Herbs and Spices

— No. 147 —

Room 112

This cock­tail is a col­lab­o­ra­tion Reed Cahill and I came up with for Mon­day nights at Wet City where we show­case a spe­cial cock­tail menu. As it’s the 25th anniver­sary of Bad Boy Records, we fig­ured it was only appro­pri­ate to do a ‘peach­es and cream’-esque trib­ute to 112. The idea came about when Reed grabbed a bot­tle of bar­rel-aged peach white grape bal­sam­ic from local Greek vine­gar and olive oil store DEVOO. This bal­sam­ic is insane­ly com­plex and fla­vor­ful, so …

— No. 146 —

Basil Smash

The 4th of July is one of my favorite hol­i­days, and I cel­e­brate every year by host­ing a par­ty com­plete with home­brewed shandy and fresh sum­mer cock­tails. Because my gar­den is usu­al­ly over­flow­ing by this time of the year, I like to take advan­tage of that by cre­at­ing cock­tails packed with fresh herbs. This year, I’ll be serv­ing my adap­ta­tion of the Basil Smash. The Basil Smash was orig­i­nal­ly cre­at­ed by Jörg Mey­er of Le Lion — Bar de Paris in Ham­burg, Ger­many. Accord­ing to Jörg, he …

— No. 135 —

City Paper Cocktail

The Bal­ti­more City Paper con­tact­ed me about cre­at­ing a sum­mer cock­tail to fea­ture in their next issue. Click here for the arti­cle. They want­ed to inspire read­ers to get cre­ative and mix up sum­mer cock­tails that take full advan­tage of the sea­son’s plen­ti­ful herbs. I chose to fea­ture Thai basil and bol­ster its anise tones with the anise fla­vors in Gal­liano and Pey­chaud’s Bit­ters. Since we’re in the mid­dle of a hot sum­mer, I kept the recipe light and refresh­ing using …

— No. 126 —

Old Faithful

Are you hav­ing peo­ple over for the Raven’s game this week­end? The last thing you’ll want to be doing while your Ravens are tak­ing it to the Patri­ots in the AFC Cham­pi­onship game is mak­ing drinks for every­one. The best way to keep your guests hap­py and liquored up while main­tain­ing fives on your seat is to pre­pare a punch. I got this recipe from Dan Sear­ing’s book The Punch Bowl. The Old Faith­ful is a recipe by Gina Cher­se­vani …

— No. 125 —

Absente Video

Are the in-laws com­ing over to your place for a lit­tle hol­i­day get togeth­er? The North Star is the per­fect way to turn an awk­ward hol­i­day par­ty around, loos­en­ing every­one up and get­ting the vibe a bit more fes­tive. The North Star is a cock­tail I came up with for Cril­lon Importer’s prod­uct Absente, Absinthe Refined. As you may already be aware absinthe and cream go togeth­er nice­ly. The kirschwass­er adds a cher­ry note to this cock­tail and of course …

— No. 124 —

El Comediante

Kitchen Kon­fi­dence recent­ly post­ed a won­der­ful arti­cle fea­tur­ing my cock­tail El Come­di­ante. Kitchen Kon­fi­dence comes high­ly rec­om­mend­ed. It’s an excel­lent source of inspi­ra­tion. This cock­tail is a recipe I cre­at­ed for the Nicaraguan restau­rant La Fin­ca y El Mar. I recent­ly went down to their beau­ti­ful restau­rant and trained their bar staff and cre­at­ed their cock­tail menu. El Come­di­ante has been one of their most pop­u­lar cock­tails to date. Recipe 2 oz red bell pep­per infused rum 1/2 oz gin­ger syrup …

— No. 116 —

El Matrimonio Clandestino

If you fol­low my Twit­ter or Face­book you may know that I recent­ly went down to Ran­cho San­tana, a Nicaraguan resort, to con­sult on their bar, train their bar staff and cre­ate their cock­tail menu. The El Mat­ri­mo­nio Clan­des­ti­no is a cock­tail I cre­at­ed for Ran­cho San­tana’s restau­rant and bar, La Fin­ca y El Mar. Cre­at­ing drinks for this client was a good oppor­tu­ni­ty to explore the cur­rent trend of low alco­hol con­tent recipes. Con­sid­er this recipe for your next …

— No. 115 —

Mint Julep

Call me what you will, but I shake my mint julep. I don’t like my straw get­ting clogged with all that mint. It hin­ders the drink­ing expe­ri­ence. So this is how I make my julep. Recipe 2 1/2 oz over­proof bour­bon (Noah’s Mill) 3/4 oz sim­ple syrup (1:1) 12 mud­dled mint leaves Crushed ice 1 mint sprig for gar­nish Dust top with pow­dered sug­ar 1 small drink­ing straw Add the sim­ple syrup in a shak­er tin. Then add 12 mint …

— No. 114 —

Bonne Fée

Ah, to live the bohemi­an lifestyle, sip­ping a Bonne Fée and lis­ten­ing to the lit­tle birds chirp away in my gar­den. Maybe I’ll reread my favorite book and smoke a hand rolled cig­a­rette. Maybe I’ll meet up with friends for mac­chi­atos and polit­i­cal­ly dri­ven con­ver­sa­tion. Maybe, but first the Bonne Fée. Recipe 1 oz Absente 1 oz water 1/2 oz lemon juice 3/4 oz house made grena­dine 1/2 oz Cam­pari 6–8 mud­dled mint leaves Top with 1 oz of club …

— No. 110 —

Ginger Rogers

The Gin­ger Rogers is the per­fect pool­side cock­tail. It’s refresh­ing and it’s easy to make. Not to men­tion mint, gin, gin­ger, and gin­ger ale are per­fect com­pli­ments. Ide­al­ly you’d want to use a collins glass for this cock­tail, but when you’re pool­side you’ll take what you can get. This recipe was cre­at­ed at Port­land’s Zefiro in 1995 by Mar­co­v­al­do Dionysos. It gained its pop­u­lar­i­ty at Absinthe Brasserie and Bar in San Fran­cis­co where it was one of the most ordered drinks. …