bowery sour

2 oz New Amsterdam Gin
2 Strawberries
1/2 oz Lime Juice
2 barspoon Sugar (3/8 oz Simple Syrup)
2 leaf Basil
1 pinch Curry Powder (pea-sized pinch)

Muddle fruit, juice, sugar, and curry. Add gin and ice, shake, and strain into a cocktail glass. Garnish with a strawberry and a basil leaf.
On Sunday morning after the Bartenders' Breakfast followed by a 4 hour breakdown of the Mixo House bar, I got a little sleep and somehow made it to breakfast and then the New Amsterdam Next GINeration Cocktail Challenge at 10:30am on Sunday morning. I was working on 3 hours of sleep (about 10 hours over the last three nights) so I started downing coffee to mentally wake up for the event. By the middle of my third mug, I was good and rambling (I know there is video of this and I sure hope it never airs...). I had some pre-gaming strategy with Jackson Cannon the week before Tales who gave the helpful hint that New Amsterdam pairs rather well with berries. Once I surveyed the ingredients table, this tip was quite helpful. There was nothing to play with other than fruits, herbs, spices, juices, and sweeteners; the only spirit was the gin so all of my ideas with vermouth and the like were out. When the contest started, we had 10 minutes to make up our drink. The logistical nightmare of 16 contestants all running toward the ingredients table (pushed against the wall to block one side of entry) would have been horrific had I not known what I had wanted and was able to grab it over people's shoulders. With 5 minutes left, I had everything ready, including garnish, except for the ice and shaking (no sense in doing this until the last minute) and a name. I walked over to Andrea and asked for help. I knew I wanted the word "Sour" in the title but my mind had blanked. Brand Ambassador Alex Ott's talking about the Manhattan-New Amsterdam connection triggered the name "Bowery Sour" which seemed to have a good ring to it.
The Bowery Sour was slightly tart which would have made it a great pre-prandial drink; upping the sugar to 3 barspoons or using a 1/2 oz of simple syrup would have made for a better balance but I did not have the time to adjust the sweetness. The strawberry flavors paired rather well with the gin as well as the basil, and the hint of curry added some accents that accentuated the gin's botanicals. Keeping the ingredients list simple was my goal, and the simplicity allowed each flavor to shine through without getting muddled. Overall, the judges apparently liked my drink and were impressed that I had garnished both the main cocktail glass and the tasting glasses. In retrospect, my drink would have done better had I stuck to a New Orleans theme and called it something like the "Decatur Street Sour." Sleep deprivation made me focus more on the flavor than satisfying everything about the contest. My neighbor, Payman Bahmani from Umamimart, won the judges nod and the grand prize; however, I did not leave empty handed for I received a glorious Yarai mixing glass for my efforts.

:: notes about shrubs ::

During Paul Clarke and Neyah White's seminar on the "Art of the Aperitif," the topic drifted off to shrubs. It started with Neyah being asked what the appropriate serving size of sherry should be in a bar or restaurant setting (3-5 oz), and Neyah mentioned that he enjoyed serving 2-3 oz of sherry mixed with a 1/2 oz of shrub as an aperitif at his old bar. After having made a pair of shrubs last year using some of Neyah's online guidance (although I followed other people's boiling-based protocols), I figured that some of his Tales of the Cocktail secrets should be shared:

• Shrub is a fruit syrup fortified with vinegar. It represents the season's best, preserved and stored without the need for refrigeration.
• Neyah used the shrub at his restaurant to share what was good the day it was made. When the last bottle was running low, it was mixed with the next batch of shrub (whatever fruit/flavor it was) in a solera system that lasted for the 4 years of his tenure.
• Vinegar is great as an appetite exciter. Think pickles and olives. Which is why he spoke at length about it at the aperitif seminar.
• The secret for a good shrub is keeping the sugar and vinegar in balance (akin to lemon and sugar in a Sour, with both the lemon's citric acid and the vinegar's acetic acid giving a similar zesty bite to the drink).
• Neyah prefers that shrubs not be cooked. While cooking is quicker, the end result will be less bright. At that point, Neyah proposes that you might as well buy fresh juice instead of starting with fresh fruit.
• For a baseline recipe, use 1/3 fruit, 1/3 sugar, 1/3 vinegar.
• A sugar maceration (squeezing fruit flesh through the fingers is acceptable) stage should occur first, followed by hitting it with vinegar afterward. Neyah did not specify a time frame but the two links below suggest 5 hour (Neyah-derived recipe) to 24-48 hours.
• When a shrub ages, it is like an ecosystem. The ambient yeast (yeast on the fruit itself and yeast from the air) turns the sugar into alcohol, and the acetobacter (the bacteria in unpasteurized vinegar) turns the alcohol into more vinegar. Eventually this will stabilize and not turn the whole shrub into fruit vinegar since the bacteria-induced pH change will stall out the yeast's fermentation process (and thus the bacteria's acetic acid-producing pathway).
• Treat a shrub like a jar of pickles. Keep it cool, and let it sit for a while to even out.

Camper English at Alcademics has a good adaptation of one of Neyah's shrub recipes and the Stirred Not Shaken blog has some other recipe ideas and pointers on shrubs that are aligned and/or influenced by Neyah's philosophies.

sherry cobbler

2 oz Lustau Pedro Ximenez "San Emilio" Sherry
1 barspoon Demerara Syrup
17 drop Bittermens Mole Bitters

Stir with ice and strain into a highball filled with fresh ice. Garnish with berries of the season.

Friday was spent learning more about French spirits. Our education at Tales started with Wednesday's "Bariana: The Golden Age of French Cocktails" and continued on with Friday's "Armagnac, France's First Brandy" and "How French Products Contribute to Cocktails." After these two sessions, we made our way over to the St. Charles Streetcar to go to the Bittermens Launch Party at Cure. Well, launch of their Tiki and Boston Bittahs and relaunch of their Mole and Grapefruit Bitters since shifting production from Germany to stateside in Somerville, MA.
Although Cure did not have a special menu for the event, the bartenders were up for making drinks with any of the four bitters. For my first drink, I asked what bartender Turk Dietrich what he could do with sherry and the mole bitters. While I was expecting the sherry to be used more as an accent, Turk surprised me by making sherry the major spirit and going old school with a Cobbler. I was also impressed at the attention to detail given in "ornament[ing] with berries in season" a la Jerry Thomas' recipe. The Pedro Ximénez sherry provided a very refreshing sweet fruit flavor and nuttiness to the Cobbler, and Andrea thought that it tasted "like liquid figs." I was rather impressed with how the fruit and nutty notes worked with the chocolate and spice in the bitters, as was Avery Glasser who quite enjoyed the pairing from the sip he had.

d-day rum sazerac

2 oz Smith & Cross Rum
1/4 oz Steen's Cane Syrup
1 dash Peychaud's Bitters
1 dash Angostura Bitters

Stir with ice and strain into a rocks glass pre-rinsed with Legendre Herbsaint Absinthe. Garnish with a lemon twist.

After the Diageo Happy Hour, Andrea and I strolled over to the Green Goddess to see if we could make a reservation for Friday night. When they replied that they do not take reservations, I asked if we could get a table for that night. Within 20 minutes, we had a table inside surrounded by various cocktail luminaries who also knew of the restaurant's wonders. While I do not like posting about drinks without exact proportion recipes, standard Sazerac proportions should yield a similar experience (see 2nd recipe in the link below). Moreover, this drink was too bad-assed not to write about it.
The inception of this Sazerac came about when the bar could not get any Tuthilltown rye and the bartender began thinking about the creation of the Hurricane during World War II when whiskey was in short supply but there was an abundance of rum. What would the bar do in 1943 to recreate the Sazerac? "We invented this to imagine New Orleans captured by German U-boats, leaving us without any rye whiskey to make our hometown Sazeracs."

The Smith & Cross Rum donated a funky aroma that coupled well with the Herbsaint and lemon oil. The rum's bold taste was accented by the Peychaud's bitters and Herbsaint notes; moreover, the spirit's overproof nature increased the effect of these spice notes. Unlike the Sazerac I had last year in New Orleans at a non-Tales of the Cocktail event, this one was a slow sipper instead of an easy drinking heavily-sugared beverage. Not for beginners, but remember -- it simulates the austerity of wartime conditions!

eclipse

3/4 oz Don Julio Reposado Tequila
3/4 oz Cherry Heering
3/4 oz Aperol
3/4 oz Lemon Juice
3 spritz Sombra Mezcal

Shake all but Mezcal with ice and strain into a cocktail glass. Top drink with 3 sprays of Mezcal.

Skipping ahead to the 1980-1990 section of the Diageo Happy Hour at Tales of the Cocktail was Leo Robitschek's Eclipse. The Eclipse currently appears on the cocktail menu at Eleven Madison Park in Manhattan where Leo works. Unlike say the next table's Don Johnson which was described as a modern variation of the 1980's classic the Cosmopolitan, the Eclipse had no historical explanation provided. The drink did remind me of Coppa's Riccardo, a Mezcal-based Blood and Sand. The Eclipse started with a rather smokey nose from the Mezcal floated on top of the drink. The sip had a delightful soft tequila flavor on the front of the sip that was followed by a sour cherry note on the swallow.

Postnote 5/1/24: The recipe for the Eclipse published in the PDT Cocktail Book attributed to Leo Robitscheck in Winter 2009 is a bit more spirit forward and is as follows:

Eclipse
• 2 oz El Tesoro Añejo Tequila
• 3/4 oz Aperol
• 3/4 oz Cherry Heering
• 3/4 oz Lemon Juice
Shake with ice, strain into coupe rinsed with Del Maguey Mezcal Vida, and garnish with a lemon twist.

the day bell

1 1/2 oz Bulleit Bourbon
1/2 oz Campari
1/4 oz Ramazzotti Amaro
1/4 oz Grand Marnier
1 oz Moet Imperial
1 pinch Salt

Stir all ingredients but Champagne with ice. Strain into a coupe glass, top with Champagne, and garnish with an orange twist.

Skipping ahead a decade at the Diageo Happy Hour, I had an interesting drink served to me by Joaquin Simo (pictured below) of Death & Co. in New York City and Josh Habiger of the Patterson House in Nashville. The Day Bell was their "modern take on the Seelbach cocktail, created in 1917 at the Seelback Hotel in Louisville, KY."
Substituting for the Seelbach's Cointreau was a combination of a Grand Marnier and an orange-flavored amaro, Ramazzotti. The Ramazzotti along with the Campari served a smilar function to the Seelbach's seven dashes each of Angostura and Peychaud's Bitters. The Day Bell had a very orange nose and lingering bitter notes from the Campari. The swapping of potable bitters for the Seelbach's nonpotable ones seemed to have a similar effect on the palate, although the decreased amount of sparkling wine did bring the Bourbon flavors more to the forefront of the drink.

honey fitz

1 1/2 oz Zacapa 23 Year Rum
3/4 oz Honey Syrup
3/4 oz Grapefruit Juice
2 dash Peychaud's Bitters

Shake with ice and strain into a cocktail glass.

Yes, I traveled all the way down to New Orleans to have Jackson Cannon of Eastern Standard make me drinks. The Honey Fitz was the first one at the Diageo Happy Hour and the second was two nights later at the Bartenders' Breakfast. While I did not get the recipe for Jackson's second cocktail, I do have this keepsake photo to remember it by:
The Honey Fitz was the perfect cocktail for Jackson to present as it highlights his family's pedigree as political historians. The drink "was created in honor of John Francis 'Honey Fitz' Fitzgerald, an Irish-American politician and the namesake and maternal grandfather of U.S. President John F. Kennedy. In 1906, Fitzgerald was elected Mayor of Boston, becoming the first American-born Irish-Catholic to be elected to that office."

I could not find a record of the Honey Fitz in the cocktail tapestries, so I assume that Jackson created this drink to honor an event that fell within the 1900-1910 decade. The drink is a rum variation of the De Rigueur and Brown Derby Cocktails with the addition of Peychaud's Bitters. Zacapa is dark and spicy enough of a spirit to make a decent substitution for those drinks' Bourbon and rye whiskey. In the drink, the grapefruit flavors and rum's richness played on the sip along with the honey's sweetness. These flavors were chased by Peychaud's Bitters and Zacapa's spice notes on the swallow. In terms of Boston political cocktails, the Honey Fitz is a good step ahead of the Ward Eight in my book.

the boothby

1 oz Bulleit Bourbon
1 oz Carpano Antica Sweet Vermouth
2 dash Angostura Bitters
1 oz Moet Imperial Champagne

Stir all ingredients with ice save for the Champagne. Strain into a flute glass, top with Champagne, and garnish with a Luxardo Maraschino Cherry.

After the Amaro session on Thursday at Tales of the Cocktail, we headed over to the Cabildo Museum for the Diageo Happy Hour. What took a little getting used to was that the event was held in the sister museum to last year's event. The previous year was at the Presbytere Museum which has practically the same layout as the Cabildo. People were asking where all of the rooms filled with fun old Mardi Gras memorabilia were. Instead, we were two doors down and downing drinks while viewing displays about leprosy and other dark moments of Louisiana history.

The theme this year was "Cocktails through the Decades," and spread out across the three floors were eleven areas representing the decades from 1900 to 2010. Each section had celebrity bartenders making both traditional and modern interpretations of that decade's drinks. Even the decades during Prohibition were well represented, and the more modern decades on the third floor toyed with today's trends such as molecular mixology and the like. Out of the forty drinks being served, I picked my top four from the ones I tasted to showcase here.

The first one was the Boothby presented by San Francisco bartenders Neyah White and Erik Castro. The caption read, "This cocktail was created in 1908 in honor of William Boothby, one of San Francisco's most famous bartenders." Neyah explained that Boothby was quite good at assessing his clientele to determine if they had extra coins that they should be parted from. One of the Boothby's add-ons was to prepare the drink requested and to top it off with Champagne. The imbiber rarely complained until they saw the extra surcharge on the bill for something they never requested in the first place.

The Boothby was essentially a Manhattan; however, the Champagne lightened up the darker flavors in the drink considerably. The brut sparkling wine cut into the sweetness of the vermouth and generated a much drier and crisper result. Overall, it reminded me of a less orange and easier to drink Seelbach Cocktail.

averna pineapple shrub

1 1/2 oz Averna
1 1/4 oz Pineapple Purée
1/3 oz Simple Syrup
1/4 oz White Vinegar
1 dash Bitter Truth's Aromatic Bitters

Shake with ice and double strain into a cocktail glass.

For our third session on Thursday at Tales of the Cocktail, Andrea and I barely made it into the "A Shot of Black Stuff: Amazing Amaros and Brilliant Bitters" with our media credentials. While many sessions had sold out, this was the first one where everyone with a ticket showed up. Well, not everyone since three or four seats in the back were empty, and two of these luckily had our names on it (albeit, we were not sitting together). The session covered two thousand years of herbal liqueur history. Jacob Briars and Sebastian Reaburn presented the history as partly a shady past of quackery, lies, fraud, marketing, spin, and advertising, and partly as a glorious history of small villages producing successful medicinal beverages for their own uses. While the former situation was often sold by transitory salesmen, the latter was produced and consumed by tight-knit populations.

Medical purposes aside, herbs were added to improve the quality of poor wine and to fortify and protect it during shipping. Over time, the successful recipes were the ones that tasted well and/or had solid health claims. Bitters eventually made their way into cocktails as the spirits made the medicine more potable especially since they did not have access to purified extracts (only the infusions which were often bitter). Intriguingly, the cocktail was to make the bitters taste better not the bitters to make the cocktail taste better. One salient point about recreating historical bitters was that in a flavor and medical sense, they could have been utter failures. Stoughton Bitters was an example they gave; the term "Stoughton Bottle" became a slang term for someone or something that was ineffectual but always around. And after having made batches of historical ones, like Farmer's and German Bitters, I would tack those on the list as well. Worse yet were the medicines that did more harm than good.

At the session, beside tasting a half dozen amaros and a few bitter extracts, there were a pair of cocktails that were served. The Averna Pineapple Shrub was definitely my favorite. Unlike other shrubs which are pickled fruit purées or juices prepared in advance for storage purposes, this one used vinegar as a way to generate a sweet-sour balance only (as the preservative qualities were unnecessary since the drink was quaffed shortly after mixing). A similar effect could have been derived with lemon juice, although acetic and citric acids do have different flavor contributions as Darcy O'Neil can describe better than I can.