“Uh, okay, sure, whatever,” was probably my response. Unlike him, I hadn’t been reading cocktail sites and had never really thought about it. “If we’re going to do it, though, we should write about it.” At the time I wrote for a gaming website, plus did random reviews and such on a LiveJournal site (where we started this site!) and so it only made sense to me. Why just read when you can participate?

Who knew where that’d lead.

There’s been the heyday of blogging, the CSOWG and the Mixoloseum, and more than a few Tales of the Cocktails. There was the first time someone referred to us as “industry”. There have been classes and even a short gig bartending. There’s been lots of words but in the end, probably lots more drinks.

Some thoughts on this ten year anniversary:

I don’t drink like I used to thanks to medication. My doctor put me on naltrexone, which reduces the urge to drink, and it’s been a good thing for me. It’s helping me keep my weight down(-ish) and working well with my other meds to keep me the healthiest I’ve been at least since 2007 (geez ain’t that coincidental — but there were other factors in there too) and combined with Latuda has really done wonders for my bipolar disorder.

I don’t know if I would have come to love DC the way I do nowadays without this site. Because of this site, because of DC’s cocktail community, I’ve made so many friends and met so many amazing people (as well as folks in other cities, obviously). I spent ten years living in Charlottesville before moving to the DMV area in 2004, and that entire time, I always said I’d never move up here. I found it soulless and boring. What I found is that DC itself is an amazing city, really a small town, and the people here support it and each other.

One year at Tales of the Cocktail I gave away t-shirts that said “Ambush Marketer”. I’ve said for years how I disagree with how things are run. The event itself, when I’ve gone, has (for the most part) been amazing, though the parts that weren’t amazing no one seemed inclined to listen to complaints about. If you haven’t heard what’s happening with it, I recommend this article. I’m hoping, for the community’s sake and for New Orleans, that it becomes a more inclusive, better run event for everyone involved, but I’ve had my time there. It’s too big and too unwieldy; I love New Orleans, and will go back (hopefully soon) at a different time, just not then (nor during Jazzfest or Mardis Gras, those kind of things).

And what about us? Since we started, Marshall got himself married (which included an epic bachelor party to NOLA and Tales that we shall not write down events from here) and now has a house and a kid. He’s even working related to the liquor industry now, albeit on the law-talkin’ side. I’m…maintaining, though with a new gig that might see a lot more travel. Already it’s taken me to Seattle where I got to see so many friends (some of whom I’d never met before). I miss bartending, but over the summer did a negroni class, and depending on how my workload goes might look into doing more. Though you’re more likely to find me posted up at at the Passenger drinking a Schlitz and Old Overholt combo.

If you’re reading this: we love y’all. Thanks for sticking with us all this time. I have no plans to stop writing (“You already have!” LAUGH IT UP FUNNY GUY) and keep meaning to write more. Hit me up on Twitter if you have ideas of what you’d like to see content on…even if it’s just short things like “I”m drinking a lot of Gibsons lately” (man, I like the brine off those onions)…

Entrance sign

So, I’d originally meant to post about how meds and drinking were going, but got distracted over…uh…a couple of months.

Shot Glass (DON’T STEAL THEM THEY’RE ONLY $5) and Tiki Mug (also DO NOT STEAL)

Well, in the meantime Hogo reopened!

Tom Brown’s tiki nuevo bar, formerly further down 7th St two doors down from the old Passenger, reopened in the upstairs of the new Passenger at 1539 7th St NW tonight.

Mug & Menu

Like the original, it’ll be open Tuesday through Saturday 5 PM until close (2 AM-ish). There’s a full menu of tiki related food stuffs and a number of drinks, including four tiki drinks on tap.

Food Menu

I got to try the pork bun, which I enjoyed quite a bit, and the pimento macaroni salad which rocked my world. I also had a couple of tiki drinks (my limit these days with the old blood sugar plus fun with citric acid), the first thanks to Left Door’s Mick Perrigo (who is there this week only) who helped with the menu.

It’s a smaller place than their old one – at least, it feels smaller – but very cool, if you’ve been upstairs before. I can’t wait to work my way through more of both menus.

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.

Which is great!

But that doesn’t mean charity needs to end there.

All week I’ve been thinking about it, so I thought I’d make a call out and see what others think.

Next time you go out drinking, put aside the cost of one drink and donate it to charity.

Pick your own charity. Tell your bartender that you’re doing it (and if so, tip on that drink!) if you’d like. Tweet or Facebook that you’re going to do it to help keep yourself accountable.

I would wager that for the great majority of folks who read our site, or who participate in cocktail culture at all, we are the lucky ones with the income to be able to go out, to have drinks alone or with friends, to spend some disposable income on food and beverage. Heck, I’m still currently unemployed (other than the bartending) and I can do that.

So from now on, each night (or day, heh) that I go out, I’m saving the cost of one drink for a charity I support. Lord knows I probably don’t need that last drink of the night anyways.

I’d encourage y’all to consider doing the same. Tell me about it on Twitter.

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.

DC bias: We do cover other cities from time to time – for instance, when one of us travels to another city, or if one of our friends is doing something special in another city that we think interests our audience. For all intents and purposes, we do not travel to other cities in order to cover events. If you are interested in having us cover an event that is not in the DC area, you may contact us, but to be honest, the answer will be no unless expenses are covered. For all of us, this is a “second” (or even “third”) job, and travel takes up a lot of time and money that we do not necessarily have.

Some events, either in DC or elsewhere, we do cover because we plan on being there. In that case, we’ll cover it as we wish. If you do wish to sponsor us in order to cover your event, please contact us and we can discuss it – but please note that we will clearly label any content produced in that regards as “sponsored” so that our readers will know. We also will not edit our content in order to please a sponsor.

Cocktails, et al: We mostly cover the liquor-related industry. We like to talk about bars that we’ve visited, bartenders we know or have met, drinks we’ve enjoyed, distilleries, etc.

We do NOT cover: general restaurant news, travel, hotels (except hotel bars), general food news, anti-alcoholism or other rehab ventures, e-cigarettes, or really anything that doesn’t involve alcohol in some form or cigars.

We also do not cover tools or ingredients that we do not feel live up to what we strive for in our own personal bars. For instance, we do not cover artificial pre-mixed mixers or flavored vodkas.

– SeanMike

• Obviously, our thoughts and prayers go out to everybody impacted by Monday’s shooting. Fortunately the one person I know who works there was out that day.
• Also on Monday, I was diagnosed as diabetic with blood sugar around 180. You might remember that Marshall had the same issue. To be honest, I’m not surprised by the diagnosis, as I haven’t exactly led the healthiest of lifestyles the past few years…decades…Still, it makes one stop and think. Fortunately for me, I’d already started exercising 4-5 times a week with running, biking, push-ups, and yoga, and lost some weight. I’ve also been eating better in general, having lots of grilled meats and vegetables during the week instead of going out so much. My doctor put me on 1000 mg of metformin a day, but finally the side effects have worn off. I’m going to continue to work out regularly and try to eat even better, but it did kind of depress me this week. I’m feeling confident about my ability to fight it but I’ll probably be keeping a much closer eye on the types of mixed drinks I have when I go out.
• I visited friend of the Den Rachel Sergi at her new gig at Lincoln last week. It’s a pretty cool place. I had a great barrel-aged Last Word, and my date later that night told me she’d tried the bacon-infused Manhattan and quite enjoyed it. The happy hour specials were quite nifty too. I’m going to have to swing back by and try some of the food.
• Before I get into the next bit, a reminder: comments are broken, so if you submit one, we can’t even see what it is. I’m torn about reinstating them – we haven’t had much problem with them here, other than a flood of spam, but I’m not sure how much use they actually are any more. If you’d like to follow up with us on one of our posts or just in general, I usually suggest Twitter. (I’m on there as HighwayStar, Marshall is VAScofflaw, and Anthony is DLDGLG. Ashley doesn’t know how to do it.)
• IT’S FALL YAY YAY YAY. Fall is my favorite season. What’s your favorite drink of fall? I’m thinking this fall, for me, it’ll be a rye Manhattan with a splash of Averna.
• Oh, and thanks to the wonderful Mr. Angus Winchester, I won a first edition copy of Ted Saucier’s?”Bottoms Up”. I’ll post pics when I get it!
• Finally, we need to upgrade some of our WordPress software for ze blog. There’ll be some downtime scheduled soon. If any of y’all notice any issues now (other than comments, natch) or after, please, let us know.

Cheers y’all!

– SeanMike

Tonight two of DC’s best and most acclaimed bartenders are mixing up drinks to benefit the American Cancer Society.

Derek Brown (The Columbia Room & Mockingbird Hill) and Todd Thrasher (Restaurant Eve, PX and Bar TNT) will be at The Passenger from 5 to 9pm shaking drinks and making “good versions of bad drinks” like the Woo Woo and the Long Island Iced Tea.

The Passenger will donate a portion of tonight’s proceeds and all tips to ACS.

Sample 10+ rums from the Caribbean and Latin America, including aged rum and the exotic cachaca. A full lunch will be served as well, the perfect accompaniment to your trip to the tropics.

The event is from 1:00 – 3:00 pm and is $85/person.

To register, email Christina@passionfoodhospitality.com or click here.

It’s been almost two weeks since I received the diabetus diagnoses. My wife and I have been eating a mostly paleo diet. If you aren’t familiar, the basic tenant of a paleo diet is that you eat like you live in the paleolithic period. This means lots of meats (BACON!) and veggies and cutting out processed foods such as bread, diary, sweets, etc. I call ours modified because we are still eating some diary, like cheese and sour cream. Of course, it’s been in moderation.

I also bought a Nike Fuelband?to track my steps and calories burned through out the day. It is a little depressing when you work a desk job where you don’t move a lot to see your “activity” at the end of the day. C’est la vie. Regardless it’s a good way to keep track of what I’m doing to lose weight and it syncs with my iPhone so it’s easy to use.

On the booze front, there isn’t anything to report. I simply haven’t been drinking. I’ve also had a major head cold for the last 4 days so the cough and cold medicine has given me plenty of “entertainment” for a while. Tomorrow is the Super Bowl so I may have a cocktail or two or some sippin’ whiskey while watching the game.

In a comment to my first post, my friend Fred?brought up his father-in-law. Fred said,

My father-in-law dealt with this. The major concerns were overdoing drinking for he stopped caring about blood testing and giving himself insulin on a regular basis, and that there couldn?t be an accurate read on his blood sugar if he had alcohol in his system.

I think this brings up a very good point that should be discussed. Granted, I’m not a medical professional or a shrink (though I did stay at a Holiday Inn Ex . . . sorry) but I would hazard a guess that this happens to a lot of people. You want to live your life they way you have in the past. What does a little number mean? I don’t have pain so it can’t be that bad right? The problem is diabetus is like a ninja – quiet, stealthy and maybe Asian I just DON’T KNOW! The point is that it doesn’t hurt and numbers are important. Luckily for me, I don’t have to give myself insulin or test my blood on a daily basis. My next blood test will be in the beginning on March. Hopefully all the good work I’m putting in this month will show positive benefits in March. My goal is to make the changes in diet and lifestyle needed to reverse the disease so I don’t have to worry about taking insulin or checking my blood daily.

If anybody reading this series has been diagnosed with the diabetus and your doctor has you on insulin and testing your blood sugar on a daily basis, please talk to your doctor about drinking! Fred is right and it can screw up your blood results.?

Another friend of mine, Mike Dietsch?commented;

There has to be a space in this field in which people can write honestly about drinking and health. It?s not a binary thing ? you don?t have to choose between hedonism and AA. But that?s the way everyone seems to want to frame the conversation. You?re healthy, or you?re a drinker. No in-betweens.

But few people in our sphere seem to want to talk about this.

I think Mike hit the nail on the head. Everything is about balance. Think about your favorite cocktail. What makes it great is that all the individual parts are working in harmony with one another – everything is in balance. This is why the best bartenders will give their cocktails a quick straw taste. They want to make sure what they are serving is balanced. Right now, I am out of balance. The good news is that I know it and can make adjustments. Enjoying great spirits and working in the booze industry is part of me. That has to be balanced with a healthy diet and weight control.

In my opinion, there is a healthy in-between of healthy and drinker. Hundreds of thousands of people reside there. Some of us will have to work harder on the healthy side, but it doesn’t mean you have to give up the drinker side. There has to be a balance and going from one extreme to the other can be just as unhealthy.

Just to end this update, I’m happy to report that I’m down to 207 pounds!

Cheers!

PS. I mentioned my friend Fred who writes at Cocktail Virgin Slut. Well, he has a new book out and I highly recommend you go pick it up. I’m constantly turning to Fred’s site for new cocktail recipes and inspiration and now some of that is in his book. Highly recommend!