:: mixology monday announcement ::

MxMo LXXV: Flip Flop!

I thought of the theme for this month's Mixology Monday shortly after making the Black Rene, an obscure drink from Pioneers of Mixing at Elite Bars: 1903-1933. The combination of brandy, amber rum, lemon, and Maraschino was tasty, but I felt that the recipe could be improved if I swapped in different ingredients. Taking a page from Max Toste of Deep Ellum who converted the Black Devil into the White Devil, I flipped around the ingredients to be pisco, white rum, lime, and Maraschino instead. With this combination that I called the White Rene, the drink really sang but it was still recognizable as being an alteration of the original recipe. Others have done similar swaps with grand effect including the Bluegrass Mai Tai that that changes the two rums to two whiskeys and swaps lime for lemon from the classic while holding everything else the same.

Here's how to play:

• Find a recipe, either new or old, and switch around at least two of the ingredients to sister or cousin ingredients but holding the proportions and some of the ingredients the same. The new recipe should be recognizable as a morph of the old one when viewed side by side. Want to make an amaro version of a Vieux Carré or a new twist on a Negroni? Go for it!
• Make the drink -- and feel free to make the original one as well -- and then post the new and old recipes, a photo, and your thoughts about the libation and how it differs from the original on your blog or on eGullet's Spirits and Cocktails forum.
• Include in your post the MxMo logo and a link back to both the Mixology Monday and Cocktail Virgin sites. And once the round-up is posted, a link to that summary post would be appreciated.
• Post a link to your submission in the comment section here, or send an email to yarm-at-verizon.net with the word "MxMo" somewhere in the subject line.

The due date is Monday, July 29th which I will interpret as whatever gets posted before I get home after my day bar shift on the 30th (yes, I will accept late entries but a deadline as a symbolic form of structure is needed for this sort of cat herding). Yes, we are doing this later in the month, but with Tales of the Cocktail this week, I figure this timing was the optimal so people could attend, recover, and still participate.

Cheers,
Frederic