grog mutiny

3/4 oz Scotch (Famous Grouse)
3/4 oz Rum (Coruba)
3/4 oz Lustau East India Solera Sherry (3 parts Lustau Amontillado to 1 part Oxford Pedro Ximenez)
3/4 oz Cynar or Averna
3/4 oz Cream
1 Whole Egg

Shake once without ice and once with ice, strain into a glass, and garnish with Angostura Bitters.

Two Fridays ago, I decided to make an Egg Nog that I had spotted on BarNotes called the Grog Mutiny. I had held off since I had not replaced my Lustau East India Solera Sherry that the recipe specified, but this time, I took my own advice that I wrote into Boston Cocktails: Drunk & Told to use 3 parts amontillado/oloroso sherry to 1 part Pedro Ximenez to replicate a cream sherry such as East India Solera. For the Averna or Cynar option, I considered Averna for it paired well with Scotch in the Egg Nog A Drunk in a Midnight Choir, but I wanted to change gears and take the Cynar route instead. I had forgotten that I had just mixed a Scotch Egg Nog with Cynar recently, the Barnaby Jones, and had already created one myself, the Wait Until Spring, four years ago.
The Grog Mutiny was created by New York City bartender Rafa Garcia Febles, and he named it around the circumstances at the West Point Military Academy over Christmas 1826. That year, the Eggnog Riot or the Grog Mutiny occurred where one-third of the students rioted after dipping too heavily into eggnog laced with smuggled-in whiskey at a party; read more about it in this Smithsonian article. Once the tribute was prepared, the Grog Mutiny welcomed the senses with a cinnamon and clove aroma. Next, a creamy grape and caramel sip gave way to Scotch and funky rum on the swallow with a hint of nuttiness and funky herbal amaro on the finish.

how do i compare

3/4 oz Bourbon (Four Roses Yellow Label)
3/4 oz Apple Brandy (Laird's Bonded)
1/2 oz Benedictine
1/4 oz Cointreau
2 dash Apple Bitters (1 dash Bittermens Burlesque + 1 dash Regan's Orange)

Build in a glass, stir to mix without ice, and garnish with orange oil from a twist. Note: This is a room temperature cocktail.

After my work shift two Thursdays ago, I ventured into Sother Teague's I'm Just Here for the Drinks book where I spotted his How Do I Compare recipe. The drink is a room temperature "cocktail" called a Scaffa that fails to be cocktail for it lacks the water component in the 1806 formula of spirit, sugar, bitters, and water. Classic Scaffas such as Frank Meier's 1934 Rum Scaffa frequently called for Benedictine, and I have found orange liqueurs to work well too such as in the Orange Scaffa. Here, the How Do I Compare utilizes both, and the name is in reference to comparing apples to oranges or apple brandy plus bitters and Cointreau, respectively. To round out the mix, Sother split the base spirit with Bourbon, and to answer the naming question, he responded, "How do I compare apples to oranges? I don't. I just drink them."
In the glass, the orange element greeted the senses through the orange oil from a twist. Next, apple and the whiskey's malt filled the sip, and Bourbon and apple flavors were joined by orange-herbal notes on the swallow.

bring me the horizon

1 oz Denizen Aged White Rum
1/2 oz Plantation Original Dark Overproof Rum (Plantation OFTD)
1/4 oz Zacapa Rum
1/2 oz Cocchi Vermouth
1 tsp Don's Spices #2 (1/2 tsp each vanilla syrup + Hamilton's Allspice Dram)

Stir with ice and strain into a small wine glass (Nick & Nora glass).
Two Wednesdays ago, I turned to Tom Sandham's 2012 World's Best Cocktails for a nightcap. There, I spotted in the rum section a recipe from Brian Miller that was aligned in spirit (albeit not in appearance) with the Tiki the Snow Away event that month. Brian created the Bring Me the Horizon for the Tiki Mondays with Miller nights at Lani Kai in Manhattan that ran from 2011 until the bar closed in 2012. Overall, the recipe reminded me of a 3-rum Pirate's Cocktail that substituted Don's Spices #2 for the bitters. Once prepared, the Bring Me the Horizon shared a rum funk, vanilla, and allspice nose. Next, caramel and grape mingled on the sip and led into the rum medley accented by allspice and vanilla flavors.

rumbold

1 1/2 oz Plymouth Gin (Tanqueray)
3/4 oz Pimm's No. 1
3/4 oz Dubonnet Rouge (Byrrh)
3 dash Regan's Orange Bitters

Stir with ice, strain into a cocktail glass, and garnish with an orange twist.

While reading Jared Brown and Anistatia Miller's The Deans of Drink book about Harry Johnson and Harry Craddock, I spotted an interesting tribute drink to Harry Craddock. Technically the drink crafted by Blair Fordelius of GoodSpiritsNews was in honor of Gilbert Rumbold who did the art deco illustrations to Craddock's 1930 Savoy Cocktail Book. The combination of gin, Pimm's, and a bitter-herbal ingredient reminded me of the Black Friar Tea while still retaining the feel of something from England in the 1930s (however, it reminds me more of recipes from the Café Royal Cocktail Book more than the Savoy Cocktail Book itself).
In the glass, the Rumbold welcomed the nose with orange and juniper notes. Next, grape and berry fruitiness on the sip led into gin and herbal flavors on the swallow with a quinine finish.

mother of exiles

1 oz Rittenhouse Bonded Rye
1 oz Jameson Irish Whiskey (Teeling's Small Batch)
3/4 oz Meletti Amaro
1/4 oz Amontillado Sherry (Lustau)

Stir with ice, strain into a cocktail glass, and garnish with an orange twist and a cherry.

In my search to find enough Meletti recipes to make the purchase worthwhile, one recipe that kept popping up in Redbook and other sites was the Mother of Exiles by Nick Bennett. Nick crafted this tribute to a 1880s poem that helped raise money for the Statue of Liberty at Porchlight in New York City. That poem was the sonnet "The New Colossus" by Emma Lazarus; while the lines "Give me your tired, your poor,/Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free,/The wretched refuse of your teeming shore" became infamous, the previous stanza declared, "A mighty woman with a torch, whose flame/Is the imprisoned lightning, and her name/MOTHER OF EXILES. From her beacon-hand/Glows world-wide welcome". Perhaps the combination of ingredients here represents the Scottish, Irish, Italian, and Spanish settlers in this country (Scottish and Irish settled in Pennsylvania and were the driving force behind rye whiskey distillation). A similar assemblage was crafted by Brother Cleve in his Union Cocktail to represent the immigrants to Somerville, MA, with Irish whiskey and Meletti Amaro being overlapping ingredients.
The Mother of Exiles greeted the nose with orange, caramel, vanilla, and floral aromas. Next, the amaro's caramel continued on into the sip, and the swallow followed things up with rye, softer Irish whiskey notes, nutty, violet, and bitter herbal flavors.

:: how to stay creative ::

First published on the USBG National blog in March 2018, and slightly modified for publication here.

On a Facebook group that I am on, a bartender mentioned how they were considering a hotel bar job that offered good benefits but would severely limit their creativity, and they wondered how to deal with that aspect disappearing. While I will not cover the cost-benefit side of what a job like that can offer towards stability, insurance, and the like, I will focus more on how to stay creative when your job will not foster it or perhaps not even allow it. While I have been involved in bartender roles where I had partial control of menus ranging from a single menu item to the majority of the menu when I was the lead bartender, I have also been in positions where I had zero say in menu development. However, this did not stop me from crafting new libations at home and at work as well as providing guests with drink experiences not found on the menu.

Creativity in bartending can be broken down into a few avenues. One is at work where the owners and managers can notice and appreciate your professional input whether through menu items, guest feedback, or social media. Second is for the guests who adore your work and seek out the nights that you work to experience your craft; this sort of one-on-one aspect can offer the bartender the greatest immediate gratification. And third is through fellow bartenders (as well as non-local drink enthusiasts) from exposure in competitions or trade blogs, magazines, and books. Overall, creativity within a drink itself can come from the ingredients, the vessel, the garnish, the name, as well as the story behind it, and all of this can help to break a bartender out of the factory production feel that the job can take on especially when it gets busy or the establishment is rather corporate.
When someone questioned the importance of creativity, I commented on that thread that it can validate that you know your stuff, can think on the fly, and can do more than the menu and 50 classics. It is possible to get regulars who not only begin to trust you but seek you out for your creativity. Creativity does not have to be just menu items, but it certainly does help as a start especially if there is an expectation that you will contribute to the list for each revision. One of the thread posters suggested, “Cultivate your regulars and get them to trust you” in how to make your “bar into a playground.” I have found success in asking if there is anything on the menu that catches their fancy or whether they would like to go off menu for their next round (I rarely offer this for the first round unless it is a regular who has worked their way through the menu already). I follow up either with questions of what they are looking for or with drink idea suggestions based off their previous drink choice.

It was pointed out that jobs can expand through promotion to allow for more creativity, and I have definitely experienced this when a bar manager left and I had to fill their shoes. But creativity is not limited to your main job and your guests there. I have had good luck with guest bartending shifts at other bars across town -- both solo ones with my own menu or duo ones where two of us combine our talents to make a menu fitting a theme. Another thread contributor pushed the concept of competitions as an outlet to invent new drink ideas and perhaps get some notoriety and exposure. Many of these competitions weigh heavily on the creative side of things including the name and story in connection with their product in addition to the recipe and presentation.

Creativity can be fostered outside of working in bars. Consider building up a home bar and utilize that as your tinkering lab. Even without guests in front of you, your recipes can find an audience through Instagram, blogging, or other avenues of social media. Instagram, apps like OnTheBar [edit: RIP] and BarNotes, and the like can also be utilized to amplify one-offs at work such that they reach drink makers across the globe as well as regulars who may come in and try your drinks in person. At some bars, we have been allowed a shift drink under a certain value, and it is possible to utilize this to let the creative juices flow for your own shift drink or one of your co-worker’s.
Besides tinkering at home or at work, consider other outlets to get the mind going. I find that reading, traveling, going to conferences (including watching video replays of talks), listening to podcasts, browsing produce markets, and visiting other cocktail bars are great ways to get thinking about new avenues to explore. Writing down ideas whether on your phone or in a physical notebook will get the moment and thought captured; this will allow for a greater efficiency such as by reducing waste in exploring recipe ideas and will eliminate the need to create concepts de novo.

Others on that thread suggested focusing on the numerous ways that you can make the guest happy, but this can happen along with creativity as well. Creativity can boost a bartender’s self esteem by expanding the role into artist and thinker and by receiving praise and respect; moreover, the importance of this aspect of bartending can range from minor to crucial depending on the person. However, frequently, working at a creative cocktail bar comes at a cost of reduced earnings and benefits that can generally be accrued at volume or hotel establishments. Indeed, there are middle grounds and ways of letting your creative juices flow while not taking a hit financially.

sugarplum

2 oz Gin (Tanqueray)
1 oz Grapefruit Juice
1/2 oz Grenadine

Shake with ice and strain into a cocktail coupe.
Two Sundays ago, I reach for Sasha Petraske's Regarding Cocktails book and spotted Joseph Schwartz's variation on the Blinker that he crafted at Milk & Honey. He dubbed this one the Sugarplum after the pet name of Joseph's wife given to her by her grandmother, and the text mentions that this recipe makes a great tequila variation. If it included the Blinker's classic raspberry syrup (instead of the general but flabby substitute of grenadine), it would be rather similar to the Orlando in Pioneers of Mixing at Elite Bars. In the glass, the Sugarplum's bouquet showcased the grapefruit melding with the gin's juniper-pine aroma. Next, grapefruit and a dry berry note on the sip gave way to juniper, pomegranate, and grapefruit peel flavors on the swallow.

"75" cocktail

2/6 gill Dry Gin (1 1/3 oz Damrak)
1/6 gill Calvados (2/3 oz Boulard VSOP)
2 dash Grenadine (1/2 oz)
1 tsp Lemon Juice (1/2 oz)

Shake with ice and strain into a cocktail glass; I added a lemon twist.

Two Saturdays ago, I considered the history of the French 75 that I had read in a Difford's Guide article. Before the drink landed on the gin (or Cognac), lemon, sugar, and Champagne number, the World War I-era French 75mm field artillery gun, it had a few non-carbonated precursors. The earliest was the Soixante-Quinze created at Harry's Bar that made a 1915 newspaper article and later appeared as the "75" Cocktail in Robert Vermeire's 1922 Cocktails: How to Mix Them book as above (with different proportions as the 1915 recipe). It was not until Judge Jr.'s 1927 Here's How book during Prohibition that sparkling wine was penned down on paper. While Judge pointed out that if you build the recipe with club soda instead, the mix becomes a Tom Collins, the literature makes me doubt the history that the libation began as a Tom Collins when British soldiers were trying to make do with what they could scrounge up.
Vermeire's recipe provided the history of, "This cocktail was very well appreciated in Paris during the war. It has been called after the famous light French field gun, and was introduced by Henry [Tépé] of Henry's Bar fame in Paris." Overall, the combination was akin to a Pink Lady sans egg white and thus reminiscent of a Jack Rose as well as the Blue Skies (a drink I was served at a local bar that was perhaps culled from the literature). In the glass, the "75" Cocktail proffered a lemon, apple, and berry nose that led into a crisp berry sip. Next, apple and the gin's juniper and other botanical notes joined forces on the swallow.

as perfect as a limerick

1 1/2 oz Hendrick's Gin
1/2 oz Avua Cachaça Prata
1 oz House Celery Blanc Vermouth (3/4 oz Dolin Dry Vermouth + 1/4 oz Celery Syrup) (*)
1 dash Pernod Absinthe

Stir with ice, strain into a cocktail glass, and garnish with a lemon twist.
(*) The ingredient name is an effort to avoid the word "syrup" because guests will assume that the drink is too sweet.

Two Fridays ago, I tested out my new menu idea at Nahita and got some feedback. I had made a celery syrup as I had done for a drink at Earl's Cocktail Lab a year or so ago, and I was planning on trying out two few directions with citrus. However, one of the stirred drinks was coming off the menu, so I opted for my Martini variation idea. As a starting point, I considered the structure of the Diamond Queen that I had crafted for the Tales of the Cocktail Martini competition in 2017, and I figured that celery would work well with cachaça which to date has not been utilized on our list (celery would definitely work great with tequila and mezcal which are already present and accounted for though). Given how well Hendrick's worked in my take of the 1937 Rio Grande that was a gin-tequila Manhattan of sorts, I started with that gin for my base and paired it with a minor amount of Avua's unaged cachaça. Given that Dolin Dry Vermouth is 29 g/L sugar and 1:1 simple syrup is around 500 g/L, a 3:1 ratio puts the sugar content around 150 g/L which is approximately the sugar content of sweet vermouth. While the combination tasted pleasingly grassy and herbal, it felt a little flat; a dash of absinthe helped that out by donating a bright complexity.
For a name, I had H.L. Mencken's quote, "Martinis are the only American invention as perfect as the sonnet," fresh in my head from reading Kate Hawking's Aperitif book, and I recalled how we passed around a book of limericks at a Hendrick's event a few years ago. While the five line poem form was named after the Irish town, it was the Scots who took the art form to higher (and lower) levels. Therefore, I dubbed this quirky number As Perfect as a Limerick. My guest later that night in the Fenix Speakeasy who requested a Martini-like drink quite enjoyed the final form.