Cocktail Hacker

So, when we covered the Old Fashioned some weeks ago there were a few variations that we didn’t end up trying. There were various reasons that they got glossed over, but none the less I felt there was a hole in our investigations. Bourbon Week to the rescue! Revisiting Bourbon gave us a perfect chance to mix up these overlooked variations and give you the real low down. To start we have the perennial restaurant Old Fashioned…

The Muddle Fruit Old Fashioned

[Ingredients]

2 oz Bourbon

3 Dashes Angostura Bitters

1 tsp Sugar

Orange Slice

2 Maraschino Cherries (the fake ones)

[Directions]

1) Combine fruit, sugar and bitters in an Old Fashioned glass

2) Muddle until sugar is dissolved

3) Add ice

4) Add Bourbon

5) Stir until well chilled

I have to say, I was a bit frightened about this one when I started mixing it up. As the orange started to break down and the cherries turned to red pulp I had visions of nastiness dance through my head. That didn’t turn out to be the case though, at least not entirely. The muddled orange added a bit of extra sweetness and a nice orange flavor which was not objectionable. The cherries on the other hand added nearly nothing except for a slight hint of almond and were not pleasant to encounter when sipping. Overall the drink was fairly pleasant though and although the muddled fruit isn’t strictly traditional I wouldn’t turn one down were I served it. Were I to make these again, which I must admit I’m not likely to, the classic is just a better cocktail, I would omit the cherries and possibly sub in a fresh raspberry or blackberry if they were on hand. I think these would add more flavor and color to finished cocktail.

The next Old Fashioned variant we tried was a bit more on the experimental side, The Bacon Old Fashioned…

The Bacon Old Fashioned

[Ingredients]

2 oz Bacon Infused Bourbon

1/4 oz Maple Syrup

3 Dashed Angostura Bitters

Orange Twist

[Directions]

1) Combine all ingredients over ice

2) Stir until thoroughly chilled

3) Strain in to an Old Fashioned glass with ice

We got our inspiration for this cocktail from this article and the associated YouTube video. My first attempt at infusing the Bourbon I used woefully underflavored bacon drippings and the result was a Bourbon with no bacon flavor at all. Not to be out smarted by bacon I went to the store and picked up a pound of hickory smoked bacon. Seemed like the route to take so home I went and rendered up about a 1/3 of the package. Once rendered the warm drippings were applied to the Bourbon and allowed to steep overnight. I tossed the jar in the freezer in the morning and skimmed off the fat when I got home that night. This time the infusion took, but was still lacking the bacon flavor I was after. Aaron felt the Bacon Bourbon was quite good, but lacked the real smokiness he was looking for. I agree, but I didn’t give this first batch even as much credit as Aaron did, it needs serious work. The lads at PDT use Benton’s Bacon which is heavily smoked and as such has a very deep smoky flavor. I think if we could find a bacon here in CO that matched that level of smokiness that this cocktail would be a completely different animal. After Aaron’s sampling of my Bacon Bourbon he has taken it as a personal mission to recreate the Benton’s Bourbon flavor so I assure you this quest is not yet completed.

Also, I finished my Bacon Old Fashioned with a flamed orange twist as you can see in the picture above. Took a fair bit of creative camera work to get that shot and I think it turned out fairly well. You could really taste the carmelized orange oils in the final cocktail which was a great addition to the flavor profile. I’d highly suggest giving this a try the next time you make an Old Fashioned.

I have two navel oranges sitting on my counter right now. They’ve been there for a couple days and as I was debating what cocktail to feature this week they popped in to my view. Orange juice is such a wonderful ingredient yet none of the cocktails we’ve covered so far have included it. So I went searching. The cocktail that first popped in to my head was the Blood and Sand, which upon further research I decided is exactly what I’m looking for. For the past several weeks I’ve been wanting to feature a cocktail with Scotch at its base. The Blood and Sand is perfect! It fulfills my desires for both a Scotch based cocktail and one that features orange juice.

The drink is named after the 1922 Rudolph Valentino movie by the same name, which was in turned named after the 1909 novel. Not having seen the movie(s) or read the book, I can’t tell you why the name is appropriate. My guess is that it’s because of the cocktail’s muted red color. Where the sand comes in to play I leave up to your imagination. The cocktail was first published in the 1930 version of the Savoy Cocktail Book. I’ll use this classic recipe as my jumping off point for the week.

Blood and Sand - Savoy Cocktail Book

[Ingredients]

3/4 oz Scotch Whisky

3/4 oz Sweet Vermouth

3/4 oz Cherry Brandy

3/4 oz Freshly Squeezed Orange Juice

[Directions]

1) Combine all ingredients in a shaker

2) Shake with ice until chilled

3) Strain into a cocktail glass

We’ve been experimenting with cocktails for quite some time now here at Cocktail Hacker. We have over a dozen drinks under our belt and not one of them has included tequila. Which, as I’m sure some of you would be quick to point out, is wholly unacceptable. So, in that spirit, this week we’re going to feature the cocktail that has become synonymous with Tequila, the Margarita. You might be wondering why we haven’t covered any tequila drinks up to this point and the short answer is I don’t much like the stuff. I have over 80 spirits in my collection and only one of those is tequila, and Cuervo Gold at that. Which, near as I can figure, is as close as a living person can get to drinking pure death. But, I’m willing and eager to change my mind on this spirit and I can think of no better cocktail with which to start my explorations than the Margarita.

We’ve all had Margaritas at some point in our lives. I’d even be willing to bet that serious teetotallers could tell you what’s in one. But have you ever had the true, original Margarita? I know I sure haven’t. Like the Daiquiri, the original Margarita is a simple affair and there are many currently implemented variants, but unlike the Daiquiri the Margarita you’re likely familiar with bears a fair bit of resemblance to the original. There are a veritable pantheon of stories about the origin of this iconic drink. I won’t repeat them here, but take a look, it’s interesting to see all the variations. In addition to these reading materials Robert Hess’ Cocktail Spirit episode on the drink is also quite good, although the sound is a bit low. In fact, I’m going to start my explorations with Robert’s recipe.

The Margarita - Robert Hess' Recipe

[Ingredients]

2 oz Silver Tequila

1 1/3 oz Cointreau

2/3 oz Lime Juice

[Directions]

1) Combine ingredients in a shaker

2) Shake to chill

3) Strain into a chilled cocktail glass with a salted rim

4) Garnish with a lime wedge

Astute readers should note the huge similarity between this cocktail and the Sidecar. In fact, some of the recipes I’ve come across call for lemon juice rather than lime which would bring it even closer in. I think you could possibly do a Tequila Sidecar with a nicely aged Anejo Tequila but that will have to wait for a later exploration.

There is a great thread on eGullet titled “You might be a cocktail snob/geek if…” Well, tonight I can add another of my own. You might be a cocktail geek if you make incredible homemade tonic syrup and immediately start thinking about what you can tweak to make it better. Last night the cocktail hacker crew had a tonic tasting to coincide with our Gin and Tonic week. I’ll be writing up our results tomorrow. To go with this theme I made up a batch of homemade tonic syrup used the recipe posted by Jeffrey Morgenthaler. This being the first time I had made Tonic Syrup I decided to stick with Jeffrey’s recipe nearly to the letter.

Two of the ingredients required a bit of foot work to find. I found citric acid at a local home brewing / wine making shop. The clerk was a bit startled when I said I was making my own tonic and later added that citric acid is usually purchased for barrel cleaning. His next question was where I got the quinine from. At Jeffrey’s suggestion, and most of the homemade tonic recipes for that matter, I used powdered red cinchona bark that I got from www.zooscape.com. There are other online retailers as well, but ZooScape treated me well and I’d recommend them if you’re wanting to try this recipe.

Once I had all the ingredient prepped we brought them all to a boil then lowered the burner and allowed the mixture to simmer for 20 minutes. Following that we moved on to the straining process. The first step to this is to use a mesh strainer to remove all the big pieces. This step will also remove a lot of the bark powder, but you’ll still be left with quite a bit of particulate. To solve that problem there are a couple of routes you can take. The immediate choice is to run it all through a coffee filter. This method, although a good one, takes an exceedingly long time. We tried it for a bit, but I got impatient so I tried my favorite filtering method. We broke out my tiny Bodum French Press [Referrer Link] coffee maker and got to filtering. The resulting syrup still has a bit of bark in it, but I think that adds a unique homemade look to the cocktail.

Once the syrup was strained we added the sweetener. This is where I deviated from Jeffrey a bit. I didn’t have any Agave Syrup and didn’t want to get any at this point so I sweetened with a 1:1 simple syrup. I used the same proportion as Jeffrey suggests but the resulting product was a lacking a bit of sweetness so I’ve been adding a touch of simple syrup as I put it in my squeeze bottles. Given that, I’m not going to list my altered recipe at this time or the recipe for the Gin and Tonic. I will say though that this is, without question, the best tonic I’ve ever had. It is bitter and sour but has great citrus flavor and the allspice really adds a nice note. As usual I love the fact that I can vary the sweet, bitter and sour components at will. This is truly what cocktail hacking is all about.

The Gin and Tonic, the cocktail that started my love. The G&T is so utterly simple that a lot of people, I would hazard to guess, wouldn’t even classify it as a cocktail, rather a simple mixed drink that you pound back to get buzzed. I on the other hand will expound that a well made G&T is truly a thing of beauty. Introduced by the Army of the British East India Company, the Gin and Tonic was originally consumed for the quinine contained in the tonic water.

Quinine was the first effective treatment for malaria discovered and was in use as early as the 17th century. In addition to its antimalarial properties it is also a fever reducer, painkiller and can reduce inflammation. The story goes that due to its very bitter taste gin was added to quinine tonics in order to make them more palatable, and thus, the Gin and Tonic was born. So why is it then that this cocktail of medicinal wonder has been relegated to the lowly position of buzz inducer?

I think the primary reason for this is people don’t give this cocktail’s ingredients and their proportions enough thought. Although the ingredient list is very short, there is a surprising amount of variability held within. This week we’re going to take a look at each of these key players and make some suggestions on how you can elevate this cocktail back to the place it rightly deserves.

Gin and Tonic (Difford's Guide #7)

[Ingredients]

2 oz Gin

Tonic Water

Lime Wedge for Garnish

[Directions]

1) Add gin to an ice filled Collins glass

2) Top with tonic water

3) Run lime wedge around rim of glass

4) Squeeze lime into drink and drop in