Alcademics.com

The Craziest New Cocktail Menu in San Francisco

DOSA Fillmore opens on Friday, but the drink menu for the restaurant has been released. The cocktails were created by Jonny Raglin of Absinthe, and they look insane. I can't wait to try them.

Batsman
Martin Miller’s Gin, Darjeeling tea cordial, lemon juice & ginger beer, served over ice with a mint sprig 9

Bowler
Marian Farms bio-dynamic Pisco, mango gastrique, “hell flower” tincture, served up with a lime twist 9

Juhu
Palm DH Krahn Gin, coconut milk, lime juice, Kaffir lime leaf, bird’s eye chili served up with a spanked curry leaf 10

Bollywood Hills
Sub Rosa Saffron Vodka, orgeat syrup, lime juice, allspice dram, served up with pickled mango 10

Elephant Parade
No. 209 Gin, pineapple gomme, ginger, cilantro, seltzer water, served long over ice with a pineapple flag 11

Bengali Gimlet
Tanqueray Rangpur Gin, ‘curried’ nectar, Kaffir lime leaf and lime juice, served up with a wedge of lime 10

Laughing Lassi
Bols Genever, Strauss yogurt, cucumber, grains of paradise, agave nectar, Angostura, served chilled with mint 12

Faux Swizzle
El Dorado Rum, St. Germain Elderflower, chicory bitters, served over crushed ice with a sugar-dusted mint sprig 9

Mood Indigo
Buffalo Trace Bourbon, jackfruit marmalade, Angostura bitters, chilled, topped with Champagne 10

Smoked Cup
Benesin Organic Mezcal, Pimm’s, black cardamon tincture, ginger beer, cucumber & smoked sea salt, over ice 11

Whisky + Shipwreck = Awesome

 

I have a fondness for booze, as you may have realized, but also for shipwrecks and pirates. (Old pirates, not Somali pirates.)

So I am particularly thrilled by the story of the SS Politician, a ship carrying 260,000 bottles of whisky that sank off the Outer Hebrides (islands off Scotland) in 1941. The local islanders rowed out to the partially-submerged wreck at night and stole all the whisky they could get their hands on. But the government was not happy about that so they searched peoples' homes and jailed some of them, even though they were just going to let the whisky sink with the ship. For years, hidden bottles from the wreck would turn up when someone cleaned out their attic or dug up a shed.

The tale was made into the book Whisky Galore by Compton Mackenzie, then a later books Scotch on the Rocks: The True Story Behind Whisky Galore and Polly: The True Story Behind Whisky Galore, retracing the story of that book. It was also made into the movie Whisky Galore, sometimes known as Tight Little Island.

In 1970, the newspaper The Mirror led a diving expedition to the ship to find any bottles that were still on it. They did find them, and rewarded a diver Bob Pert with a few bottles for his efforts. He's auctioning off one of those (unopened but evaporating through the cork) bottles December 3rd. [Props to Lyke 2 Drink for finding news of the auction.]

This bottle would make an excellent holiday gift for someone obsessed with booze. Or shipwrecks. Or both.

Free Beer (Magazine)

You can get a free subscription to any number of booze-including magazines (none more inclusive than Beer Magazine, probably) here. It's through GoReadGreen from Zinio.

Attack of the Giant Bartender

And you thought my Photoshop skills were challenged.

Nirvino, which is a drink finding and rating website, hosts cocktail contests about every other week in San Francisco. The bartenders make enough drinks for the crowd, and the crowd votes for the winner on web-enabled cell phones. It's all good fun.

Or at least it was. The image on the invitation for the next contest makes it clear drinks will be served by a Gigantic Terrifying Bartender who is standing on the basement floor to fit behind the bar at Bourbon & Branch. Order a Cosmopolitan in here and he will smash you into pieces with his six-foot muddler.

Or perhaps this is a regular sized bartender and the contest will take place inside a scale miniature of B&B. How would everybody fit?

Veggie Turkey, Meaty Wine

I often forget that much wine is not vegetarian. They use egg whites, gelatin, and isinglass to clarify it. And while I'm all for using every part of the animal, I'd prefer it be used on something I'm not drinking.

This blog has some more information on animal products in wine, and links to further information. This blog has information on animal products in beer.

Chinaco for Dinner

Last week I attended a dinner at Tres Agaves in San Francisco with Gabriel and Guillermo Gonzalez of Chinaco Tequila. Tres Agaves is hosting monthly distillers' dinners with a different tequila brand each time.

Chinaco is a special tequila brand for a couple reasons. First, it is the only distillery located in Tamaulipas. Until the 1970's, all agave for tequila had to come from the state of Jalisco. Then the area was expanded to allow for more agave, and currently includes Jalisco and areas of four bordering states, plus part of Tamaulipas apart from the rest.

The other reason it's special is because it is cited as the first premium tequila on the US market. In the early 1980's Robert Denton began importing Chinaco and selling it as a high-end product as opposed to the rough spirit it was known as historically. (Some good historical information can be found here and here.)

The distillery closed in the late 1980's and reopened in the early 1990's by the founder's four sons, including Gabriel and Guillermo who were at the dinner. Interestingly, in the past two years the agave for the tequila has been sourced from Atotonilco in the highlands region (Don Julio, Siete Leguas) instead of from Tamaulipas. I'd like to learn more about this- highland agave is much prized but it seems odd to truck in a bunch of it to another agave growing region.

The barrels for Chinaco are also unusual in that they're first used for bourbon, then they're used for scotch whisky before they're shipped to Mexico for use in tequila. Thus they're likely pretty inert, imparting less wood (caramel, vanilla, butterscotch) notes to the tequila than the average barrels.

All in all, an interesting dinner with an educational aspect- and not bad in price, either. $75 includes many margaritas, a tasting of the night's range of tequilas, a three-course dinner, and tax and tip. Dinners are on the third Thursday of the month. The schedule for next month should be on the website soon.

Update: Here is the upcoming schedule:

December: Don Julio
January: Fortaleza
February: Corazon
March Arette
April: 7 Leguas
May: Corralejo

Unexpected Trends

Last week I went to a trend talk at the J.W. Marriott hotel. The panel was made up of a hospitality space designer, a marketing firm head, an environmental style specialist, and a beverage specialist. But I internally translated all information into cocktail trends, since that's all I care about. I'll spare you the details, except this one:

Zem Joaquin from EcoFabulous shared this trend:

Get it while it's hot!

Monday Reading

Liza Weisstuch writes about Drink in the New York Times, the Boston bar without menus and with "The Cocktail as Theater."

Jason Wilson of the Washington Post writes about apple cider.

Here are some bourbon food recipes and a brief history of Maker's Mark.

Drink Dogma has some information on mezcals. 

Wayne Curtis has a story in The Atlantic (they do drink stories?) about Fernet Branca. For those who don't know, San Francisco consumes 25% of the Fernet sold in America.

Here's a list of all the absinthes available in the US. There are 32 with a bunch more on the way. [link via kegworks]