It’s hot here, man. Like, WAY hot. Time for someting simple, cool, and refreshing. Nothing but NOTHING beat the Mojito when it comes to sheer cooling power.

The Mojito

12 fresh Mint leaves
2 ounces light rum
1 ounce of fresh lime juice
1/4 ounce of simple (sugar) syrup
Club Soda (to top)

Toss the mint leaves in a tall glass. Take a big-ass bar spoon (or, if you have it, a muddler) and mash the leaves into the side of the glass, the bottom; give em’ a general crushing. Roll the muddler / spoon around a bit, beat em’ up real good. Bruise them, though, don’t rip them to ribbons or the mint shrapnel will float arounnd. Like beating a guy who owes you money with a sack of oranges, we don’t want to have any bits break off – we just want to rough up the subject.
Then toss in the rest of the goodies; the rum, the lime juice, the sugar syrup. Muddle a little more but don’t be a big tough monkey when all that goop is in there – a ton of force is going to make it all end up on your shirt. Massage it around a bit.

Fill the glass with ice. Stir it a bit, then top it up with the Club Soda.

Aaaaaaah.

I feel better already!

Cheers,

JJ.

Back from Comic-Con! Sorry for the lack of updates. Had a great time and met a load of cool people at the Diggnation taping. It’s time to shake off the pop culture dust with a drink from the vault.

This one comes from one of the oldest books in my collection; it’s a spiral bound tiny little thing from the “Pink Elephants” line (which fetch a pretty penny on Ebay) and was printed in 1952. It’s got a load of old classics which can be a nice change of pace.

This one is to be served in a cocktail glass; something I almost never use. They’re just so…tiny. I mean, the heft of a Tiki mug… the sexy allure of a nice tall Collins… compared to them, the little dinky shot-glass on a stem just seems to look dorky. But hey, that trip down memory lane? It’s free, and we don’t even need a passport.

The Ideal Cocktail

1 ounce. dry Gin
1/2 ounce Grapefruit Juice
1/2 ounce dry Vermouth
1 teaspoon of fine sugar (a bit less than quarter ounce of simple syrup would probably work as well – I never seem to have any fine sugar on hand)
3 dashes Angostura bitters

The book says to “shake with cracked ice and strain into a chilled cocktail glass dressed with a cherry”.

Consider the “Ideal” a cocktail vacation from our usual rum-chugging antics.

Enjoy!

Here’s a kickass tropical creation dreamed up by Tiki legend Jeff “Beachbum” Berry, which I’ve cribbed from his must-have essential Tiki Bar cocktail book – Beachbum Berry’s Intoxica!

If you don’t already have that book, AND its sibling, the much touted Grog Log… well, I mean, come on. Get with it, rookie. What the hell have you been mixing with your rum up until now… coke? C’mon!

I’ve been meaning to try this one, but I had a devil of a time tracking down one of the ingredients; the much touted Licor 43, which isn’t sold widely north of the border. However, that’s why man created carry-on luggage; it carries one pair of pants, some socks, and six bottles of exotic booze… and is specfically designed to be easy to whisk past Customs Officers. Not that I’d condone smuggling… I’m just sayin’. Plus, 43 is my lucky number, and this stuff wears it well. It’s way, Way, WAY tasty.

This one is meant to be served in an official Beachbum Berry mug, which is carried by the good folks at Tiki Bosco. In a pinch your favorite mug will probably do – it just won’t stare back at you while you sip from it.

Beachbum’s Own

3/4 ounce of fresh lemon juice
3/4 ounce of unsweetened pineapple juice
3/4 ounce of orange juice
3/4 ounce of Passion fruit syrup (The Trader Vics one is great!)
3/4 ounce of Cuarenta Tres (AKA Licor 43)
1 ounce of Demerara Rum
1 1/2 ounces of Light Rum (Havana Club if you can get it – and if you can’t… remember, carry-on luggage?)

Shake over 12 ounces of crushed ice, and then pour the shaker and it’s contents into whatever mug you fancy, be it from Tiki Farm or Tiki Bosco. Honestly, the booze doesn’t really care.

Cheers!

JJ.

For some reason I feel like posting this tonight so it’s here for tomorrow. I wonder why?

There are countless variants of this classic hangover remedy, but I’ve opted to post one of the more “entry level” versions. More advanced Cocktologists might consider adding a smidge of horseradish to funk it up a little. Some tell me that adding a 1/2 an ounce of Tawny Port really helps to make your Mary sing.

The Bloody Mary

1 1/2 ounces of Vodka
3 ounces of Tomato Juice
Juice of one lime wedge
Juice of one lemon wedge
4 or 5 dashes of Worcestershire sauce (wooster? whoostesshire? wooshhrreire?)
As many dashes of Tobasco as you can handle (six? eight?)
Dash of sea salt
Dash of black pepper

Add all ingredients to your shaker and work it, WORK IT, then decant into a nice tall glass loaded with fresh ice. Or, if you are in a pinch, just pop the top off your shaker and load into an empty glass. As the Mary is most often a hangover remedy, all that shaking and ice loading and preperation can be a bit trying on your poor, pounding head. Me? When I’m consuming this the morning after, I shake it, tear off the top, drop a straw & celery directly into the shaker I just used, and head directly to the couch.

Cheers!

JJ.

Here’s a modern spin of an old classic from the good people who bring you the always excellent Diffords Guides to Drinking (they also sell cocktail books, like this one which are FAN-FUCKING-TASTIC. The Diffords cocktails books are GREAT, and they also sell quarterly “publications” from their webpage (”publications” is a loose term – they’re basically 300-some page softcover books) which list the best bars around the world, have even MORE drink recipes and loads of bartending tips, booze reviews, and the like. Big thumbs up for Diffords.

Anyhow, this recipe is one the Diffords Gang adapted from a recipe pulled out of the long-out-of-print The Savoy Cocktail Book (it’s from the 1930’s) by Harry Craddock – which is damned near impossible to find, unless you want to pay three hundred bucks.

Enjoy.

The Lutkins Special Martini

1 1/2 ounces of Plymouth Gin
1 ounce of Dry Vermouth
1/2 ounce Apricot Brandy (they recommend the Bols Liqueur one)
3/4 ounce of freshly squeezed orange juice

As we do with Martinis – chill the glass, fresh ice in the shaker, vavoom vavoom, decant into chilled glass. Garnish with a twist of orange zest.

A classic, reborn!

Cheers,

JJ.

So two good ideas in the past couple of days; Midori and Ben Reed. Ben’s got another book, one that favors Tequila, called Margaritas and other Tequila Cocktails. Like the title says, there’s more than just Margarita recipes in the book… For instance, you’ll find this little gem, which is easy to make, and really delicious. I’m a huge fan of Tequila, and think it’s one of the most under used ingredients – push aside the shot glass, leave the salt at home and mix it up for a change!

The Green Iguana

A curious combination of Melon and Tequila. Ben says he favors Midori over fresh melon juice, as it’s a little sweeter, which is needed to balance the drink. Fix one for yourself and tell me you don’t agree with him!

1 1/4 oz Tequila
1 oz Midori
1 oz of fresh lime juice (never from a can…)
1 oz of Cointreau
Lime wedge for garnish.

Add all the goodies to your shaker, beat it with some ice a bit, and decant into a rocks glass which has some fresh cubes in it. Go on, give it a whirl and find out why Absolut Vodka declared Ben as the “Cocktail Bartenter of the Year” a few years back.

Enjoy!

Cheers,

JJ.

This one comes from a fantastic book by Ben Reed, who among other things, is an award winning bartender and bar manager, and is the mixologist who created the cocktail menu of the legendary Met hotel in London. This recipe, named after the hotel, was created by Ben himself and comes from his Cool Cocktails book – which is excellent.

The Metropolitan

2 oz. Absolut Kurrant Vodka
2 oz. triple sec
1 oz. fresh lime juice
1 oz. cranberry juice

Add all the ingredients to your cocktail shaker (filled with ice) and do that thing you love to do. Shake away, and then decant into a frosted martini glass. Me, I think the metal ones are swanky, but the glass onces stay colder longer (damn that science!).

Ben suggests garnishing with the following: squeeze the oil from a strip of orange zest, skin downward, over a flame. Rub the rim with the hot orange zest before dropping the drink in the glass.

Hey, if you’ve got the time, go for it. Me? I’m already mixing my next one, because DAMN, these things are GOOOOD.

Enjoy!

This one comes to us from the The Great Tiki Drink Book.

This is a gorgeous lime green drink which is both amazingly refreshing and wonderfully fruity without being too sweet. Peach, Pineapple and Midori… what more do you want?

The Tropical Moment

1 1/2 ounces of WHITE RUM
1/2 ounce of PEACH SCHNAPPS
1 ounce of MIDORI
1 ounce of PINEAPPLE JUICE
1 ounce of SOUR MIX*
1/4 of lime (for garnish)

Combine all the ingredients (except for the lime wedge, silly; that goes on the glass when we’re done) in your handy-dandy cocktail shaker along with a bunch of ice.

Shake, shake, shake;

Drain the delicious looking mixture into a highball glass which is loaded with fresh ice. NOW you can add that yummy lime to the rim of the glass, toss in a straw, kick back, and relax.

*OH! Hey, this recipe calls for Sour Mix. Most decent booze supply stores or grocery stores will have it in the “mixes” section, but it’s also not terribly hard to make at home using frozen concentrate. Take 1 part frozen lemonade concentrate, 2 parts frozen limeade concentrate, and mix with half the amount of water that they tell you to use on the cans (that’s what they suggest in the Great Tiki Drink book above).

ALTERNATELY, you can make your own sour mix like this: mix one part sugar syrup (which is 3 parts sugar, 2 parts water – boil it for a couple of minutes, then let it cool) with one part lemon juice. So, for the above: you’d use 1/2 oz of lemon juice, and 1/2 oz of sugar syrup.

Enjoy!