AMERICAN BEAUTY .75 oz. brandy (Pierre Ferrand cognac) .75 oz. dry vermouth (Dolin) .75 oz. orange juice .25 oz. white crème de menthe (Tempus Fugit) 1 oz. port (Taylor Fladgate 10-year-old Tawny Porto) A few drops of grenadine Brian: Check out this laundry list of ingredients: vermouth, brandy, orange juice, port, grenadine! Eric: That sounds…
KITCHEN SINK: A PLAY IN FOUR ACTS ACT III “AMERICAN BEAUTY” A cold feeling of hopelessness descends upon the two men in the kitchen. Or maybe it’s just the advancing chill of night as the sun retreats behind the earth. The counter is littered with bottles and spent fruit. One man recites the next recipe…
AMER PICON COOLER 1.5 oz. Amer Picon (substituted Amaro CioCiaro) 1 oz. gin (Bombay Sapphire) .5 oz. cherry liqueur (Cherry Heering) 1 tsp. sugar syrup 1 tsp. lemon juice Club soda Combine with ice; shake well. Strain. Add ice and club soda. Eric: Amer Picon is no longer available so we’re using a substitute, Amaro CioCiaro….
A warm summer afternoon. A kitchen. Two men in early middle age make cocktails while their wives consort in the living room. One man, Brian, consults a bartender guide. A recipe awaits. AMBROSIA FOR TWO 3 oz. brandy (Pierre Ferrand cognac) 3 oz. apple brandy (St. George California Reserve) Several drops of raspberry syrup (DIY) Champagne…
KITCHEN SINK: A PLAY IN FOUR ACTS ACT II “AMER PICON COOLER” Passage of time. The sun clicks downward in the sky. The two men in the kitchen, Brian and Eric, address the next recipe in the ancient bartending manual. This is what it says: AMER PICON COOLER 1.5 oz. Amer Picon (substituted Amaro CioCiaro)…
KITCHEN SINK: A PLAY IN FOUR ACTS ACT I “AMBROSIA FOR TWO” A warm summer afternoon. A kitchen. Two men in early middle age make cocktails while their wives consort in the living room. One man, Brian, consults a bartender guide. A recipe awaits. AMBROSIA FOR TWO 3 oz. brandy (Pierre Ferrand cognac) 3 oz….
The ALABAMA is the only beverage in its session without “special” in its name. Humility is important in a cocktail, we are discovering, but it’s also the death knell if you’re a cocktail trying to survive amongst an ocean of self-aggrandizing, self-promoting millennials. A cocktail that has really mastered SEO and branding is the Alabama Slammer,…
There is no mention of the AIRMAIL SPECIAL on the Internet, whatsoever, but instead of filling me with excitement, like the A-1 PICK-ME-UP, this dearth of information depletes my energy stores. We are back in the jungle again, with anarchy, and no road map to guide us. Going by what the Bartender Guide tells us, the AIRMAIL…
36 HOURS OF MAYHEM “I’m scared, Brian.” This is not the first time I have uttered these words and it probably won’t be the last. But it is a very real fear this time and it is potent. We are attending our first liquor convention, the San Francisco Craft Spirits Carnival, and we have no…
Previously on the Rituals: We dutifully marched through the ADDINGTON (a nothing drink) and the ADIOS AMIGOS (a worse-than-nothing drink) without feeling any sense of life fulfillment. But we still need to meet the Admiral—or three creepy versions of the Admiral, anyway, like some boozy version of The Prestige. So, like gluttons for punishment, we soldier on to…
Prohibition was a double-edged sword. Organized crime and bootlegging were bad for the United States but they were great for the world of cocktails. Would we have the cocktails we have now if there was no Prohibition? Questionable. If I had a DeLorean that could take me back in time to the days of Prohibition…
Last week was Negroni week—a week of Negronis, Negroni variations, and charity brought to you by Imbibe and Campari. Bars across the United States that participate in Negroni week donate a portion of their proceeds to a charity of their choice. Negroni week is a wonderful reason to drink up and give back. I recently…
After spending 3½ weeks working on a movie in New Orleans, I persuaded Brian to let me do a recap of my experiences here—because there were a lot of good ones! During this time I was able to visit 27 establishments; certainly not every bar in New Orleans but a good, obsessive chunk nonetheless. In…