At the Manhattan Cocktail Classic 2011 Gala at the New York Public Library

Nattily dressed imbibers bask in the pink and purple glow of the New York Public Library at this year’s Manhattan Cocktail Classic on May 13.

This year’s Manhattan Cocktail Classic gala was held once again at the New York Public Library. The weather cooperated fully as Mother Nature blessed us with a cool spring evening with no humidity. Hanna Lee Communications, led by the illustrious Hanna Lee, delivered us cocktail aficionados yet another extravagant kickoff to the spirits and liqueur seminars and events to take place over the next four days, during which cocktail-geek nirvana is sought. Upon entering, we rubbed shoulders with thousands of thirsty souls clambering for tens of thousands of well-crafted cocktails made from every spirit that ever dripped out of a still. And, if you could flag down a cater-waiter, you can nibble on tasty au courant morsels such as a marrow hors d’oeuvres, and the now ubiquitous steamed pork buns made famous by chef David Chang and his crews at the Momofuku restaurants.

We stuck with American Whiskey, as is our wont, and delighted in sipping Dana Hutty’s riff on a Manhattan cocktail using Russell’s Reserve rye (or was it Michter’s?). We followed that with a Maker’s Mark Manhattan riff topped with champagne in one hand, and, breaking tradition, a rum rocks drink in the other. Three drinks proved sufficient to bring a silly grin to our faces.

As we roamed the majestic hallways and stairways of this iconic building, we snapped a few photos on our iPhones. Take a look. [CLICK PHOTOS TO ENLARGE]

Enter at your own risk. If you can’t find a cocktail in five minutes, you’ve already had too many.

Paul decides to have his mug immortalized.


Do we really look like this after only one cocktail?


The faces of revelers, both real and drawn.


Steve noshing in between sips.


Red Light Texting.


Luminescence at the New York Public Library.


Aerial artistry above and below (watch video).

Get Ready for Spring Pea Guacamole

by Steve Schul



While traveling through Maui’s Upcountry, Paul & I stumbled upon a restaurant which occupied an old general store in Hali‘imaile, simply named the Hali‘imaile General Store. After a long day driving winding roads through incomparable beauty and cascading waterfalls, this was a fitting way to cap off a beautiful day.

We ordered a well-made cocktail with a little kick, their signature jalapeño margarita, which we accompanied with a red grape quesadilla festooned with dollops of spring pea guacamole. All delicious, but the Spring Pea guacamole was the recipe I kept thinking about and tried to re-create back home. With no idea to how it was made, experiments began. The original perhaps had some avocado in it, but I wanted to see if I could come up with a version that used only the freshness of spring peas, a simpler mix that would satisfy and refresh. The result couldn’t be easier, and a perfect companion for homemade tortilla or pita chips.

Spring Pea Guacamole
(created by Cocktail Buzz)

Serves 4–6

Ingredients
14 ounces frozen green peas, rinsed to thaw
1 1/2 tablespoons olive oil
1 tablespoon lemon juice
1/4 teaspoon garlic powder
1/2 teaspoon sea salt
1/8 teaspoon white pepper
2 tablespoons chopped chives

Method
Pulse in food processor until desired texture. Serve with baked homemade tortilla chips, or with store-bought tortilla or pita chips.



The French 75 cocktail—fizzy, lemony, and refreshing—turns out to be a perfect accompaniment to your Spring Pea Guacamole. Have some friends over this weekend, or make a batch for you and yours during the week. You’ll marvel at how the citrus and the champagne mingle with the taste of your springtime spread.


The French 75 will light up your life this spring, especially if you serve it with a side of Spring Pea Guacamole.

Celebrate Cinco de Mayo with Kahlúa Cocktails

The Sombrero is a rich and sweet combo of coffee liqueur and dairy. After a few sips, you may end up with a milk mustache.

Cinco de Mayo (the Fifth of May) commemorates the Mexican army’s defeat of the French in Puebla in 1862, and is celebrated today primarily by Mexican-Americans, proud of their rich heritage. You can bet that Kahlúa will be involved in the festivities, especially when served with desserts such as those Mexican doughnut rods known as churros. Kahlúa, as you probably already know, is one of the most popular coffee liqueurs on the market. This Mexican syrupy tipple has been around since the 1930s and is an ingredient in a smattering of world-famous cocktails that rely on its rich coffee-bean essence, and its robust bittersweetness. Can you remember the first time Kahlúa touched your lips? Perhaps like Paul, you tried it for the first time in college, mixed with some milk plus a few ice cubes bobbing in the mix. Or maybe your initiation into the world of Kahlúa occurred earlier in life, as with Steve. His parents always had Kahlúa stocked in their home bar? Why? It’s an ingredient in Steve’s mom’s favorite drink, Kahlúa and Milk, aka a Sombrero. But did you know that any coffee-flavored cordial mixed with dairy is called a Sombrero? Try it with cream or half and half, and its rich velvety goodness ventures into the realm of liquid dessert.

Sombrero
(adapted by Cocktail Buzz)

Ingredients
2 ounces coffee liqueur (such as Kahlua) or coffee-flavored brandy
1–2 ounces or more milk, cream, or half and half (your preference on amount and type)
ice

Method
In an ice-filled rocks glass, pour the liqueur first, then top with the dairy. Stir if you like.


Like cream? So does your Sombrero. Add as much as you desire.

Sombrero sounds so much nicer than Kahlúa and Milk, though we suppose the Kahlúa people would disagree. It’s a decidedly “light’ drink in terms of its alcohol content—it sports half the proof of most spirits, such as vodka. We understand that sometimes you want a little more hooch in your beverage, and that’s where the vodka comes into play. By adding vodka to your Sombrero, you’ve just created a White Russian, a drink immortalized by Jeff Bridges’s “The Dude” in the Coen Brothers’ flic The Big Lebowski, a wacky mistaken-identity romp whose primary location is a bowling alley. We think it’s time you take your White Russian to your local oak-laned alley and get busy.

White Russian

(adapted by Cocktail Buzz)

Ingredients
2 ounces vodka
1 ounce coffee liqueur
1 ounce cream
ice

Method
Shake ingredients and strain into an ice-filled rocks glass.

And for those drink enthusiasts who are lactose intolerant and don’t have a Lactaid pill handy, there’s always the Black Russian, whose provenance dates back to a 1949 Belgian bar.

Black Russian

(adapted by Cocktail Buzz)

Ingredients
2 ounces vodka
1 ounce coffee liqueur
ice

Method
Shake ingredients and strain into an ice-filled rocks glass.

photos © Steve Schul, Cocktail Buzz

Say Good-Bye to Winter (finally!) with a Whiskey Sour

Made with the freshest lemon juice, a Whiskey Sour may become your go-to cocktail next time you’re at the bar.

What a long winter. Time to shed this malaise that’s been hanging over us like a damp wool overcoat and toast winter’s overdue farewell with a bright dash of sweet and pucker called the Whiskey Sour. Just smelling the whiskey hit the lemon juice brings back memories of our parents mixing them for friends to grand acclaim back in the seventies. Aah, that golden aroma. Making Whiskey Sours now transports us back to our families’ basement bars. For Paul, one plushly swaddled in hi-lo rust-yellow-orange shag, edged in caramel Naugahyde; for Steve, one evoking the Wild West, fashioned with reclaimed Civil War–era wood.

We’ve been perfecting our Whiskey Sour recipe for what seems like years. Some seasons we like them more sour than sweet, like in the deep of winter when all you crave is the scurvy-fighting power of citrus; then sometimes in the summer, you just want a hint more sugar to balance with whatever food you happen to be nibbling on, such as Lamb Meatballs. Whiskey Sours also pair swimmingly well with Spiced Nuts.

This is the recipe we prefer today. So raise your glass high with a colleague after work, a friend who applauds your penchant for mixed drinks, or a loved one who is raring to celebrate the arrival of flowers shooting up from the frost-free ground. Discuss more childhood basement tales. Bottoms up!

Whiskey Sour
(adapted by Cocktail Buzz from a traditional recipe)

Ingredients
2 ounces bourbon or rye (we like a higher proof, between 90 and 100)
3/4 ounces simple syrup
3/4 ounces lemon juice
maraschino cherry and/or orange slice, as garnish (optional)

Method
Shake in ice for 15 seconds. Strain into a chilled glass. Add cherry and orange slice, if you so desire.

A New Cocktail for St. Patrick’s Day, with Raspberries!

A Cox or two will do you just fine this St. Patrick's Day. The Erin Cox Cocktail will make your Irish eyes smile.

About a year ago, our friend Erin came over one night for drinks and dinner, and like any good guest, brought with her a bottle. Instead of wine, she held some Mathilde Raspberry liqueur in her hand and said, “I hope you don’t already have this. I knew I was taking a chance with you guys.” We must have conjured up the luck of the Irish, because we didn’t have any raspberry liqueur, aka framboise, anywhere in our house, except for a few drops of Chambord left in a nip bottle.

Delighted, and knowing that the liqueur was highly regarded by many in the “drinkworld,” we set out to make Erin a signature cocktail using the Mathilde framboise. We knew that whiskey of some sort would be the main spirit, seeing as how Erin, a born-and-raised Southern gal, loves her liquor aged in oak barrels, especially bourbon. We’ve been know to throw back a few with her and this seemed like a no-brainer. (She did, however, relate the tale of her and a friend who would get together in her early days of living and working in New York for some wild night fueled by Irish whiskey. We’d keep that bit of info on the back burner, just in case . . . .)

Raspberry and bourbon can make difficult playmates: when mixed, both tend to create an aura of sweetness that can be cloying depending on what else goes into the mix. For some reason, Paul got in his head that the much-aligned liqueur amaretto and the sweet and slightly sour licks of orange juice had to insinuate themselves in the equation (if you’re familiar with the drink called a Bocce Ball, you’re probably wondering why in hell would he want to do that?).

All we cared about was making Erin’s drink taste great. So we decided after much sipping that the orange juice had to go. Eighty-sixed. But we needed some acid to break up the sweetness that blossomed when the raspberry liqueur mingled with the burnished-almond sweetness from the amaretto, in this case Lazzaroni. So in went some Punt e Mes, a more bitter sweet vermouth, and that seemed to do the trick.

But when Erin came over, at the eleventh hour, we created two drinks for her: one with bourbon, and another with Irish whiskey. After a sip from each, Erin decided that the Irish whiskey drink tasted better. Another round led into her tales of living in NYC, sipping on Irish whiskeys with her friend from work at some local Irish Pub, perfect for camaradarie, solidarity, commiseration.

We give to you this St. Patrick’s Day, the Erin Cox, which incidentally means Irish Coxswain. She steers the boat and calls all the shots. And, she’s one helluva dame.

Erin Cox
(created by Cocktail Buzz, with the participation of Ms. Cox)

Ingredients

1 1/2 ounces Irish whiskey (we like Jameson for this)
1/2 ounce Punt e Mes vermouth
1/2 ounce raspberry liqueur
1/2 teaspoon amaretto
6–8 raspberries

Method

The Erin Cox is perfect before or after dinner, or any time in between. Shake all the ingredients in ice for 15 seconds. Double-strain into a chilled glass (try not to get any raspberry seeds in your drink). Garnish with a fresh raspberry.

An Old-Fashioned Dilemma

The Old-Fashioned is one of the most popular bar drinks, though recipes vary widely from bartender to bartender.

Never underestimate the power of a simple drink. The Old-Fashioned, or Old Fashioned, sans hyphen, if you wish, is one of the six basic drinks in David A. Embury’s classic The Fine Art of Mixing Drinks. At its most basic, it is a rocks drink made with nothing more than an American whiskey, such as bourbon or rye, and a sugar cube doused with bitters. Twist a lemon over it, and you’re done.

You look confused. You say you distinctly remember your last Old-Fashioned having an orange slice floating on the top of the ice, donning a neon red maraschino. Truth is, there are countless recipes for the Old-Fashioned, and everyone likes hers or his uniquely. The self-proclaimed Purists eschew all traces of fruit, and prefer their Old-Fashioneds pared down to the basics. The self-proclaimed New Purists add fruit, such as orange and cherry, but decry its muddling. Those who enjoy rococo presentations, we’ll call them the Revelers, love all the fruit muddled, and even a splash of soda on top. (This would be anathema to both Purist and New Purist.) Never has a drink inspired so much brouhaha.

We do have a standard way we enjoy our Old-Fashioneds, and probably would align ourselves with the New Purists. But we’ve got to say, in the hands of the right bartender, a fruit-free Old-Fashioned is a study in balance; contrarily, a muddled Old-Fashioned can boast layers of deep flavor. Regardless of how you like this drink, what’s probably most important to you is the ratio of whiskey to sugar. The sweeter your drink, and if with muddled fruit, the better it’s going to pair with salty and rich appetizers such as barbecued chicken on skewers, or ones that have a nice portion of grilled steak. The following is our go-to recipe for the Old-Fashioned. Normally, we use rye or bourbon, usually at a proof between 90 and 110 when we’re drinking it without an accompanying app. (Try between 80 and 90 proof when you want to pair with food.) Also, Angostura bitters is standard in our home, but we dance all over the barroom floor and have been known to use other brands of aromatic bitters, and orange bitters as well. Feel free to embellish at will. After all, getting to the bottom of how you like your Old-Fashioneds is one of life’s delightful dilemmas.

Old-Fashioned

(adapted by Cocktail Buzz)

Ingredients
2 ounces rye or bourbon
3 dashes bitters
1 sugar cube
1 cherry, such as maraschino, marascha, or brandied
1 thin orange slice
1 lemon twist
standard-sized ice cubes

Method
Place a sugar cube in a rocks glass and douse with bitters. Add 1/2 teaspoon water and muddle until the sugar cube has broken apart. Fill with ice cubes. Meanwhile, shake the whiskey and bitters in ice and strain into the glass. Add the orange and cherry. Twist lemon over the glass and drop in. Add a small straw.

Photos © Steve Schul, Cocktail Buzz

Kümmel Explained, plus Two Easy and Flavor-Popping Cocktail Recipes

The world is full of strange and exotic liqueurs (or cordials, if you prefer). Take kümmel, for instance (or kummel, without the umlaut; or even kimmel, as this is the closest pronunciation in English). Perhaps you’ve spotted a bottle of Gilka brand at the liqueur store, with a penguin wearing a kaiser helmet and monocle. How utterly German. Berlin, in fact.

For those of you who are aficionados, you already know the power of kümmel. It lies in its distinct flavor: caraway. After all, kümmel means caraway in German and Dutch. It also means cumin; both spices come from the same family. So it wouldn’t be amiss to find some kümmel liqueur that has notes of cumin in it as well. Some producers even add the flavors of fennel seeds to the process.

It is believed that kümmel was first created in the late 16th century in Holland by Lucas Bols, and because of its popularity, it spread east to Germany, then Russia, where most of the world’s kümmel is produced today.

Our association with this liqueur began several years ago when Cousin Jon gifted us a bottle (he’s such a nice guy). Of course we tasted it immediately and decided to get busy to come up with some cocktails.


CiCi will make your mouth sing as you settle into your evening.

Steve played with it first and came up with a nice take on an after-dinner sipper that unites the caraway flavors of the kümmel with the delicate bittersweet taste of elderflower. He then grounded the mix in a bath of cognac. Ooh-la-la. A very merry distinct flavor emerges from the first sip as the two flavors create one new flavor. Herbal, floral, a perfect way to end a meal and head into the prospects the evening has to offer. The name he bestowed upon this libation was CiCi. Why? Well, who can remember at this point, but the name stuck. You can have a CiCi during cocktail hour as well. Pop in a brandied or marasche cherry, and serve it up or on the rocks.

CiCi
(created by Cocktail Buzz)

Ingredients
2 ounces cognac
1 ounces kümmel
1/2 ounce elderflower liqueur (such as St-Germain)
marasche cherry, as garnish (optional)

Method
Stir in ice for 30 seconds. Strain into chilled glass. If serving as an after-dinner drink, split this between two people and use smaller glasses (see photo above).

❤ ❤ ❤

The Remington, with its lick of caraway, is one smooth cocktail thanks to Canadian whisky, some fresh orange juice, and sweet vermouth.

Coming up with our next drink, the Remington, happened by accident. In this case, a happy one. We were craving Oriental Cocktails one night, but were out of lime juice. All we had was one orange in the fridge. So Paul decided to use orange juice instead of lime juice, and swap out the triple sec in an Oriental for something more exotic. Adding triple sec to orange juice just seemed redundant. Kümmel, on the other hand, proved to be a dynamite choice; shaking it up with orange juice and sweet vermouth creates a smooth citrus-bittersweet tang that makes your whole mouth feel good. So smooth, and a pinkish shade of amber. We both looked at each other and winked. “Lady smooth.”

As we threw our heads back and laughed, one of us added, “Like a Lady Remington.”

“Let’s call it a Remington. That way, a guy would want to order one too. He’ll never know how the name actually originated.”

“Utterly devious.”

“Cheers.”

There’s a little addendum to these recipes. Paul knows a young brilliant drummer named Cici who works with a young brilliant writer named Chris who has a lovely wife named Mary née Remington. Mary happens to be a hugely devoted caraway fan. Wheel in the sky, keep on turning.

Remington
(created by Cocktail Buzz)

Ingredients
2 ounces Canadian whisky
1 ounce sweet vermouth (try Carpano Antica)
1 scant ounce orange juice
1/4 ounce kümmel

Method
Shake in ice for 15 seconds. Strain into chilled cocktail glass. You can use blood orange juice to give your Remington a spikier, more bittersweet edge.



photos © Steve Schul, Cocktail Buzz