The Friday Tipple: DIY Craft Cocktail

We’re feeling crafty, Boozers. What with the upsurge of interest in barrel-aged cocktails and gin-and-tonics on tap, we began to yearn for a ready-made cocktail of our own. What could be nicer after wearily trudging home from a long week at the cube than being able to open up the fridge and find a tasty infused cocktail just waiting to be consumed?

Because we like to mix practicality into our cocktails, a mason jar seems to be a perfect vessel for both crafting and imbibing — no fuss, no muss. Our DIY Craft Cocktail can be set up before you leave for work and all you have to do is twist off the lid when you get home, add a few ice cubes, and drink up, straight out of the jar. Put together several jars and invite some friends over, or line them up next to the La-Z-Boy while you binge-watch ”The Office”. It’s a Friday night made in heaven.

DIY Craft Cocktail

This drink is a model of infusion — by putting all the ingredients, including the mixer, into the jar, you end up with a cocktail where the flavors have begun to meld together, but the shorter infusion time allows for some of the specific characteristics to remain freshly distinct. Whatever. It tastes good. Drink up.

2 ounces gin (our local Catoctin Creek Watershed Gin or Green Hat Gin are generally at the top of our list, but go local wherever you are, of course)

1 ounce freshly-squeezed grapefruit juice

2 ounces club soda

2 wedges fresh grapefruit

1 – 2 tablespoons orange blossom honey (adjust to your taste)

1/2 teaspoon freshly grated ginger

1 sprig of fresh thyme (optional, but nice if you have it)

1 quassia chip (also 0ptional — we keep them on hand for making bitters — otherwise, just add a couple of dashes of your favorite bitters)

Place all ingredients into a 12-ounce mason jar, stir vigorously, and then put the lid on tightly. Put in the refrigerator for at least 8 hours or overnight. To drink, remove the lid, fish out the quassia chip (and grapefruit wedges, if you wish), stir well, add a few ice cubes, and enjoy.

The Friday Tipple: Margarita Memory

The Ides of March is upon us, dear Boozers. Historically speaking, it marks the day that Caesar was assassinated — “Et tu, Brute?” — although the term “Ides” simply refers to either the 13th or the 15th day of the month, as the Romans couldn’t make anything simple. We like to use this day to lift a glass in memory of friends and loved ones — and as our dear ones all seem to have had a penchant for margaritas, that most communal of libations — we are celebrating today with a Margarita Memory.

A margarita is really a classic blend of sweet and sour, to which we like to add notes of spice — creating a perfect representation of a life well-lived. It can be made with a variety of citrus, from traditional lime to blood oranges, mandarins, and grapefruit, and its flavor can be subtly altered by the type of tequila you use — blanco, mixto, reposado, and so forth — or you could even substitute with an unaged whiskey (we’ve done this often with Catoctin Creek’s Mosby’s Spirit with excellent *hic* results) or even a smoky mezcal. Most importantly, to make a Margarita Memory really sing, choose ingredients that really reflect the person you are remembering — sweet, smooth, fresh, rich, perky, snarky, optimistic — and then savor every drop.

Margarita Memory

Our version today contains some muddled peach and a blend of lime and orange juice, because it reminds us of happy days drinking margaritas on the beach with special people. We added a pink peppercorn syrup to pack a bit of punch  — because peaches are not in season now, we actually used the syrup from canned peaches as our base.

2 ounces silver tequila

1 ounce Cointreau

1/2 ounce Amaretto

2 ounces fresh lime and orange juice

Slice or two of peach (canned is fine if peaches are out of season)

1 tablespoon pink peppercorn syrup, or to taste (recipe below)

dash of citrus bitters (such as Urban Moonshine or even Bitter Ends Thai Bitters)

Wedge of lime or other citrus for garnish

Muddle a couple of slices of peach in the bottom of a cocktail shaker. Add tequila, cointreau, citrus juices, syrup, and bitters; add a few ice cubes and shake vigorously. Strain into a margarita glass (salt optional) filled with ice and float a little Amaretto over the top. Garnish with lime and serve immediately.

To make pink peppercorn syrup: Strain syrup from canned peaches into a small saucepan. Add 2 tablespoons of whole pink peppercorns and simmer over very low heat for about 30 minutes. Cool completely, then strain and store in the refrigerator for up to two weeks.

 

The Friday Tipple: Sequestration Sour

Tighten your belts, Boozers. The much-anticipated Sequester seems to be on its way, unless some eleventh hour deal is inked in the cozy confines of a Capitol Hill cloakroom. Our expectations are low, however, so we’ve decided that it’s time to cull 10% of the liquor cabinet. And, because such a sequester calls for neither rhyme nor reason, we’ve decided to throw any old thing into a cocktail shaker and make what we like to call a Sequestration Sour.

A basic Sour cocktail calls for liquor, simple syrup, citrus juice, and an egg white. To give it South American flair, add a few drops of bitters. Shake it with ice, strain it into a glass, and drink up. Sounds simple, right? Ah, if only those Congressional sourpusses sucked down some Sours and embraced bipartisan camaraderie, we might not be wondering if the air traffic controllers will be at work tonight. We think we’ll stay home in the meantime.

Sequestration Sour

Some people may be afraid of putting a raw egg white in a cocktail, conjuring images of Rocky in training. However, there’s little evidence to suggest that it’s not perfectly safe to drink a small amount, especially if you have reasonably fresh eggs that haven’t been sitting in your refrigerator for three months. You can make a sour without the egg white, but it simply won’t have the same creamy mouthfeel and that luscious foam that makes a simple cocktail seem decadent, even in the midst of a budgetary meltdown.

2 ounces of whatever alcohol needs to get the axe (we used Catoctin Creek Mosby’s Spirit, but, honestly, use whatever you like — vodka, tequila, whiskey, Pisco, grappa, and Amaretto are all good candidates)

1 ounce simple syrup or agave nectar (even honey would work nicely for a bourbon-based sour)

1 ounce fresh citrus juice (we used a combination of lime and grapefruit juice, as that’s what we had on hand)

1 teaspoon egg white (basically, about half of an egg white — so we suggest doubling the above ingredients and using the whole egg white, allowing you to make a drink for a friend now rendered obsolete by the Sequester. Misery loves company.)

a few dashes of bitters

Place all ingredients except bitters in a cocktail shaker and shake vigorously. Add a few ice cubes, shake again until well-chilled, and strain into a rocks glass. Add a few drops of bitters and serve immediately.

Fat Tuesday Tipple: Creole Coffee Cocktail

Laissez le bon temps rouler, Boozers. Beads are flying in New Orleans even as you read this, but most of us are sadly bereft of a true Mardi Gras experience, so we turn instead to the Shrove Tuesday alternative: pancakes.

In the Protestant tradition, pancakes are the preferred meal on the night before Lent, dripping with butter and sugar before 40 days of denial. And, whatever your spiritual beliefs, or non-beliefs, who doesn’t like breakfast for dinner? Even if you don’t participate in a Pancake Race, this is the time to break out your favorite recipe — buckwheat, blueberry, chocolate chip — and load up those carbohydrates.

As excess is the word of the day, a proper cocktail needs to accompany such a treat, something bitter, subtly sweet, and complex enough to balance out the full-fat decadence of a stack of hotcakes. The Creole Coffee Cocktail hits the spot here — we like to use a chicory-based coffee to enhance the nutty flavor, but any dark roast will do. We like to think that this little shot of caffeine will truly help keep the good times rolling until Ash Wednesday sobers us up. Keep your shirts on, Boozers — or not. Carpe Diem!

Creole Coffee Cocktail

2 ounces strong black coffee, cooled

1.5 ounces rye whiskey (we like Catoctin Creek Roundstone Rye)

1/2 ounce Nocello walnut liqueur (Frangelico, Kahana Royale, Amaretto, or even Kahlua will work as a substitute)

Dash of Peychaud’s bitters

1/2 a small orange, peeled

orange twist, for garnish

Put the orange in the bottom of a cocktail shaker and muddle; add a couple of ice cubes and the coffee, rye whiskey, Nocello, and bitters, and shake vigorously. Strain into a martini glass and garnish with the orange twist.

The Friday Tipple: Arctic Char

It’s time for a reality check, Boozers. Reality television, that is. We enjoy curling up on the couch on a cold winter night to watch the sordid machinations of complete strangers trapped together in an alternate reality. Who’s in, who’s out, who came up with the snarkiest comment about a fellow castmate. Ah, guilty pleasures.

This week, we were captivated, as always, by Top Chef, and particularly intrigued by the burnt lemon garnish whipped up by the kindly and unassuming Sheldon for the Quick Fire Challenge. Pulverized into dust, he claimed it would have a concentrated smoky essence of lemon. How could we resist?

Turns out, “citrus charcoal” is an ingredient found in the Mid East and Asia, and, as you can imagine, is pretty easy to make, and, when mixed with agave nectar, has exactly the same flavor as the lovely charred skin of roasted marshmallows, with a lightly citrus undertone. Inspired by the recent snowfall in our area, we wanted to create a cocktail that was both bright and smoky, able to combat the frosty chill: the Arctic Char. Because life is a reality show, Boozers. Drink up.

Arctic Char

To add to the smokiness of this cocktail, we roasted several pieces of orange over an open flame. We used Catoctin Creek Mosby’s Spirit, an unaged whisky: its warm bite provides the right counterpoint to the sweetness of fresh orange, and unaged whisky, or moonshine, is readily available these days from small distilleries across the country. 

3 ounces smoked orange juice (technique below)

1/2 ounce triple sec or Cointreau

1.5 ounces unaged or white whisky

2 – 3 drops of bitters (The Bitter Truth Lemon Bitters adds a nice dimension)

1/4 teaspoon orange charcoal (technique below)

1/2 teaspoon light agave nectar

Wheel of roasted orange for garnish (just quickly roast over open flame)

Put the smoked orange juice in a cocktail shaker with the triple sec and set aside for 15 minutes. In the meantime, mix the orange charcoal and agave nectar together into a paste and put in the bottom of a cocktail glass. Put the strained juice, whisky, and bitters into a clean cocktail shaker with a single ice cube, stir, and strain into the glass. Garnish with a wheel of roasted orange.

Orange Charcoal: You guessed it: Citrus charcoal is made by burning citrus peel (we used orange, but lemon, grapefruit, etc. will also work). This can be done fairly quickly by holding pieces of the peel with a pair of tongs over a flame; the peel will spark slightly as the natural oils in the skin heat up. As you burn each piece to a crisp, set it aside to cool slightly, then pulverize the pieces in a food processor or with a mortar and pestle until fine.

Smoked Orange Juice: Peel an orange and hold each section over an open flame for 15 seconds per side or until it begins to lightly char. Put warm sections into a glass or cocktail shaker and muddle thoroughly. Add the fresh juice of another orange and set aside for 30 minutes before straining thoroughly (you may want to use cheesecloth).

The Friday Tipple: Fizzy Friday

You’ve done it again, Boozers. You told yourself “I will not have a third helping of mashed potatoes” and you stuffed yourself on stuffing and then there were three kinds of pie. We know how you feel: bloated, bleary, and blubbery.

After sucking down a bottle of Grampa’s homemade dandelion wine and those shots of Wild Turkey with your cousin Gerry behind the garage, Black Friday is a bit of a blur. What you need to do is soothe your tum. Enter bitters. There are two types of bitters: digestive bitters and cocktail bitters. Both types are basically herbs and roots that are used to flavor alcohol, usually having a bitter or bittersweet taste. Cocktail bitters, like Angostura, Bittermens, Fee Brothers, and Urban Moonshine, are generally used sparingly to flavor cocktails, much as you might add salt and pepper to your food. Digestive bitters, like Campari, Pimm’s No. 1, and Cynar, can be drunk straight up or on the rocks as well as in cocktails.

We like to make our own cocktail bitters and just finished up a batch of what we call Chocolate Stout Bitters (want a bottle of your own? drop us a line), featuring fresh hops, espresso beans, and cocoa nibs, but don’t be intimidated by our ingenuity. Drag yourself to the local liquor store and grab any bottle of either cocktail or digestive bitters, along with some tonic water or club soda. Down the Fizzy Friday in one go and you’ll be back in fine fettle before you can say “Alka Seltzer“. Cheers!

Fizzy Friday

There are as many ways to make a Fizzy Friday as there are recipes for Thanksgiving leftovers. You can choose to go the digestive route and pour a generous slug of Campari (our personal favorite) over ice and top it off with a splash of club soda. However, we’re going the other direction today, for reasons that will soon become clear.

Tonic water or club soda

Cocktail bitters (Bitters, Old Men Restorative Tonic is good here)

Gin (as always, we’ll be reaching for the Catoctin Creek Watershed Gin)

Fill a lowball glass with ice and add 4 ounces of tonic water or club soda. Add 20 drops of bitters — yes, that’s right, we said 20 — and drink it down quickly. Then fill the glass with more tonic or soda, throw in some gin, and you’re good to go. Great Aunt Joan’s waiting for you to drive her to Walmart.

The Friday Tipple: Post-Convention Bounce

The political season is in full swing, Boozers. Now that we’ve slogged through two weeks of speechifying, the fun begins in earnest as the presidential debate drinking games start to surface. In the meantime, we, like the candidates, need a Post-Convention Bounce to help get us back on our feet.

In our world, a bounce is a liqueur often distilled from brandy, fruit and sugar — the first First Lady, Martha Washington, is somewhat revered for her own recipe for a Cherry Bounce. However, as it takes several weeks to make a proper bounce, we looked for a quick alternative and were rather taken with the idea of using fruit preserves in cocktails — that’s what we call American ingenuity at its finest.

Our Post-Convention Bounce cocktail is a concentrated nip of bliss, perfect for those early days of autumn when there’s a bit of a snap in the air after sunset but it’s still warm enough to wear flip-flops. Put the campaign rhetoric aside for today — you can rock the vote later.

Post-Convention Bounce

Using fruit preserves in cocktails is more than a shortcut — they bring a concentrated burst of flavor and the pectin helps provide a silky mouthfeel. And, while brandy cocktails are thought by some as rather old-fashioned and by others as sacrilege, we enjoy the warm hug of a brandy-based cocktail, especially when punched up with the brightness of a tart cherry jam. 

2 ounces brandy (we used Catoctin Creek’s 1757 Virginia Brandy)

1 ounce fresh orange juice

1 large teaspoonful of cherry preserves

dash of bitters

Put all ingredients in a cocktail shaker with ice and shake vigorously. Strain into a chilled martini glass and enjoy immediately. You can also serve this over ice and top with an ounce of chilled club soda.

The Friday Tipple: Goin’ to a Go-Go

We’re bustin’ loose, Boozers. Here in our neck of the woods, we take our go-go music pretty seriously and, with the passing of Chuck Brown, the Godfather of Go-Go, earlier this week, we’re feeling the need to get a little funky.

Washington, DC, that geographical amalgamation of all peoples, does not have much that it can truly call its own. In fact, its indigenous culture extends to just three things: go-go, half-smokes, and political gridlock. After that, it’s pretty much Anytown, USA, albeit with a lot of cool monuments and free museums.

Goin’ to a Go-Go is funk in a glass — we recently became intrigued with the concept of a beer simple syrup and felt compelled to try it out with some local brews from Chocolate City and DC Brau. We created a malty little treat from porter with a smoky undertone, which pairs well with whiskey, bourbon, and, in this case, brandy, but a lighter ale syrup is perfection with tequila.

Here’s a toast to you, Chuck Brown. Get, get, get, get on down.

Goin’ to a Go-Go

We used a local brandy from Catoctin Creek in this funky little nod to a Pisco Sour, and added some tart pickled cherries, which can be whipped up quickly and stored in the refrigerator for a few weeks.

2 pickled cherries

2 ounces brandy (a young or unaged brandy works best)

1/2 fresh orange

1/2 fresh lime

1 teaspoon beer simple syrup (recipe below)

dash bitters (a citrus-based variety like Scrappy’s Lime Bitters is good here)

Another cherry for garnish (optional)

Put two cherries in the bottom of a rocks glass and crush lightly with a spoon or muddling stick. Put a few ice cubes in a cocktail shaker and add brandy and beer syrup, then squeeze the orange and lime into the shaker. Cover and shake vigorously then pour it all into the glass, including the ice cubes. Add a dash of bitters and another pickled cherry for garnish and drink up.

How to make beer syrup:

1 12-ounce beer

1 cup sugar

a few dashes of hot sauce (we used our local Uncle Brutha’s)

Pour the beer into a 2-quart saucepan and simmer over low heat until reduced by half; do not boil. Add sugar and hot sauce and stir to dissolve, continuing to simmer over low heat for another 5 or 10 minutes or until thickened. Allow to cool completely. Can be stored in the refrigerator for 2 weeks.

The Friday Tipple: Antioxidantail

We’re on a health kick, Boozers. The Good Booze HQ is crammed with fresh fruits and veggies from our local green grocer, inspiring our good intentions to create a tasty pick-me-up for cocktail hour. And why shouldn’t your happy hour drink of choice help boost your immune system at the same time it calms your nerves from another day navigating the rat race?

A selection of fresh mango and blueberries highlight our Antioxidantail; the mighty mango is rich in vitamins A and C, potassium, and omega-3 fatty acids, while blueberries are high in manganese, vitamin K, and anthocyanins. Not only that, but they taste good, too, especially when combined with calcium-loaded dairy-free coconut milk, which has anti-bacterial properties that aid digestion. Add a splash of vodka — we liked Boyd & Blair potato vodka with this particular treat, since, after all, potatoes are also high in potassium, so the vodka must be nutritious, right? We predict you’ll soon start finding this on the menu of your fancy health club’s juice bar, a perfect way to cool down after that hot yoga class.

Antioxidantail

While we love the smoothness of mango combined with coconut milk, we tweaked the flavor a little with the addition of elderflower liqueur and celery bitters (The Bitter Truth makes excellent versions of both). The elderflower liqueur lends a lightly floral undertone when used in moderation while the celery bitters adds a slightly piquant vegetal note, bringing a subtle counterpoint to the sweetness of the fruit. Besides, celery is actually also chock-full of antioxidants. Who knew?

1 fresh mango, cut into chunks

1/2 cup fresh blueberries

1/2 cup unsweetened coconut milk (there are several good varieties out there, including Silk and So Delicious)

1 teaspoon maple syrup (yep, you guessed it, an antioxidant-rich natural sweetener)

1.5 ounces vodka (we used Boyd & Blair here, but also highly recommend Square One or Nude)

1/2 ounce elderflower liqueur (St. Germain is usually readily available if you can’t find The Bitter Truth)

a few drops of celery bitters

Put first four ingredients in a blender and blend on high until smooth. Add vodka, liqueur, and bitters and pulse a couple of times. Pour into a glass and enjoy.

Fat Tuesday Tipple: Creole Coffee Cocktail

Laissez le bon temps rouler, Boozers. Beads are flying in New Orleans even as you read this, but most of us are sadly bereft of a true Mardi Gras experience, so we turn instead to the Shrove Tuesday alternative: pancakes.

In the Protestant tradition, pancakes are the preferred meal on the night before Lent, dripping with butter and sugar before 40 days of denial. And, whatever your spiritual beliefs, or non-beliefs, who doesn’t like breakfast for dinner? Even if you don’t participate in a Pancake Race, this is the time to break out your favorite recipe — buckwheat, blueberry, chocolate chip — and load up those carbohydrates.

As excess is the word of the day, a proper cocktail needs to accompany such a treat, something bitter, subtly sweet, and complex enough to balance out the full-fat decadence of a stack of hotcakes. The Creole Coffee Cocktail hits the spot here — we like to use a chicory-based coffee to enhance the nutty flavor, but any dark roast will do. We like to think that this little shot of caffeine will truly help keep the good times rolling until Ash Wednesday sobers us up. Keep your shirts on, Boozers — or not. Carpe Diem!

Creole Coffee Cocktail

2 ounces strong black coffee, cooled

1.5 ounces rye whiskey (we like Catoctin Creek Roundstone Rye)

1/2 ounce Nocello walnut liqueur (Frangelico, Kahana Royale, Amaretto, or even Kahlua will work as a substitute)

Dash of Peychaud’s bitters

1/2 a small orange, peeled

orange twist, for garnish

Put the orange in the bottom of a cocktail shaker and muddle; add a couple of ice cubes and the coffee, rye whiskey, Nocello, and bitters, and shake vigorously. Strain into a martini glass and garnish with the orange twist.