The Flying Cucumber

August 30th, 2007

Dunno how summer’s treating you where you are. Here in BKLN NYC, the weather’s been unpredictable all summer. Be that as it may, here’s a great drink for your Labor Day weekend.

I’m calling this the Flying Cucumber because of its obvious origins in the Aviation. The Martin Miller’s is good for this because it has definite cuke notes, but Hendrick’s would probably work well, too. Here’s a piccy of it; the recipe’s after the jump.

photograph by Jennifer Hess

Flying Cucumber

Technique: Muddle two cucumber slices in a mixing glass, and then add:

2 oz. Martin Miller’s gin
1/2 oz. lemon juice
1/4 oz. St.-Germain Elderflower Liqueur

Shake over ice and fine strain into a chilled cocktail glass. Garnish with cucumber slices or strips of peel.

Smooth and sloe

August 28th, 2007

Food & Wine’s Mouthing Off reports today that Plymouth plans to introduce its sloe gin to US shores next year.

And now, the fun begins

August 27th, 2007

photo by Jennifer Hess

Do you know how many absinthe cocktails are in the Savoy Cocktail Book? According to the Real Absinthe blog, there are 104. One hundred and four recipes that geeks like me couldn’t easily mix in this country, thanks to the cost and difficulty of acquiring absinthe from overseas.

Now that Lucid is available domestically, those sad days have ended. Hm, 104. If I mixed up one absinthe cocktail a week, I’d have blog fodder for the next two years. I can’t guarantee that I’ll mix them that frequently, but I am damn well going to try all 104 of those drinks, as long as legal absinthe and my liver hold out.

And, no, that’s not a first-edition Savoy; it’s the facsimile release.

Bear with me…

August 21st, 2007

I’m working with Darcy O’Neil to test a new ad system, so things are going to shift around a just bit here.

I’m also considering going with Feedburner or adopting some sort of WordPress plugin to better manage my RSS feed. I want to drive eyes to the blog to read the full content, but at the same time, I want my snippets long enough to give readers a feel for what I’m writing about. A snippet that truncates after 25 words or so isn’t helpful.

For now, I’m using the More feature,

Satan’s whiskers

August 19th, 2007

photograph by Jennifer Hess

LeNell’s

August 17th, 2007

Just a quick note about this: since many of you met LeNell Smothers at Tales of the Cocktail this year, I wanted to put it out there that she’s lost the lease for her store in Brooklyn and is looking for a new storefront. She has to vacate by next summer. It might seem that 10-12 months is a long time, but when you have to find and possibly renovate a new location, that’s a crunch.

The Times has the full story. I meant to link out to this earlier, but the week got away from me.

She runs one of the best liquor stores in the whole damn country, and she’s a great person to boot, so keep her in your thoughts.

Salon’s summer swizzles sizzle

August 17th, 2007

To anyone clicking through from Salon.com, welcome. Snoop through the cabinets and make yourselves comfortable.

On Tuesday, I had the honor of joining Salon’s witty New York editorial team for its summer-cocktail contest. You’d search long to find a finer group of raconteurs and bon vivants. Sarah Karnasiewicz and her colleagues welcomed me not just to taste but to mix up a couple of batches as well, and I quickly felt like part of the team, even though I had just met everyone. My only regret is that I had to leave shortly after we finished the mixing and judging.

Sarah has posted the results of the contest, so pop over and find a new favorite! I’m a big fan of LUPEC Boston‘s Irma le Douce, but I’ll have to alter it for home use since Mrs. Bitters is allergic to grapefruit.

MxMo: Hair of the devil

August 13th, 2007

mxmo18-orange It’s fitting that this month’s MxMo should be about orange. Some of the first mixed drinks I ever quaffed had orange juice as an ingredient. In fact, I’ll let you in on an embarrassing secret, one that will no doubt get me 86′d from any bar that any of you might happen to tend or haunt… one of those orangey drinks was <cough>fzynvl</cough>. What can I say?! I was 14!

As an adult I traded up to the screwdriver, but it wasn’t long before that just seemed boring. I mean, voddy and OJ? Let me tell ya something, buddy–that crap’s just watered-down fruit juice.

And now, unfortunately, although I love orange juice, I seldom mix with it. Mrs. Bitters is allergic, I’m afraid. She can have neither orange nor grapefruit. Luckily, other citrus is clear, and that’s a good thing because without lemon or lime at my disposal, I wouldn’t bother with this site.

But that brings us to today’s MxMo, hosted by the zodiacal intoxicant herself, Gwen. The theme, orange.

Hi ho, hi ho, it’s off to work I go

August 10th, 2007

At pretty much the same moment that Mouthing Off, the Food & Wine blog, honors me by linking here, I have to announce that my presence will likely become more sporadic for a few weeks as I enter a heavy-overtime period at the day job. This will run well into October.

I will participate in MxMo on Monday, and I’m hoping to take part in September’s and October’s installments as well. I have a couple of ideas in mind for MxMo Oranj; which way I go will depend on what ingredients I can source.

I also want to continue to post weekly. I’ve finally reached a point where I’m writing at least twice a week, after a period where I was lucky to post that many times a month! I do think I can maintain weekly posting, but we’ll see. I’m actually hoping to post a bit more frequently than that, but I’m only promising myself once a week for now.

Edited to add: I’m well aware that my blog roll is out of date. I’m thinking of a complete overhaul of the blog roll’s categories, but that will take time, too.

A Dash of Bitters

A weblog detailing cocktails, spirits, liqueurs, barware, bars, and bitters. Maintained by Michael Dietsch, a writer and hobbyist mixer in Brooklyn.

Monthly Archives: August 2007