DesignInquiry09

Whoa, Swafford

Me: (click click click, drag drag drag, edit curves, blah blah) updating portfolio site.

Trey: (click click email, when are we going to practice) "Sean, have you tried the Swafford? I think it's my new favorite cocktail.

Me: (click search email history, find old email):
1 oz rye
1 oz applejack
1/2 oz maraschino liqueur
1/2 oz green chartreuse
stir, strain, orange twist

Me: "Hmm... check, check, check..." (pour, pour, clink, clink, swirl, swirl, strain, twiiiiiist, plop, sip) "Whoa. Swafford."

(click, blog, sip)

That pretty much catches us up.

p.s. new blog for design writing (no cocktails, sorry) www.seanwilkinsondesign.com/blog

Swine Wine

Pig Whiskey. Bacon Bourbon. What an amazingly delicious invention.

Using not-so-proprietary methods found online, with additional tips from the inestimable cocktailitarian Mr Myers, I infused some Wild Turkey with delicious applewood-smoked bacon. Basically, cook the shit out of some smoky bacon, strain 2 oz of the fat into 750 ml of bourbon, let sit 8–12 hours, freeze, remove frozen chunks of congealed fat, strain back into bottle. I stuck a charred stick of bacon in with the booze for good measure.

Why Wild Turkey? Because I like the subtle smoky flavor of Wild Turkey, it's affordable, and I knew it would then make the end product completely irresistible to one J. Ellis. You shall taste of the wonder, Ellis. Fret not.

This is for a BBQ on Friday, but I couldn't resist making one cocktail, as the picture might have given away. I got this PDT recipe from NYMagazine online.

Bacon Bourbon Old Fashioned:
2oz B-I Bourbon
1/4 oz maple syrup
2 dashes bitters
twist of orange

Stir, strain, twist. Restrain yourself.

It's such a perfect mix of savory, sweet, bitter, and... bacon. I upped the Bourbon by 1/2 ounce, added a third dash of bitters, and left the syrup as is, because I like my drinks a little less sweet. And I'll stand by that recipe. And I won't have any more until tomorrow. I swear.

In what is somehow a much stranger combination, Bakon Vodka. Someone else try that one for me. Although... I see a bacon bloody mary developing...

I should write more

And now maybe I'll have more time to write.

I parted ways with The Bollard last week. June was my last issue as Art Director/Designer. A new designer will be stepping in and I will be wishing them well and reading every issue and maybe attending the occasional cocktail tasting (yes please).

The 'Life,' she is like twisty road, with many forks. And my fork I chooses last week, she goes just left of Bollard Town.

Maybe I'll pontificate on this further sometime.

Maybe I'll just let it go.

Maybe I'll go listen to Surfer Rosa and drink some tea. Because my throat, she is sore.

New consumables

Emptying the camera for a trip downeast this weekend, and feeling the need to annotate a couple of photos. Consumables, to be precise.



First of all, I got some great old cocktail glasses at Goodwill. Proper little 4-ounce cocktail glasses that fit the classic cocktails perfectly. Crazy that what we consider cocktails these days consist of 8 to 10 ounces of booze. Anyway, these short glasses make the drinks much more satisfying. Without that 3 inches of dead space above the cocktail it seems so much more finished and refined.

This one happens to be what I've found to be my favorite new manhattan. Nearly perfect. 90 proof Bullitt bourbon, noilly prat sweet vermouth, a dash of maraschino liqueur, and a dash of absinthe. Twist of lemon, no cherry. I think this would be entirely perfect (if an entirely different drink) with some overproof rye. Alas, not in Maine. Have to place that DrinkUpNY.com order soon...



I had the urge for seafood the other night and decided to make some mussels. And a tomato and herb salad and some steamed asparagus. All good, but the highlight was a delicious Pimm's Cup (top left). I picked up the bottle of Pimm's #1 on sale, thinking it was more versatile. Apparently, though, as I'm searching through recipes, I'm finding that it's basically either added to lemonade, seven-up, sprite, or ginger ale. At least published in the popular sources. Maybe I'll have to make something up. In any case, the Pimm's Cup with ginger ale is a delight.

Speaking of delight, I'm currently watching the LOST recap they aired in place of an actual episode. New information would have been nice, but seeing this season's madness laid down in order is also pretty agreeable.



Speaking of making drinks up... the real reason I started writing this blog tonight. I bought a bottle of champagne yesterday (before I had to buy a $375 starter for the volkswagen) because I had some champagne cocktails I wanted to try out. First, the Prince of Wales's Cocktail, because I almost always have the ingredients on hand, short of the champagne, and it sounded delicious. Rye, Angostura Bitters, Lemon peel, Maraschino liqueur, and surprisingly, fresh pineapple. I always have these things. But I never have champagne. So I tried that cocktail, and it was pretty delicious. A little boring, compared to my later discovery, but tasty.

Then I made a French 75 (which I hear the White Heart makes a decent version of). Lemon juice, Gin, simple syrup, shaken, then champagne added to that with a cherry and a twist of lemon. It was delicious. And a little dangerous. Sweet, but packing a whollop (which I'm starting to feel now and need to head to bed). I wanted a second taste, but had squeezed the last ounce of lemon juice on hand. I did, however, have 2 blood oranges. I decided to substitute the blood orange juice for lemon, then considering how sweet blood oranges are, nixed the simple syrup. For an extra bite and layer of complexity, I added a good dash of absinthe. I'll transcribe the recipe below and strongly suggest that you try it out. It is by far the most successful invention I've had in the realm of cocktails.

2 oz gin (90° Plymouth is nice)
1 oz fresh squeezed blood orange juice
1 goodly dash of absinthe (or other pastis)

Shake the above with plenty of cracked ice. Strain into large cocktail glass or champagne flute. Add cold champagne to the glass and garnish with blood orange.

Glad I bought that bottle. Now to make up some Pimm's #1 drinks...

-s

O, Easter!

You're lucky I capitalized Easter, Jesus.

It's probably because I'm so excited about happening on what is perhaps the perfect Easter cocktail. As none of you probably know, I've been eschewing the bar drinking of late to parlay time, effort, and money into developing my own home bar. And also to decrease the fuzziness that the usual 'drink with the pack' mentality can produce.

I added a bottle of Absente absinthe, that king of the pastis, to the bar yesterday. So in honor of that AND the great undead jesus bunny performing feats of strength in boulder rolling and wound-fingering, I decided to find a drink containing both absinthe and egg (a common ingredient in many cocktails in the golden age of drinking).

I happened onto (thanks to the mighty CocktailDB) the 'Roselyn Variation.' And it may be the perfect Easter tipple. But it needs a new name. More on that later.

I had tried the original Roselyn last week, because I was looking for a grenadine-heavy drink to try out my newly homemade grenadine. It's a delicious classic-tasting but slightly sweet cocktail. 1.75 oz gin, .5 oz dry vermouth, and .25 oz grenadine. Stir with ice and strain into a cocktail glass.

The Roselyn Variation adds absinthe (or other pastis), lime juice, and egg white, and the result is really delicious. That same sweet fruitiness shows through, but it's backed up by a tart bite with subtle hints of anise. And it's all whipped into silky-smoothness by the egg white. It's as if the creator was inspired by a mix of fruity sweet jelly beans, with that sinister black jellybean interloper, and a touch of that christian bitter guilt that makes alcohol so important for those followers of the besandaled one.

O Sandaly Greatness! What shall we call this drink of drinks for your special day? The Frothy Wound Fingerer? Dogma Sour? Hijacked Druid Fertility Festival Fizz? Zoroaster Zinger? The possibilities are endless... Try one yourself and name accordingly.

1.5 oz gin
1/4 oz absinthe/pastis
1/4 oz grenadine
1/4 oz lime juice
1/2 egg white (Save the other half, you'll want two. Or make two and pour one out for your dead homie and hope that he has the good fortune of rising from the grave and lumbering about for three days before ascending to the heavens. I mean Heaven.)

-s

Jesus, I'm terrible at regular blogging

Oops. Shouldn't take the lord's name in vain on Palm Sunday.

Why am I writing today? Because I have work to do. Work to do is work to eschew. Things to ponder today as I sit in the penthouse suite of Trelawney Towers:

• should I place the order for unavailable-in-maine absinthe and overproof rye on drinkupny.com or place the order for the self-charging dock and remote for the Roomba... Or neither because it's a week away from tax day and I haven't yet begun to tabulate the terrible total that my year of full freelance has created...


• Should I really be returning a week's worth of emails when the sun is shining for the last time for the next 5 days? Wait, I know the answer to that one. No.

I probably also should not be blogging. I still hate the verb blog. I blogged. Yeah, I hate it.

Speaking of blogs (I'm totes okay with the noun form, and totes okay with the word totes), Best New Blog in Portland: PortlandFoodComa. Nice work, Joe. I'm still going to keep trying to weasel my way into one of these overindulgent evenings. Maybe if I bring illegal absinthe and 101 proof rye...

Speaking of which... mmm, delicious Double Cross martini.

-s