EMBURY COCKTAILS

A Great Day in Cocktails

For Inside F & B's second annual "Best Drink I Had All Year" article I just wrote up something I had after last years pre-Tales Pig & Punch Volunteer Day, organized by San Francisco's cocktail A Team, the Bon Vivants (Josh Harris & Scott Baird). Above, the assembled cocktail army in front of Ruby H. Lee High School in New Orleans, where we painted an entire floor of the buidling (31 rooms) over the course of a very productive day.

If you want something done, give it to a bartender. The project-driven spirit of the coprs meant efficient teamwork and lots of it.

And lots of painting corners.

The day wasn't all drudgery by any means; Godfather of the Austin cocktail scene Bill Norris chats up a dapper Yorick.

At lunchtime a killer food truck roledl up--above, Milagro's Jaime Salas.

Not everyone was a bartender--Left, Emil Jattne of Brooklyn Gin.

Then it was back to work for another 4 hours, followed by a bus drive back to Bon Vivants Tales' HQ, a sprawling second floor apartment near Frenchmen Street, for debriefing and cocktails. 

Actually, it was more like beer: lots and lots of cold, refreshing beer in cans. But there was plenty of Tequila Ocho in the house..

Host Harris above with a cache of Tequila Ocho minis.

A serious game of dominoes broke out the minute we arrived.

Ample ink on display on that veranda.

Houston Eaves of San Antonio's Esquire Tavern (our prior post on Houston's cocktails here.)

Bon Vivant team member Ruby Wilson made a Mello Ocho for me, the  traditional Volunteer Day cocktail (read more about it at Inside F & B). Tequila Ocho, rocks from an ice tray, Mello Yello, a pinch of sea salt and a lime--stirred by knife, a key part of this traditional volunteer day lo-fi cocktail. Salty, tangy, and so damn refreshing after working hard all day in the intense humidity of New Orleans in late July.

As a photographer sometimes your camera is just drawn to certain people in a group; Ruby's perpetually elegant stance kept drawing my lens to her. It wasn't until I reviewed the photos that I realized that something about her reminded me of Sargent's Madame X.

As the sun finally began to set the cellphones came out and the party slowly broke up as everyone set forth for their evening's adventures. The 85 plus who joined for the day's good work were all on a collective high of doing good. For info on how to pitch in for this year's 4th Annual Pig & Punch Volunteer Day the Tuesday before Tales gets underway (July 16th) contact Josh Harris at [email protected].

Cynar Cocktail Contest & The Search for Delicious

I attended the first ever Cynar cocktail competition the other night at the Trump Soho (which is nowhere  as tacky as you'd expect!) I took a friend who'd never experienced the Italian aperitivo that's made from a blend of artichoke leaves and herbs infused in an alcohol base. He declared all five entries to be delicious, and I'm not sure how much of his response came from how good the cocktails were (all very good) and how much from the uncommonly harmonious combination of  savory and sweet the spirit acheives. Both, probably. The big surprise to me was how well the spirit mixes--5 cocktails, 5 varied approaches, and I daresay 5 complete successes. And, for the most part, quite easy to make at home with some simple prep. I was also reminded of Kirk Estopinal of Cure in New Orlean's and his sumptuous "The Search for Delicious".  That's below, and below that is the complete list of entrants in the Cynar contest, with recipes.

The Search for Delicious

2 oz Cynar
3/4 oz Punt e Mes
15-21 drops of lemon juice
6 dashes Regan's bitters
2 pinches sea salt
5 swaths of lemon peel

Start with one "baker's" pinch of salt in a rocks glass. Add the Cyanr and briefly stir. Add the Punt e Mes, bitters, lemon juice and ice. Stir briefly to incorporate. Taste, looking for only the faintest hint of salt. If the drink tastes salty, throw out your first attempt and adjust your salt levels. When the salt level is correct, express the oil from five swatch of lemon peel onto teh sruface of teh cocktail, dropping one in along the side of teh galss, skin side facing in. An 1/8 rim of salt will allow your guest to experiment with a few salty sips. Making the following sips pleasantly sweet, which will not make your brain hurt.

IL MIO RAGAZZO (MY ITALIAN BOYFRIEND) Pictured above, and winner of First Place, created by Tina Michelle Braunstein, Empire Rooftop, NYC. Winner selected by party guests.)

1 1/2 oz  Cynar.
1  oz  Martin Miler's Gin.
1  oz Trader Joe's orange, mango, peach juice.
2  dashes Regan's Orange bitters.
Splash Fresh squeezed Lemon Juice.
Sicilian sea salted cucumber (for garnish)

Stir over ice everything but the garnish  =  the Cynar,  the gin,  the 2 juices and the bitters.  Then serve straight up in a chilled cocktail glass. Garnish with a cucumber wheel salted with sicilian sea salt, floating on top.

 
TEAM CYNAR: (Clockwise, starting lower left) Raphael Reyes, Tina Michelle Braunstein, Jessica Butt of Heaven Hill, Jonathan Pogash of USBG, James Menite, Justin James Noel & Nic Hirsch.

COMPLETE LISTING OF RECIPES AFTER THE JUMP

The Gunshop Fizz

[Ed. Note: we posted this video sometime back, but when the recipe showed up in the new issue of Out I thought it was time for a revisit. And as spring sweeps across the Northeast this bitters & citrus fantasia seemed like a perfect cocktail for a night with a hint of summer in the air. There's a bit of prep involved and one does need ample Peychaud's bitters--which you should always have on hand, anyway---but it's worth the effort. iPhone and iPad friendlier versions on YouTube here. J.R.]The Gunshop Fizz is Kirk Estopinal's counter-intuitive bitters-based cocktail developed for the book he's co-authored, "Rogue Cocktails". Kirk and fellow author/curator Maksym Pazuniak, both of the New Orleans' marvelous craft cocktail oasis Cure, have rounded up some high-flying, so-crazy-they-just-might work recipes from bartenders around the country and assembled the thrilling results. As Kirk says, "These are drinks they sound like they would be terrible-but they're incredible." I  tasted a lot of them during Tales Of The Cocktail and they were among the best cocktails I encountered during the extremely drinks-rich week. Kirk's Peychaud's-heavy Fizz is a perfect example of the form. Don't be afraid, be inspired. J.R.

THE GUNSHOP FIZZ

2 oz Peychaud's bitters
1 oz lemon juice
1 oz simple syrup
2 strawberries
3 cucumber slices
3 swaths of grapefruit peel
3 swath of orange peel
Sanbitter

Add all the ingredients except Sanbitter into a mixing tin. Muddle and set aside for two minutes to allow the flavors to blend.

Add ice, shake and strain over fresh ice in a collins glass; top with Sanbitter. Garnish with a cucumber slice.

Cure
Rogue Cocktails

Wednesday's Cocktails: Poolside Sangria & Spicy Pepino

Two more today from the poolside Tres Generaciones party in New Orleans. The Poolside Sangria defied two strong convictions I'd held for decades: first, that tequila and white wine should never, ever play together and second, that peach schanpps should never, ever be played with period. Two simply brutal hangovers from senior year at Catlin Gabel High School led to these aversions.  But Bobby Gleason's winning white tequila-gria (sorry) cleared those misconceptions right up. The Poolside Sangria is perfect for wilted guests seeking relief on a blazingly hot summer afternoon, instantly delivering cottonmouth-grade refreshment and almost just as instantly an inescapable sense of euphoria. Crying out to be batched as a punch, this one.

3G POOLSIDE SANGRIA

1.25 oz Tres Generaciones Plata
.50 oz DeKuyper Peachtree
1.50 oz Fresh Lemon Sour*
1.50 oz Sauvignon Blanc

Build cocktail over ice, garnish with a sliced strawberry a thin lemon wheels.

The more Tabasco that can be added to drinks the better. The jalapeno and Green Tabasco in the Spicy Pepino rocks some serious heat, but the cucumber and cilantro soothe your tongue. Another party-starter.

SPICY PEPINO

1.50 oz. Tres Generaciones Plata
2.0 oz. Fresh Lemon Sour*
3 - ½” slices of peeled cucumber
¼ cup fresh Cilantro leaves (15-20 leaves)
1/3” slice of fresh Jalapeño pepper or 2-3 dashes of Green Tabasco Sauce

In a mixing glass muddle the pepper first then add cucumber and cilantro and muddle again. Now add remaining ingredients and shake vigorously with ice. Double strain using a fine mesh strainer into a chilled cocktail glass,

Garnish with a cucumber wheel on the rim and a floating cilantro leaf.

* HOW TO MAKE FRESH LEMON SOUR: "I use a mix of lemon juice and simple syrup. I always start with 3 parts lemon juice and 2 parts simple syrup (equal parts sugar and water) then adjust them there. I feel it is always better to be a bit tart and add a sweetener to the cocktail because if it is too sweet you can't take sugar out. Some people will use a ratio of equal parts lemon juice + simple syrup + water."

Bobby Gleason, Beam Global Ambassador.

Cross Training Monday: WWOZ 90.7 FM, New Orleans

 

As what feels like the entire spirit and cocktail world begins its annual exodus to New Orleans for Tales Of The Cocktail (who's manning the bars back home this week?), there's only one appropriate soundtrack to accompany packing: WWOZ 90.7 FM, NOLA's Jazz & Heritage Station. The DJs cover an incredibly wide range of what we may as well call soul--blues, Soul, Reggae, Dub, Trip Hop, jazz of all stripes. It's soul music, because it's so unabashedly real, felt, authentic and unvarnished: an exact antidote to the glossy, periptatic way of life in most northern cities, and a bracing dose of raw music that's a tonic after the pervasive electronic soundtrack that dominates  modern life, whether it's from the radio or your cell phone. None of that here. While packing for Embury's first foray into the boozy, schmoozy educational fray of Tales Sunday night I was serenaded by Nina Simone, Black Uhuru and Massive Attack vs The Mad Proffessor. This morning it's rootsy jazz, just the kind you expect to hear wafting from open windows on a hot summer day in The Quarter. It's also soothing music after a big night; I expect nothing but from this trip. The constant announcements of shows around town are dizzying to a live music fan, and provide a sort of map of where to go to hear what--the station as a whole is a aural map of a town so unbelievably rich in music. Mike Kobrin, an old pal from our tech writing days in New York City,  moved down to New Orleans last year and is now the Web Editor for WWOZ. He also plays jazz trumpet around town, thereby acheiving as serious a quality of life upgrade as any I've heard of in a while. He's been appointed to be the local Embury point person this week--and we'll be doing out best to stop into the station to see where the real magic still happens, too.

WWOZ 90.7 FM,