Post-Op Fluids

One year ago yesterday, The Jess came home after having a major surgery. It was a huge moment in our lives and one that we continue to come to grips with. Part of this process was our dinner to mark the occasion. All of my wife's favorite flavors were in play, and she was just a whirling dervish in the kitchen. Beautiful.
I took on the responsibility of crafting a new cocktail to help us toast the moment. Following Ariana Johnson's advice of picking the flavor palate you want to work with and our theme of all of The Jess' favorites, I came up with the base structure of blood orange, ginger, and cachaca.
From there I grabbed the Leblon Cachaca, Domaine Canton Ginger Liqueur, and a handful of beautiful, in-season, local blood oranges.



I'm proud to say that the first trial turned into the single-best drink I've invented to date. All the flavors balanced, a lovely, silky texture, and a palatal parade of some of The Jess favorites. The name also has a playfulness around it, as one should not consume booze after surgery. I give you:

Post-Op Fluids
1.5 oz Leblon cachaca
1 oz Domaine Canton Ginger Liqueur
2 oz fresh-squeezed blood orange juice
Shake vigorously until your shaker frosts up...
...and pour into martini glass
Follow these step and you will end up with a seriously delicious drink!

Crazy Tennis/Coffee/Cocktail Tapestry Post

I know that sometimes this blog is a bit of a whirlwind, what with the myriad Civil War threads we're weaving, all the while hyped up on coffee, gravel-voiced from screaming at another Nadal-Federer tennis classic, and sticky-fingered from mixing some new concoction. All comes together to make one crazy tapestry.
I like it this way, I like having lots of different stories being told at the same time. It makes everything dynamic, unpredictable, and fun. You don't know if I've been reading some thick tome on Reconstruction, tinkering with my coffee roaster, playing tennis, or all at the same time; thus, you (and I) don't know what's coming next.
To honor this, I've got a few things to say on a few different subjects. So I don't step on my own posts by putting up multiples in one day (a costly mistake, some people won't scroll far enough to find the new stuff), we've got a crazy silly-putty-that-rolled-down-gravel-driveway amalgam for you to chew on.
First up is a favorite punching bag of this space, Starbucks. This monolith of coffee mediocrity, exploitation, and marketing is about to roll out a new gimmick: instant coffee.
INSTANT COFFEE!!!!!
I love the use of marketing terms like "innovation", "game-changer", and "value". Here's the bottom line, if you buy this stuff, you're getting a double whammy of being ripped off and screwing the farmers who grew the beans, they'll see maybe 5 cents on the dollar. Just remember, you have a choice, so don't buy this crap.
Speaking of choices, the United Arab Emirates made a poor one when it revoked the travel visa of Israeli tennis player Shahar Peer on the eve of the Barclays Dubai Tennis Championship.
Now there are international headlines blasting the decision, the tournament nearly got canceled and may get yanked off next year's WTA schedule, and the Tennis Channel made the courageous decision of canceling its television coverage in protest.
Many Gulf nations have had standing policies that Israeli citizens and those with Israeli visa stamps in their passports will be denied entry. I say "many" instead of "all" because nearly one year ago to the day, Peer broke ground as the first Israeli woman to compete in a professional tournament in the Gulf. Now a huge step backwards has been taken with this gruesome misuse of sport to make a despicable political statement.
WTA chairman Larry Scott had this to say on the issue, I direct your attention to the last sentence of the statement:
"The Sony Ericsson WTA Tour believes very strongly, and has a clear rule and policy, that no host country should deny a player the right to compete at a tournament for which she has qualified by ranking"
Then, Mr. Scott, you have a responsibility to enforce this policy. This issue did not come out of nowhere, and without an assurance that a host city can apply this policy, tournaments should not be awarded. When the policy is violated in this egregious manner and right before the tournament to boot, the event should have been shut down.
Peer's exclusion is sad and infuriating on many levels, and leaves me wanting to make a t-shirt out of the stamps from Israel I have in my passport. Next week, the issue will resurface when the men come to Dubai, including Israeli doubles player Andy Ram.
Man, all of this ranting has left me thirsty, good thing we've got a new refreshment coming down the pike. On Valentine's Day, The Jess and I made a beautiful fruit salad with winter strawberries, blood oranges, and navel oranges drizzled with some passionfruit juice. After inhaling the salad at brunch, there was a brilliant juice mixture floating in the bottom of the bowl.
After a few minutes of contemplation, the Fruit Salad HugYa was born...

Fruit Salad HugYa
1.5 oz Hangar One Mandarin Blossom vodka
0.5oz Noilly Prat sweet vermouth
1.5 oz fruit salad juice (I think fresh-squeezed OJ and passionfruit juice evenly mixed would probably suffice)
Add all three liquids to shaker filled with ice. Shake vigorously and serve up.
Whew, did you get all that? Take your time, because there will be another post tomorrow wrapping up my visit last night to the Orange County Civil War Rountable and tonight's SDCWRT meeting. Oh wait, I'm not helping, but you'll be fine, and back for more.

Touching Base And Providing Refreshments

Hello friends, hope everyone is having a happy and fulfilling holiday season thus far! It's been an energetic one here with births, family, trips, birthdays, lots of work and Hanukah preparations (remember to buy your books from local/independent bookstores)! So it follows that my blogging frequency has dipped a bit from my usual 5-7 posts per week.
I've finished Piston's book on Gen Longstreet, entitled "Lee's Tarnished Lieutenant", and am working through the themes of my review. As a little teaser trailer, this is one of the best studies of the Lost Cause and it's effects that I've yet read. We have some powerful and challenging issues to explore together.
This book has reinvigorated my desire to explore the Lost Cause, so my study of the Western Theater will wait until I finish Steven Budiansky's "The Bloody Shirt". I'm not a multiple-book-reader-at-the-same-time like some, so I have to stay focused. We've covered some important ground on this subject matter this year, so I'd like to do a year-end wrap of this blog's content.
Just so you don't go away thirsty, here's a little concoction I put together the other night. It received high praise from The Jess, so you know you're in business. It's a playful little interpretation of the gin and tonic, helps make sure that you get all of your medicine in one dose, quinine, vitamin C, everything. I'm assuming that as historians, we're all aware of how gin and tonic came together in the first place. Something to do with malaria...

Your Daily Dose
1.5 oz Tanqueray Ten
3 oz Schweppes tonic water
0.5 oz fresh squeezed orange juice
one strip mandarin orange peel
thick slice of kiwi fruit

Add gin and tonic to a Collins glass filled with ice, pour orange juice in next. Give gentle stir with stirring rod, then twist mandarin peel over top to release oils. Don't add peel itself to drink. Float kiwi slice on top of ice and enjoy. At the end of the drink, be sure to fish out the kiwi , it'll taste incredible!

Breaking News On The Cocktail Front!

Dinner is almost ready, and The Jess mentioned that she had fresh-squeezed, unpasteurized OJ in the fridge. Duly prompted, I sprung into action, and here's what we're drinking as I write this, and it's really good!

Tipsy Orangeade
1.5 oz Tanqueray Ten gin
1.5 oz fresh-squeezed OJ
juice of 1/4 lemon
one teaspoon simple syrup
Schweppes tonic water

Pour gin, OJ, and syrup into rocks glass. Squeeze in lemon juice. Fill glass to 3/4 full with coarsely crushed ice. Top with tonic water and stir gently with bar spoon. Garnish with lemon wedge.
This one is winner-winner-chili-dinner!

On The Refreshment Front

Two interesting new recent refreshments that need to become part of the repertoire here, and the first is all because it's melon season!
The Jess and I sojourned to The Fruit Stand just up the road, and after a fabulous session of percussing, hefting, and sniffing, selected what has proved to be the single greatest cantaloupe either of us has ever tasted.
When we cracked it open, dissected it, and chopped it into a bowl, my brain sprung toward a complementary beverage. It was time for dessert, so we needed a sweet, fruity pairing that could be served cold with the chilled melon. Where to turn...
There is a maxim in our household, being I'm of South African parents, that any food item made or invented in South Africa is primo-delecto good. (Anyone remember our wedding cake?) I applied this rule in the dessert drink category and selected a bottle of Amarula. A double served in a rocks glass with ice for each of us, and a bowl of fresh cantaloupe...this was heaven!
I know this doesn't strictly classify as a recipe, not that you shouldn't try it, but here's one that will blow your mind!

Cantarula With A Spoon
1/2 sliced and cubed cantaloupe (preferably chilled)
1/2 cup Amarula
2 scoops good vanilla ice cream

Add cantaloupe to bowl. Put ice cream on top. Pour Amarula over the top of that. Find your spouse/partner/best friend/companion and eat the whole thing out of the same bowl. Repeat if necessary.
Alternate: dump the fruit/ice cream/Amarula mix in blender for a short burst. Drink out of a highball glass.
On the coffee front, I'm experimenting with my first blend. Up to this point, I've done one varietal at a time in my roaster and my cup. Today I found myself needing to roast and having just a small amount of three different beans in the cupboard. So, I did them all together. To err on the side of caution, I went with a Full City + roast; the smells are amazing right out of the roaster, the beans are dark and oily...this blending thing seems to hold a great deal of promise!
Here are the components of this first blend:
Guatemala Antigua Finca Relana Yellow Bourbon
Guatemala Fraijanes - Finca Agua Tibia
El Salvador Matapala Estate Peaberry

The Beer Shandy

It's hot in San Diego right now, so the quest for refreshing and inexpensive beverages is at its apex. I had been one of the rare people who does not find beer to be a suitable drink for a hot day until I perfected The Beer Shandy
This is a drink that my parents used to enjoy both at home and on visits to their home country of South Africa, and is a simple blend of beer and ginger ale. Well, simple on the surface at least. I've been fumbling through various beers, various ginger ales, and a mixture of glasses to find the right mix.
The basic ingredient is of course, the beer. Because we're looking for a light, crisp base for maximal refreshment, the lager beer in all of its varieties is a good choice. The Jess and I experimented with several choices, but couldn't find the right choice. The answer ended up coming from a most unexpected place; the back of the fridge. There rested two cans of Heineken, a beer that The Jess doesn't really care for at all.
Given that we were hot and thirsty, I figured I'd give it a try. We had long ago selected the ginger ale of choice; Schweppes. This one has just the right mix of spicy and sweet, as well as not too much carbonation. Now we needed the glass.
One of the best and most elegant glasses I have in the bar is a set of pilsner glasses. Long and inviting, they show off the beverage so well, and the tapered base is just perfect to hold. So now these three disparate items came together, and the beer shandy was perfected.

The Beer Shandy
1 12 oz can Heineken beer
1 10oz bottle Schweppes ginger ale
pilsner glasses

First, it goes without saying that the beer and ginger ale must be cold from the fridge. Pour 6 oz of beer into a tilted glass to minimize head formation. Add 5 oz ginger ale, again tilting the glass to allow the ginger ale and beer to intercalate.
Drink and be refreshed

From The Mixing Lab: Summer '08

The concoction I'm about to break down for you needs no fancy name, it is so good and such a delicious way of capturing the flavor of one of our great summer finds, the name "Summer '08" is just about perfect.
It started with a trip to the farmer's market a few days ago when I discovered a stone fruit called black apricots. A relative of the apricot, it's not some funky hybrid (read: pluot), but a long lost cousin of the orange fruit we know so well.
It's skin is darker like a plum, and the flavor is much richer and sweeter than a regular apricot. Needless to say, it's delish! After munching a few, I decided to take the remainder and turn them into a drink. I'm proud to say that, after a bit of experimentation came, in the words of The Jess "the best drink you've ever made!"

Summer '08
one black apricot, chilled in the fridge
1 oz Hangar One vodka
0.5 oz Cointreau
1 teaspoon simple syrup
juice of 1/2 lemon
crushed ice
lime wedge

cube up the black apricot with peel on, add to muddling glass with syrup and lemon juice. Muddle vigorously. Add to strainer over shaker and press the solids with the muddler to push through as much juice and pulp as possible. Pour vodka over remains in strainer and press solids again. Tilt strainer and scrape a small quantity of pulp into the shaker (no skin, though).
Add Cointreau and crushed ice to shaker and shake it up!
Pour into lowball glass that is filled with crushed ice.
Garnish with lime wedge and drink the defining beverage of Summer 2008!

The Green Dream

I was lying in bed last Sunday night getting my mind right for the work week when I thought "what would happen if I mixed some gin, lime, basil and sugar together? Would it be good? Would I rejoice or would it be heaved against the wall?" I had just bought fresh lime from the farmer's market and The Jess is growing basil outside, so why not.
After work I repaired to the mixing lab and got to work. I had made a batch of simple syrup some time ago which has been resting quietly in the fridge, so that came out. I got some robust, fragrant basil leaves, and quartered the lime.
I muddled, shook, mixed and tasted, as did The Jess. We looked at each other and knew it was back to the drawing board.
It took a bit of finagling, but what came out of the lab was one seriously delicious beverage I call The Green Dream. Here's the official breakdown

The Green Dream
1.5 oz Tanqueray Ten gin
3 fresh basil leaves, finely minced
one small fresh lime, quartered
1.5 teaspoons simple syrup (note: my simple syrup is not particularly sweet, so you may need to vary this ingredient depending on your syrup and personal tastes)

In glass, muddle lime, basil and syrup. When I say muddle, I really mean MUDDLE! Like put your back into it! You want to extract as much of the oils from the basil as possible.
Strain into shaker already filled with crushed ice
Add gin
Shake and strain into chilled martini glass. Serve up with small basil leave floated on top for garnish.

Great spice from the gin, basil up front, then a nice limey-sweet finish. We actually paired this beauty with some amazing moussaka The Jess whipped up and it was perfect! I really will try to start adding pics, I get so excited when the drinks are ready, I forget.

New Creations From The Mixing Lab

So it's midsummer now, and there's nothing nicer than barbeque, veggies, salad, and a few friends to enjoy it with. Thankfully we had just such an opportunity after the unbelievable drama of the men's singles final at Wimbledon. Rest assured, I made my feelings about this epic known in the post preceding this one. Anyway, time to get focused on post-sports-history-making refreshment. The Jess cranked out the marinade for the chicken and took care of the veg, I manned the grill and got behind the bar.
Warm days and great fruit call for cold, crisp drinks with bold flavors. We had some brilliant limes from the farmers market and a new bottle of Leblon cachaca, thus...caiprinhias! This Brazilian refresher is fashioned from sugar (I like brown sugar cubes, most recipes call for fine white sugar), ice, limes, and cachaca.
The ice must be crushed, so you get just a bit of melting during the shaking process. I'm having tons of fun mixing drinks with fresh crushed ice generated by my first class hand cranked ice crusher (take one guess who bought it for me). The lime is quartered with the pith cut away, but leave the peel on. There's a certain romance that comes from this process; each drink really feels like it has been assembled out of very disparate components.
Anyway, here's the recipe:
The Tipsy Caiprinhia
2 oz cachaca
3 brown sugar cubes
one lime
freshly crushed ice
soda

Quarter the lime and add to lowball glass with sugar cubes. Muddle vigorously until sugar fully broken up and dissolving. Add 1.5 oz of cachaca, then ice to fill glass. Transfer mix into shaker. Use 1/2 oz cachaca to rinse bottom of lowball and add to shaker. Shake vigorously until metal is cold. Pour back into lowball. Rinse out shaker with splash of soda (some of the sugar likes to stay behind, you gotta go get it!) and pour into glass.

As the premeal festivities wore on, other drinks were needed, and I was called upon to make an old staple; the amaretto sour. I had forgotten how satisfying this one can be. Dry and tart, sweet at the end. Really a perfect aperitif and easy as sneezing with your eyes closed.
Amaretto Sour
3 oz sweet and sour
1.5 oz amaretto

add amaretto and s/s to lowball glass. Add ice cubes. Stir. Drink. Order another one because it's so good!

Though we were still thirsty, we were running short on ice, so we had to adapt. Only items cold from the fridge would suffice. Thus was born a new concoction from The Mixing Lab, dubbed The Markalicious by Mr. Triathlon.
The Markalicious
1.5 oz vodka
1 oz sweet and sour
1.5 oz Odwalla Pomegrand juice
lime
soda

add vodka, s/s, juice to highball glass. Add ice cubes, splash of soda. Squeeze generous lime wedge and toss into glass. Stir gently (the juice is quite dense and will settle if not mixed a bit before drinking)
I promise, dear reader, that I will try to remember to take pics of my concoctions from The Mixing Lab before they're consumed, because they look as brilliant as they taste.

A Couple of Coolers

So The Jess and I went to the Farmer's Market on Thursday, and it is most definitely stone fruit season. We came back with all sorts of plums, peaches, and cherries, all at peak perfection. This means only one thing...
Time to start muddling!
There is nothing nicer than fresh fruit, sugar, and spirits all muddled together, so I invented a couple of coolers over the past two nights, both turned out beautifully!
Plum Delicious
1 red plum, cut into small pieces
1.5 oz vodka (I used Hangar One, but any non-infused vodka will work)
2 brown sugar cubes (but simple syrup or white sugar cubes will work)
crushed ice
either lemonade or tonic water

put fruit, sugar and liquor into Collins glass and muddle vigorously until sugar dissolved and fruit well-pulped. Add ice until glass 2/3 full. Top off with either lemonade (my favorite) or tonic water (Jess' favorite) Stir well with bar spoon. Garnish with whatever you want, I didn't bother, wanted to start drinking.
This drink was fantastic, crisp and cold, sweet and sour alternating. There was more lemon up front, then tart plum at the end.

Make It Peachy
1/2 peach, cut into small pieces
1.5 oz bourbon (I used Maker's Mark, the king of all bourbons)
one brown sugar cube (again, syrup or white sugar is fine)
crushed ice
lemonade

put fruit, sugar and liquor into Collins glass and muddle vigorously until sugar dissolved and fruit well-pulped. Add ice until glass 2/3 full. Top with lemonade. Stir well with bar spoon. This drink is too delicious for commentary, just make yourself one!
The muddling of the fruit with the spirits and sugar just opens it up and brings out unreal flavor. These are perfect long drinks to enjoy outside. My muddler works fine, but I'm still waiting for Captain Sizzle to get me one of his handmade speciality muddlers!