An online speakeasy of potent potables and other pabulam.

No, not mine…still working on that vital step before it “finding a girlfriend”.? Instead, it was my brother’s wedding as he married Cathy.? They’re on their honeymoon right now, giving me some vital quiet alone time in the house (I live with the two of them for the time being, though that’ll change soon) which is also showing me how freaking insane our damn cats are when they feel neglected.

But you don’t come here to the Den to read about cats, you come for the drinks.

Cathy had asked me to come up with drinks for each of them for the wedding reception.? We talked about it with the wedding planner at the Four Seasons Georgetown and she liked the idea, so I started banging my head against a table.? What would be a good drink for each of them?

Matt – most of his liquor drinks are “something and coke” – usually Jack Daniels or Crown Royal (Crown Royal being the unofficial family drink of our clan, it seems).? I had hoped to convince Crown to hook us up for the wedding, but alas, they didn’t write back to me.? He’s not a fan of very “liquor”-y tasting drinks.

Cathy – her primary drink is usually the kir royale or some variation of it – Chambord or creme de cassis topped with champagne, basically.? One long night I’d invented a drink called the “Cathy cocktail” which was Hendricks, creme de cassis, and something else topped with Sprite but I wanted something new.

I took into consideration a few other things, too:

1. The wedding cakes would be soaked in Grand Marnier.
2. The drinks should be easy on everyone – in terms of tastes.? I might love a good Sazerac, but that doesn’t mean my cousins do.
3. It should be easily made by the Four Seasons.

So I started experimenting.? From the looks and the sounds of it, I hit the ball out of the ballpark with both of them – especially by the descriptions of some of the hangovers!

I’ll show the Cathy first, since it doesn’t have my ugly mug in the picture.

This picture is from our friend Jennie Lin (used with permission).? She and Debbie are enjoying a Cathy’s Cocktail.

Cathy’s Cocktail
1/2 ounce vodka
1/2 ounce Grand Marnier
Dash of Chambord
Champagne
Shake the vodka and Grand Marnier together.? Pour a dash of Chambord into a champagne flute and swirl it around to coat the flute.? Pour in the vodka and Grand Marnier, then top with champagne.? Garnish with a twist of orange rind.

One of the things that the Four Seasons did for both was premix parts of it, and that made them faster.? Which is a good thing to do with hundreds of guests, but after the reception I went upstairs and had Kevin at the Bourbon Steak bar make another Matt’s Cocktail and it was goshdarned delicious-er.

(And if you’re wondering, I’m going back to the bar at Bourbon Steak, as their drinks and food were AWESOME, but I want to devote some time just to that.)

Here I’m holding up a Matt’s Cocktail while Joanna and I sing along with some song that the DJ was playing (picture courtesy of her husband, Mike Conroy).? That’s the kind of thing that a drink like this will do to you – it’ll fill you up with sugar and caffeine and make you silly.? I hadn’t drank that much “regular” Coke in years and I definitely did not sleep at all that night (well, for the most part).

Matt’s Cocktail
2 ounces Crown Royal
1 ounce Grand Marnier
2 dashes Regan’s Orange Bitters
Coca-Cola
Shake the first three things over ice and strain into a glass.? Top with Coke.

So – have any of y’all out there made specialty drinks for someone’s big occasion?? How’d it go?

Hee hee, he said hard.

Ahem.

Sorry about that.? Had to get that out of the system.

This month’s Mixology Monday is hosted by Matthew Rowley over at Rowley’s Whiskey Forge.? I, unfortunately, procastinated and now have the fun of trying to squeeze mine in while wishing I was in bed after a long holiday of meetings and more work in the morning.? Ahhh, I love my job.

Which makes the theme of “hard drinks for hard times” a bit harder for me.? I’m lucky enough to have a great job with a company that I really enjoy working for, and so, I usually don’t pay close attention to how much I spend on booze (too much).? Should I do cheap wine?

Oh lad-dee-dah!? WINE?!? I’m supposed to be giving ideas of how to drink cheaply and I’m sipping on a bottle of Sangiovese I got from Wegman’s?? Oh, sure, it wasn’t THAT expensive, but for some reason I think if you’re going to drink WINE in hard times it needs to be something that barely fits the moniker of wine.? Something you’d drink in college, like Mad Dog or Boone’s Farm.

I ain’t touching those things again.? I might spend my money on stupid things (Ice Pirates on DVD?? YES PLEASE) but I like to enjoy my drinks, such as they are.

Some of you might take offense or something from that when knowing how much cheap beer I drink.? That’s more of a lifestyle choice, I’d argue; both that cheap beer, in my humble opinion, is much more palatable than a lot of cheap wines (sometimes – Two Buck Chuck or whatever it’s priced at now helps disprove that, admittedly) and and also that I’m the type of person who always needs a drink in hand, and I drink a lot of liquids.? Not just booze – sodas, milk, juice, water, I just like to have a drink at hand.? I get made fun of it.

But that really doesn’t work for MxMo. And honestly, the price of a keg is better than a lot of the prices on even cheap beers.

In the keg right now we have Dogfish Head 60 Minute IPA.? It ended up being right around $150 or so for the keg.? Never minding the capital costs of a kegerator – the kegerator itself, for instance, the irregular refills of CO2, to name but a couple – the average price for a 12 ounce beer if you get the full 15.5 gallons out of it is about $.91.? They charge you about $5 or so for a pint of it at most restaurants.

Back at Christmastime my parents got me a SodaStream machine.? Now, you’re probably trying to get one ahead of me and say “Oh, HA!? You got Morgenthaler‘s tonic recipe, and ordered cheap quinine from online, and…”

No.? Shut up.? I didn’t.? I drove down to Boater’s World in Springfield and bought at $5 bottle of diet tonic syrup.

Seriously – uh – it’s not that bad.? It’s better than any other diet tonic water I’ve definitely had and I can make a bunch of liters of it for about the same price as a four pack of Fever Tree.? Just gotta carbonate that water…

I really had figured that a gin and tonic is a great “cheap” drink.? Maybe it was the night I ended up drinking 16 ounces of gin in my gin and tonics.? Maybe it’s the reputation that gin has as the beleaguered poor Englishman’s drink of choice (Jay?) (not to imply you are poor or beleaguered).? Maybe it’s…I don’t know.? But what I did know was that I needed a proper cheap gin to drink with it.

A while ago, one of our Thursday Drink Nights over at the Mixoloseum involved stuff that you’d never bought before.? I used a bottle of Beefeater gin but while I was out there I figured, you know, what the hell, and I bought a bottle of Jacquin’s Orange Flavored Gin.

The thing was, it ended up, that it really wasn’t that bad.? Oh, I know, you’re all JUDGING ME and stuff, I can tell it, because I like to drink 3-4 Miller Lites in between cocktails and I willingly listen to Katy Perry.? SCREW YOU.? It’s orange-y, it’s about 66 proof, and you know what, it was like $3 for a pint of it.

So there we go.? I ended up pouring in three ounces of the “makes a great orange collins” stuff and topped it off with diet tonic and a few ice cubes.? Keeping with the orange theme – which always rocks with my UVA glass – I used the orange drink stick.

Now, admittedly, I did drink that whole bottle of Sangiovese before even starting in on this experiment.? And the first taste was kind of rough.? But after that, as I started to drink it, I started to kind of dig it, and think, hey, maybe all it needs is a brown paper bag, and maybe all you critics of what I like to drink need to just shut the hell up, and oh, maybe there’s some kernel of truth to the whole thing about “gin makes a man mean” but you know what I’LL TAKE YOU ALL ON I WILL YOU JUST SEE!!!!

KITTEN THERAPY TIME

Okay, sorry about that.

Anyways, it’s not really a bad drink, and I guess it’s basically a gin and tonic but I’ll think of something cheap and easy to call it…

Orangin and Tonic
3 ounces Jacquin’s Orange Flavored Gin
Dash of Orange Bitters (orange angostura)
Build in a double old fashioned glass over ice.? Stir, garnish with a small piece of orange.

Is that good enough for you buggers?? HUH?? I didn’t need to drink one so FANCY SCHMANCY so you bloody fools can…

DOGGY THERAPY TIME

Okay, okay, I’m all right now.? I gotta get to sleep anyways.

Big thanks as always to Paul for setting up MxMo and to Matt Rowley for hosting this month.? Also props to The RZA and Master Shake, our two cats in the first picture, and Cosmo, my parents’ dog in the latter, for helping me resist the urges of demon gin.

Maybe just one more drink…

This month’s Mixology Monday with brought to us by Matthew Rowley of Rowley’s Whiskey Forge.? Matt’s topic seems very a propos with the current state of the United State’s economy, massive bail-outs every where you look and all around belt tightening when it comes to finances.? For this topic I really had to sit down and decide what to write about.

I could write about brands of spirits and liqueurs which offer the best quality and variety of purpose for your dollar.? Or, I could write about what I drink when the financial belt tightens.? Or I could just make something up as I go along.? Yeah, I’m pretty much doing that last one if you haven’t guessed.

Now don’t get me wrong.? Articles about the best bang for your buck on the spirit shelf are great and generally contain lots of useful information.? I just feel I’ve read this same story a hundred times since the word “recession” became ensconced in everyday vernacular.? With that said, I can certainly see me writing the same kind of story for Scofflaw’s Den because I feel like it.? Oh well . . .?? As far as what I drink when the financial belt tightens, well that’s easy.? I drink the same things I do when I’m not concerned so much about my finances.? Rather, I cut back on purchasing booze and limit my trips to bars/cocktail joints.? I love buying random ingredients and spending an hour or two bellied up at one of my favorite bars having great conversations with the bartenders and friends, new and old alike.? But both of these activities tends to eat into my bank account and by curtailing both, I feel much on much more stable financial footing.

So for this Mixology Monday, I decided to page through some cocktail books and give you two drinks on different ends of the “hard times” continum.? First, we have a cocktail that would perfect for those times when you’re very concerned about your next paycheck.? When your job may fall victim to a lay-off or go to the ATM to check your accounts and the machine laughs at you, I give you;

Gloom Chaser Cocktail
1/4 lemon Juice (.5 oz)
1/4 grenadine (.5 oz homemade grenadine)
1/4 Grand Marnier (.5 oz homemade tangerine ratafia)
1/4 Curacao (.5 oz Cointreau)

-Shake everything until well chilled and strain into a chilled cocktail glass.
(The Savoy Cocktail Book, p. 76)

The Gloom Chaser is one sweet cocktail.? Literally.? I was a little surprised at how sweet this came out considering it only has half an ounce of grenadine.? The Cointreau also adds some sweetness but I’ve never considered Cointreau to be a “sweet” liqueur.? The homemade tangerine ratafia is brandy based, like the called for Grand Marnier.? I’ve found the ratafia works admirably well as a replacement liqueur. ? Regardless, the drink isn’t bad, just a little sweet.? Then again, I think that is precisely the point for a cocktail called the Gloom Chaser.? The orange reminds you of brighter sunnier days and the sweetness is like a reminder of childhood sweets.? Certainly a drink that would provide an uplifting step during a hard time.

Of course, the old saying goes “it’s always darkest before the dawn.”? Or “every dark cloud has a silver lining.”? The point is even though many of us are weathering this troubling financial storm, eventually things will look up.? When they do, our worry and dread will seem like a distant memory.? Who knows, maybe it will lead you to greener pastures and brighter skies.? Maybe, you’ll even find yourself as . . .

The CEO Cocktail
2oz Brandy
.5oz Chambord or creme de cassis (.5oz Massenez Creme de Cassis)
1oz Lillet Blanc
2 dashes orange bitters (Angostura Orange)
a lemon twist for garnish

-Shake (stir please) with ice and strain into a chilled cocktail glass
The Joy of Mixology, p. 237

A nice brandy cocktail that isn’t too sweet.? The cassis adds just a touch of sweetness and really mellows out the brandy.? I was afraid the brandy and cassis would fight in the glass but the Lillet plays mediator really brings the two together.? I wonder how Chambord would change the outcome of the drink.? Seeing as I don’t have chambord, nor am I inclined to go buy a bottle, I’ll just have to wait until these economic waters even out a bit.

Thanks again for Matthew Rowley for hosting MxMo this month.

Cheers!

If you look back to last week, you’ll see where we talked about TDN video with Mata Hari absinthe.? We got a few comments on there when I noticed a disturbing trend – they appeared to be from the same IPs, had the same style, and were promoting a rival – La Tourment Vert.

Over in the Mixoloseum, some of us were talking about this and realized that we were all being hit on posts mentioning Mata Hari absinthe.

I wasn’t the hugest fan of Mata Hari but it wasn’t bad – and “bad” is all I’ve heard about La Tourment Vert (“Grain Neutral spirits + Scope Wintergreen = La Tourment Vert” was one comment on it in the chat room, as well as descriptions of how their spam is better than their product and how urinating in a jar and letting it sit was better than drinking it) and with the amount of good absinthe I have, well, I have no desire to BUY any.? Besides, over at The Wormwood Society they don’t even seem to consider it absinthe!

Seriously.? Who would do such a thing?? All I knew – from tracerouting the IPs – was that they were in LA.? Then one of our fellow bloggers pointed out the PR contact he had:

Kayla Isenberg
Interactive Media Manager, CASHMERE AGENCY
1110 North La Brea Avenue | Inglewood, CA 90302 Email: kayla@cashmereagency.com | www.cashmereagency.com EMBRACE THE RENAISSANCE

Does “EMBRACE THE RENAISSANCE” mean “spam the hell outta bloggers”?

Seriously, folks.? If you want good absinthe there are lots of better choices out there.? Mata Hari was very nice in providing us the resources to do the live TDN and it’s a different change of pace from many absinthes.? Kubler is one of the better deals in absinthe I’ve found.? I’ve heard good things about St. George.

Just don’t buy La Tourment Vert.