For those of you with an interest… I’m always looking for new drink ideas. I don’t drink a lot, but when I do get a cocktail or glass of wine I make sure it is a good one. I like peaty scotch—I drink that neat, so there’s no real recipe to provide. Ardbeg, Laphroaig, Lagavulin. All good. I’m a big fan of gin drinks. My favorite is the classic Negroni. Equal parts gin, Campari, and a quality red vermouth. Has to be garnished with orange, and I add a drop of edible orange essential oil to the drink. I like gin and tonic as well. Various versions of Hendricks, or the Botanist, or good ol’ Plymouth. I also like Empress, which is blue-tinted. My favorite wine is Caymus Cabernet Sauvignon. But I like all kinds of reds—Merlots and Pinot Noirs are hit or miss for me but if I find one I like (looking at you Emmolo Merlot) I really like it. I’m less a fan of white, though there is an unfiltered Viognier I am quite fond of. What about the rest of you. What can you recommend? I’m open for anything. Most recently I’ve purchased Arak, Advocaat, and Aquavit.
I think Homer is more afraid of spamming this thread endlessly with his favorite drinks. I was drinking some Irish creme liqueur (sp?) in my coffee until summer hit and it got unbearably hot, and suddenly I didn't want coffee anymore. My other beverage of choice is fresh-squeezed lemonade. I tried some vodka in it but it tasted a little strange, like pure alcohol or something. So I tried it with my old standby bourbon instead and it actually works really well (surprisingly). I'm a simple man, I tried mixed drinks a few years back but decided I prefer just something simple like good old whiskey and Coke. But I try to avoid soda these days, and drink lemonade instead, so this is my new standby. When fall hits I'll probably go back to my Ezra Brooks (creme liqueur) and coffee.
I generally don't either, it always gives me a faint headache, but it's almost flavorless, so it goes in everything. Except apparently lemonade. Somehow I didn't think bourbon would taste right at all in lemonade, but it does. And next time I get ahold of some blackberries I need to put a few in there, maybe mash a couple up and a few whole. Supposed to be good, but I have yet to try it.
No, I was wondering if I can ban my own ass before I crash the server. I run 6 mixology programs and order about $1.5 million in hooch a year. Just met with all my bar managers this week about fall cocktails. And the 10 Oktoberfest drafts I just preordered. And all the pumpkin shit I am NOT ordering this year, so don't even think about it. And the private cask bourbon. And the private cask tequila. And the 12 cases of Mezcal stuck on a fucking boat/train/rickshaw somewhere between Jalisco and Providence. And if one more person mentions a maple bourbon old-fashion I'm gonna... meh, shut up, Homer!
Back in the halcyon (??) days of my misspent youth, there was a favorite drink of the sports car club to which I belonged. It was called the cadavre, if I remember correctly, but I remember exactly what it was: 1/3 apple brandy, 1/3 Laird's apple jack, and 1/3 hard cider. It was very smooth to drink, but deadly. It sneaked up on you. You didn't feel the effect until the next morning, when you woke up feeling like ... well, like a cadavre, but one with an apple stem growing out of one side of your head.
Well it doesn't flash up a warning when I put your name in the thread-ban dialogue... Sounds like a rusty nail - lovely, smooth christmassy drink - simply Scotch whisky and Drambuie in equal proportions (neither as sweet as the latter nor as harsh as the former), but the next day it feels as if somebody has hammered a rusty nail into your head. Back on track with good drinks, one I discovered recently was the Aperol Spritz - a vermouth measure of Aperol over ice, 50cl of Prosecco, and a splash of soda water. Looks beautiful if you don't over-stir it, and the intensity of the bittersweet orange of the Aperol gradually increases as you drink down. On the other hand, you can't beat a cold beer on a hot day. Simple tastes me. I only tried the Aperol for research...
Okay, as a south african I can definitely recommend Amarula which is a cream liqueur. It has a high % alcohol content so it can really make you drunk. The main ingredient is the marula fruit. In africa the animals, elephant, baboons etc gorge themselves on the marula fruit. Yep, you guessed it - they get hopelessly drunk. Drunk animals - Marula fruit party!! - YouTube
I like stuff like mint juleps and mojitos. Those are excellent. I like these drinks called Texas Teas. They're like Long Island Teas but with bourbon. Those are so good. Plus it gives me an opportunity to lapse into Clampet-speak, which never annoys my family. They're not tired of it at all. "Welllll doggies!" Usually if I go out though, I have to be careful with those candy-tasting drinks. I'll just get a whiskey, like an Old Fashioned. It burns enough that I take my time and so I don't drink (spend) too much. And I like vodka. Ketel One is the best. Avoid trash like Absolut. I'll never understand why people drink that. Branding, I guess. It's really not very good. It's only marginally better than the bottom shelf vodkas.
I have half a fifth (a tenth?) of Smirnoff on the shelf gathering dust now. I think the only other vodka I've tried was Seagram's 7 (or is that a whiskey? I think it is). I remember because I mixed it with seven-up for a seven & seven. Not sure how much those cost, but I do tend to get the economy stuff. I was originally going to get some tequila or gin to try in lemonade, but one of them was ridiculously expensive. I think it was the tequila, and they had it in a locked glass case. I did get some more expensive whiskeys for a while. Jameson and J&B Rare. I thought they'd taste better, but I didn't notice it if they did. I prefer the taste of Jack Daniels or Evan Williams, the cheapest stuff in the store. Maybe it's because they go better with Coke or Pepsi? But I've heard the cheap stuff is worse for your health. I've also heard the Irish (and Scottish) whiskeys go better in coffee and the bourbons in soda. That seems to hold true.
Lol I guess it's like the drink equivalent of a McDonald's hamburger! Which I love by the way. I went through a big snob phase many years ago, but I got over it and I enjoy life a lot more now.
haha, I didn't even think of that. They're my father-in-law's favorites, so I had to get used to them.
They're overly botanical. Not quite as much as gin, but unless you like straight martini shit, they need balance. Vodka likes a 2:1 ratio with something a bit sweeter: like elderflower, domaine de canton (ginger), aperol, or even a simple syrup rendered with your fruit of choice. Gin likes a bit deeper ratio, usually a 3:1 to retain the botanical. Try infusing with lavender, lemongrass, basil, or rosemary. Rosemary is magical in mixology. It will mute sweetness in rum, draw out sweetness in tequila, or compliment the botanical elements of gin. A good rule of thumb is two ounces of booze to .5 citrus and .5 simple. Lemon and grapefruit will kick you in the teeth while lime is much more subtle. And your simple syrups came be made with just about anything: all fruits as well as hot peppers, maple syrup, lemongrass, peppercorn... you name it.
I carried that for a minute. Tough sell. Really all Irish whiskeys are difficult to sell here except Jameson, but that doesn't really count. Same as Jim Beam doesn't count as bourbon or JW as Scotch. It sells on independent name. Whiskey is completely dead either way now. It peaked about 3 years ago. Now tequila is running roughshod over everything. PMIX rate went from like 7% to 30% over the last year. The "experts" have been predicting gin as the next trendy thing forever now but I haven't seen any indication of that.
Scotch whiskey blend or brandy are good for sipping. Sometimes I'll add bitters or a frozen strawberry. The latter tastes pretty good at the end when it's thawed and liquor-logged. On the mixing front, a strawberry passionfruit daiquiri is hard to beat. I put in the fzn strawberries, cover with passion puree, then add a bit of lemon and whatever rum is laying lying around. Blend. I'm partial to pina coladas too but never get around to making them.
Sticking with the alliterative theme, it's worth trying Armagnac. The bottle I've almost finished is Baron de Signogac 20yr, it's pretty good. I'm also a fan of peaty whiskies and I like this for a lot of the same reasons. Also Diplomatico Reserva rum. I was never much of a fan of rum, and I'm still not sure I'm much of a fan of rum, but that stuff I could quite happily drink by the pint.
Jack is Jack. It sells to that guy who onlu drinks Jack coke. Same as a Titos and soda, a Tanqueray and tonic, or a seven and seven, though I haven't seem Seagrams 7 or 7up for a few years now (decades on the latter). There are two kinds of drinkers: Drinker A drinks the same thing no matter what and can't be moved off their spot for anything. Usually it's beer, wine, or one of the aforementioned mixers. Drinker B only drinks what the joint features... typically something you can't get anywhere else or make at home without a zillion ingredients. It's Drinker B that mixology targets to offer something unique and to get them coming back and back and back to work their way through the menu, which changes constantly. An interesting anecdote regarding the utility of Drinker A as it regards to business. In RI, each spirit is unique to a single distributor. You can only buy Bud Light from distributor X, Titos from distributor Y, Jack from distributor Z, and so on. No competition, only game in town, no leverage for me the proprietor to bid them against each other... or so they think. Well, our Bud Light distributor decided they were going to whack me with a 10 case minimum delivery. When I balked, the rep said "You can't not carry Bud Light," to which, I said hold my beer and watch this! I dropped bud light from all 6 bars and moved all my business from that distributor elsewhere. The guests? They didn't care. Bud Light Guy ordered Miller Lite. Three weeks and $6K in lost sales later, the president of the company called me up and said he would make an "exception" in our case and drop our minimum delivery to 5 cases. I thanked him, waited another three weeks, and put Bud Light back on the menu. The lesson, as always, is to never, ever, EVER get out-leveraged in business. If someone doesn't want your money, there're plenty more who will.
Good one! Boozier are more rustic than Cognac. I believe it has a more stripped down distillation process, but I could be wrong about that.
