Monthly Archives: July 2009

Vice Cream #1: Cherry Chocolate Port

Food & Booze, Recipes

As promised, I bought an ice cream maker and started concocting my boozey Vice Cream.  The first batch is fantastic.

portgarciaCherry Chocolate Port Ice Cream

1/2 cup sugar
1 tablespoon corn starch
3 large egg yolks
1 1/2 cups milk, scalded
1 1/2 cups cream, cold
1/2 vanilla bean (about 2 inches), scraped
3/4 cup dried bing cherries, reconstituted in port
3/4 cup bittersweet chocolate chips

Stir together sugar and starch and whisk in egg yolk, then milk.  Over medium heat, stirring constantly, bring to a boil and continue stirring for 2 minutes.  Remove from heat and pour into a chilled bowl, stir in vanilla scrapings, cover and chill.  Once cold, whisk in cream and put in ice cream maker (mine took 20 minutes, but follow the instructions on your own), and then stir in cherries and chocolate before covering and putting in the freezer to harden.

Notes:  scalding milk is simply bringing it briefly to a boil, which will cause solids to separate from the milk and stick to the pan, so they are left behind when you pour off the milk.  To make the cherries, put a cup of dried bing cherries in a cup of good port and let them sit, covered at room temperature for a few days.

Cheers!

Food & Booze

3424718973_0a965af4cb_oI am tired of hearing people say they are, “going to cheers,” when a round of drinks is delivered. That involves a trip to Boston, as far as I am concerned, and I’m not sure how it has come to the point that I hear “to cheers” used in place of “to toast” more than I hear toast used as a verb.

  • toast: verb [trans.] drink to the health or in honor of (someone or something) by raising one’s glass together with others : he toasted his family’s health.
  • cheer: verb [intrans.] shout for joy or in praise: he cheered from the sidelines.
  • cheers: Not a verb! You cannot cheers someone. The phrases, “let’s cheers,” or “we should cheers to him” should never be uttered. Cheers is an informal exclamation, expressing good wishes, in particular before drinking, not the action of toasting: “Cheers,” he said, raising his glass.

::end of rant::

Jigger Is Not A Dirty Word

Food & Booze

It’s the little cup your bartender uses to measure, and no matter how good he or she is, you should be grateful if it’s being used at the end of the night.  Free-pouring a drink accurately is tough for anyone, and after a few hours with a shaker, fatigue can throw off even the most skilled.

jigger

For the home bartender, it’s just essential. Don’t be ashamed to use one in front of your friends. They will be more impressed by an exceptional cocktail and it’s not nearly as emasculating as asking for directions at a gas station.

The trio below came into my possession at Tales of the Cocktail last week and they offer a good range. On the left is a traditional jigger, which can also come in clear plastic with measurement lines.  In the middle is a measuring cup that lists measurements in milliliters, ounces and fractions of a cup. In a pinch, a standard coffee scoop is a one ounce pour, equivalent to 2 tablespoons if you are really desperate.

traditionalmeasureubertool

On the right is an innovative piece from Ubertools, which I noticed in heavy rotation at the Carousel Bar while I was at Tales.  One side is a full ounce measure and the other side is separated into three sections (1/4, 1/2 and 3/4 ounces), each of which is on a corner to facilitate easy pouring.

BLTini: Bestialized Little Tipple

Food & Booze, , , , , , ,

Inspired by the Carnivorous Cocktails seminar at Tales, I started Sunday brunch with the BLTini, a sandwich in a glass.

I like my BLTs on potato bread, so I opted for vodka over gin, squeezed the bejeezus out of a gorgeous heirloom tomato, then decided that lettuce was lame and so opted for basil as an aromatic garnish.

makinbaconTip: bacon is best for this purpose when crispy, flat and most of the fat has been rendered off, so I devised this little trick.  Lay raw bacon in a hot pan and then put a Pyrex baking dish on top, pressing the bacon flat while it cooks. Creates perfect cocktail bacon.

bltini

BLTini

  • 2 ounces vodka (plain or citrus)
  • 2 ounces tomato water (see note)
  • 1 dash dry vermouth
  • 1 piece crispy bacon
  • 1 basil leaf

Shake vodka, tomato water and vermouth with ice to chill and strain into a chilled martini glass.  Stir with bacon, and literally clap once with the basil leaf on your palm to release the aromatic oils before floating it in the glass.

Note: to make tomato water I diced the tomato, wrapped it in cheese cloth and squeezed out as much liquid as I could.  When my hand got tired, I put the whole pulpy package into a citrus squeezer, extracted the rest and filtered the tomato water through a fine mesh strainer.  A medium-large heirloom yields about 2 ounces of juice, less than you will get with a roma of comparable size.

On my way to Tales of the Cocktail…

Art & Design, Food & Booze, News and Updates, Recipes

Because I couldn’t just spend the weekend celebrating the 4th and packing for Tales, I:

_mg_6451

  1. made a batch of hot sauce from farm-fresh chiliespeppery
  2. created a tincture of shiso
  3. made a gallon of traditional umeshu
  4. improvised almost a gallon of apricot/pluot “umeshu”
  5. infused a bottle of Hendrick’s gin with cucumber and persimmon
  6. devised the Tomcat Collins with the aforementioned gin (recipe posted soon)
  7. hosted the “Squash Blossom” dinner party with the lovely TSB (we may not be together any more, but we still throw one hell of a dinner party), where I served the aforementioned cocktail the following hors d’oeuvres
  8. deep-fried two kinds of cheese-stuffed squash blossoms (chevre and mascarpone) with 4 dipping sauces (southwestern salsa, spicy tomoato, lemony aioli and a green onion sour cream).

Tinctures, Bitters and Infusions

Food & Booze, News and Updates, , , , , , ,

Tinctures, bitters and infused spirits are all created by steeping culinary components in alcohol to extract flavor.  It really is just that simple and it is easy to do at home, so I will keep an eye out for how they’re being used at Tales of the Cocktail next week and update you on any trends or exciting uses I discover.

At a gin tasting workshop last night (many thanks to Right Gin and Nirvino) I asked a favorite local bartender, Josh Harris of 15 Romolo, what exactly a tincture is, having only recently encountered the term as a cocktail ingredient.

tinctureHe defined it as being like aromatic bitters: herbs, spices or other ingredients with intense flavor steeped in over-proof, neutral spirits (strong grain alcohol like Everclear) to extract the flavor, which is added to cocktails in dashes or drops. He said that while bitters are a combination of flavors, tinctures are made with a single flavor.  I’ve since seen tinctures online that were composed of more than one flavor, but none so complex as bitters, so a stronger distinction may be that tinctures need not be bitter in flavor.

Note: the definitions of these terms in bar-speak differ from their traditional usage.  Technically, all three are tinctures, defined as an alcoholic extract of plant material with an ethanol percentage of at least 40% (assuming the spirit you are “infusing” is at least 80 proof).  Infusion is the result of steeping plants in water or oil, not alcohol, so infused vodka, rum or gin is a contradiction in terms. Vinegar is also an acceptable medium, so shrubs are really tinctures too.

I would offer recipes, but frankly, all you do is soak stuff in stiff spirits.  Just go try it.