Archive for the ‘Gin’ Category
August 8th, 2008
Photos by C. Fernsebner
Joy Richard, bartender-manager at Tremont 647 and Sister Sorel in the South End, also known as Bourbon Belle of LUPEC Boston, won the Hendricks Gin Beantown Bartender Battle at Green Street on Tuesday night with her recipe, Nobody’s Darling, and the limerick she wrote to describe it. Congrats to Joy; she gets to fly anywhere in the country on Hendricks’ dime. Her drink, which will soon be on Tremont 647’s cocktail menu, was a most unique mixture starring the flavor of celery (one of the dozen botanicals used in Hendricks).
Parked at the bar for most of the evening, I was like the misbehaved kid in the back of the classroom ignoring the lesson, so I don’t have much color commentary for you (check out C. Fernsebner’s captioned photo gallery on Bostonist for an idea of how the battle went), but I did manage to track down all five finalists’ recipes — which only the judges got to sample that evening — along with Joy’s winning limerick.
Nobody’s Darling
by Joy Richard
2 oz Hendrick’s Gin
1/2 oz yellow Chartreuse
1 oz angelica root-infused honey
3/4 oz fresh celery juice
1/2 oz fresh lemon juice
Place all ingredients in iced cocktail shaker, shake well and strain into a chilled cocktail glass.
An elixir of cucumber and rose
With a scent that amuses the nose
Angelica-honey we’ll pair
Then some celery sounds fair
Yellow Chartreuse, lemon juice and there goes!
The Seersucker
by Chris O’Neil of Upstairs on the Square
2 oz Hendricks Gin
3 oz chamomile syrup (chamomile, orange peel, honey, sugar)
Dash of lemon juice
Mint sprig to garnish
Shake first three ingredients in an iced cocktail shaker, pour into a highball glass, top with mint sprig.
Hendrick’s Tea
by Claudia Mastrobuono of Highland Kitchen
1 1/2 oz Hendricks Gin
1/2 oz orange peel-infused simple syrup
1/2 oz fresh lemon juice
3-4 oz chamomile iced tea (enough to top off the highball)
Shake all ingredients in an iced shaker, pour into a highball glass and garnish with a candied orange peel (the candied peel is a by-product of the simple syrup — just roll the peels in sugar and let them dry out).
Boston Tea Party
by Jeff Grdinich of White Mountain Cider Co.
2 oz Hendricks Gin
1 1/2 oz chamomile citrus tea*
1/2 oz Demerara simple syrup**
1/4 oz lemon juice***
1/2 to 1 barspoon Fernet Branca***
* Infuse 1 bag per 8 oz water for 5 minutes.
** Dilute 400g Demerara sugar in 1000 ml water.
*** Amount of lemon juice and Fernet varies based on tea infusion. Start small.
Place all ingredients in an iced cocktail shaker, shake well and strain into a chilled cocktail glass. Note: In the spirit of the competition, which required highlighting the botanicals used in Hendricks, Jeff put one hell of a garnish on his cocktail: a toasted brioche and cucumber sandwich brushed with butter that had been infused with most of the Hendricks botanicals. If you simply must have the recipe for that, email me.
Captain Kidd Cup
by Justin Falcone, freelance bartender
1 1/2 oz Hendricks Gin
1/2 oz pimento dram (St. Elizabeth’s Allspice Liqueur)
1/2 oz Pimm’s
1/2 oz lemon juice
Shake all ingredients in an iced cocktail shaker and pour into a highball glass. Top with ginger beer and garnish with lemon wedge and cucumber spear.
Tags: contests, hendricks beantown bartender battle, Recipes
Posted in Bartenders, Events, Gin | 1 Comment »
August 1st, 2008
The folks at Hendrick’s Gin have chosen five finalists to compete in the Beantown Bartender Battle at Green Street this Tuesday night, August 5. Selected on the merits of the original, Hendrick’s-based cocktails they submitted, the contestants will be mixing those cocktails for a panel of judges that includes chef Barbara Lynch, Boston Globe writer Liza Weisstuch, bartender and cocktail historian John Myers of Portland, Maine, and Hendrick’s brand ambassador Charlotte Voisey. As they’re mixing, the only way they can present and describe their potion is by reciting a limerick that they penned themselves. Oh, this is gonna be good. The finalists are:
Justin Falcone, Boston-area freelance bartender
Jeff Grdinich, bartender at the White Mountain Cider Co. restaurant in Glen, NH
Claudia Mastrobuono, bartender at Highland Kitchen in Somerville
Chris O’Neil, bartender at Upstairs on the Square in Cambridge
Joy Richard, manager of Tremont 647 and Sister Sorel in Boston
From what I hear, there were a lot of kick-ass recipes submitted for this contest, so to those whose cocktails weren’t chosen: you’re in good company.
There’s still time to make reservations for this cocktail party-style event, whose $20 price gets you four Hendrick’s cocktails (separate from those competing in the Battle) and some light snacks. Call Green Street at 617-876-1655. A limited dinner menu will also be available for purchase. One of the featured cocktails is by Sierra Zimei, the winner of the San Francisco Bartender Battle:
The Secret Garden
2 1/2 oz Hendricks Gin
1/4 oz fresh lime juice
1 oz fresh grapefruit juice
1/2 oz cilantro infused simple syrup
4 slices of cut-up cucumber
Shake and strain ingredients into a chilled martini glass. Garnish with slice of cucumber.
Hope to see you there.
Tags: mixology contests
Posted in Events, Gin | 6 Comments »
July 23rd, 2008
This just in from Green Street bar manager Misty Kalkofen regarding the Hendrick’s Beantown Bartender Battle at Green Street on August 5: “We’ve extended the deadline for recipe submissions to Sunday. As many of us were busy destroying our livers in NOLA, Charlotte [Voisey, Hendrick’s brand ambassador] and I felt many folks could use a couple of extra days. Email your submissions to Charlotte and start working on a limerick!”
Tags: contests, mixology
Posted in Events, Gin | No Comments »
July 9th, 2008
The limerick’s structure somewhat
necessitates *eloquent* smut.
If you haven’t the time
to learn meter and rhyme,
then don’t write them, you ignorant slut.
— From the top 150 limericks on LimerickDB
Finally, a contest for those yearning to combine their mixology and rhyming skills. The Hendrick’s Beantown Bartender Battle is putting out the call to all Boston-area mixologists — from those who pour booze for a living to those who have never mixed a drink outside their kitchen — for original recipes using Hendrick’s gin. Recipes can use up to six ingredients, but Hendrick’s must serve as the base. The cocktail also must highlight one of the 13 botanicals used in the gin: cucumber, rose petal, elderflower, chamomile, juniper berry, caraway seed, coriander, cubeb berry, orris root, lemon peel, orange peel, meadowsweat, and angelica. (Anyone who highlights cubeb berry should get extra credit.)
Submissions are due Wednesday, July 23, and should be emailed to Hendrick’s brand ambassador Charlotte Voisey at cvoisey@wgrantusa.com
Now for the fun part. Charlotte will select five finalists and invite them to present their cocktails to a panel of judges at Green Street (280 Green St., Cambridge) on Tuesday, August 5. The contestants can use only one five-line limerick to present, describe or announce their cocktails to the judges. The judges will, of course, consider the limerick along with the cocktail. First prize is a round-trip air ticket to anywhere in the U.S., and Hendrick’s promises other, “mysterious and unusual” prizes.
If you just want to be a spectator, no problem. Tickets for the event, which starts at 7:00 p.m., are $20. Charlotte and Green Street bar manager Misty Kalkofen will mix up four Hendrick’s gin cocktails, and there’ll be some bites to eat, too. To reserve your spot ahead of time, call Green Street at 617-876-1655.
Tags: bartending contests, Hendrick's gin, limericks
Posted in Events, Gin | 9 Comments »
May 16th, 2008
If you couldn’t get into the sold-out World Cocktail Day party at Green Street on Tuesday, I’m sorry to tell you that it was a ton o’ fun. In fact, it was an evening I was downright thankful for. It marked the end of World Cocktail Week, whose frivolity contrasted unavoidably with a coinciding spate of tragedies: the cyclone in Myanmar, the earthquake in China, tornadoes in the U.S. (not to mention the continuing grimness in Iraq, Afghanistan, etc, etc, etc). I’m not trying to bring anyone down here. I’m just saying there were times during the evening when I paused, soaked up the good vibe among the crowd and thanked my lucky stars.
Our guest bartenders, four knowledgable and talented New England gentlemen, each mixed a vintage cocktail of their choice, then went from table to table recounting that libation’s origins and moment in history. They time-traveled from 1870s San Francisco to an 1880s bartender’s manual to the Spanish-American War (1898) to an early 20th-century obsession with songs about maidens. The cocktails (below) were accompanied by flatbread pizza, beef tongue tacos and other tasty treats from the Green Street kitchen. We started with an innocent-seeming Maiden’s Prayer and ended with a brassy Remember the Maine, at which point the joke was whether anyone would remember the Maine.
Maiden’s Prayer
by Tom Schlesinger-Guidelli of Eastern Standard
3/4 oz Plymouth Gin
3/4 oz white rum
3/4 oz lemon juice
1/2 oz Cointreau
1 dash orange bitters
Shake well over ice, strain into a cocktail glass, and garnish with a flower. Based on a variation (circa 1930) of the original (circa 1907), which may have been inspired by a hit piano tune of the late 1800s.
Nicol’s Secret Pisco Punch (without cocaine)
by John Gertsen of No. 9 Park
6 parts BarSol pisco
3 parts lemon juice
2 parts pineapple syrup
1 part water
Shake, strain into a cocktail glass, and garnish with pineapple. The recipe originated with Duncan Nicol, the proprietor of San Francisco’s Bank Exchange saloon from the late 1870s until Prohibition. The secret’s out: a wee bit of gum arabic (which comes in a white powder — get it?) makes this a silky sweet punch.
Bijou
by Brother Cleve, cocktail historian and mixologist
1/3 Plymouth Gin
1/3 sweet vermouth
1/3 green Chartreuse
1 dash orange bitters
Stir well over ice and strain into a chilled cocktail glass. Garnish with a cherry or a lemon twist. A Golden Age cocktail dating back to Harry Johnson’s Bartender’s Manual in 1882.
Remember the Maine
by John Myers, Portland, Maine-based bartender and cocktail historian
1 1/2 oz good rye whiskey or bourbon (i.e. Maker’s Mark)
3/4 oz sweet vermouth
1-2 tsp of cherry brandy
1/2 tsp absinthe or Pernod veritas
Stir well over ice and strain into a chilled cocktail glass with a lemon twist. Named for the rallying cry of the Spanish-American war, the cocktail is described in Charles H. Baker Jr.’s The Gentleman’s Companion (1939). Myers’ note: “Any absinthe substitute will work, but the ‘cherry brandy’ is up for some interpretation. Different drinks occur — but still work, so little is deployed — if Cherry Heering or maraschino are used.”
World Cocktail Day at Green Street benefited the Museum of the American Cocktail, which launched World Cocktail Week. Plymouth Gin, Maker’s Mark bourbon and BarSol Pisco were the evening’s sponsors. Many thanks to Green Street bar manager Misty Kalkofen, owner Dylan Black and everyone else in the kitchen, behind the bar and out on the floor for totally kicking ass.
Posted in Cocktails, Events, Gin, Pisco, Whiskey | 8 Comments »
