Swig & Swill: Añejo Highball

A few things to note here. First, see that awesome glass? We picked up four of these for a dollar each at Deals, and these things are super sturdy. If you are in need of some fancy-pants pint glasses, run to your nearest Deals and buy ‘em up. Second, within the glass is the Añejo Highball from Dale DeGroff, which just so happens to be one of the cocktails we’ll have at our upcoming wedding. We decided to keep the bar fairly small (since we’ll have a lot of beer) and have a suggested cocktail for each major spirit. The other consideration was that I wanted all of the suggested cocktails to be really straightforward. No shaking, no straining, just stirring. Got to keep people moving and put cocktail novices at ease. If you can measure liquids, you can stir up our cocktails. So just what is in this Añejo Highball, you ask?

Añejo Highball

Start with a half glass of ice
add:
2 dashes of Angostura bitters
1/4 oz lime juice
1/2 oz orange liqueur (Cointreau)
1.5 oz aged rum (El Dorado 5yr)
fill with ginger ale
stir and enjoy with a slice or two of lime!

Swig & Swill: Allspice Dram

So yesterday I mentioned that I needed quite a bit of allspice, and I know you all had some trouble sleeping because you kept thinking, “What could he possibly be up to?” Well, here’s you answer: allspice (or pimento, if you want to be old-school) dram. It was a common ingredient in many tiki drinks, and along with the revival of both classic and tiki cocktails, it’s enjoying a bit of a comeback. There is even a commercial variety on the market: St. Elizabeth’s Allspice Dram. But who needs to buy a finished product when you can make it yourself? Not me!
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Swig & Swill: To Cuba!

{ Mojitos from *Karo* }

When creating our cocktail menu, one of the ways I found inspiration was through perusing menus from established bars and restaurants. This can be particularly interesting, because while you may know which ingredients are used, it’s still up to you how to put them together.

I took one drink from Mark Peel and Audrey Saunders’ (recently in trouble for raw egg whites in NYC) new LA bar/restaurant The Tar Pit — The Old Cuban. For the preparation I stuck pretty close to a traditional mojito, just substituting aged rum and champagne for white rum and soda.

In a 16-oz mixing glass, gently muddle together:
1 large sprig spearmint
3/4 oz simple syrup

Add:
Half a spent lime hull,
1 oz of lime juice
2 oz aged rum
 (I used Angostura 1919)
3 oz sparkling wine

mojito recipe from Jeffrey Morgenthaler.

Swig & Swill: Dead Bastard

{ Tiki Gardens Postcard from Greg Tykal }

With the revival of vintage tiki drinks and the opening of bars like Smuggler’s Cove in SF, Rum seems to be set for a big decade. For our party a little while ago, I used Joe Scialom’s recipe for the

Dead Bastard (via TraderTiki):

• 1/2 oz Gin
• 1/2 oz Brandy
• 1/2 oz Bourbon
• 1/2 oz Rum
• 1/2 oz Rose’s lime juice
• 2 dashes Angostura bitters
• 4 ounces of chilled ginger beer

Shake Gently with 1 cup Crushed Ice, pour into Goblet or other large vessel.  Garnish with whatever the hell, it’s dead and doesn’t care.  I used a whole lime.  It’s a big drink.

To really hammer home the deathly theme of the drink I used Bulleit Bourbon, and Death’s Door Gin. If anyone happens to know any death themed Rum or Cognac, please let me know.

Swig & Swill: Pink Slip

Results from last weekends cocktail trials are in and surprisingly, one of the most popular cocktails was one I created myself: the Pink Slip:

2oz Tanqueray (works well with white Rum, too)
3 basil leaves
2 tsp raspberry syrup
3/4 oz lime juice
ginger beer
a dash or two of  grenadine

Add raspberry syrup, lime juice, and basil to a fizz glass. Muddle. Fill glass 3/4 full with cracked ice. Top with ginger beer. Then top the whole thing off with a little bit of grenadine for a bit of a color boost!

A note on ingredients: You’ll benefit by making some of these ingredients yourself:

Raspberry syrup is really easy. Start with a rich simple syrup. Simmer a 2:1 mixture of sugar to water in a small pan until it is clear and not cloudy. Let it cool and poor over a bunch of raspberries (frozen will work fine). Let the syrup and raspberries sit out overnight before straining out the berries. You should be left with a sweet red berry syrup.

For the grenadine, I used Jeffrey Morgenthaler’s super easy recipe.

For the ginger beer, I used Audrey Saunders recipe, which is equally easy. If you use housemade ginger, you’ll want to add a little seltzer to give it a sparkle.