The other night at TDN: Fruit Brandy I came up with a drink that I’m quite proud of: the Rhumble. For those of you not familiar with Thursday Drink Night, it’s a weekly chat room gathering of cocktail folks inventing original drinks around a pre-chosen theme and awarding prizes to the one voted ‘best’. It’s put on collectively by the CSOWG.

I’ve always liked the apricot brandy and dry vermouth combo (ie Darb, Frankenjack from the Savoy Cocktail Book) and wanted to see if sherry could stand in if some bitters were added. Also, I really haven’t spent too much time with the Bitter Truth Celery Bitters (available here) so I fit them in there. I didn’t want to overcome the apricot fruit aroma with heavy spices, so they fit the bill quite well.

Rhumble

• 1 1/2 oz rhum agricole blanc (Saint Etienne)
• 3/4 oz dry sherry (Barbadillo Manzanilla)
• 3/4 oz apricot brandy (Rothman and Winter)
• 2 dashes celery bitters (Bitter Truth)

Stir, strain, up. Lemon twist.

I think that one really has good bones, and would be different but quite good with other bottlings. So far the Neisson blanc has proven a tasty alternative.

As a bonus recipe, I’ll leave you with my other drink that night, the Miss Haversham.

Miss Haversham

• 1 1/2 oz Irish whiskey
• 3/4 oz pear eau de vie
• 1/4 oz 2:1 demerara syrup
• 2 dashes Jerry Thomas bitters
• 1 dash Fees Barrel Aged bitters

Stir, strain, up.

This one is named after the Jasper Fforde character, who is a kind of an alter ego of Dicken’s Miss Havisham. I used Redbreast, but I’m sure something like Powers or Jameson would work as well.

For those readers that are not regular scourers of the cocktail blogs, I wanted to let you know that SeanMike over at the Scofflaw’s Den has just posted about a drink named after yours truly, the Sylvania. It’s kind of a whiskey sour with addition of cherry vanilla bitters, mint and St. Germain. I haven’t gotten around to whipping one up just yet, but I’ll be fine straining out the mint.

It’s his drink, so I’ll let him tell it:
http://scofflawsden.com/blog/2009/06/24/sylvania/

While I feel like I buy bourbon whiskey more often than other spirits, I can’t say that bourbon is my favorite spirit to mix with; I’m much more likely to drink it on the rocks or in a Whiskey Cocktail (basically an Old-Fashioned without fruit). But there are a few drinks that I make regularly using bourbon. For mixing, I recommend using an affordable bourbon like Evan Williams black label or even the Elijah Craig 12 year old. There’s really no need to go to more expensive ’single barrel’ or ’small batch’ bottlings. Unless that’s just ‘how you roll’, in which case you should invite me over for drinks sometime.

One of my favorite variations on the tried-and-true Champagne Cocktail is the Kentucky Champagne Cocktail, which is nothing more than a Champagne Cocktail with a shot of bourbon in it.

Kentucky Champagne Cocktail

• Put a sugar cube in a largish champagne glass and soak with 3-6 dashes of Angostura bitters.  Then add:
• 1 oz bourbon
• Fill with champagne or other bubbly (Segura Viuda Cava, recommended)

Other bitters will work, especially orange bitters, but the venerable Angostura is my current favorite for this drink. This one isn’t too far from the classic Seelbach Cocktail either – just up the Ango. to 7 dashes, add 7 more dashes of Peychaud’s and 1/2 oz of Cointreau and you’re there.

One thing to note when making this, or any other champagne cocktail, is to be very careful when pouring the bubbly, as it tends to foam up dramatically when poured onto the sugar cube.

Another drink that I make at home (mostly because they are almost impossible  to get made well away from home) is a Whiskey Sour. I’m most likely to make this to use up some extra lemon juice, or to use a lemon that has been thoroughly peeled for garnish. I’ve recently added a variation on the Whiskey Sour to my repertoire, the Port Light.

Port Light – from Beachbum Berry’s Grog Log

• 1 oz bourbon
• 1 oz lemon juice
• 1/2 oz passion fruit syrup
• 1 Tbsp grenadine

Blend with 1 cup crushed ice for 5 seconds and pour into a collins glass.

This is quite tasty – there is more going on in the glass than a traditional Whiskey Sour. The tartness is nicely balanced and given depth by the passion fruit and grenadine. I’m using a homemade passion fruit syrup from the clear part of a settled out Looza passion fruit nectar and sugar.

There are more bourbon drinks out there than you would think, once you start looking. Whiskey Smash, Mint Julep, Manhattan, Bourbon Crusta, Honi Honi – what’s your favorite bourbon drink?

New Orleans has been on my mind this week, with Mardi Gras being this last Tuesday and all. I’ve found that one of the more elusive classic New Orleans drinks to get out on the town is the Vieux Carré. It seems that few bars, even at Southern or Cajun/Creole restaurants, deem it necessary to have Bénédictine on hand, presumably due to the expense. I would remind them that there has always been a distinctly French influence on the cuisine of New Orleans, and this drink only uses 1 teaspoon. And you just can’t duplicate this drink without it.

The Vieux Carré is one of the few drinks that we conclusively know the origin of; it was invented in 1938 by Walter Bergeron at the Monteleone Hotel in New Orleans. Vieux Carré (meaning ‘Old Square’) is also one of the local names for the French Quarter.

Vieux Carré

• 1 oz rye whiskey
• 1 oz cognac
• 1 oz sweet vermouth
• 1 tsp Bénédictine
• 2 dashes Angostura bitters
• 2 dashes Peychaud’s bitters

Stir with cracked ice, strain and garnish with a lemon twist and its oils.

This is a fine and balanced drink that turns out to be very sensitive to the exact amounts called for. When proper care is exercised in measuring, I love the way the spiciness of the rye and the sugar notes of the cognac mellow with the sweetness of the vermouth and the Bénédictine. Then the drink gets a quadruple blast of herbal complexity from the herbal liqueur, the vermouth and the two kinds of bitters. It’s kind of like a Manhattan, but smoother, sweeter, more refined, and more complex.

If I use 100 proof rye, I’ll back it down to 3/4 oz. Be careful when measuring the Benedictine; use a proper kitchen teaspoon and don’t overdo it or the drink will veer into cough syrup territory. While I have used brandy as a sub for the cognac, there is definitely room here for a nicer cognac. You can control the amount of water added by the fineness of the ice. Freshly hammered ice with a reasonable portion of crushed/powdered ice makes for a smoother potion. And, of course, with a classic mostly whiskey and bitters cocktail like this, be sure to get a goodly spray of lemon peel oil on the surface and rub the peel around the rim for a wonderful citrus entry as you bring the glass to your lips.

The Vieux Carré is really one of the most enjoyable signature New Orleans cocktails and it is a shame that more of the restaurants purporting to deliver the unique cuisine of the Crescent City do not serve it on their menus.

A note on pronunciation – I’ve heard a number of folks put the full Gallic gargle on the end ‘r’. But both proper French (note the accent on the é) and current New Orleans usage is ‘voo cah-ray’ or ‘voh cah-ray’, and of course some are going to say ‘view cah-ray’.

This last Sunday (2/22) was National Margarita Day. It may seem like a strange time of year to schedule this, but my hunch is that it is because limes are in season right now, and the best margaritas use fresh squeezed lime juice. Whatever you may say about commercial margaritas, we can thank this drink for bringing tequila to America. As recently as the 1950’s, tequila was seen as a tough man’s drink and wasn’t very popular at all. Let’s shake one up.

Margarita (7-4-3)

• 1 3/4 oz Tequila
• 1 oz orange liqueur (Cointreau/Citronge)
• 3/4 oz fresh squeezed lime juice

Shake with cracked ice until frosty and strain into a chilled, salt rimmed (optional) glass.

No, I didn't drink that monster all in one sitting.

A margarita is really a simple drink, basically a New Orleans
Tequila Sour and a predecessor to the Cosmo, with its roots traced back to the Daisy. In fact, ‘margarita’ means ‘daisy’ in Spanish.

With so few ingredients, you really need to pay attention to each one. Make sure to get a ‘puro‘ (100% agave) tequila and look for ‘Hecho en Mexico‘ on the label. Otherwise it is likely to be low quality stuff shipped over the border in a tanker and USA bottled. Some prefer a blanco here, claiming the oaky notes of a reposado or añejo are unwelcome, but I disagree. Obviously the base tequila makes a huge difference, but my experience had been that this is a classic example of the kind of mixology that gives you a way to use more inexpensive bottlings. My house mixing tequila was the Margaritaville blanco (a cheap mixto), but I recently picked up some Lunazul reposado. It’s 100% agave and available at a very reasonable price point. Next, do yourself a favor and trade up that old Triple Sec for something better. Jay over at Oh Gosh! has a great write-up of bottlings. Continuing on with the ingredients, you absolutely must use fresh limes, and if necessary adjust sweetness with the liqueur to balance out any extra tart limes.

Variations

How much variation before it is no longer a margarita? Margaritas are quite bastardized these days, but the recipe is surprisingly flexible. I currently favor the 3-2-1 recipe I first tried after reading Regan’s Joy of Mixology, mostly because it is easy to remember. Before that I used a recipe of approximately 4-3-2. There are schools of thought that use some lemon, maybe some simple syrup and a fair number of the current crop of gourmet recipes includes some zest from the citrus. Gran Marnier is a common component of a ‘Cadillac Margarita’, but this is starting to stray a little far for my taste. Blood orange juice, pomegranate, mango and even passion fruit (lillikoi) have made their way into ‘margaritas’ I’ve seen in restaurants.

Going simpler, there are those that substitute agave nectar for the orange liqueur, to better taste the tequila, but I have trouble calling that a margarita.

Anyway, don’t forget about the venerable margarita when you are looking for a drink to make. I don’t make a heck of a lot of margaritas around the house (at least not in the winter) but it is a classic for a reason. And next time you find yourself sipping on a top-shelf tequila or mezcal, think about the humble margarita and its role in bringing that spirit to the American market.