Alright, it’s Tuesday, so sue me. ?We had some site issues that kept me from posting this yesterday and hey, look, content!!!

I was sitting at work the other when my phone beeps alerting me that someone on Twitter mentioned me. ?I check the tweeters and it was my buddy Chris?informing some of us old fogies that this MxMo would be the last. ?He sent along Fred’s announcement on Cocktail Virgin Slut?that after almost 11 years, MxMo would be ending. ?I tested Sean and we decided that the occasion called for an old-school Scofflaw cocktail makin’ hootnany. ?Scofflaw’s Den has posted 52 articles for MxMo over the years and we’re happy (and a bit sad) to participate in the final one.

The theme is “Irish Wake” and as you can read from Fred’s post, the goal is to uncover or create a new recipe using Irish whiskey or tell a story where Irish whiskey played a role. ?If you know Sean or I, or have read this site before, you know we like our whiskey and Irish whiskey is no exception. ? Sean brought over a bottle of Powers and a bottle of Writer’s Tears. ?I contributed a bottle of Redbreast 12 Year Old and Slieve Foy.

Sean brought over a bottle of BG Reynold’s Orgeat?which we simply had to use. ? Considering a theme of an Irish Wake, it only seemed appropriate to use an amaro as well. ?Something dark and bitter just seemed appropriate. ?We started with Nardini Bassano Amaro. ?The roasted and coffee notes seemed perfect for a sad theme. ?So after several drams of Irishwhiskey, we started mixin.

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The Nardini Amaro was determined to be too complex for the drink. ?We needed something just as dark and bitter with just a little less going on. ?Sean and I looked at each other and both said “Averna!” ?After a couple of attempts we had a cocktail that we both really enjoyed. ?I give you . . .

The Irish Goodbye
2 oz Irish Whiskey
.75 oz ?Averna
.5 oz ?fresh lemon juice
.5 oz orgeat

Mix all ingredients in an ice filled shaker and shake it like you’re hoping a potato will pop out. ?Strain over ice and garnish with a maraschino cheery.

Now, of course, we can’t leave well enough alone. ?When we go out there is a phenomenon we call the Irish Goodbye where a person simply disappears. ?One second they are talking with you at the bar and then next, POOF, they are no where to be found. ?The thing about the Irish Goodbye though is that you’ve still had quite an enjoyable night and you know that you will see your compatriot soon and bend elbows again. ?With this in mind, I wanted to make the Irish Goodbye something eye catching for the final MxMo.

My freezer contained several hollow ice spheres I made for a party. ?Using my smoke gun, I filled the ice sphere with apple wood smoke and plugged the hole with a maraschino cherry. ?I then poured the cocktail over the ice sphere in a double old fashioned glass. ?After the drink is served, using an ice pick you crack the ice sphere and POOF a puff of smoke rises from the cocktail and disappears into the ether. ?A true Irish Goodbye.

Pictures!

Pouring the drink

Tapping the first ice ball

Tapping the second ice ball

Smoke on the cocktail

The ball really got rolling yesterday at 7:30am when the contractors showed up to begin the basement renovation. Tearing down walls, rewiring the current lights, and adding additional lights were on the docket. We got everything set before having to run out the door to get the baby to day care and us to the office. All day, I kept my phone within grabbing distance in case the contractors called or texted. Maybe I watch too much HGTV, but I had a pit in my stomach waiting for that “We have an issue . . . ” call. Thankfully, it never really came. The electrician called mid-morning and asked about lighting configurations, locations, and the (unplanned) installation of an access panel in the ceiling. The access panel needed to be installed to bring the basement electrical up to code.

In talking with various contractors I knew that we’d need a solution on fixing the holes in the floor once the walls came down. The easiest, and most affordable, solution was to use the flooring located in two adjacent closets to fill in the holes in the bar area and replace the flooring in the closets with something new or similar enough to what was removed. To that end I went to Home Depot and bought two cases of flooring that?almost matched what was currently there.

Hey, it’s going inside a closet, it ain’t gots to be a perfect match.

When I got home yesterday though, I learned that the flooring I bought was too thick to match what was there. The way one guy described it, “What was here was the lowest grade. What you bought was the best. What we put in was middle-of-the-road.” That was an interesting lesson in flooring. For me at least. Luckily, what they ended up putting in is an even closer match to what I bought that it’s virtually seamless.

Needless to say, I was really excited to see the work after I got home. I practically sprinted from the car to take a look. What I saw was amazing. Although unfinished in several places and more electrical still to do, it matched my vision to a tee.

This is what the closed off portion of the basement looked like before we moved in. If you remember from the last post I called the enclosed room the “weird room.” Here is what the space looks like now:

Standing a bit further back from the perspective of the picture above, you can see how different it looks. We had wondered about the use of this room ever since we first looked at the house. Shaped odd, power outlets high on the walls, and no, that’s right?no air registers really made this room something of a conundrum. After talking with the contractors, they confirmed what I had guessed, namely that the walls we just removed were put up by a previous owner to make this area a bedroom/living area. The high outlets were probable placed there because of a countertop which was removed. I bet if they had never put up the walls to begin with, they could have asked a lot more for the house. Another good lesson in long term planning when it comes to owning/selling a home.

Here is a close-up of the lights we had installed that will be above the bar. We’ll put vintage Edison bulbs in them when all is said and done.

In the last post, I asked folks to email me thoughts on their own renovations, home bars, or what I’m currently doing. My friend Sylvan from?Tasty Libations?emailed and strongly suggested we not scuttle the sink/plumbing from the plans. Has he stated;

“You won’t miss the money after a few months, but you’ll regret not having the sink every. single. time. you need to wash something. And every time you do use it, you?ll smile.”

While I don’t disagree with him, at this stage of our finances we just couldn’t make the sink and plumbing work without sacrificing something, which, quite frankly, is higher on the priority list such as the backbar cabinets and seating. But the option for adding a sink is always there in the future. Of course, we may have to find a new location for it since the countertop will be one huge slab of granite, but it’s still an option. While it does suck a bit, we also get a bit of luck on the sink front.

If you look at the photo above (sans walls) you’ll notice two columns. The one on the left supports the ductwork in that particular bulkhead. The one on the right was a bit of a mystery. Does it house anything other than support for the cross beam of the house? Most likely it was structural so we couldn’t move it, but was it hiding anything else? Maybe something like . . . plumbing?

This my friends is what we found. Apparently it is the main drainage pipe for the entire house. If you look closely at the bottom third of the pipe you’ll see a 1.5 inch pipe nubbin. (I’m pretty sure that’s a plumbing technical term.) Our contractor said that at some point there was a sink within the vicinity of this pipe and that nubbin was where the sink drain connected to the main drain. HUZZAH!!! Of course, unless we do some more investigative demolition, we don’t know where the water for the sink came from. But the point is, we have a pipe! And for future projects that could come in quite handy.

That’s it for this update. The next update should have the space completed and ready for back-bar cabinet installation and the bar itself. Cheers!

We’ve been in the house for a little over two weeks now. Moving was an experience. We were scheduled to move on a Saturday. The weather gods decided that Saturday was the perfect day to have a huge snowstorm on the East Coast. So the move was rescheduled to the Thursday?before the storm. It was hectic. The movers finished everything by Thursday afternoon and on Friday, I had four contractors out to look at the basement, take measurements and prepare quotes. We also had the cable/internet guy out and luckily got everything hooked up just before the storm hit.

Dealing with the contractors has been interesting. Most came in, measured the space, talked briefly about the project and left. Some, spent considerably more time discussing the project, providing ideas and suggestions, and generally seemed to be more interested in the job. After a week of having a couple more contractors in, we slowly started to get estimates. Some were laughably high. Some pulled out of consideration because the project was “too small” for them. ?One of these latter contractors actually said that he would be happy to do the work, even though it was too small, if I agreed to meet a minimum of $25k. Twenty. Five. Thousand. Dollars. Right, that was ridiculous. I mean who would say yes to this? It’s not like we’re having the entire basement remodeled. Crazy. A few of the estimates came in under our budget but still seemed high for the work we wanted to do.

When we met with all of the contractors we clearly detailed everything we wanted done to the space – two walls to tear down, some plumbing and a sink installed, light electrical work, and cabinet purchase/installation. After receiving a handful of quotes, we decided that the plumbing aspect was too time consuming and too costly at this particular time.?It was a very intense discussion with my wife over making this a true “wet bar.” It would be fantastic to have a fully function sink right behind the bar to wash glasses, tools, fruit, etc. and not have to cart dirty items upstairs to the kitchen. However, there is a full bathroom right around the corner from where the bar is being placed with a perfectly good sink installed. And truly, I don’t think we’ll be serving so many people at one time that taking a few dirty glasses to the dishwasher in the kitchen is a big deal.

I also went to Home Depot and met with a kitchen design person and had them draw up plans for a service bar counter and cabinets. I’m currently waiting for the finished estimate on these to see if Home Depot is a good option for this aspect of the bar. It was really exciting to see my vision put in a 3D print out containing many of the very specific details I requested. I’m looking forward to seeing the final numbers.

As promised in my last post, below are a few pictures of the basement as it looks now, before any work is done. In the next post, I hope to have some “after” shots of the basement and some more info on the service bar area.

This is looking down the basement hallway. the steps coming down from the living room are to the right and the bathroom is to the left. At the end of the hall, just before the carpet, there is a door on each side. To the right is a storage closet. To the left is the entrance to the “weird room.” This is the room we’re removing.

This is affectionately called the “weird room” due to it’s shape and unclear purpose. We think it was an office, but it could have also been a bedroom. This is the room we’re opening up to the rest of the basement. The wall directly to the left (door jam) will be removed as will the perpendicular wall to the left.

This is looking at the enclosed “weird room” from the main basement floor. The wall right in front will be removed. The door to the right is to the utility room (hot water heater, HVAC, etc.) The carpet will eventually be replaced with hardwood or the like.

This is the wood burning fireplace and sliding door to the fenced in patio.

I want to wish anyone who still reads these words we put on here a Happy and Prosperous New Year! I hope everyone has had a great holiday season.

2016! I mean, 2016!!! I think the first day of this new year is really appropriate for this post. A lot of people made resolutions last night. Their resolutions are generally things they want to accomplish in the new year or lifestyle changes they want to stick with for the next 365 days. This is not a resolution post. Rather, with the start of a new year, there are new adventures and this is a space I want to use to share these adventures. Don’t worry, they will still be booze related, and who knows, maybe more posts will be born from these adventures.

If you know me in real life or follow me on the social medias, you are already aware of the biggest change and adventure that began in 2015. If you have no idea what I’m talking about, I became a father. I’m not going to give too many details here (those are elsewhere in the web) but my wife and I have a beautiful 5-month old girl, Addie. The next biggest adventure began just before the New Year, we bought a house!

But I hear you there behind your computer or smartphone saying, “So, what does that have to do with Scofflaws Den and drinking boozy goodness?” Well, the house has a finished basement and a wood burning fireplace. And with those bones, what is a Scofflaw to do but put in a working bar! To be clear, our basement will be, generally speaking, our family room where we hang out, watch TV, and relax with friends and family. The formal living room will be upstairs, but the basement will be a relaxed oasis.

My goal is to document the process of creating this oasis. Writing about the process, what I want to do with the space, what my wife lets me do with the space, and the final product will, I hope, be a fun exercise and interesting to others. If anyone has built a custom home bar, I’d love to hear about it in the comments.

To begin, I want to share my (very amateurish and childlike) drawings of what I envision. In the next post, I’ll share photos of the basement space as it currently is. Without further ado, here is the beginning:

This would be to my left as I stand behind the bar.

The back bar.

Bookalokal?is a company that connects local experts in various cities with people who want to experience local flavors, dishes, drinks or meals in a safe, comfortable environment. It’s free to sign up and you only pay the price of the event you want to attend. The hosts are verified by a Bookalokal employee so you can be certain you won’t sign up for an Evening with Indian Food and find a BDSM torture chamber instead.

We have scheduled three classes so far. Below are the descriptions of these classes.

Basics of Bitters
Most bars worth their salt have at least one kind of cocktail bitters on their back bar. But what are bitters? Why use them? Why does there seem to be a hundred different kinds on the market nowadays? If you enjoy cocktails and have always wondered about the mysterious dashes and drops your bartender is adding to that drink, this class will let you in on the secret! Learn the history of cocktail bitters, how and why they are used, and taste several different types of bitters. You’ll also get to try three cocktails where the use of bitters is not only called for, but essential. For those who wish to try their hand at making bitters at home, we’ll also discuss how to go about starting, what you’ll need and how long the process takes.

Home Bartending Basics
Come learn how to stir, shake and muddle your way to a successful cocktail party! You will learn the techniques of making cocktails, how to stock your home bar, and three recipes to show off your new talents. Oh, and the professional tools you use to practice your new skills? Yeah, you get to keep those! This class is a must for anyone wanting to throw a cocktail party!

Welcome to the Tiki Lounge
Summer is here and what better way to celebrate than relax with an icy, fruity, boozy tiki drink? This summer when you invite friends and family over for a cook-out and some drinks, throw in a touch of Polynesian flair by serving the best tiki drinks around! Learn the history of tiki drinks, the tricks to making them and hot Tiki became synonymous with Americana. And probably light things on fire.

Due to the limited seating in these classes, if there is demand, we will repeat them throughout the summer. We also plan on offering additional classes on various subjects and will let you know about those here and on Twitter.

Please click here for dates, times and cost of these classes.?

We hope to see you soon! Cheers!

On March 27th, for Women’s History Month, DC LUPEC is reviving a 2011 Tales of the Cocktail seminar given by four fabulous women on the history of women behind the bar. The speakers are Misty Kalkofen, Lynette Marrero, Meaghan Dorman and Kitty Amann from NY and Boston. LUPEC DC will be crafting the cocktails.

If you are interested in purchasing tickets, click here!

Cheers!

Such is the way I followed the opening of San Diego’s Polite Provisions and its proprietor Erick Castro. Over the years I have met Erick at several cocktail events and was even able to introduce him to a friend at StarChefs one night at New York’s Milk & Honey. All this is to say I knew his talent behind the bar was superb and he had a personality to match. When he announced the move from San Francisco to San Diego to open his own place, I couldn’t wait to see how it worked out. As he built Polite Provisions, I watched via Twitter and knew I’d have to go visit.

The only problem? I have never been to San Diego! So when discussing our Christmas plans with my wife, I was excited when she suggested we take a few days away from visiting her folks in Cali and spend them in San Diego.

Which, a few days after Christmas, I found myself walking through the front door of Polite Provisions.

This bar is simply gorgeous. The tile floors, dark wood and metal seats and tables make you feel like you’ve stepped into a swanky soda shop. Now I can talk about how good the drinks are (fantastic) and how attentive and nice our bartender Frankie was (extremely) but I want to mention some of the small details that truly made drinking here a treat.

First, the chairs for the high-top tables have built in foot rests that are actually comfortable. If you can’t sit at the bar but still want to see the action, these are great seats. Second, there are copious hooks under the bar for coats, hats, purses, etc. Third, there is a perfect amount of light. It’s just dark enough that the candles and other sources of light provide great ambiance but not so dark that you can’t read the menu. I hate going to a bar and needing a flash-light to read a menu.

A few other things I noticed which really impressed me: Each bartender station had an antique desk lamp built into the bar allowing them to see their work (and their work to be seen!) without ruining the guests’ time with excessive lights. Along the bar at several intervals were multi-level lazy susans holding various bitters, tinctures and tonics. Much less bar space taken up with their prodigious bitters collection since they go up rather than out. One of the neatest things I noticed were the hidden storage built into the columns behind the bar. These were used to hold glassware, extra tools and at least one bottle of George Stagg Bourbon.

It was also great to look across the room and see row upon row of my friend Darcy’s Acid Phosphate and Lactart for sale.

The bottom line is that if I lived in San Diego, Polite Provisions is a bar I would be spending a lot of time. It had everything that makes my haunts here in DC so loved – great drinks, great atmosphere and, most importantly, great people.

Polite Provisions
4696 30th Street
San Diego, CA

http://politeprovisions.com/

The next thing I want to highlight is the Cuisinart Electric Kettle.

It holds 1.7 liters (that’s almost 7.2 cups to us non-metric folks) of water and has a handy window to see exactly how much water is in the kettle.

The kettle is “cordless” which means that the base is plugged into an outlet and the kettle heats up by being placed on the base. One design that I love on this appliance, and one I wish other manufacturers would implement, is that while the cord is rather long there is a built-in cord wrap on the bottom of the base. This lets you reach far outlets if necessary or keep the kettle close to an outlet without excess cord getting in the way.

The main selling point on the kettle though is the automatic temperature settings. Each setting has the temp and general type of beverage for that temp (even french press coffee!!!) and a “Keep Warm” function.

We use this kettle almost nightly for hot tea, on weekends for french press coffee and any other time we need boiling water. And you know what, it’s perfect for hot toddies!!!

My next gift suggestion is a simple CO2 soda siphon. Now I know you can go to the market and pick up soda water. Or you can get one of those fancy soda rivers that make all sorts of fizzy drinks. But I don’t want to keep buying plastic bottles of soda water that will go flat after I only use half of it. I also don’t drink lots of fizzy drinks so a machine that spits out all different types is overkill. That’s why I like the simple soda siphon.

This is the siphon I use at home. It also happens to be a wedding gift from my cohort SeanMike. I’ll admit it’s a little fancier than most models but you can find a bunch of different types on Amazon.

Well there you go, two more suggestions from me to you. Both the electric kettle and the soda siphon are practical gifts for the cocktail fan or budding chef in your life.

The first tool is one of the handiest gadgets I have. It hangs on the wall right next to my mixing station in the kitchen so it’s within easy reach. During parties I throw it in my back pocket to use throughout the night. What is it? It is the Microplane Bartender’s Garnishing Tool.

This little gem is a zester, peel curler and bottle opener. It fits comfortably in your hand making opening bottles and garnishing those holiday martinis pretty simple. But honestly the neatest thing about this tool is the zester. During the chilly months of the year I find myself making more drinks where a quick zest of fresh nutmeg on the top puts a cocktail over the edge. Think eggnog, spiced apple cider or mulled wine. Having a nutmeg in my pocket and a zester is easy, slightly theatrical for guests and really just fun. (Never claimed I was not a huge nerd!) At $20 MSRP it is a great stocking stuffer or lost cost gift to someone who loves making drinks for friends and family all year long.

My next favorite thing is a relatively new addition to the bar. I was gifted a set of these rocks glasses by friends for working on their wedding cocktails. I originally saw them on a random “neat stuff” website, fell in love with them and immediately put them on my Amazon wish list. I can’t say these glasses “do” anything except hold my tasty beverages, but just look at them!

For those of you who don’t live in the DC area, these glasses are etched with the streets and neighborhoods of Washington, DC. The picture above is of the same glass rotated so you can see the full etching. These glasses feel substantial in your hand and have a nice heavy bottom. These glasses come from The Uncommon Green and each rocks glass runs $12.50. They also have pint glasses and carafes etched with lots of different city street maps. Check out their website to see if your city is there.

That’s it for part 1 and I’ll have a few more favorites in a couple of days. Maybe a few other Scofflaws will chime in with some of their favorite things as well!

When Scofflaws Den gets asked to create special cocktails, whether it be for a wedding or other event, we’ve modeled this service after the process for choosing a wedding cake. The recipes are theirs now so I won’t include them here. In this post I want to tell you about some of the fun, and not-so-fun, aspects of this process.

I started by sitting down with the couple to ask what they had in mind; any particular spirits, styles, dis-likes, allergies, etc. in order to figure out exactly what they want. The bride is from Kentucky so she requested something with bourbon. She also wanted it to be fall themed since it was a fall wedding and I found out there was a history with relatives making and sharing fresh apple cider. They didn’t want anything with a licorice flavor or anything overly herbaceous.

As we talked it also became clear that his-and-her punches would be best. For one thing the caterers would be serving the drinks. They would not be trained bartenders and as such I didn’t want to create anything labor intensive to mix, shake, stir and serve. Second, since these drinks would be served during a finite time frame, it would be better to have something pre-batched that could be poured over ice and served to more people in a short time.

With these points in mind I began creating recipes. Because the bride-to-be had more specific desires as to her drink the recipes were pretty easy to come up with – bourbon, apple and fall spices were going to be in the mix. In the end, I presented the couple with three punches for the bride. One was bourbon, apple cider, lemon, pimento dram, sparkling apple cider and bitters. Another was bourbon, becherovka, apple juice, vanilla liqueur, sparking apple cider and bitters. The third was bourbon, apple cider, concord grape syrup, lemon, a spice tincture and sparkling water.

The groom’s punch was a little harder to figure out. He really didn’t have any restrictions on ingredients so everything was at my disposal. The groom-to-be is a prolific homebrewer so I decided to do something with hops. And this is where the real fun/frustration began. The question was how to use the hops. To begin, I started a hop and gin infusion. This turned out to be a bad idea. My guess is that I allowed the hops to infuse for too long but the result was a bitter mess. This stuff made Malort taste like fresh lemonade.

For my second attempt, I made a hop and grapefruit “tea” which I carbonated. Mixed with gin, some simple syrup, fresh grapefruit juice and dry cura?ao. This turned up much better. It was still on the bitter side but certainly nothing a little tweaking couldn’t fix. The final recipe for the groom’s punch was probably the simplest and best tasting.

After creating a very light, citrusy, gin punch, I dry-hopped the punch. Basically, I quickly infused the hops into the punch directly. This gave the punch the aroma of hops without overly bittering the punch.

So after I had these 6 different recipes, I had the couple over to hang out and try each punch. We discussed what they liked and didn’t like about each one. I also made it clear that if they didn’t like any of them, I’d take the notes from this tasting back to the drawing board.

In the end, they picked the easiest two punches to make. Each one hit the couples directives and even more important, they thought each punch was delicious.