bourbon

AlcoHOLidays | Caramel Popcorn Day | Caramel Jack

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Caramel Jack Cocktail

Caramel Jack Cocktail

In our house we’re quite divided between sweet and savory popcorn–Todd prefers his strictly savory and while I do enjoy some salt or Parmesan cheese on mine on occasion, I really adore the sweeter side of popcorn, even better if it’s got nuts and chocolate, too!

Way to make a healthy snack decided less so, right?

But Michael Pollan says you can eat as much junk food as you want, as long as you make it yourself, right? So I suppose if you’re willing to put in the work, then you deserve the indulgence. While I remember making batches of it to give as Christmas gifts many moons ago, it seldom seems worth the effort going through all that trouble these days. Which is why most of our popcorn has salt, nothing more.

A cocktail version, on the other hand, why that’s no trouble to mix up at all! Though I do think I’ll stick to one, know matter how easy they are to make.

Caramel Jack

2 oz Cola
1 oz Jack Daniels Tennessee Whiskey
3/4 oz Butterscotch Schnapps
1/2 oz Dark Rum

Combine all ingredients in a mixing glass over ice and shake like kernels rattling in a popper. Strain into a chilled cocktail glass and enjoy.

Usually I don’t call out a particular spirit without a reason and while I suppose you could use another corn-based whiskey and be fine, it’d be harder to call it a Caramel Jack, right? The play on Cracker Jack-brand caramel corn was just too enticing. The richness of the rum and butterscotch strike just the right balance for mimicking the rich caramel coating and the cola adds color, a little more sweetness, and the much needed mixer level to take this from a high-proof shot to a sippable tipple.

How will you celebrate Caramel Popcorn Day on April 6?

50 Shots of America–Nebraska

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The Strobe

The Strobe

I think I’ve been both looking forward to and dreading getting to the 37th state: it’s Todd’s home state and so there’s a little extra pressure to come up with something stellar. Am I up for the challenge? Let’s see…

The Cornhusker state came to be on March 1, 1867, just a couple years after the end of the Civil War. It’s name means “flat water” (for the Platte River) and it’s a good thing it’s got those rivers running around and through it as it’s landlocked three times over. Another curious fact is that Arbor Day began in Nebraska; curious because the early homesteaders (who came for the free land grants a la Far and Away) built homes out of sod because trees were so scarce.

Being smack dab in the middle of the country, it’s no surprise that railroads are big in Nebraska. The state hosts the Union Pacific headquarters and Bailey Yard (only the railroad classification yard–where they sort and switch cars and tracks–in the world).

When we visited Nebraska in 2010, I was amazed at the richness of the soil, the fact that seems just seemed to grow anywhere they were planted, and the number of wineries we found spread throughout the state (too late to visit any, though). The local food of fame, the Runza (aka Bierock), was sampled, as well as the eponymous Omaha Steaks.

Something we were glad we didn’t need to use was the 911 system (developed and first used in Lincoln).

And with that bad segue in place, here’s this week’s drink.

The Strobe

3/4 oz Bourbon Whiskey (like Jim Beam)
1/4 oz Goldschlager
1/2 oz Grenadine
1 oz Club Soda

Combine whiskey, goldschlager and grenadine over ice and shake like a tornado roaring down the plains. Strain into a chilled cordial glass and top with the club soda.

If you think it looks a little like Kool-Aid, there’s a reason for that: in 1927 Edward Perkins created the famous powdered beverage in Hastings, Nebraska. I may not keep the stuff in the house but the grenadine goes a long way towards making this drink look like it’s predecessor. The Goldschlager is a nod to the start of the Black Hills Gold Rush in Sydney and, well, it just wouldn’t be right to have a drink for the Cornhusker state made with anything other than a corn base, would it?

And, of course, it’s named after another Nebraskan invention: the strobe light was invented by Dr. Harold Edgerton of Aurora. Too many of these and you might be seeing spots of light, yourself!

But did the drink pass the Todd-test? With a response of “refreshing,” I think it passed.

50 Shots of America–Kentucky

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I spent a week in Louisville, Kentucky, when I was about 13. We were visiting my aunt (a professor at U of L at the time) over Thanksgiving. Many things stand out about that trip:

  • the 11 hours spent in the car (a Toyota Tercel hatchback)
  • the speedometer that lost it’s mind going through the foothills (it flip from 0 to 80 back and forth several times a second for a while)
  • the fact that it was 18 degrees when we arrived in Louisville but that it didn’t snow until the week after we left (I think I’m snow-repellent–this has happened way too often)
  • being too ill to fully enjoy Thanksgiving dinner (major bummer–but I did get better in time to enjoy the leftovers)
  • our trip to Mammoth Caves, the longest cave system in the world(and the hideous blue and yellow sweater dress thing I wore–it was the late 80s and, thankfully, no pictures survive of that thing)

Earlier this month the annual Kentucky Derby was run. Untold pounds of Kentucky Hot Browns were consumed and who knows how many gallons of Mint Juleps were made.

Even though the state beverage is milk (where have we heard that before?), Kentucky is well known for it’s local distillation of corn into Bourbon. Jim Beam Sour Mash Bourbon to be more exact. The bourbon that has a starring role in the Mint Julep as well as another classic cocktail invented in Kentucky: the Old Fashioned.

There’s a fair amount of controversy over a proper Old Fashioned. Some say with fruit (a twist garnish or sometimes muddled with the sugar and water), some without; some say with club soda, some with branch water, some say none at all. For this week’s small sipper I’m using the Old Fashioned as inspiration, adding Cointreau for the citrus note and using honey over sugar or simple syrup in honor of another local staple (the state honey festival is held in Clarkson, KY).

the Mini-Mammoth

3/4 oz Kentucky Bourbon
1/2 oz Cointreau
1/2 oz Honey
Club Soda

Combine Bourbon, Cointreau and honey in a mixing glass over ice and shake like a bat flying out of the caves. Strain into a cordial glass.

It might seem like a lot of honey but chances are most of it is going to end up stuck to the wall of your shaker, adding a bit of sweet to smooth out the sour mash bourbon, but not so much that it makes a truly sweet drink. If the first sip seems too strong, take another. In our experience, the 2nd sip is always the truest test of an alcohol’s flavor.

http://www.nps.gov/maca/index.htm

A Tale of Two Sours

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Whisk(e)y Sours, that is–we’re up to ‘w’ in our travel through the Alphahol and that means delving into the oak barrels and coming up with what exactly?

I may have mentioned before that I’m not a big whisk(e)y fan. Until very recently I couldn’t stand the stuff and wouldn’t drink anything made with it thanks to an unfortunate encounter at a wine and spirits tasting. The bourbon I was served burned my throat, robbed me of breath and made my eyes water–it probably didn’t help that I’d been drinking a lot of sweet wines prior, but the port I tried afterwards smoothed things over between me and the wine guy. At any rate, I’ve come to respect well-made whisk(e)ys.

To ‘e’ or not to ‘e’, what’s in a spelling?

Ever wonder what the difference between whisky and whiskey is? At first I thought it was just an American versus European style thing but that’s not it because Irish varieties are spelled with the ‘e’ but Scotch without. True, most people who mean Scotch just say Scotch, but it’s still whisky so it counts. In North America, Tennessee, Kentucky and the other USA varieties add the ‘e’ while Canadian whisky does not. Other than who uses it and who doesn’t, there’s really not much more to it.

So What’s the Real Difference?

Whiskey is pretty much any grain spirit that’s aged in oak for as much time as needed to develop the flavors or scents necessary to be a pleasant drink. The type of grain makes a big difference in the finished product, also how it’s treated. Scotch is traditionally prized in the Single Malt category, made only with malted barley whereas Bourbon uses primarily corn and, in the case of Sour Mash, reserves a portion of the previous fermentation to add to the next batch in a method that reminds me, in turns, of sourdough starter and the Amish Friendship Bread that gets passed around from time to time.

(This, of course, is gross over-simplification. I’m just trying to distill it into a highlight reel for the sake of an overview.)

Mixing With It

So, probably the most common Whiskey drink most folks think of is the Whiskey Sour which, as I understand it, is generally made with Bourbon. Well, here’s the thing: you can make a Sour out of pretty much any base liquor so I decided to make a Scotch Sour and a Bourbon Sour and see how they compared.

Whiskey Sour

1.5 oz Whisk(e)y
1 oz Simple syrup
3/4 oz Lemon juice (as fresh as possible)

Combine over ice and shake vigorously. Strain into a chilled old fashioned glass and garnish with an orange slice and a cherry (also known as a flag).

Both the Bourbon and Scotch sours were made in exactly the same way and here’s how, for me, they compared. Visually, the Bourbon Sour is darker than the Scotch Sour–no worries about labeling the glasses for this test. The Bourbon also has a stronger smell (I used Jim Bean Kentucky Sour Mash Bourbon) and, as one would expect, a stronger flavor. More insistent. The Scotch Sour (made with Glenfiddich Single Malt 12 Year) was lighter in color and smoother in flavor, it took both the sweet and the sour in stride and retained it’s crisp pear notes (seriously, before last month I would have NEVER thought to think pears when I thought Scotch).

Obviously I preferred the Glenfiddich Sour, it’s much more palatable. I think I’ll keep the Sour Mash for the Bourbon Chicken.