Posts Tagged ‘Recipes’
March 1st, 2009
A few spirited nips for you on this snowy Sunday…
Tremont 647 director of operations Joy Richard, aka Bourbon Belle of the Boston chapter of Ladies United for the Preservation of Endangered Cocktails, deserves a shout-out. She recently traveled to L.A. to compete in the Hendricks gin Marvelous Limerick & Cocktail Competition.
You may remember how Richard qualified for this gig: by winning Hendricks’ Beantown Bartender Battle at Green Street last summer. Contestants mixed an original Hendricks cocktail that highlighted the botanicals used to flavor the gin, and they penned an accompanying limerick about their potion. Check out the recipe for Richard’s drink, Nobody’s Darling, and her limericks at LUPEC Boston’s blog.
“The competition itself was in this incredible bar called the Edison, which I believe was L.A.’s first electric company. The space was like nothing I’ve ever seen,” Richard said.
“We were judged on the following points: 1. costume (theme: Victorian Steampunk); 2. limerick; 3. cocktail name, and why you named it what you named it; 4. cocktail taste; and 5. showmanship.”
Alas, our clever Bostonian did not take home the trophy that night. It went to Peter Vestinos from the Wirtz Beverage Group in Chicago for his drink, A Cotswold Afternoon.
Meanwhile, a group of amateur mixologists competed in TV Diner’s annual cocktail contest on NECN. The entries in this competition fall largely in the silly-vodka-drink camp — first place went to the jailbait-appropriate Dreamy Banana Tini — but the classic cocktail revival made a showing with the second-place finisher, the Father’s Advice.
“I couldn’t believe that I placed at all. Seriously: gin and raw egg?” quipped the drink’s creator, James Slaby, who has been a regular at drinkboston.com and LUPEC Boston events. He presents his cocktail — “halfway between a Ramos Fizz and a Gin Flip” — in this clip from the show.
Father’s Advice (a morning-after tonic)
1 ½ oz Plymouth gin
¾ oz Baines pacharan (a Spanish cordial)
¾ oz fresh lemon juice
½ oz light cream
½ oz simple syrup
½ teaspoon Regan’s Orange Bitters
8 drops Fee’s Brothers Whiskey Barrel-Aged Bitters
1 fresh, whole egg
Healthy grind of fresh black pepper
1 dried star anise
Pour liquids into shaker half-full of cracked ice. Add egg and fresh pepper. Shake vigorously for 60 seconds. Strain into a well-chilled sour glass or rocks glass. Float star anise on top.
Finally, check out this Bostonist interview with Adam Lantheaume of the Boston Shaker, a first-of-its-kind boutique for Boston-area cocktailians that I wrote about not long ago.
Tags: cocktail contests, ingredients, LUPEC Boston, mixology, Recipes
Posted in Bartenders, Cocktails, Drinking supplies, Gin, Nips | 7 Comments »
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 »
April 3rd, 2008
If you attended LUPEC Boston’s Ladies Night at Toro on Sunday, it’s entirely possible that the sea of bodies filling the room prevented you from noticing that the Ladies United for the Preservation of Endangered Cocktails were selling a book. That’s OK, because for $15 you can still get a copy of the Little Black Book of Cocktails: Namesake & Favorite Recipes by LUPEC Boston.
It’s a great-looking little volume, and it’s for a good cause. Cambridge photographer Matt Demers took photos of all the Ladies as part of what he calls his “pearls project” — portraits of a variety of women he knows, inspired by the iconic Eugene Richie portrait (below) of 1920s film actress Louise Brooks. Damned if that Matt doesn’t have a way of making everyday gals look like glamour-pusses. We (yes, I am a founding member of LUPEC Boston) were so pleased that we decided to put our photos together in a book, along with cocktail recipes, and give the proceeds from the books’ sales to an organization that seriously helps women feel better about their appearance. That organization is the Friends Boutique at the Dana-Farber Cancer Institute, which provides wigs, prosthetics, scarves and other items to people dealing with the side effects of cancer treatment.
Each portrait in the book is accompanied by recipes for the subject’s namesake cocktail (mine’s the Barbara West) and two favorites (I chose the Jaguar and the Maharaja’s Revenge, by two of Boston’s best bartenders). The book contains roughly 40 recipes, all classics or inspired by classics.
Instructions for ordering the Little Black Book by mail are on the LUPEC Boston blog. And starting this weekend, you can purchase a copy at Magpie (617-623-3330) in Davis Square, Somerville, or Buckaroo’s Mercantile (617-492-4792) in Central Square, Cambridge. But give these places a call first to make sure they’re not sold out.
Tags: LUPEC Boston, photography, Recipes
Posted in Books & resources, Cocktails | 1 Comment »
