Scofflaw's Den

Hey Folks!

Another Mixology Monday is upon us and I want to thank Sean aka runoknows, my cohort here at the Scofflaw's Den for hosting this month.  He is doing the heavy lifting of the round-up while I sit back and drink some tasty bourbon concoctions.  Yep, this month's theme is Bourbon. 

Both of us here at the Den love this spirit, maybe above all others.  For me, the love dates back to my undergraduate days at the University of Virginia.   Our drink of choice was the simple Bourbon and Coke and we certainly had plenty of them.  But now our tastes have changed and I've learned more about bourbon than I ever thought I would.  From wheaters to high-ryes and tastings at one of our favorite DC bars, Bourbon, I feel like my education is ongoing and endless when it comes to this particular spirit.  Of course, that doesn't mean that for the first home UVa football game, I don't break out the Jim Beam and Diet Coke and enjoy a glass or two while cheering on the Cavs.  As an old friend of mine would state whenever he smelled bourbon, "Smells like football season!."

For all my appreciation and love for bourbon, Sean picked a challenging time for MxMo.  The Kentucky Derby and the Mint Juleps are generally my last great dance with bourbon until the heat of summer subsides.  Of course this doesn't mean I completely turn my back on bourbon during the scorching days and nights of summer.  I'll still whip up some Mint Juleps, have a bourbon and coke or maybe just have a nice dram over an ice cube after a long day at work.  But still, bourbon isn't really what I think of as a summer spirit.  This makes finding suitable libations a bit more daunting.

When trying to decide what to write about, I wanted drinks that were refreshing and easily drinkable.  Something with lots of ice, full of flavor and really beat back the hot humid weather.  What I came away with is one winner and one that needed some work.  First, lets look at the one that needed some work.

Kentucky Orange Blossom
1.5 oz bourbon
1.5 oz tangerine juice
.75 oz Cointreau
1 dash orange flower water

*Shake everything with ice and strain into an ice filled rocks glass.

I found this drink while looking up recipes for bourbon drinks.  It was a variation on a bourbon based sidecar that used tangerine juice.  Frankly, I've been drinking lots of sidecars lately so the variation sounded better.  Maybe that should have been a clue . . .  The drink was "eh."   It was very dry and none of the flavors really popped out at me.  The bourbon was muted and even though everything else is orange based, the orange flavor really disappeared.  I was pretty disappointed.  I decided to tinker a little bit and see if I could save this drink, at least for my tastes.  I think it has a great base, but I really wanted to sweeten it up some.  So I pulled out my orange-cardamom syrup and added about half an ounce.  That really brightened up the orange flavor!  I still think it could use a little something extra, but for now, it isn't half bad with the extra sweetness.



The second drink I wanted to give you folks is an original (at least, I didn't do any research so it's new to me!) and is a variation of a Lynchburg Lemonade.  Now as I'm sure you know, a Lynchburg Lemonade is simply lemonade spiked with Jack Daniel's Tennessee Whiskey.  And since this is a bourbon themed month, J.D. had to step aside.  Here is what I came up with:

Front Porch Cooler
2 oz bourbon
1 oz creme de peche
2 dashes Fees Peach Bitters
1 dash Fees Lemon Bitters
5 oz lemonade

*Shake the first four ingredients with lots of ice and strain into a chilled, ice filled chimney glass.  Top with the lemonade.



Now, a few notes on this drink.  First, taste your lemonade.  Is it really sweet?  Is it very tart?  Commercial or homemade?  You really want the lemon flavor to come through and most commercial lemonades are not very sweet or tart.  If you don't have homemade lemonade that is good and tart, you can always add lemon juice and/or simple syrup to the final drink to up the tartness/sweetness to your own liking.  If you want more peach flavor, consider muddling a slice of fresh peach or two in the glass with the creme de peche then add the other ingredients.  The point is, you can vary this recipe endlessly to find what tastes good to you.  Want to add blueberries, blackberries, raspberries or whatever else to the mix?  Feel free!  Enjoy!

Well, thanks again to Sean for tackling this Mixology Monday!  There certainly wouldn't be a Scofflaw's Den with out him and he deserves a round of applause.  Personally, I'll just buy him a beer sometime.  Or better yet, I've got this nice bottle of Balvenie Doublewood Scotch that I just *know* he'd love to have some of . . .

Cheers!

AH-HA!!!  I finally have the elusive Angostura Orange bitters!  Wooo-Hoooo!!!! 

I'm afraid that I won't be able to post much about them until next week.  The Scofflaw's are taking a well deserved three day weekend to the beach.  But as soon as I get back, I plan on doing a tasting between the three types of orange bitters I now have, Regan's #6, Fee's and the Angostura.  I'm sure if my co-hort Sean wants to join in the tasting that can be arranged.  I can't wait!!!

If you're wondering how the new site is coming, well . . . its coming.  That's about all I can say for now.  But rest assured that Sean is working on getting it up and running and then you'll see a marked uptake in posts from us.  We still have lots of fun stuff planned and I, for one, can't wait to get started!

See you at the bar!
Marshall

Back to gin...

When we went to New Heights Restaurant last week, I had a lot of fun.  Marshall wrote up his long post on it but I wanted to touch on some of the points of my visit.

Like I said, I had a great time.  Everyone was very friendly there.  I felt a bit bad for our bartender, Chris.  He was a pretty nice guy but was almost overwhelmingly slammed a good bit of the night.  Two different tables ordered brandy alexanders!  There were a lot of no-reservation walk-ins for both the dining room and the bar thanks to a convention and the article in the WaPo (I heard them say).

Marshall is s-m-r-t ... errr... smart.  When we first walked in it was fairly empty so we took seats right at the very end of the bar.  That kept us from getting surrounded when the large group came in.  I still got jostled a lot by one of the first guys in from that group.  I was convinced that they were going to be quite annoying but in fact they were very polite and when they realized they were running into me made it a point to be careful about it.  You know what?  Thanks!  Honestly, I appreciated their concern and effort to be conscientious bar-neighbors.

(Compare that to the other night at Bailey's when the guys next to me - even a few chairs down - seemed nice at first but quickly grew annoying, to the point of having my chair stolen when I was in the bathroom and smoke blown at me.)

For the most part that night I stuck with gin and tonics.  My reasoning - which seemed to be accurate - was two-fold.

First, that'd provide a consistent tasting amongst the different gins.  To be completely consistent I should've stuck with the same tonic all the time.  They had a list of tonics and how to pair gin with tonic so I stuck with those guidelines.  At home I tend to stick to one kind of tonic.

Second, it would be easier for the bartender.  That it was - I definitely got drinks faster.

It looks like I didn't manage to Twitter EVERYTHING...oh well.  I definitely had a gin and tonic to start, I just don't remember which one!  Andrew (our original bartender) made us an Aviation with Aviation gin.  I liked it more than previous ones I'd had, though Marshall does have that creme de violette fetish.

Next was the #24.  They had a couple of these "numbered" drinks and I neglected to ask what was up with that naming schema.  This one was, according to my Twitter, G-vine gin, St. Germaine elderflower liqueur, Peychaud's bitters, simple syrup, kaffir lime leaf, lime juice, Schweppes tonic.  I'd never heard of G-vine gin before that night and they had sent the pastry chef out to buy some more of it.  It's a French gin and I actually found later in a gin and tonic that I liked it a lot.

Next up was another gin and tonic.  This time I tried the Old Raj, blue label, with the Fever-Tree tonic.  That was quite good.  There's another label (red, I believe) of Old Raj, but the blue is stronger and I wanted more of the taste to shine.

Around this time we got our food.  The ham & cheese croquettes were awesome, as were the truffle fries.  I also got the pickled herring (MINE MINE MINE MINE MINE) and I loved it.  Honestly - I think it was the best pickled herring I've had.  To be completely honest, I've only had it a couple of other times but I think it was better than it was at Aquavit.

I threw Chris a curveball for the next drink.  Let's avoid the gins and hit the classic - a Sazerac.  It's always interesting how other people make it.  He used St. George absinthe, for one.  Due to the expense of St. George, as he pointed out, he doesn't just toss it out as you're supposed to do with the pastis.  He just pours a little bit in.  Then there was a sugar cube, both Peychaud's and Regan's bitters, and Russell's Reserve rye.  That rye is one I use a lot in Sazeracs.  It was quite tasty, if not as sweet as I tend to prefer mine.

Next was back to the gin and tonic.  I knew I needed something big to cut through the remnants of taste in the Saz.  I went with the G-vine and Fever-Tree bitter lemon tonic.  That was a SPECTACULAR choice.  I'm really digging the G-vine.

Jake had been hanging out with us and had been waiting on a complimentary Aviation for a while but finally needed to leave.  Just after he left it came up so Marshall and I polished it off.  I'd had a Rogue Spruce gin and Schweppe's before that and needed to clear some of the taste out of my mouth; it wasn't that bad but it wasn't something I particularly go for.  Kind of like how a really peaty Scotch might not be everyone's cup of tea.

The final drink of the bar for me was a martini - I'm a huge martini fan, I've found.  And it was good.  Marshall had a champagne cocktail of some sort.

We went home after that.  Just as I got home some friends of Cathy's were coming in for the birthday of one of her really good friends.  Cathy wanted a drink and surprisingly enough, not a champagne drink like she usually has.  I ended up drinking the Kir Royale made with sparkling shiraz (not the best drink ever) while I thought up something.  I called it the Cathy Cocktail:
3/4 ounce Hendrick's gin
1/2 ounce creme de cassis
1/4 ounce simple syrup
dash of Regans bitters

Shake, pour over ice in a collins glass, top with Sprite.

Later her friends and I did an absinthe tasting between the Kubler and the Lucid.  While tasty, it was not what I needed at that point in the evening...it definitely led to a rough morning when I had to get up early to take care of the block party!

I don't know how many of you picked up the brief mention in this post, but a few weeks ago I entered a local cocktail competition.  The competition is held by a local DC hotel, Hotel Helix, for their spring and summer cocktail menu.  The winner get his or her name and cocktail featured on the lounge's cocktail menu and an overnight weekend stay at the hotel. 

This past Friday I was informed that:

I AM A SEMIFINALIST!!!

WOOO-HOOO!!!!

This Tuesday, April 29th, the ten semifinalists are invited to the lounge to test their cocktails.  The final three will be chosen that night by a panel of the hotel staff.  The winner will be decided on Saturday, May 3 at 10pm.  That night, patrons of the bar will sample each of the three finalists cocktails for $7 and the winner decided by crowd approval.

Here is the recipe for my entry, and I will keep you updated with what happens on Tuesday. 

De Lente Smash
3-4 strawberries
5-6 basil leaves
2 oz. Genever Gin (or 1.5 oz London Dry)
.75 oz rich simple syrup
2 dashes Peach Bitters

*In a mixing glass muddle the strawberries, basil and simple syrup.
*Add gin and peach bitters and shake over ice.
*Double strain into a chilled cocktail glass.  (I use the Hawthorne strainer and a fine mesh sieve.)
*Garnish with a small basil leaf that has been smacked between your hands to release the aroma.




Wish me Luck!!!

Cheers!

And just when you turn around, it's another Mixology Monday.  This time around our host is Anna over at Morsels & Musings.  Thanks Anna!

For this months MxMo, Anna has selected "Fruit Liqueurs" which is kind of funny since Sean and I just finished an orange liqueur tasting not long ago and so I had to think of something different flavor-wise to use.  Unfortunately my homemade tangerine ratafia is still aging and it won't be ready until June 1st.  But it is spring and the weather is beginning to turn sunny and warm again (at least here in Northern Virginia) that a fruit liqueur theme should not be to difficult.

Well, those are famous last words.  I began by looking through the bar at what I had - various orange liqueurs already mentioned, creme de mure (blackberry), limoncello, creme de casis, frambois, creme de peche, cherry heering, calvados, applejack, maraschino and apricot eau-de-vie all begging to be used.  But thoughts turned to one of my favorite fruits - the humble delicious peach.  My first thought was to work on a riff of peach tea.  I have some newly made swedish punsch with it's lemony, rum and black tea flavors that would play very well with the creme de peche.  Unfortunately, I couldn't quite come up with a drink that made me completely satisfied.  I'm sure there is a drink in there somewhere, and I aim to find it, but that shall be a project for another day.

The next day, I was pouring over some books, trying to find some recipes that I can tinker with when I decided that I needed something nice to sip on.  It was this past Friday night and it was a very warm day but around 10pm a quick and strong thunderstorm came through.  At that point I decided a Dark & Stormy would be the perfect fit for the evening.  The sweet dark Goslings and the biting fizzy ginger beer certainly hit the spot.  Then a light went off in my head.  I was holding the basis for my MxMo drink at that very moment.

I quickly ran to the bar and begin playing.  The following drink was the results:

A Georgia Thunderstorm
2 oz Goslings Black Seal
1 oz Messenez Creme de Peche
.25 oz St. Elizabeth's Allspice (Pimento) Dram
2 dashes Angostura bitters
4 oz Ginger Beer (I used Regatta and then Bundaberg - both with excellent results)

Build everything in a chimney glass filled with lots of ice.
Garnish with mint sprigs and a straw.
Sip slowly until the dark sky passes.



The drink is spicy, peachy and fairly sweet.  It may even be too sweet for some folks, but if you've ever had really good authentic southern sweet tea, you'll get this drink.  It is meant to be sipped slowly letting the fragrance of the mint hit you before the ice cold liquid caresses your lips like the fuzz of a ripe peach.   On a hot summer evening when the clouds break and the rain showers everything around you, this will be a fantastic beverage.

Of course, this wouldn't be the Scofflaw's Den if I didn't give you at least one more recipe.  The following recipe is an original creation that I submitted to a local cocktail competition.  I won't know how I did until the end of the month, but I thought I would share it with y'all anyway.  I really enjoy this drink and certain ingredients are adaptable to whatever you may have in your home bar (or for a bar that may not have certain name brand spirits for that matter . . . it pays to know your audience I guess!)  And unfortunately there are no pictures of this drink.  When I created it, I wasn't thinking of putting it in this post and when I did decide to do so, I didn't have the main ingredient.  Oh Well.  Without further adeu . . .

De Lente Smash
4 medium ripe strawberries
5-6 medium basil leaves (or 3-4 very large leaves)
2 oz Genever style gin (Boomsma, Zuidam Holland or Damrak) OR 1.5 oz London Dry Gin (Plymouth)
.75 oz Rich Simple Syrup
2 dashes Peach Bitters

In a mixing glass, muddle the strawberries, basil leaves and simple syrup.
Add gin and bitters and pour all into an iced shaking tin.
Shake until the tin frosts.
Double strain into a chilled cocktail glass.  (I used the hawthorne strainer in the tin and a fine mesh strainer over the glass.)
Take one small basil leaf and smack it with your hand.  Float the bruised leaf on top of the drink and garnish with a sliced strawberry.

Well, there you go.  Thanks again to Anna and I hope everyone has a great MxMo. 

Cheers!

I figured - given the events of tonight - it was time to make some drinks and you know what, let's try out the apricot-flavored brandy.  I'd tossed out the Jacquin's crap, but I still had the Dekuyper.

I went through a couple of my books, did some research online, and just looked around.  You have to remember the rules: it has to have the apricot brandy, it has to be fairly simple, and it has to be published somewhere (no originals).

So what happened?

I had planned on waiting until tomorrow and getting my co-conspirator at the Den to help me, but then I figured, what the heck, I think I know what I want to do.

I don't have a lot of the really old cocktail books, but I saw four recipes in Ted Haigh's _Vintage Spirits & Forgotten Cocktails_ and a number of recipes in Gary Regan's _The Joy of Mixology_.

I skipped a number of them that had stuff like rum in them since I didn't feel like dealing with rum this week.  I went through the rest and got rid of ones I felt were derivative of each other, or at least rather similar.

Finally I had one recipe and it was time to give it a shot - I wouldn't make y'all drink something that I wouldn't drink myself!  So I made one, and hey - not bad.  Then I realized it had Calvados in it, and that's not exactly the most common ingredient in the world - I still get overly excited when I see a bar with it.

Thus I had to go with a different one.  It's from the same book, but had what I liked - a nice clean taste, simple construction (no ambiguities), and best of all, I didn't have to try to make a lemon twist or something (which I'm not very good at).

It had a nice tart taste to it - I'll be making it again when we get up to Kentucky Derby time, since it's named for a private club in Louisville.  I got it from page 102 of Haigh's _Vintage Spirits & Forgotten Cocktails_.

Pendennis Cocktail
2 ounces gin
1 ounce apricot brandy
2 or 3 dashes Peychaud bitters
3/4 ounce lime juice

Shake in an iced shaker and strain into a cocktail glass.

My second place cocktail, with that whole Calvados problem, was this one from pages 38-39 of the same book:
The Golden Dawn
3/4 oz Calvados
3/4 oz dry gin
3/4 oz Cointreau
3/4 oz apricot-flavored brandy
3/4 oz orange juice
Shake and strain.  Drop a stemless cherry into it as a garnish.  Dribble some real grenadine into it (but don't stir!).  (I can't wait to try this one with applejack, but I see that even less in bars around the DC area than Calvados.)

Anyways, hope y'all enjoy.

 - SeanMike in the Scofflaw's Den (East Falls Church outpost)

I was just excited to be in a contest with as esteemed people as this one.  But hey - maybe people will like my suggestions.

The "simple" part of the instructions gets harder and harder as your bar gets better and better, I think - heck, now that I can go to so many bars and say "eh, I've got better at home" I keep forgetting things like "oh, most bars don't have Calvados".

Anyways - I still have plenty of things I want to make for experimentation purposes - and to post on here!

Given that I fell on ice tonight and broke my laptop, and that it was a hellacious ride home - I had a nice sip of some Glenfiddich 15 year old.

What would you have drank?

I know, I know, this is a bit early.  I've got a good reason for that: you see, in all odds, I won't have time to work on this tomorrow, so I thought I'd go ahead and update with mine.  After all, it just has to be by Monday, correct?

I believe so, but correct me if I'm wrong.



(And a big thanks to jimmy's cocktail hour for hosting this month!  Woohoo, and stuff!)

As usual, I'm a person never to rely on just one drink.  So this time I have two: a variation of the Bronx and a variation of the Suffering Bastard.

Originally, I'd considered doing the Bronx and Satan's Whiskers, but those drinks are both very similar - notably in the latter's case by adding Cointreau or Grand Marnier.  There's also the Bronx and the Income Tax cocktail.  Basically, an Income Tax cocktail is a Bronx with bitters, but you'll often find that people just say "a Bronx with bitters" or even write up the recipe with bitters in it anyways.

Then there's the incredible number of variations of the Bronx already.  If you hit Robert Hess' website, he's got the Bronx as having 1 1/2 ounces of gin and 3/4 of an ounce each dry and sweet vermouth and orange juice.  His Income Tax cocktail, on the other hand, is 1 1/4 ounces gin, 3/4 ounce of orange juice, and 1/4 ounce of each vermouth, plus one dash of Angostura bitters.

Gary Regan's The Joy of Mixology has a recipe for each.  He says he increased the amount of vermouth in his Bronx cocktail, but it's still only 1/4 ounce each - plus 2 ounces gin, 1 ounce orange juice, and orange bitters to taste.  His Income Tax cocktail is exactly the same but is distinguished by using Angostura bitters.  Ted Haigh in Vintage Spirits & Forgotten Cocktails seems to agree with him, though his recipe - 1 1/2 ounces gin, 3/4 ounce each vermouth, the juice of 1/4 of an orange, and two dashes Angostura - makes the vermouth more prominent (something I tend to like).

But, in the end, I went with David Wondrich's recipe in Imbibe!, listed as "a la Billy Malloy, Pittsburgh, PA".

One-third [1 oz] Plymouth gin, one-third [1 oz] French vermouth and one-third [1 oz] Italian vermouth, flavored with two dashes of Orange bitters, about a barspoonful of orange juice and a squeeze of orange peel.  Serve very cold.

I went ahead and made one this style and I liked it a whole lot.  But this is "Variations" month, after all, so I needed to switch it up.  I thought long and hard about it, and then experimented changing one ingredient at a time.  The orange juice I used ended up being about 1/4 of an ounce.

The first thing I did was swap out the vermouths.  Instead of dry and sweet, I went with Lillet Blonde and Dubonnet Rouge.  I then changed up the bitters, using one dash of Fee's West Indian Orange bitters and one dash of Fee's Lemon bitters.  Instead of Plymouth I went with Hendrick's gin, and finally I also experimented with using freshly squeezed clementine juice instead of orange juice.

The latter was kind of "eh" so I left it; besides, as you might have seen, squeezing clementines was a huge pain in the butt.

This left me with my recipe, which I felt was very silky and would be good for a lot of people.  I named it after the color it ended up taking.  I can't wait until summertime, this will be really good when it's hot out.

Bronx Sunrise
1 ounce Hendricks gin
1 ounce Lillet blonde
1 ounce Dubonnet rouge
1/4 ounce fresh squeezed orange juice
1 dash Fee's orange bitters
1 dash Fee's lemon bitters
Mix and shake.  Garnish with an orange peel twist.



Look at the color the drink takes - it's much rosier.  I kind of like it.



One of my favorite hangover drinks is the Suffering Bastard.  That's a mix of gin, bourbon, lime juice and ginger beer, plus a dash of Angostura bitters.  It is good at making you feel better after a long night.

I had a long night, sort of, yesterday.  I got a chance to meet up with some of tmfiii's friends, including one friend of his who just got back from service in Iraq.  We hit a couple of my favorite places in the District, such as Shelly's Backroom and Bourbon.  Unfortunately, I think that i got hit with the unfortunate combination of "too much liquor too fast" and "not enough food", having only snacked on a plate of wings at Shelly's and some tater tots at Bourbon.  I basically had my switch flipped, as we tend to say, which means that I got pretty darn tired in no time, despite drinking a very pleasant Basil Hayden's and Coke Zero.  I wandered outside to the cab stand, cabbed it back to Virginia, and passed out on my living room floor.

D'oh!

I felt pretty much fine today but there's a problem with the usual Suffering Bastard.  It's very good, don't get me wrong, and I could drink 'em all day - but it lacks one thing I find vital.

Caffeine.

So I experimented.  Hey, that's the point of this month's MxMo, isn't it?

Let's call it the:
Wake Up and Suffer You Bastard
1 ounce vodka
1 ounce bourbon
1 teaspoon lime juice
1 ounce Stone's Original Ginger
1 dash Angostura bitters



Shake and pour into a collins glass over ice.  Top with Coca-Cola.

Thanks to the fact that we're using Coca-Cola, I swapped out the gin for vodka, as the gin didn't seem to work well with Coke.  You could up the amount of Stone's, if you wanted more ginger taste, and some people may want to decrease the amount of lime juice.



If you haven't seen the Stone's, it's basically an English ginger flavored currant wine.  I find it in the vermouth section; I picked up mine at Total Wine here in Virginia.

Anyways, hope you enjoy the drinks.  If you give them a shot, let me know!

I'm about to lose control and I think I like it!

No, waitaminute...nah, it's true.  Seriously.  I've got about 3 hours left in my work day, and then it's home - and I have tomorrow off for work for a trip up into the woods, wine tasting over the weekend, and then the Super Bowl.

On my trip to the woods I plan on taking my bottle of horseradish-infused vodka with me and offering to make bloody mary drinks.  Whether or not I take anything else I haven't decided, but I probably will bring at least some whiskey or something.  A good, easy to make cocktail is key in times like this.  Heck, depending on packing constraints I could throw the bison grass vodka in there - we pick up some apple juice and the ladies (oh, who am I kidding?  David too.)  will be ready to go!

One day we'll probably hit Rappahannock Cellars.  I've been to that winery once before but it should be a good time.  There's a few other decent wineries in the area, too.

Super Bowl day is Sunday, and despite the myriad cocktail opportunities pointed out in Slashfood today, I'll probably stick with beer.  But I did want to look at what they have.  And I have to bring something with me, and I'm thinking Muldoon's whiskey-marinated chicken wings with barbecue sauce from the LA Times - I'll talk about that recipe after the cocktails.

Slashfood's link was actually over to Cocktail.com.  There they had a page about American football cocktails written back in 2004.  To be honest, most of these appear to be more shooters and less of the traditional cocktails that we here in the Scofflaw's Den tend to prefer, but hey, whatever floats your boat.

The Blitz for instance is 1 ounce each of tequila, rum, gin, vodka, cranberry juice, and sours mix, shaken, poured into four shot glasses, topped with tonic, and then shot (done tequila style with a lick of sugar, shot, suck on a lime).  Almost like a variant of a long island iced tea made for shooting.  I'm not certain how this drink relates to football other than the name and perhaps the desire for some people to get tanked while watching/tailgating for football.

The False Start, surprisingly enough submitted by a Raiders fan, has four ounces of apple cider, two ounces of bourbon, and one ounce of apple brandy plus half a lemon, shaken, and makes two four ounce cocktails.  I could see myself trying this one, though I probably wouldn't make two out of it.  The apple and the bourbon, to me, says FOOTBALL.  Apples are all about the fall.

In a kind of random drink in my opinion, the First and Ten has a ton of different juices and just a bit of gin, plus a float of dark rum.  You start with three ounces of gin, then add two ounces each of orange, pineapple, grapefruit, cranberry, lemon, and lime juices.  Yikes!  You shake it, strain it into two Collins glasses filled with ice, and top with a dash of grenadine, a splash of soda water or seltzer, and float some dark rum on top.  Again, I don't see how this one gets it's name or what it brings to football - maybe it looks kind of brownish by the end.

The Fumble is yet another gin drink.  Two ounces each of gin and vodka, plus two ounces each grapefruit and cranberry juices, shaken and strained into two rocks glasses packed with crushed ice, then topped with soda water or seltzer.  I'd prefer, personally, to go with all gin in something like this, and I kind of wonder what Fee's Brothers' Grapefruit bitters would do to the drink (either in conjunction or in replacement of the grapefruit juice).  Again, I'm not seeing the football connection.

The Incomplete Pass is two ounces of bourbon, one ounce of pineapple juice, shaken and done as two shots.  I guess a pineapple and a football have some similarities (see that hysterical commercial they play every year) but unless you're doing one for every incomplete pass, it seems kind of like a wimpy shooter.

The Interception is clearly one you intercept someone's actually-alcoholic drink with (if, say, they've had too much already).  You rub the inside of a glass with a lime wedge, put in two ounces of tonic and a splash of pineapple juice.  I guess the Browns fan who submitted it was confused as to the whole business of "alcohol" in a drink.

The Punt is the kind of drink you'd expect for someone looking to get hammered.  2 ounces tequila, two ounces vodka, two teaspoons of sugar, 1 lemon - you shake the lemon juice and sugar, stir in the vodka and tequila, and strain into two sugar-rimmed shot glasses.  The shooters should sit up straight and try to drop a lemon hard candy into the drink from their mouth before shooting.  I could see this being done in bars to celebrate a touchdown or something.

Now, the Quarterback Sack is a drink I think that might have some potential - kind of a psuedo-Bloody Mary.  It's two ounces of vodka, two ounces of gin, four ounces of Bloody Mary mix, an ounce of triple sec, all shaken up and topped with tonic water.  The recipe says it serves four shots, but I could see doing that as one or two slightly bigger morning drinks.  (In other words, the kind of drink we'd do at an 8 AM meet-up to go tailgating before a 'Skins game.)

Next we have the Time Out.  This is three ounces of Jaegermeister and one ounce of anisette, turned into - something.  The recipe says shake with cracked ice and strain into two sugar rimmed martini glasses.  I have no idea what this would turn out like, as I have a hard time imagining the taste of the anisette.  Maybe tmfiii can help me.  Though he'd probably tell me to use Pernod and laugh at me as I sputter while drinking it.  He's a mean one.

Like the False Start, the Touch Down is one I can see myself drinking and reminds me of football season.  You mix four ounces of bourbon with eight ounces of unsweetened ice tea, strain into hurricane glasses with ice, and top with eight ounces of lemonade.  It's like a bourbon and "Arnold Palmer" I guess.  The reason why I associate bourbon with football is my glorious alma mater, the University of Virginia, and our tradition of bourbon and Coke for football games.  I've also always enjoyed Lynchburg Lemonades, often cheaply made with Evan Williams green label and lemonade, so I could see this working, too, for those luscious fall days.

Finally, there's the Two-Point Conversion.  Now HERE is a weird one for football season!  You start with four ounces each dark and white rum, three ounces cranberry juice, six ounces of sours mix and blend it.  In a second blender you mix pina colada mix with ice.  Then in two glasses you alternate with the layers and serve with a straw, an orange wheel, and a cherry.

First off, how many tailgaters or anyone else watching football have two blenders?  And this is like, maybe, a beach drink or something.  It doesn't seem like a very manly man drink, even with four ounces of rum in each.  I do believe this recipe entitles you, as a football fan (be it any kind of football around the world) to make fun of Kansas City Chiefs fans.

They have any problem with it, you tell them to talk to ME, Marshall aka tmfiii, full contact information available upon request.

(Just kidding!  I live near enough heavily armed large people to not have a problem making fun of others.)

Whew.  This post went a lot longer than I expected - guess I gotta get to the wings in another post!

Today I took a ride with Sean, aka runoknows, down to Schneider's in DC.  Regular readers of the Den will recognize that Schneider's is our regular candy store and the best place to find new and interesting (and tasty) beverages.

I picked up some good stuff.  Some Massennez Creme De Peche, some Cherry Herring, a small bottle of Clear Creak Eau de Vie de Pomme, and a bottle of Aperol.  While I'm standing there looking at all the liqueurs and apertifs, something catches my eye.  I look down a shelf and almost hiding, tucked next to the wall are two small green eyes staring at me.  I take off my glasses and run my face, just to make sure that what I am seeing isn't a hallucination.  But when I look down again, those two green eyes are still staring at me.

Lucid Absinthe has come to DC!!!  The liqueur guy at Schneider's came by and asked if I had come for the Lucid.  I explained how happy I was to see DC finally getting some of the real stuff especially since Lucid has been on the market for a while now.  He said they had a few bottles last week but local restaurants bought them out and the four bottles on the shelf were their latest shipment.  I asked if there were any plans on getting any of the other new absinthes on the market in and he said that they were going to try.



Happy Days!!!!

So tonight . . . hell later this afternoon . . . I will get to have my first true Sazerac cocktail.  I plan on using the Lucid, 18yr Sazerac Rye and Peychaud's bitters of course.

Stay tuned for updates and pictures from my night of experimenting.

Cheers!

 

The Sazerac is one of the "classic" cocktails.  Originally made with brandy, the quintessential recipe for it right now is rye whiskey, an absinthe substitute, simple syrup, and bitters (typically Peychaud's).

But the different recipes...

I originally made the recipe using Robert Hess' website's recipe.  If you click on his recipe, you'll see his very nice description and history of the cocktail.  His is just a "splash" of simple syrup, some absinthe substitute (I use Pernod), two ounces of rye, and a dash of bitters.

I'd made it a couple of times and honestly, I never really saw the appeal of it.  It wasn't that bad - well, it was a bit.  Too much Pernod taste, too strong of a whiskey taste.

I kind of put it to the side.  Whatever.

So this week I'm trying to think of a drink to make since our keg of Dogfish Head Shelter Pale blew on Sunday, and I wanted something whiskey based to drink while smoking one of the myriad Lone Wolf cigars (Wolfpack vs. Sungrown taste test coming soon!) out in the cold.  I thumbed through my copy Vintage Spirits and Forgotten Cocktails.

Nothing in there was really tweaking my interest until I got to the back of it.  I noticed that this one used 3 ounces of whiskey, more simple syrup (1 teaspoon vs. 1/2), and more bitters.  Noting the difference, I went over to Gary Regan's The Joy of Mixology and looked up his recipe.  Again, it used three ounces of rye, but he called for 3/4 of an ounce of simple syrup.

Now that changes everything.

I made one up using Regan's recipe and suddenly had a very wonderful drink in my hands.  I was using my Russell's Reserve rye, but wow - it was great.

Unfortunately the first one I made was a bit screwed up as I managed to forget the bitters.  Who forget the bitters?!  Me, I guess.

Still, an old drink quickly became a new favorite for me.  Heck, if I wasn't drinking a Dogfish Head 75 minute IPA (I mixed 60 and 90 myself, yes I did, instead of only ordering it at the restaurant), I'd think about making one tonight.

Now to finish my book and go to bed.  Tomorrow shall be a short day, thank goodness!

Suffering Bastard
1 ounce bourbon
1 ounce gin
1 tsp lime juice
1 dash Angostura bitters
Shake and pour into a collins glass filled 3/4 of the way with ice.  Top with ginger beer.

Courtesy of SLOSHED!.

I'm already thinking forward to the next Mixology Monday which is tweaks - changing a recipe around a bit.  I've got ideas for a variation on the Suffering Bastard, though remembering that the Suffering Bastard is also a tiki drink whose recipe I don't know.

But I couldn't resist making one today.  Mmm, mmm, good.

Today it's Jefferson bourbon, Bombay gin, and Fentiman's ginger beer.  The tingle means it's working.

I probably make this drink most often the Sunday after a long night.  What kind of drinks do y'all make?  The standard bloody mary?  Suffering bastard?  Bourbon and coke?  Something else?

I want to welcome everyone to a New Year.  Hopefully, during the next 365 days, this blog will continue to improve and you readers (all two of you) will enjoy the journey.

Anyhoo, as I mentioned in my last post, I wanted to make some new syrups.  I love syrups for two reasons.  One, they add sweetness to a drink.  And B, you can pretty much flavor them any way you want.  You can be aggressive with the flavoring or you can be light and just impart a slight essence of flavor.  The downside to syrup making is that if you screw up, you're stuck with what you made and although sugar and water are pretty cheap, your flavorings can get expensive.  I don't know about you, but I really don't want to waste an ingredient if I happen to screw up.

All that to say that I have made two new syrups to help with my concoctioneering.  (To give credit where credit is due, concoctioneering is a term I absconded from Blair Reynolds over at Trader Tiki's Booze Blog.  I love that term!!!!)  It also goes with my "Intoxicologist" shaker . . . 

Anyway, I've got a bit of a photo show that goes with my creations, so here you go.  I've also followed it up with an original cocktail using one of the syrups.



Here are my tools; Cardamom, crystallized ginger, fresh oranges, vanilla beans, and sugar.  You can also see two containers for the finished syrups, a measuring cup and a kitchen scale.  I didn't use the kitchen scale, it was a christmas gift, but it was lonely and wanted to be in the picture . . . 

The first syrup I decided to make, after a consultation with

runoknows, was an orange-cardamom.  If you aren't familiar with cardamom, check here.  It is a spice that is generally associated with middle eastern and african cuisine.  It is kind of spicy, like ginger, but has a very potent and distinct taste.  It plays very well with citrus.



Using the good ole mortar and pestle, I roughly ground up my cardamom seeds.  I then zested one orange.



I used a ratio or 2 to 1 sugar and water.  Bring the sugar and water to a simmer and cook until it becomes clear.  As soon as it clears up, turn off the heat (or better yet move the pan to another spot on the stove.)  Then add in the orange zest and cardamom.  Let this mixture sit for at least twenty minutes and up to an hour, stirring occasionally.  When the mixture was almost a room temp, I added one ounce of 100 proof vodka.  This will make the syrup shelf stable allowing me to keep it in the fridge for a good long time.  Next, you want to get a fine strainer and strain all the seeds and zest out of the syrup.  Once it is free of all the goog, you can bottle it.



Here you can see what it looks like in the bottle.  However, the lighting is off and the syrup looks much darker than it really is.  See the next picture for a better representation of the actual color or the syrup.



You can see that it's a nice gold hue.  The flavor turned out to be like a sweet, spicy (think ginger) burnt orange.  There is a certain . . . caramelized flavor that I'm certain came from the cardamom.  Especially since you aren't cooking the sugar enough to change it's flavor (at least by this amount.)  The syrup is certainly more orange flavored than cardamom, but the cardamom puts a certain something that will make people wonder what that *extra* flavor is.  

The next syrup I made was a vanilla-ginger syrup.  



Here is chopped crystallized ginger and 2/3 of a vanilla bean.  Why not a full vanilla bean you ask?  Well, I knew I wasn't making a lot of syrup so I didn't want to use a whole one, plus I wanted the other third to sit nice and pretty in a container of sugar to impart a subtle vanilla to the sugar.  Yes, a by-product of my concoctioneering was vanilla sugar.  <insert evil laugh here>  Plus, have you ever dealt with vanilla beans???  They are wonderfully fragrant and very very tasty.  But those !@@@#$%^#@#%@#$@!$% little beans get to be a pain.  You'll see what I mean later . . . 



Here is the pan with the ginger and vanilla.  I used the same 2:1 ration of sugar and water, chopped the crystallized ginger into tiny pieces and cut the vanilla bean in half length-wise.  Why did I do that?  Because the vanilla flavor is in the seeds hiding inside the bean.  You cut the bean length-wise and introduce those beautiful little seeds into the syrup.  If you look closely at the picture (click on it for a larger one) you can see the seeds floating around.

This brings me to my little rant about vanilla beans.  Those !@#Q#$!@#$ seeds!!!!  I don't know about you, but when I'm making a syrup, especially one that is going to be used in a cocktail, I don't want little things floating in it.  Do you know how hard it is to strain vanilla seeds?  Huh?  DO YA?  Well let me tell you that YOU CAN'T!!!  I used a fine mesh strainer to get the ginger out.  Then I used some cheese cloth and ran the syrup through that.  It got out about 4 seeds.  So I tried a coffee filter.  That would have worked beautifully if I wasn't an impatient SOB, and had about 24 hours to let it filter.  So I went back to the cheese cloth.  After adding a few more layers, I had a filtering system that was doing the trick.  Next time, vanilla extract may be the way to go. 

Anyway, be sure to add the vodka after the syrup cools for the same reason mentioned above.



Here's the final product.  It is a very pale color.  The vanilla is the prominent flavor with a spicy background.  I think for the next round of this syrup, I'll use fresh ginger instead of crystallized.   That will up the ginger quotient.  

Well, time for a drink!!!  Here is another original that I'm playing with.

Bittermom (Okay, the name needs some work, but I was thinking bitter and cardamom . . . any suggestions, leave in the comments)
2 oz grapefruit juice
1.5 oz gin (I used Plymouth)
1 tsp Cointreau
1/4 tsp Campari
.5 oz orange-cardamom syrup
.25 oz raspberry syrup
2 dashes orange bitters
Orange flower water

Shake everything except the orange flower water with ice and strain into a chilled cocktail glass.  Put two drops of orange flower water on the head of the drink (do not mix in, this is for aromatics.)  If you don't have orange flower water, this would be the perfect time to use a flaming orange peel garnish . . . damn, now I wish I had thought of that earlier . . .  

  




One of the things I like about this drink is that is it adjustable.  If it isn't bitter enough, add more Campari.  If it's too sweet, you can lessen the cointreau or orange-cardamom syrup . . . or add more Campari.  HA!  Feel free to play with the ratios . . . and that goes for any and all drinks.  Find something you like.  Cocktail making, like cooking, is about finding what you like in a cocktail.  Use a particular recipe and if you don't like it, tweak it until you have something you like.  

Above all else, try new things and enjoy the ride.

Cheers!

 

While cleaning up on New Year's Eve, having made a number of cocktails (and did vodka shots, which I think helped erase most of the end of the night), I managed to drop my bottle of Fee's West Indian Orange bitters.

CRAP!

So I call Scheider's and they do have it in stock.  That's good, if only that it's still a haul to get down there and back, and other than maybe buying another bottle of that armagnac, I'm not certain if I feel like wandering down there.
I go over to Amazon, where I bought a few of the bitters that I couldn't find there the last time I had gone (errr, time before last, I guess).  Sure, they have it, also, but there's shipping to keep in mind.  Ouch.

But then I thought again.  I was kicking myself for not having gotten myself some orgeat and falernum earlier; why not just add that in?

One problem: while the orgeat from Fee's is listed as being from Kegworks, for some reason, instead of Fee's, it's sold from someone else called "Left of Main".  Which means that it's an additional shipping cost.  I found that I could force the Amazon site to sell it to me via the Kegworks storefront, however.

I plunked around a bit on the Kegworks website, and sure enough, I found that they had it also.  Even better, they had a "Cocktail Mixers Starter Set" - a bottle of the West Indies orange bitters, a bottle of falernum (smaller than the other, natch), a bottle of orgeat (ditto), blue curacao (I already have some, but it'd be interesting to compare), sloe gin (ditto), and curacao-triple sec (ditto again).

It's $29.95 plus approximately $9.31 from Kegworks directly; it's $34.95, reaching $44.10 after shipping, from Amazon.com.  So I ended up going with it from Amazon, as I was buying some other things at the same time and it saved me a bit of hassle.

The smaller sizes will work better for me, I think, as I'm not the tiki drink maker like tmfiii is.  Given that I'm also living with roommates, I have to be more careful about the size of bottles, etc., I get that need to be refrigerated after opening.  I know the bitters don't, but I'm not certain on the rest - and my little dorm fridge is getting crowded with all the stuff that's in there.

Perhaps I should "take care of" that bottle of apple schnapps this weekend...and whatever beers are in there...oh dear, there goes that plan...

The best Cocktail a la Louisiane ever.

Recipe from Cocktail Chronicles:
3/4 oz. rye
3/4 oz. sweet vermouth
3/4 oz. Benedictine
3 dashes Pernod (all I have; he suggests Herbsaint)
3 dashes Peychaud's bitters

Given that I'm making a double, I use 1 1/2 ounce of the first three; given my previous experience, I use 3/4 of a teaspoon of the Pernod, and just use simply 6 dashes of Peychaud's.



Oh yeah.  Look at the ingredients.

Obviously, the Pernod, the Peychaud's, and the Benedictine are standard.

The vermouth is Camparo Antica.

The rye is Red Hook Rye; I poured an ounce of it, and half an ounce of water, to make it an appropriate proof.

DRINK = TEH AWESOME



I simply can't express how it good it was.  I used two brandy soaked cherries that I'd done myself with a bit of Grand Marnier.

Later that day I was asked to taste some wine; I felt like an ass, 'cause my tastebuds aren't that refined to begin with (see next post here) and after that drink, well, damn.

Well, there's no snow, per se.  And I ain't dashing anywhere but into my beverage.

I often make double size drinks.  For a lot of them, it can make it easier to measure the ingredients.  Also, it gives me more drink to enjoy.

With tmfiii trying not to get sick, I figured I'd make a drink that he'd like, and one that would work on some of the stuff that I don't drink often.  Thanks to the Cocktail Chronicles (where I was scanning to find out the theme for the next Mixology Monday) and remembering his fondness for the drink I went with the Cocktail a la Louisiane.

Cocktail a la Louisiane
3/4 ounce of rye whiskey
3/4 ounce of Benedictine
3/4 ounce of sweet vermouth
3 dashes Pernod
3 dashes Peychaud's Bitters

But here's the question: how big is a dash?

That's an easy question for bottles such as bitters that have the little plastic dashing doohickey in the top of them.  But what of the Pernod?  If there's one thing I don't want it's too much Pernod; it can so easily overwhelm a drink.

Google to the rescue!

I found this blog posting on A Dash of Bitters and just read the top part first.  Michael Dietsch, the author of that blog, suggested that a dash be about 1/8th of a teaspoon.  I simply did six solid dashes of the Peychaud's (remember, I was doing a double); for the Pernod, I measured out 3/4 of a teaspoon (6/8ths, natch) of the Pernod and mixed up with the drink with 1.5 ounces each of Sazerac rye, Benedictine, and Noilly Prat sweet vermouth.

Garnished with two of my homemade brandy soaked cherries it came out, as my brother might say, "damn hell ass good".

A number of the commenters - including Jonathan M. Forester who is a regular poster on Slashfood, one of my daily reads, and hey, he has a drink blog which doesn't look like it's been updated since May - pointed out that a dash is 1/6th of a teaspoon.  That would've added another 1/4 of a teaspoon to my Cocktail a la Louisiane, which might not have been bad.

Yeah.  It might've been better.

But this one is pretty darn good.

But it looks like my glasses have the same problem as his did:



The drink is a Pink Gin.

Pink Gin
3 ounces Plymouth gin
6 goodly dashes Angostura Bitters

The glass is - well, it cracked as soon as it went into the shaker.  It was room temperature when I put ice in it.

At least it didn't shard!

A friend of mine was asking me about bitters the other day.  He pointed out that he really doesn't know anything about them other than the occasional thing we've mentioned on here.

Now, I'm not going to pretend to be a bitters expert.  I do, however, own a bunch of bitters, and I've used them in a number of cocktails.

Bitters provide an interesting counterpoint to the sweetness in many cocktails.  They add another layer of complexity into the taste, either reinforcing currently existing tastes or adding a counterpoint to tastes already in there.  For instance, in the Winter's Touch drink that I came up with, I debated between whiskey barrel aged bitters and mint bitters.  The whiskey barrel aged ones reinforced the taste of the whiskey, which wasn't actually what I wanted to do; the mint, however, gave a nice refreshing counterpoint in taste that reminded me of Christmas and so I went with that.

So, that being said, I grabbed my bitters and decided to taste them, drinking water between each.  The bitters I have:

• Peychaud's
• Angostura
• Stirrings Blood Orange
• Fee Bros. West Indian Orange
• Fee Bros. Aromatic
• Fee Bros. Whiskey Barrel Aged
• Fee Bros. Mint
• Regan's Orange Bitters #6

So, away we go!

Peychaud's Aromatic Cocktail Bitters:  In Virginia, you can get these in about any liquor store.  It's got a strong bitter taste that made me almost think of coffee syrup.  I'd lean towards citrus type drinks with this one.

Angostura Aromatic Bitters:  I usually find these in grocery stores around here.  I find it a bit spicier and often would lean towards this more for whiskey drinks.

Stirrings Blood Orange Bitters:  I find these at one ABC store that I go to.  It's non-alcoholic, I think the only one that I have that is.  It's got a tart orange taste to it, but without the edge of some of the other bitters.

Fee Bros. West Indian Orange Bitters: Lighter than the other orange bitters, it doesn't have the blood orange taste - obviously - and so might feel more familiar to a lot of people.

Fee Bros. Old Fashioned Aromatic Bitters:  These have a nice, light bitter taste, less distinctive in some ways from Peychaud's or Angostura.  Again, it'd work well with whiskey or other liquor drinks that are trying to concentrate on the taste of the spirit.

Fee Bros. Whiskey Barrel-Aged Bitters:  These are the limited edition ones.  There's a smoky quality to these that accentuates the natural flavors of the aromatic bitters.  I've found that drinks that it's added to seem to taste more, for lack of a better word, higher class.

Fee Bros. Mint Bitters (Peppermint):  Bright green in color, these remind me of a huge mouthful of the peppermint candies that my grandparents had.  They're a special use bitters, obviously, sort of like the peach bitters that Fee Bros. also sells (and that I don't own, but tmfiii does have).

Regans' Orange Bitters #6: This one reminds me of a cross between the blood orange bitters and the West Indian orange bitters.  It's definitely better than the Stirrings, but it's a different enough one from the Fee Bros. that you'll want to determine what's best for the individual drink.

Anyways, that's enough for that - I need something to wash the taste of these bitters out of my mouth.  It's not that they aren't tasty -- errr, they ARE tasty, let's watch those double negatives -- but by themselves they're a bit rough.

I made several of these this weekend.  I started with the basic formula that I posted before:

2 oz. bourbon
3/4 oz. vanilla vodka
1/2 oz. rich simple syrup
2 dashes mint bitters

Things I discovered:

Applejack, or in my case, 100 proof Captain Applejack Apple Brandy, can replace the whiskey.

The vodka and syrup can really be to taste; I was free pouring a couple of them and they still came out pretty tasty.  The trick was to make sure to have some ice in the glass to cut the burn (since I wasn't actually mixing).

The bitters can be cut back nicely to just one dash.

Later this week I may experiment with this using Dr. McGillicuddy's Vanilla Liqueur.

 So as you know (if you've been reading along), I've got a slight aversion to vermouth.  It's been chronicled before so I won't get into it.

BUT!!!  I had a cocktail in it a few days ago and made another one last night (in celebration of Repeal Day) that has begun my road to recovery.  

Cocktail a la Louisiane
1 oz Rye
1 oz Benedictine
1 oz Sweet Vermouth
1/4 oz Absinthe (I used Pernod)
3-4 dashes Peychaud's Bitters

Stir everything in a mixing glass with cracked ice for a slow 20 count.  Counterclockwise is preferable.  Strain into a chilled cocktail class and garnish with a cherry.

This is one fine cocktail.  In fact, may even be one of the best drinks I've ever had.  It's spicy yet smooth, sweet and herbacious.  The pastis gives it a certain warmth that makes me wish for a snowstorm and a roaring fireplace.  Quite frankly, WOW!

I made my first attempt with a Baby Saz (Sazerac 8yr).  Last night, I decided to gild the lilly a bit and went with the Sazerac 18yr from the Buffalo Trace Antique Collection.  Of course, you already know how the drinks turned out.  I'm contemplating making one using the Thomas Handy Rye, but I'm afraid that the increased potancy of the Handy will throw the drink out of balance.  I could always play with the proportions, but the Antique Collection is not something you do experiments with . . . 

Sorry no pics today.  Next time I make a Cocktail a la Louisiane, I'll snap a few.

Cheers!

Slashfood posted a "Red Hot Santa Tini" which sounds good to me...cayenne plus cocoa?  Yummy.  It has Mazama vodka - never heard of that, myself - and Godiva chocolate liqueur plus some other stuff.

MSN (the default site in my web browser at work) had a story about five cocktails ripe for a comeback.  The first was the Bronx, which I definitely agree with - you can look through here to see my article on the Income Tax Cocktail, which is the Bronx plus bitters.  Their recipe for the Rob Roy seems to be missing a word or two, and also insinuates that the only orange bitters you can get are from Angostura.  That's odd since I have orange bitters from Fee Brothers, Regan, and Stirrings, but not Angostura...

But hey - one of the writers is a UVA alum, so I have to plug it, I think!