vanilla vodka

A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forest

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When contemplating this week’s letter, the first thing to come to mind was Frangelico–the wonderful hazelnut liqueur that comes in a bottle shaped like a Franciscan monk, complete with a rope belt. But a single ingredient a cocktail does not make.

So while supper simmers I have to ponder what else to put with the nutty Friar. Oooh, Friar? As in, perhaps, Friar Tuck? As in Robin Hood? This calls for some serious research via my DVD library. And I’m not talking about the Kevin Costner version, either. My favorite Robin Hood is the animated one from 1973.

But how was this going to turn from cartoon into cocktail?

Sherwood Forest Cocktail

Well, we already had the Friar covered, so I’m leaning sweet. Vanilla Vodka for the lovely Maid Marian gives us a good base for our cocktail, and puts the love-interest front and center. Somewhere along my wandering pondering I decided on blue curacao but I can’t remember for who or why, though the hazelnut-orange combination makes me want to keep it. Let’s just say it’s for Little John, voiced by Phil Harris who also voices Baloo the bear in the Jungle Book. Baloo, B-lue. Close enough for me!

But, oh, we’ve got three great alcohols, here, what ever are we going to combine them with? You know I need a non-hooch mixer to balance these heavy hitters and we still haven’t paired up Robin Hood yet…

I’ve got it!

Sherwood Forest

1 1/4 oz Vanilla Vodka
3/4 oz Frangelico
1/2 oz Blue Curacao
3 oz Ginger Beer

Combine vodka and both liqueurs over ice and shake like the “safety’s on ol’ Betsy.” Strain into a chilled martini glass and top with ginger beer, letting the carbonation stir things up for you.

The finished drink is a bright green/teal color. If that doesn’t appeal to you, feel free to substitute Cointreau for the blue curacao, but not triple sec–it’d be too bossy. (A cherry speared with a little wooden arrow would make a fantastic garnish, don’t you think? Fresh out of both, I went with an classic-style cocktail glass that’s actually from the Walt Disney Signature collection.)

So, how did I get from Robin Hood to ginger beer? Well, in the animated version Robin Hood is a fox, foxes are red and this is an English tale. Across the pond redheads are called gingers, ergo ginger beer! Yes, I suppose you could substitute ginger ale for the ginger beer but the flavor will be weaker unless you’ve got easy access to some artisanal  ginger ale micro”brew” or something. Seriously, go for the real thing or you might have to call it the Sheriff Nottingham (a wolf in fox’s clothing).

MxMo LIX: Beer Cocktails and a Return of the Glazed Doughnut

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Glazed Doughnut Cocktail and Props

Ever since I started cocktail-blogging I’ve meant to participate in the Mixology Monday meme but always remembered too late. This time I was smart and actually put it on my calendar as one of my to-dos for today.

It also helps that this MxMo theme, hosted by Frederic of Cocktail Virgin Slut is cocktails made with beer. If you followed my 50 Shots of America series you know that I’ve made quite a few beer cocktails over the last year and a bit, some tastier than others, but none better than the first one, in honor of North Carolina and the Krispy Kreme doughnut that began there.

The Glazed Doughnut

2 oz Honey Wheat beer*
1 oz Sweetened Condensed Milk
1/2 oz Butterscotch Schnapps
1/4 oz Vanilla Vodka

Combine over ice in a sturdy mixing glass and shake as if the fryer’s broken and the pre-church crowd is about to descend. Strain into 2 small cordial glasses (or 1 martini glass) and steel yourself for the oncoming rush.

Shortly after creating this cocktail I was at the rehearsal dinner for my brother’s wedding and explaining some of what I do to my beer-connoisseur of an aunt. When I said I’d made a fabulous cocktail out of beer the look on her face could not have been more disbelieving. Once I explained about the need for that yeasty flavor in certain drinks and the only good way of getting it being beer, even she agreed that it made sense and even sounded pretty doggone good! The fact that the original recipe for Krispy Kreme doughnuts is said to have been purchased from a pastry chef from New Orleans, and we’re from that area of Louisiana, well, let’s just say our love for those pillowy breakfast confections is no longer a mystery.

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I’m happy to report that this cocktail still makes me do a little happy dance and is still the perfect remedy to a late-night doughnut craving when you can’t quite justify heading to the doughnut drive-thru in your pajamas.

Beware the Hag With the Poisoned Apple

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Welcome to the first of our new Alphatini series where we take a look at 26 varieties of the classic martini and come up with the best possible version of each, maybe even creating some new ones on the way.

~~~oOo~~~

A is for Apple

If we, in our gin-soaked haze, remember nothing else from those early learning years it’s that A is indeed for apple. That big, red, juicy fruit purported to keep the doctor away with one a day, win us extra points with the teacher and even find the first initial of our true love in it’s peel. Whether piled high in a pie, cooked down to sauce or juiced for convenience we’ve all had some sort of experience with apples in our life.

And while apples come in reds, greens, yellows and combinations thereof, exactly when did they become neon-hued and sour? While we may have become used to the chartreuse cocktail billed as an Appletini, it resembles an alcoholic candy more than what some believe the serpent tempted Eve with.

Let’s see if we can’t come up with something better, shall we?

Surveying the Orchard

Taking a quick stroll through bartending guides and web recipe repositories, the Appletini always seems to have a vodka base (sometimes a flavored vodka but often plain). The other main ingredient is apple schnapps–usually the sour sort like DeKuypers Apple Pucker. It’s not a bad ingredient, really, but I’d like to at least see a little apple juice in my apple martini (I know, shocking), not just booze. What I certainly don’t need is sour mix, citrus soda or cranberry juice mucking around my glass. They’re all find ingredients in their own right (well, except the sour mix–make your own!), just not what we really need here.

What could we add instead? Obvious would be apple juice or you could go even more direct with some apple puree. If you want to invoke the feel of a warm apple pie some vanilla and cinnamon would not go amiss (hello, vanilla vodka and maybe some cinnamon schnapps or syrup), even some condensed milk shaken in for that a la mode vibe. Or you could go a little classier with some Calvados (apple brandy) and a cinnamon stick for a cider-like cocktail.

In Search Of…

Caramel Apple Spice MartiniOnce, in a fairly decent chain restaurant, late one night after a holiday concert, I was intrigued enough to order a Caramel Apple Martini expecting something I wanted to just curl up in and take a nap. Instead what was brought to me was thin-tasting, bitter and gritty from the powdered cinnamon around the rim. The only thing it had in common with a real caramel apple was that it was sticky.

It’s so sad when a drink doesn’t live up to the menu’s hype.

Enter my solution: a dreamy, creamy caramel apple flavor with just a hint of spice. It’s definitely a dessert drink and even with less than 2 oz alcohol in there it’s pretty potent (the sugary ones always are). Sip it slowly and savor it.

Caramel Apple Spice Martini

1 1/4 oz Vanilla Vodka
1 1/4 oz Apple Juice
1/2 oz Caramel Sauce
1/4 oz Cinnamon Schnapps
Garnish: cinnamon-demerara sugar, apple slice, cinnamon stick

Combine the vodka, juice, caramel sauce and schnapps in a cocktail shaker over ice. Give it a good, long shake to toss the caramel sauce around and strain into a chilled cocktail glass rimmed with cinnamon-demerara sugar. Garnish with a slice of apple and a cinnamon stick.

The “secret” is to use a caramel sauce and not a syrup–the syrup will give a thinner mouth-feel and can have a very chemical edge to it. And yes, I mean sauce like you’d use for ice cream topping. When you mix the cinnamon sugar, go easy on the cinnamon–it really doesn’t take more than a sprinkle in a quarter cup of sugar (I prefer demerara for the natural color and large crystals) to get the point across without any grittiness.

For an extra treat, try sipping the drink through the cinnamon stick!

50 Shots of America–Alaska

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East Meets EastI think it’s safe to say that more people know more about Alaska these days (thanks to shows like Ice Road Truckers, Gold Rush Alaska and, of course, the Palin family escapades in and out of the political arena) than they ever did when all we had was Northern Exposure, Jack London and the Iditarod to shape our opinions of the 49th state.

Back in Middle School (you may know of it as Junior High), we had a transfer student from Alaska and the one thing I remember her saying, difference-wise between there and here was that she was shocked at the number of single-story houses, here. Apparently two-story was the norm in her Alaskan town and the cost of living was much lower. Whether that was truly the case (we’re talking about the observations of 13-year-olds, here) it certainly isn’t now. But it’s what sticks as my co-earliest memory of the state.

It’s pair is one is one of the very (very) few things I retained from any sort of American History class–that the territory (purchased from Russia in 1867 at pennies per acre) was known, colloquially, as Seward’s Folly. Of course, once gold was discovered in Alaska (the big Klondike rush in 1896), the tune changed dramatically, though it wasn’t until January 3, 1959, that the Land of the Midnight Sun achieved statehood.

East Meets East

1 0z Vanilla Vodka
1 oz Pomegranate Juice
3/4 oz Sake
Crushed Ice

Combine the vodka, juice and sake over ice in a mixing glass. Shake vigorously, until the mixture resembles the icy tundra. Fill a small, chilled glass 3/4 full of crushed ice. Strain the cocktail over the fresh ice.

Why the 2 batches of ice? If you shake a drink with crushed ice, the amount of water you’re adding (i.e. dilution) will be greater and the ice will be “tired” when it’s time to sip your drink. If you don’t have an ice crusher, skip the blender and put some cubes in a clean flour-sack towel and beat it with your muddler or a rolling pin until the ice reaches the level of crush you desire.

This drink is a little larger than some of the “shots” I’ve featured in this series, but for the biggest state in the nation it seemed appropriate. Due to said size and the eastward spread of the Aleutian Islands, it’s both the westernmost and easternmost state in the United States. Obviously it’s also the northernmost state. The flavor influence of the drink is a nod to the early Russian settlers as well as the Japanese that occupied the aforementioned Aleutian Islands during WWII.

The pomegranate, though, was pure fancy on my part. The long stretches of darkness and light (polar night and midnight sun, respectively) that Alaska encounters made me think of the myth of Persephone and the pomegranate seeds. It adds color, flavor and balance to the vodka and sake mix.

50 Shots of America–West Virginia

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Gold and Delicious Cocktail

Gold and Delicious

I thought we were done with the east coast last time! Looks like I was mistaken. Again.

Turns out the powers that be in the state of Virginia were having some issues within themselves while the country as a whole was in a bit of an uproar. The idea that Virginia was going to secede from the Union didn’t sit too well with some folks in the western counties so they decided they’d just take themselves out of it and create their own rival state government (which was happily acknowledged by the Federal powers that be). On June 20, 1863, (after a 60-day waiting period), West Virginia became our 35th state and the only one to be formed by seceding from a Confederate state.

Coal is the name of the game in the Mountain State, so named because, well, it’s all mountains–Appalachian Mountains to be specific. A few other facts stood out for me as I was doing my research:

  • July 1, 1921: The first state sales tax in the US went into effect in West Virginia.
  • 1926: The first US federal prison for women opened in West Virginia.

Now, does anyone think those two facts might be related? I mean, you ask a woman to pay even MORE for her purchases and, well, sure… laws might get broken.

That’s probably not true, but it was the first thing to pop into my mind. (Admit it, yours too!)

Anyway, with all those mountains, agriculture isn’t any sort of main share of the state’s output. Do you know one thing that does grow in West ‘By God’ Virginia? Golden Delicious apples. Those yellow-skinned, buttery-tasting glorious apples were first discovered in 1775 near Wellsburg, in Clay County. They are my favorite type of apple, and sometimes hard to find, so that’s what this week’s cocktail is dedicated to.

Gold and Delicious

1 oz Apple Juice
1/2 oz Vanilla Vodka
1/4 oz Butterscotch Schnapps

Combine over ice and shake like a freight train full of coal. Strain into a chilled cocktail glass.

It may not be quite the same as biting into a crisp Golden Delicious apple, but it’s the next best thing in my book.