak Portuguese more than Portugal. Why does any of this matter? Cocktails, duh.

First of all agua fresca is delicious and refreshing if you did not know. Its basically lemonade using other fruits. Water, fruit, sweetener, citrus, sometimes herbs. Its less sweet and more refreshing than plain old juice and it stretches your produce into more drinks. When made out of cucmbers and mint and lemon I've heard it called cucumber water. However, watermelon water sounds stupid. Watermelon agua fresca sounds delightful though. I made it like this:

Watermelon Agua Fresca

10lb watermelon, rind cut off, chopped coarsely to fit in a blender
4 C water
1 lime
6 Tbl Agave nectar

This is a monster batch. My watermelon didnt even seem that huge to me but when I weighed it the scale said ten pounds. It filled the blender 4 times! I did a quarter of the water melon, 1/4 lime, 1 1/2 tsp agave for each batch. My watermelon wasn't amazing and this was a great use for it but if I had an amazing watermelon it would be even better and maybe not need quite as much sweetener. I strained it through a mesh strainer and then washed away the foamy pulpy stuff. I filled 4 quart jars when I was done. When it sat in the fridge for a day, it separates into fine fruit pulpy solids and more clear liquid but a quick shake and its back to normal. Now what? Drink it as is, or over ice with mint leaves and lime slices added top the glass or make a cocktail:

Melancia Sour

recipe adapted from Kevin Deidrich of the Burritt Room, SF; via the internet.


1 1/2 oz Cachaca
1/2 oz lemoncello
1/2 oz lime juice
1 1/2 oz watermelon agua fresca

Stir with ice, then strain into a cocktail glass. Garnish with a lime wheel.

I adapted the recipe only because I didn't have the necessary ingredients for the original but I thought my version was really tasty. Cachaca is like the funky Brazilian cousin to rum. It is made from cane syrup rather than molasses and it is aged in wooden barrels for a year or more. It's pretty interesting if you can find it. If I didn't have Cachaca but I did have Smith & Cross Rum, I'd probably make it with that and be intoxicated more quickly but the flavor profile would be similar.

Pegu Club Cocktail

This one is apparently from a country club in Burma originally. It is virtually unknown in Myanmar today, according to wikipedia and there happens to be a bar in New York currently which stole the name. Its an old school classic dating to at least the 1920's and its basically a gin margarita. I'm not sure why people don't make these more often. Its different but very good.

Pegu Club Cocktail

2 oz gin
1 oz triple sec
1/2 oz lime juice
dash Angostura bitters
dash Orange bitters

Shake with ice and strain into a chilled cocktail glass.


This drink follows the 3:2:1 formula that I enjoy for sours, like margaritas and sidecars. The addition of 2 kinds of bitters got me thinking of variations. While there are still peaches in season, heres what I got:

Peachauds Club Cocktail

2 oz bourbon
3/4 oz peach schnapps
1/2 oz lime juice
dash Peychauds bitters
dash peach bitters

Shake with ice and strain into a chilled cocktail glass.
I made the first drink with Cointreau.
The peach schnapps had to be reduced slightly for a balanced drink.

Jalapaloma

This month Mixology Monday is being hosted by Feu de Vie. Check out all the fiery entries here: fire drinks The theme is fire and it has me a little indecisive. Do I infuse something with chilis? Do I go over the top and make a drink that you ignite before serving? Do I go super subtle and just use bourbon, because it is aged in charred oak barrels? Do I infuse a smoky ingredient rather than a fiery ingredient like black cardamom or lapsang suchang tea? Uggh.

           

My wonderful girlfriend reminded me that I made a chili version of a Paloma last week that we both really enjoyed. So that's settled. When I made the original drink, I used jalapeno tequila made by Karen at Little Baby's Icecream. They were experimenting on a weirdo ice cream flavor, as they always do, and it didn't pan out and they had left over booze. I bake cookies for them and Karen knows I like making cocktails so she gave me what they had left over.

I looked up some jalapeno infused tequila recipes/ recommendations on the internet and I didn't believe them. However, I think they were right. I ended up testing a batch which was 1 small jalapeno, sliced  crosswise then infused in 1/2 C tequila for 30 mins. It was so incredibly spicy!!! Not unbearably so, but so much more than I expected. Most infusions (except tea) I do for days if not weeks so 30 mins didn't seem like much. Half a chili in a cup of booze is what Id recommend. Or use more chili for less time. Or if you like heat, do it the way I did and add a little more lime and salt to help balance out all that spicy. {But I don't recommend it, I prefer the more subtle spiciness.} And my camera died while procrastinating my cocktail homework so here's just a pic of chilies infusing....

Jalapaloma

2 oz jalapeno infused tequila
4 oz grapefruit soda
wedge of lime
pinch of salt

Build in an ice filled collins glass. Squeeze the lime, throw it in and stir.
To make jalapeno infused tequila, leave half a deseeded jalapeno in 8 oz tequila for 30 mins.
You can rim the glass with salt if you love salty things, but at least throw a pinch in the drink, its really nice. 

Benedictine

Benedicitine is a french liquer traditionally made by monks. It is a cognac base infused with a blend of herbs and sugar. Its in a few classic drinks, so I finally bought a bottle. Most of the drinks I've made call for it in very small amounts, but they wouldn't be the same without it. (Actually they all call for 1/4 oz which is a tricky measure with a jigger. I usually do 2 barspoons or try to eyeball half of my 1/2 oz jigger if Im already using it.) If anybody has made any other good drinks with it, please let me know! First up is a cocktail whose name I've been familiar with, although I've never ordered one at a bar, the Singapore Sling. This drink goes back to at least the early 1900's, although the recipe has changed slightly. Here's how I made it:

Singapore Sling


2 oz Gin
1/2 oz Cherry Heering
1/2 oz Cointreau
1/4 oz Benedicitine
2 oz pineapple juice
3/4 oz lime juice
dash Angostura bitters
splash club soda

Shake everything except the club soda.
Strain into a Collins glass filled with ice.
Top with soda.

Its pretty good. I recommend it if you have all those ingredients at your house...



I had never heard of this next one, even though its made with very normal ingredients. Except for Benedictine, which I forgot was in the drink until I saw this picture. I found this recipe in Gary Regan's Joy of Mixology. This is one of my favorite cocktail books. (The Sling recipe above is his as well...) Regan delves into the history of a lot of the drinks in this book. Unlike some cocktail tomes, this book doesn't have that many recipes. The drinks that are presented are well explained and really well organized. I liked it okay when I made it with Bourbon and Martini Rosso. It was even better when made with Carpano Antica.



Preakness Cocktail

2 oz Bourbon or Rye
1 oz Sweet Vermouth
1/4 oz Benedictine
Angostura Bitters
Lemon twist

Stir with ice. Strain into a chilled cocktail glass and garnish with twist.








The Vieux Carre is a New Orleans classic. It is booze forward without actually having that much booze in it, compared to say an old fashioned, which I usually make with 3 oz of bourbon. It is kind of like a more complex whiskey old fashioned. I love it. Its an easy to remember recipe and it has rye in it. This recipe is from the newest Mr Boston, which is great because it has pretty much every drink worth making in it.

Vieux Carre

3/4 oz Rye
3/4 oz Brandy
3/4 oz Sweet Vermouth
1/4 oz Benedicitine
dash Peychauds bitters
dash Angostura bitters