Algonquin

Time for a drink named after a hotel… a 1920s New York hotel at that. Browsing through the cocktail book I came across this drink as one I could make with the limited mixers I have on hand… so there you go. It comes from my favorite drink book, so it can’t be too bad, but the combo of ingredients sounds a little optimistic for my taste buds. I’ll report back on the reality below.

• 2 ounces rye
• 1 ounce pineapple juice
• 0.5 ounces dry Vermouth

Add everything to a cocktail shaker and stir over ice, strain into a chilled Martini glass.

Dave’s Thoughts:

• I was expecting this to be horrific if I am being honest, and the reality is that it’s surprisingly ok.
• Overall taste is dry pineapple juice (is that a thing?) with a kick.
• Something to serve for those in search of a unique libation.

Tasting Notes:

• Dave’s Rating: 7/10
• Strength: 4/10
• Sweetness: 6/10
• Proof that the end result can be better than the sum of its parts.

Jungle Bird

Tiki time, all the time. Last drink was a simple drink, this time its time for something a little more complex. Enter the Jungle Bird. Not sure how many more drink samples I can make before selecting the winning game beverage for the party. I’m starting to really like this Smugglers Cove book. Pick one up for yourself!

I’ll take suggestions on what to bring to the party…

• 2 ounces pineapple juice
• 0.5 ounce fresh lime juice
• 0.5 ounce Demerara syrup
• 0.75 ounce Campari
• 1.5 ounce dark rum

Fill a shaker with ice, add everything inside and give it a shake. Serve onto a Collins glass filled with ice.

Dave’s Thoughts:

• Sweet start, pineapple forward, but seconds later the bitter flavor of the Campari sits on your palette.
• It’s an interesting mix of flavors, I simultaneously like it and am unsure of it… So confusing.
• If you are a Campari fan in the mood for a sweet tiki cocktail, you should sign up for the Jungle Bird.

Tasting Notes:

• Dave’s Rating: 7/10
• Strength: 3/10
• Sweetness: 7/10
• I take a sip… Enjoy the sweet pineapple goodness… Then the Campari comes along to challenge my taste buds… So I take another sip and goodness returns.

Halekulani Cocktail

The tiki experiment continues. Researching drinks it is amazing the variety of ingredients included in tiki recipes. Almost as impressive is the care with which contents are selected. I mean, you can’t just call for simple syrup, you must use the demarera version for added punch. It makes it challenging to stock a bar with everything, but overall the effort rewards you with some fun tasting, and generally very strong, beverages.

• 1 ounce lemon juice
• 1 ounce orange juice
• 1 ounce pineapple juice
• 0.5 ounce Demarera syrup
• 1 teaspoon grenadine
• 3 ounces bourbon
• 2 dashes Angostura bitters

Throw everything in a cocktail shaker and fill with ice. Shake vigorously and strain into a Martini glass.

Dave’s Thoughts:

• Lots of juice and lots of sugar in here – this is in no way a diabetic friendly drink.
• You have to like sweet, but leaves you with a tart finish.
• No one will ever guess that there is liquor in here unless they watch you make it… Or drink more than one.

Tasting Notes:

• Dave’s Rating: 7/10
• Strength: 2/10 (but it’s hiding)
• Sweetness: 10/10
• In the tradition of a good tiki cocktail… Lots of juice and plenty of liquor to sneak up on you!

Mary Pickford

Who is this Mary? Apparently she acted her way to start United Airlines – go figure. To enhance the legend, during Prohibition she was hanging out in Havana and this drink was a popular libation of the time. This recipe comes courtesy of Smugglers Cove – so be sure to order one up next to you take a visit to their Tiki bar in San Francisco.

• 1.5 ounces pineapple juice
• 1 bar spoon grenadine
• 6 drops of maraschino liqueur
• 1.5 ounces aged rum

Fill a cocktail shaker with ice and the ingredients, shake vigorously and strain into a chilled martini glass. Drink up! Dave’s Thoughts:

• The drink is an interesting combination of sweet with the complication of the maraschino. The flavor is unique and something that would be fun to serve to a house guest.
• Leaves you with the slightly bitter aftertaste of the maraschino.
• Looks as good as it tastes, the pineapple juice helps leave a nice froth that ups the presentation.

Tasting Notes:

• Dave’s Rating: 8/10
• Strength: 5/10
• Sweetness: 7/10
• One thing is sure, its a hell of a lot better than any cocktail you can enjoy on the friendly skies of United today!

Lauwiliwilinukunuku’oi’oi

A new drink book showed up in the house this weekend in preparation for a Tiki party that we will be part of next weekend. This particular book is the official Smugglers Cove guide to all things Tiki, including a number of recipes from the world famous restaurant.

While we have not had time to digest all of the advice within, we did at least take the time to flip through the pages and find a couple of drinks to sample. Look for the second cocktail in my next blog post! I wish this cocktail had the most ridiculous name in the book, but it actually isn’t!

• 0.75 ounce lemon juice
• 0.75 ounce pineapple juice
• 0.5 ounce orgeat syrup
• 2 ounce blended aged rum
• 2 dashes Peychaud’s Bitters

Fill a cocktail shaker with crushed ice, and add all of the ingredients. Shake vigorously and poor (ice and all) into a double old fashioned glass. Garnish with a maraschino cherry.

Dave’s Thoughts:

• From the first taste, this is all Tiki. It’s sweet, it’s got rum and it has a distinct almond flavor.
• Despite the long list of ingredients, it’s an easy cocktail to make, and likely would be a good candidate for a premixed drink at a party.
• It’s a very sweet drink, leaving the sweetness in the back of your mouth long after you swallow its goodness.

Tasting Notes:

• Dave’s Rating: 9/10 (if you like some Tiki)
• Strength: 4/10 (lots of juice)
• Sweetness: 10/10
• With a bit of practice, the name is not that hard to pronounce to order at a bar, but I’m guessing they will just look back at you with a blank stare.

Nacional

The second drink of Christmas has arrived!  Just in time to help with a weekend of holiday shopping.  Malls full of people trying desperately to think of something creative for their loved ones.  The only problem is when they return to work in the new year, the realize that they all received the same sweater and trinket that was on sale at Macy’s.  I guess I shouldn’t be so jaded… it is a nice sweater after all,

To help with the holiday shopping, along comes the Nacional.  Drink enough of these and you too will be a creative force, turning over every pile of clothes in the mall to find that different sweater,  You know the one that somehow didn’t get marked down like the rest of them, and really looks no better.  But damn it, it’s different.  Mission accomplished.

It seems like this drink has a high standard to reach, so let’s give it a try.

• 1.5 ounces gold rum
• 0.75 ounces apricot brandy
• 0.75 ounces pineapple juice
• 0.25 ounces lime juice

Serve this once in a martini glass after shaking everything over ice.

Dave’s Thoughts:

• The combination of apricot brandy, rum and pineapple juice make this a sweet drink.
• Essentially a “complex” pineapple juice.  It’s hard to discern the other ingredients, but you can tell something is there,
• When drinking this in martini sized portions, it seems like it disappears too fast.  So one leads to two… all the better to lighten your mood.

Tasting Notes:

• Dave’s Rating 8/10
• Strength: 4/10
• Sweetness: 9/10
• A nice gateway martini for those who are scared of “short” format drinks.

Park Avenue Cocktail

This year for Christmas my wife treated me to a new cocktail book to expand my horizons and allow me to keep expanding my experiment in mixology that is DaveDrinks.  This book is a great one full of classic cocktails, and is appropriately named “Vintage Spirits and Forgotten Cocktails” by Ted Haigh.  It’s a fascinating book, with many interesting tidbits, although unsurprisingly, many of the drinks contain a difficult to acquire ingredient not found in the modern bar.  There are exceptions of course, and tonight I tried the Park Avenue Cocktail.

According the Haigh, “This drink is synonymous with wealth, power, and luxury in New York City”.  That’s high praise for a cocktail, so let’s see how I feel after a sample…

• 2 ounces gin
• 0.75 ounces pineapple juice
• 0.75 ounces sweet vermouth
• 2 teaspoons orange curacao

Shake it all over ice and serve it up in a martini glass, simple enough.

Dave’s Thoughts:

• It starts dry, has a just perceptively sweet middle and ends dry again.  You should enjoy your gin before sampling this wealthy beverage.
• I’m not sure how the drink earned it’s powerful moniker, as to me it tastes of a softened dry martini.
• Don’t be confused with its three luxurious sweet sounding ingredients, there is only a hint of the sweet pineapple flavor.

Tasting Notes:

• Dave’s Rating: 6/10
• Strength: 5/10
• Sweetness: 4/10
• I tried to be witty and note its wealthy, powerful and luxurious qualities, but honestly, I didn’t think these were the best descriptors as I tasted.  On the whole, and ok classic cocktail, very middle of the road.

Sorry for the lack of a picture – just wasn’t feeling photographic tonight!

 

Rum Shake

I’ve been drinking a lot of bourbon lately – my drink of the month appears to be a Manhattan, as every drink I order in a bar has a 50% chance of being a Makers Manhattan. It’s a lovely drink, but I needed some variety, so a flipped through my “World Bartender Guide” on the lookout for something that sounded very different. With that I stumbled on the Rum Shake.

At first read you might think that this was a desert cocktail with some dairy product thrown in for fun, but alas, the ingredients give way to a Caribbean themed drink with a little rum and pineapple juice. Then the curveball is Pernod. Let’s give her a whirl.

• 1.5 ounces dark rum
• 0.75 ounces Pernod
• 2 ounces pineapple juice

Shake everything over ice, and strain into an ice filled rocks glass.

Dave’s Thoughts:

• There’s definitely some interesting flavors in here.  The pineapple and the Pernod set each other off quite well.
• In the tradition of Caribbean rum cocktails, you can’t really taste any liquor in here.
• It drinks heavy, its frothy and rich like a shake – now I understand the name.

Tasting Notes:

• Dave’s Rating: 7/10
• Strength: 4/10
• Sweetness: 7/10
• According to plan, this is a different cocktail to try when you are craving a sweet alternative.

Honolulu Lulu

I’m seventy or so posts in, and today I am having a bout of writers block.  What’s a blogger to do?  Maybe it’s because it’s Blah Blah Blah Day, maybe it’s because I just wrote a check to Uncle Sam, I dunno.  Instead of wasting your time with more words, let’s just focus on the drink – the Honolulu Lulu.

• 1.5 ounces dark rum (Myers)
• 1 ounce light rum (Bacardi)
• 1 ounce Frangelico
• 0.5 ounce Kahlua
• 3 ounces pineapple juice
• 1 ounce lime juice
• 1 tablespoon simple syrup

Mix everything over ice and shake, serve in a tall collins glass over ice.  Garnish with a lime wedge if desired.

Dave’s Thoughts:

• An interesting drink, nice and sweet flavor of pineapple, and the interesting taste of coffee in the background, like rum punch meets Columbia.
• The rum disappears, although I am sure it helps the enjoyment…
• More writers block, let’s just say its good.

Tasting Notes:

• Dave’s Rating: 8/10
• Strength: 6/10
• Sweetness: 8/10
• Try this as a great summer cocktail – you will not regret it.

East India

I am so happy today.  The wife is coming home from being away on business/pleasure to New York and Chicago for the last 8 days – and I have to say she is missed.  I cannot wait until tomorrow, when I no longer have to eat McDonald’s three meals a day, have to pick out my outfits unassisted and, most importantly, drink alone.  Alas, she is not arriving until later this evening – so one final solo cocktail is in order – the East India.

• 1.5 ounces brandy (Spanish)
• 0.25 ounce Cointreau
• 1.5 ounces pineapple juice
• Dash of Angostura bitters

Shake everything over ice and serve in a chilled martini glass.  Garnish with a lemon twist and a maraschino cherry.

Dave’s Thoughts:

• Basic flavor is pineapple, but it is subtle, almost like a cocktail with infused liquor and not one containing real juice.
• Very mellow drink, and a little on the sweet side.  Easy to sip and enjoy.
• The finish is a mix of sweet pineapple and the complexity of the brandy.

Tasting Notes:

• Dave’s Rating: 8/10
• Strength: 6/10
• Sweetness: 7/10
• Exceedingly well-balanced cocktail, if you want and easy sipping martini with the friendly taste of pineapple – you should give this a try.