This is my submission to the Home Bar Awards August Challenge, ‘It’s Alive’. The challenge this month is to add a living culture, yogurt, kefir, kombucha etc to your cocktail. My husband suggested miso, and I just ran with it. You might think that coming up with a concept for putting Miso in a cocktail would be a challenge, but this one just came to me. This cocktail a bit of a salty-sweet moment, with a slight smokiness to add some depth. I used Ten to One's white rum, which has a pepperiness that I thought would work perfectly in this drink, and I was right! Its the kind of thing that would pair perfectly with some small bites, and I immediately thought of making tiny cocktail sized spam masubi. This cocktail is dark and murky, perfectly fitting for something that’s alive. Miso, It’s Alive!
2 oz. Ten to One White Rum 1/2 oz. Smoked Maple Miso syrup 1/4 oz. Scrappy Bitters Lime bitters 1/4 oz. lemon juice Place all ingredients in a shaker with ice and shake until chilled and slightly diluted. Double strain into a coupe glass and garnish with mini masubi! Smoked Maple Miso syrup 1 part Ohsawa Yamaki Soybean Miso 4 parts Runamok Pecan Smoked Maple Syrup Whisk the miso into the maple syrup until combined. ** note. I used a smoke flavored maple syrup, but you can always make this with a regular maple syrup and add a little liquid smoke. Cocktail-sized Spam Masubi 1 can spam 2 cups uncooked sushi rice 1/4 cup smoked maple miso syrup Nori
Cheers!
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My baby turned five years old today! So, I’m celebrating with my favorite Brut Rosé, I deserve it after all. And, now is when I tell you her birth story in deep and gory detail. Just kidding, but I will tell you more about my favorite sparkling Rosé. This sparkling wine comes from Picchetti, a local Bay Area winery in the Santa Cruz mountains. This is a dry Rosé, crisp with delicate bubbles, a floral nose, and clean fruit flavors. It is one of my favorite summer time wines, and while it’s best enjoyed sitting on the beautiful grounds of the winery, surrounded by the mountains, its pretty good anywhere else too. While the wine is obviously for me, the fancy dresses are for the five year old (ok, also a little bit for me). My dress is Vera Wang, and is from ten years and two babies ago, needless to say it seems to have shrunk a bit... More importantly, it matches this beautiful birthday dress from Tutu Du Monde. Despite my face in this photo, this was the most fun, and I think this is going to be a new tradition, especially the wine.
It been suggested that I prefer to make a certain type of cocktail, and I have to say I felt attacked. I do tend to stick to the floral and fruit flavors, even though I don't really love super sweet cocktails. Honestly, I’ll be the first to admit that is probably because the more layered and sophisticated cocktails require a level of skill that I’m not quite at…yet. In an effort to expand my horizons so to speak I’ve created a dark moody cocktail that is spirit forward and full of herbaceous flavors. This is not for the faint of heart, but if you love a Coffee and Cigarettes then this if for you. I started with the Heaven Hill Bourbon which is infused with Big Heart Teas Fake Coffee, a spicy blend of cacao, chicory root, dandelion root, and cinnamon. Infuse at your own risk, ten minutes will get you a vague spiciness while twenty minutes will have your Bourbon tasting more like bad diner coffee. I would recommend something between twelve and fifteen minutes. The Spiced Pear Liqueur was included to play off the cinnamon of the Fake Coffee, and because it's such an iconic fall flavor. I used the absinthe wash to tie in the fennel garnish. The sugared fennel is from Tartine Cookbook, they use egg whites to glue the sugar to the fennel. I used some left over simple syrup and it worked just as well, in my opinion. Keep scrolling for the specs. Burning Leaves
2oz. Big Heart Tea Fake Coffee infused Heaven Hill Old Style Bourbon 1/8 oz. Fernet-Branca 1 oz. St. George Spirits Spiced Pear Liqueur Absinthe wash Sugared fennel garnish Place the first three ingredients in a shaker with ice and shake until chilled and slightly diluted. Wash a chilled coupe glass with a small amount of Absinthe and pour contents of shaker into prepared glass. Garnish with sugared fennel. Cheers! This drink was inspired by orange dreamsicle cotton candy. I love cotton candy, it has the best texture, and it’s just so magical. I’m not as big of a fan of the orange creamsicle flavor though, super sweet and creamy doesn’t really do it for me. So, my intention with this cocktail was add a little maturity with some more adult flavors, while remaining reminiscent of the original concept. I started with Hangar 1’s fantastic Mandarin Blossom Vodka and some vanilla extract. I wanted to really up the orange flavor, but not the sweetness and I thought using orange bitters in a larger than normal amount would add extra depth. The addition of the Baller whisky brings a smokey aspect to the drink helping make a more elegant rendition of a childhood classic. Creamsicle Dream
2 oz. Hangar 1 Mandarin Blossom Vodka 1/2 oz. orange blossom simple syrup 1/4 oz. Regan’s Orange bitters 1/4 oz. St. George Spirits Baller Single malt Whiskey 1/4 oz. lemon juice 2 drops vanilla extract Combine all of the ingredients in a shaker with ice, shake until chilled and slightly diluted. Pour into a Nick and Nora glass and garnish with Orange Dreamsicle cotton candy. Cheers! School starts for us today, so I had to celebrate the last official day of summer yesterday in style. Which means I pretty much spent the day drinking wine coolers and pretending like I don’t have to deal with the shit storm that is distance learning. While you’re pretending to be rich, childless and in Palm Springs (is that just me?) it helps to have a vintage 1970’s kaftan. I can’t decide whether this is more 1970’s cruise wear or really chic cult leader… Either way the kaftan is from a company called Mary. Juana, I kid you not, and was purchased by my father in Mexico some time in the ’70’s. The earrings are a mystery, but the shoes are Anne Klein from at least two years ago. This is more of a drink recommendation than a classic cocktail recipe since this drink came directly from a can. Original House Wines makes my favorite canned wine, and while I’m partial to anything that has bubbles in it, they also make some very tasty cocktail inspired wine coolers. This one happens to be the Casa-Rita, their take on a Margarita, but the Paloma is very good and the Tropical Spritz is great too! Keep scrolling to see how I like to drink my Casa-Ritas! Casa-Rita
1 can of Original House Wine Casa-Rita 1 tsp Salt Rimmer 1 slice of lime Rim glass with salt, open can and pour into glass. Garnish with slice of lime. Cheers! We were lucky enough to be able to go on a bit of a vacation back in July, to my PIL’s hobby farm in Oregon. I was super excited to take advantage of all the nature, and use some foraged plants in a cocktail. I’m no plant expert, especially considering most of my life was spent on the opposite side of the continent, but here’s my one piece of advice. Plants can be dangerous, don’t ingest anything if you’re not sure what it is. So, I did what any of us would do, and spent way too much money on a plant identification app. After I confirmed that everything I had picked was in fact poisonous I decided to stick with herbs from the garden. Not being at home, cocktail supplies were a bit limited, but we happened to have fresh honey comb on hand. Clearly, that called for a riff on a Bee’s Knees. I used some Beefeater that I infused with some lemon thyme, and the straight honey, as making it into a syrup seemed wrong. This is a much more layered cocktail than a traditional Bee’s Knee’s with a more herbal lemony note and an extra richness from the honey. Honey, I’m on Holiday
2 oz. Lemon Thyme infused Beefeater London Dry gin 2 bar spoons Honey 1 half lemon Garnish with fresh honey comb and a sprig of lemon thyme preferably in bloom. Combine all ingredients in a shaker with ice and shake until very cold. Strain into whatever glass you can find. Cheers! I have not had break from my children in many months, and that scenario is not likely to change any time soon. Since even going to the bathroom by myself is almost impossible, self-care has become both a necessity and a rarity. That being said this pajama set from Lunya has become a very important part of my self-care routine, in fact I think regular pj’s have been ruined forever. Admittedly, they are silk (machine washable!) and expensive, but they are the most comfortable, lux sleepwear I’ve ever owned and I’ve grown deeply obsessed. These pajamas and a cocktail make washing my face into a much more pleasant ritual, and I’ll take anything I can get right now. The Manhattan has been around forever, but I took offense to it some time in my twenties. Thanks to an incident many years ago its become a bit of a joke that if I’m asking for a Manhattan I’m too drunk and its time to go home. I’m not sure why I hated this cocktail, but I felt like I needed to give it another shot. Turns out I’m completely out of sweet vermouth, but I didn’t let stop me. I substituted with Lillet Blanc and some syrup from my bourbon cherries. I was tempted to call this Lex Does Manhattan, but I’m 99% sure that’s the title of a porn… I can’t be 100% on that though, because I’m not willing to do that google search. Keep scrolling for the specs! Manhattan
2 oz. Heaven Hill Kentucky Straight Bourbon 1/2 oz. Lillet Blanc 1/2 oz. Syrup from Jack Rudy Cocktail Co. Bourbon Cocktail Cherries 3 dashes Angostura bitters 1 dash Scrappy’s Bitters orange bitters 3 Bourbon cocktail cherries Combine all ingredients in a low ball glass with ice and stir until chilled. Cheers! |
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