A Quick Drink: The Daiquiri

There has been a lot of talk about Go Cups lately. I am not sure who started this ruckus; but quite frankly, it has me craving a daiquiri. The daiquiri, besides being one of those confusing to spell words, began its life in humble circumstances. It soon immigrated from its native Cuba to the United States where it became bastardized into a frozen concoction built for getting teenager girls who don't like the taste of alcohol drunk. While I have no personal qualms with the frozen daiquiri, a true daiquiri does not dispense from a machine.

A good daiquiri should be three things and three things only: cold, balanced, and simple. Think of it as the roast chicken of the cocktail world. How it is made says more about the bartender than his credit score. The tartness of lime juice should blend harmoniously with the rum and simple syrup. The drink should be slightly cloudy from a vigorous shake, with maybe a few shards of ice floating on top. Bayou Rum has become my daiquiri rum this summer. It has a light hint of sweetness that I find allows me to cut back on the simple syrup without comprising the balance of the drink. Look, I'd rather DRINK my sugar than drink my sugar if you catch my drift.

As far as my opinion on Go Cups, let's just say when the City Council says there is no prohibition against Go Cups and then lists all the ways they limit Go Cups, I see no dichotomy in that. Or the fact that the main reason they give for not allowing new places to have Go Cups is litter. Meanwhile, six blocks away from my house, Claiborne Ave. is strewn with litter from Popeyes, Wendy's, McDonald's, Walgreens, and just about any other spot on the road. Funny, I don't recall any provisos limiting their ability to litter the neighborhoods. Or the fact that sometimes neighborhood groups don't request a Go Cup proviso but the City Planning Commission adds one anyway. But hey, nothing to see here.

Solution? Have another daiquiri. You'll feel much better.

Daiquiri

2 oz Bayou Silver Rum
.5 oz of simple syrup
Juice of three-quarters of a lime (use other quarter for a lime wheel) or .75 oz fresh squeezed lime juice

Chill a coupe or similar glass vessel.

Combine rum, simple syrup, and lime juice. Add ice. Shake it like it stole from you. Strain into chilled coupe. Add lime wheel. Drink quickly.

A Quick Drink: The Aperitif

Sometimes it is a relatively mild summer afternoon. Perhaps you are all out of beer and wine seems too demanding for the occasion. A cocktail could work but you aren't quite ready to delve into the high octane of a Saturday night. What is the intrepid drinker to do? Pour yourself an aperitif.

Aperitif comes from the ancient Latin phrase meaning "The food isn't quite ready, honey, distract them with more booze." In general, these are low alcohol quaffers meant to stimulate the appetite. Think of it as the foreplay to a Roman orgy of eating or drinking. Vermouths, pastis, bitter beverages like Campari, and fortified wines, such as sherry, are examples of aperitifs. They are light, interesting, flirty and just the perfect little sip -  the summer romance of the drinking world. Now, I won't try to convince you that I begin every evening with a pull of rare vermouth, a conversation with great aunt Mildred, and a Cole Porter record. However, on a Saturday afternoon, once all the chores are complete, I like one to three.

My preference is for Lillet blanc (pronounced with a soft et, i.e. not pronounced like the restaurant, Lilette). Lillet is refreshing blend of traditional white Bordeaux grapes and citrus flavors plus other proprietary botanicals. Serve it well chilled. This time of year, dropping in a few slices of Chilton County peaches won't hurt. The peaches don't add much to the Lillet, but once you've polished off a few glasses of Lillet, the peaches taste much better than God ever intended.

A Campari and soda with a fat wedge of orange or lemon does well in pinches, if you don't have all the materials for a Negroni (hint: you should). Try an inverted Manhattan with vermouth and rye swapping proportions. And hey, should the afternoon bleed into the night, Champagne is an aperitif in my book. Just make sure to give me a call.

A Quick Drink: Old Fashioned

Just because Matt Weiner has taken his Don Draper ball and gone home for the summer, doesn't mean you need to give up drinking like Duck Phillips. The Old Fashioned is a simple cocktail combining a base spirit with bitters, sugar, and usually some type of fruit or zest. Rumor has it it got its name from a salty patron who had grown tired of fancy cocktails and demanded something "old fashioned". More importantly, this anecdote confirms that animosity towards newfangled drinking ways is nothing new.

What I've done here is taken out the simple syrup and/or muddled oranges. Instead, imagine a maitre'd standing in front of a gueridon with your order of crepes suzette. What he might do (and they were all men when this went on so I am only slightly sexist) is take a sugar cube and rub it across the skin of orange. The white cube turning a pale orange as the intense citrus oils latched onto the sugar. Do the same thing here and you will get the effect of orange without all the cloying sweetness of orange juice. I like a high proof bourbon or rye, but don't get too fancy with your booze or some salty barfly might call you an insufferable whippersnapper.

An Old Fashioned

2 oz of bourbon or rye
1 demerara sugar cube
1 orange
2-3 dashes of bitters (your choice, Peychaud's, Angostura, or Orange)

Rub the sugar cube on all six sides across the flesh of the orange. You really want to scratch the hell out of it. Place sugar cube in mixing glass, add bitters, and muddle briefly. Add bourbon or rye and ice and stir about 63 rotations. Stain into a rocks glass with a few cubes of ice. Garnish with an orange peel.

A Quick Drink: Rose

"I f%&#ing love rose!"

One of us over here at Blackened Out Delinquent Bloggers, et al. is very fond of saying the above quote. But to allow both of us to tell our mothers the other one is the foulmouthed brat, we will keep his identity a mystery. What is rose? Well besides the single best overall food wine? Rose is a fantastic summertime wine. Rose is also perfect in the wintertime when infected with secondary fermentation and turned into Rose Champagne. Rose is the perfect funeral wine. One thing is for certain, The Biebs isn't putting on a leather shirt, sipping rose, and sitting courtside at a petanque match anytime soon.

Rose is a good wine to drink while swimming laps or lounging on the beach. Rose's color makes it a perfect match for front porch sitting or intensive games of Trivial Pursuit. We recently returned from a beach vacation where we succeeded in setting a new land speed record for rose consumption. Rose is best consumed in pairs of two; our record is about a half a case over a long afternoon. Good luck trying to top it. But if you attempt it, invite us over.

Basically rose denotes a wine in which the grape juice is allowed a very brief period of contact with the skins. The skins give the wine color and a distinctive dryness. Rose is a staple in the South of France, typically Provence, where the immense heat of summer and temperamental mistral of winter tends to make producing affordable wines of either white or red character difficult. So Provence's offering to inventions's mother is rose. If you've been to Provence, you likely believe in heaven. This is God's juice.

The wine pictured above however, those of you with a rudimentary understanding of Basque language will understand, is not Provencal rose. Instead, I've shown you what is one of the least talked about fantastic wines in the world. A txakolina rose from Ameztoi produced just outside of San Sebastien, which has a slight effervescence. In fact, I think it is the best wine in the world under $20 a bottle.

But you want to know my favorite part of rose wine? No one ever pays attention to or bothers to develop lengthy, boring, erudite tasting nights about rose. Rose is a fun, uncomplicated wine.  Seek it out and drink it up. You will thank me later this summer.

A Quick Drink: Riesling

You and I aren't drinking enough Riesling (pronounced Reese's Peanut Butter Cups). The International Association of Riesling Exporters and Importers' (IAREI) states that the average American drinks only 1 tablespoon of Riesling every two years. Art Vandelay, head of the IAREI, recently expressed his firm desire to "get that number up to 1/4 cup at least every eighteen months."

Well, you might be saying, why should I drink more Riesling? Chances are you are going to go out for spicy food, seafood, barbecue, or Asian food soon. Likely the waiter will come by first to take your drink order and you will request something disgusting like sweet tea or Pepsi. The reason you want these drinks is because of their inherent sweetness. Sweetness brings stability and helps balance out aggressive, bold flavors. Put down the sweet tea and ask for a Riesling instead.

What is Riesling? Riesling is a type of grape, grown mainly in Germany, but also Germany-light (Alsace), the Finger Lakes Region of New York, and other cool areas, such as Washington State and Sean Payton's bachelor pad. Besides having a touch of sweetness or honey on the palate, Rieslings can also have some acidity which makes them the George Gershwin of wines. You can pair them up with fancy food like smoked salmon and caviar or dress them down and pair with boiled crawfish. Try it with poached salmon with a grapefruit and ginger beurre blanc.

In short, drink more Riesling.

Grapefruit and Ginger Beurre Blanc

I use less butter than is traditionally called for per Ms. Child's classic recipe, as I do not think you really need 2 sticks of butter to achieve a rich and luxurious sauce. But look, Mrs. Child is probably right.

1 Shallot, minced
1 joint of ginger about the size of your thumb, peeled and roughly chopped
3 tablespoons of grapefuit juice
3 tablespoons of white wine
8 tablespoons of butter
Salt and Pepper, to taste

In a saucepan, combine the shallots, ginger, a pinch of salt, a few cracks of pepper, wine, grapefruit juice and 3 tablespoons of butter and bring to a rapid boil. Allow this mixture to reduce to a syrupy consistency. Take the remaining 5 tablespoons of butter and cut into small pieces roughly the size of your thumbnail. Or if you are a giant, the size of your pinky nail.

Strain the reduced sauce into a clean, unheated sauce pan. Immediately, add 2 pieces of the reserved 5 tablespoons of butter. Whisk furiously. Then, place pan on low heat and whisk in the remaining butter and remove from heat. Taste, adjust for seasoning, and spoon over poached or grilled fish for best results.

A Quick Drink: German Lager

Sometimes you just want a beer that tastes like beer. Of course, each beer drinker has their own expectations and biases about what beer should taste like. I enjoy a beer that makes me remember my first sip of beer. Maybe you were eight or ten, but at some point, you took a sip of beer when someone's back was turned. Your face promptly contorted into something resembling Jim Carrey's funny days. That will always mean, to me at least, a beer that sort of tastes like Dixie. Albeit, now I want a better version of that.

Lagers. That is what I reach for. These beers are fermented at colder temperatures resulting in a crisper, more refreshing beer than its richer cousin, ales. The Germans are really good at a few things: dismantling Barcelona with efficiency and ruthlessness, invading (but not conquering) other countries, engineering, turtlenecks, and brewing beer. Ayinger is my German lager of choice. This one here is called Jahrhundert Bier which means (pardon my German) "A beer perfect for after cutting one's grass."

A Quick Drink: Beer and Pizza

I can hear the beer nerds now. "Beer and pizza? That's the best you could do for an article on the greatness of beer and food pairings?" They will scream that beer is much more than just a foil for pizza and much more than just something to chug while watching the ball game. Beer is sophistication. Beer is how humankind survived when there was not an adequate water supply.  They would suggest trying an ultra hopped, smoked barley, green tea and raspberry infused lambic with a sauteed duck breast with kim chi Brussels sprouts.

In a way they would be correct.

But no pairing in the arena of food and beverage can beat beer and pizza, not even milk and chocolate chip cookies. A crisp yet chewy dough's faint yeastiness, the acidic vibrancy of marinara, the salty, creaminess of cheese, herbs, and myriad toppings are just tailored man for a quality beer. With pizza, I like a beer with more than a touch of hoppiness and a decent heft, but with enough bubbles to help scrub your mouth to prepare it for the next bite. Pale Ales and their sub genre, India Pale Ales offer this in spades. The immense hops of pale ales and IPAs bring both a welcome acidity and bitterness. Whereas sometimes sauvignon blanc is described as a squirt of lemon, an IPA to me is like biting into the rind of a lemon that has been cross bred with a pinecone, in a pleasant way. They are just heavy enough to remind you to take it easy without weighing you down. This is key in a pizza eating marathon. Some I have particularly enjoyed as of late are the Green Flash Brewing Co. West Coast IPA, the Southern Star Pine Belt Ale, and NOLA Brewing Co. Hopitoulas.


Grab some beers from the store, invite over the neighbors and friends and throw a pizza party. Its better than making your own kim chi Brussels sprouts.

A Quick Drink: White Burgundy

There are three main areas of Burgundy which produce white wine. From north to south they are: Chablis, Cote de Beaune, and Maconnais. Each of those areas can be further divided by village or vineyard. That is a chore you can study on your own time. There are also wines simply labeled Bourgogne, which for one reason or another can't be classified by region, village, or vineyard. The French hold grudges and luckily for you this means there is the opportunity to grab some great wines at a low price.

Burgundy is the land of the negociant. A negociant buys grapes from growers and turns it into wine. So a good way to find which wines you like from Burgundy is to start by figuring out which negociants you like. Their names are on the label making it easy for you to remember.

Chablis: The wines of Chablis are generally high in acid and perfect with raw or lightly cooked seafood. Think of Chablis as still Champagne; it isn't a perfect analogy but it will get you there. The wines of Chablis go particularly well with most of the crabmeat, crawfish, shrimp dishes in the New Orleans culinary canon. In a crowded room, if you note that it is steely, lemon kissed, or that it is like drinking seashells, people will probably think you are goober who knows a lot about wine.

Cote de Beaune: According to some, birth order is everything. Usually the middle child suffers from a lack of attention and does crazy things like drop out of college and follow String Cheese Incident. But here, in Burgundy, the middle child is thriving. In fact the wines from the Cote de Beaune give the region its gravitas. Read here: there are some shockingly expensive wines that hedge fund managers covet. Of course, there are plenty of fantastic options for those of us balling on a budget. Look for the name Mersault or Puligny-Montrachet on the label. Suggesting that this wine would be perfect with lobster with tarragon cream sauce or veal tenderloin with mushrooms should make people wonder if you are in the 1%.

Maconnais: The further south you go in many countries, the warmer and friendlier the people become. The food is generally better, also. The wines of Maconais are good wines to sip at the end of the day while you cook dinner. If you are getting married or throwing a party, pick a wine from Maconnais as your white. People will thank you. These wines are unfussy, simple pleasures which get along with a wide range of foods. There is no better co-pilot for roast chicken than a Macon-Villages. Best of all, these wines are generally affordable enough to make opening a second bottle a no-brainer.

A Quick Drink: Champagne Cocktail

Welcome the newest soon to be abandoned Blackened Out Series: A Quick Drink. A Quick Drink will be a brief glance at a cocktail, bottle of wine, or pint of beer. No pretentious tasting notes, immersion circulator fueled infusions , or overly flowery descriptions of hops that sound like descriptions of potent marijuana. Just booze, served up neatly. 

The three biggest improvements in American dining in the last ten years have involved roast chicken, hamburgers, and cocktails. Cocktails, perhaps more than anything, have benefited from increased attention to sourcing and improved techniques from bartenders. A well-curated list of house made cocktails employing elderberry shrub and house made nocello is so standard it must be given out with a liquor license. All of that is well and fine but sometimes you need to pour drinks in a hurry and you aren't going to shrub your own elderberry. Scoff not wine nerds, cocktail connoisseurs are just following in your well-trodden foot steps. Beer geeks, you aren't far behind to the path to ubiquity and a touch of over saturation.

The Champagne Cocktail is a fantastic flourish and can be prepared with stuff you probably have around the house. I've taken a couple liberties with this drink. First, don't use Champagne. If you are buying real deal Champagne, don't use it in a cocktail unless you want to be painted as a ne'er-do-well or worse, a charlatan. A fifteen dollar Cava Brut, St. Hillaire, prosecco, or Californian sparkling will do.

Second, ditch the champagne flute. I know it is pretty and traditional, but you don't get enough juice to balance out the sweetness of the sugar cube. And while you can probably get five ounces in a champagne flute, it will more than likely spill out of the glass. Use a large wine glass instead. Thirdly, ditch the traditional lemon twist. Use a orange bitters in its place, which delivers the citrus punch without the fussiness and sadomasochism of twisting and bending a lemon peel.

Champagne Cocktail

1 sugar cube, I like the brown demerara  kind
2 dashes of Peychaud's Bitters
2 dashes of orange bitters
5 oz sparkling wine

Place sugar cube in bottom of wine glass, add bitters. Pour sparkling wine in glass. Serve immediately; the sugar will continue to dissolve as you sip the sunset hued elixir.