My new project
I’ve been thinking for some years that I’d like to learn a little more about bartending. I don’t like beer, and I have a rather narrow line of favorites in wines . . . but I like a good mixed drink. I just don’t know that many.
So, for a variety of reasons, I’ve decided now is the time. Once a week I’m going to try a new recipe, as my wife did for a while - but mine will be not for dinner, but for mixed drinks. I’d like to find a couple new favorites. It’s also a good opportunity to build up a decent bar, a little at a time - since I’ll try to pick up new bottles just as I need them for the recipes.
The first one, I figured, would be for New Year’s Eve. Perfect. We’d invite a couple friends over and see what they thought.
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Experiment #1
London Fogcutter
Also tasted by Una, HRIMKC1, and
stilwatrs
I was looking at quite a few recipes with different kinds of rums, which my friend
hrimkc1 doesn’t drink. (I’m also planning on trying to make some things I HAVE heard of before, like a Cosmo or a Hurricane or a Whiskey Sour . . . but for now, it’s obscure drinks with funny names.) But as we were planning to have some champagne for New Year’s Eve anyway, the London Fogcutter seemed a natural choice. It’s just 6 oz of champagne, 1 oz of lime juice, and 2 oz of gin, served over ice.
I carefully went through the pathetic stores we had in the home liquor cabinet - plenty of Captain Morgan, some margarita mix (just add tequila), and a dee-lightful rum I brought back from Costa Rica last year and forgot I had. And not too much else - a little vodka, a bit of scotch whiskey which I can NOT drink. I made a small shopping list and went to the liquor store around the corner. I didn’t even know we HAD a liquor store around the corner!
I picked up two bottles of Martini & Rossi Asti. (Let’s have no discussion on what is ‘champagne’ and what is ‘sparkling wine,’ please, by the way.) The lime juice was easier to find than I thought it would be - Rose’s Lime Juice, just like my wife said. The gin was just gin, I don’t really know brands for gin.
While I was there, I did a little extra shopping. Some tequila gold for making margaritas (which turned out not to be necessary), some cranberry juice to go with the vodka, if anybody preferred, and a bottle of coconut rum (looking ahead to next week’s recipe - we already had blue curacao in the house).
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Back at the house, I found I didn’t have much for actual measuring, except the usual kitchen measuring cups, and one shotglass which had markings on it. I could pour 1 oz at a time from the shotglass very easily, but that didn’t seem to make sense for the 6 oz of champagne.
I measured out in a very un-sexy Pyrex glass cooking-measuring thing, the first time, and with some experimenting (OK, spilling) found that our fancy champagne flutes are just about exactly 6 oz. After that, I used a larger glass for the final drink, pouring in a fluteful of champagne, 2 shots of gin and 1 shot of lime juice, mixing it with a stirrer and then dropping in a couple ice cubes. It came out perfect every time, and I got pretty good at mixing them up.
(The glasses I used, I can’t even find a name for - something between a wine glass and a sherry glass, they have a stubby little stem, and a large, tall bowl, with the rim just slightly narrowed. I understand this helps the nose enjoy the bouquet of the sherry or wine. All I know is, it held 9 oz drinks plus ice cubes with plenty of room to spare.)
How did it taste? I have trouble defining it except to say that it was delicious. I think I had three. We got a lot of the ‘nose’ too - we discussed for a while how gin kind of smells like pine trees, and then of course there was a lot of smell of lime . . . so overall, you may be getting the scent of cleaning products, but it also smelled a little like Christmas, or New Year’s. Aah, who cares how it smelled? It tasted great. And it flavored a lovely evening. I’ll definitely have one of these again - and I’d recommend it to you.
London Fogcutter
6 oz champagne
1 oz lime juice
2 oz gin
Serve over ice
Stilwatrs and I played Guitar Hero while Miss Buttons danced around (our festivities started at 5), and Una made her magic pasta salad for us all. After Stil left, we watched “Breakfast at Tiffany’s” with HRIM - and created an LJ account for him! - and played in the snow with MB, making a snowman that turned into a snow rabbit. An early night for us all, and a very pleasant one. Happy New Year, everybody!
PS Found the glass on the Mikasa website - not exactly the same design, but it’s the same shape. They don’t really have a name for it either.
PPS I’m getting to an age where even a single glass of wine, or one small rum and coke, might give me a headache sometime the next day. Sometimes not, and I don’t know if it has to do with what kind of liquor, or how much I eat, or if it is just that I’m getting old. But I had no ill effects from my night of drinking the next day at all. So that’s another point in its favor. Maybe champagne agrees with me better than other things? We’ll see.