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Bar Stars of SF

The SF Chronicle's Bar Stars 2009 feature just came out, and the introduction to the winners is here.

The 2009 Bar Stars are:

• Reza Esmali of Conduit
• Brooke Arthur of Range
• Marcovaldo Dionysos of Clock Bar
• Cate Whalen of Pizzaiolo
• Thad Vogler of Heaven's Dog

I did the write-up of Thad Vogler.

I think the combination of profiles came out really terrific. I didn't know who the other chosen Bar Stars were or who was writing about them (I assume they were selected by my editor- it was all very top-secret), but in the end the stories reflect the different styles of the bartenders: Brooke creating a new drink of the day, Reza using food flavors, Marco's geekery, Thad's back-to-nature approach, and Cate Whalen's homemade creations.

So congrats to everybody.

Behind the Scenes at the Rosangel Launch

I was in New York a couple weeks ago for the launch of Rosangel, the new hibiscus flavored tequila from Gran Centenario. Naturally, when launching a tequila, your first choice would be to do it in New York in February.

During the day I attended the taping of a film about the product that will be used to help train the sales force, and that may show up on the web down the road. They flew in a bunch of bartenders from around the country to help. Paul Pacult of the Spirits Journal spoke about the product, and Julie Reiner of the Flatiron Lounge and Clover Club talked about mixology.

I sat in the back and took notes. Here is some of what I learned from Paul:

• The Extra-Anejo and Flavored tequila categories were only created in 2006 so we're really seeing the beginning of what's going to be launched, especially in flavors.
• The top five markets in descending order for tequila in the US are LA/Orange Country, New York, Dallas, Houston, and San Francisco.
• Someone from the Gran Centenario family married a Cuervo descendent so now the two companies are under the same group.
• Cooking the agave for a longer period of time in clay or brick ovens, as opposed to autoclaves, "rounds out the juice" says Pacult.
• Gran Centenario pioneered using new French Oak barrels instead of ex-bourbon. 

 

Then as we did a tasting, Julie Reiner gave her impressions of what flavors would pair well with each tequila. She mentioned that citrus pairs well with all of it so I'll leave that out.

• For the blanco, with its notes of pickle brine, dill, and citrus peel, she said it would pair well with herbal liqueurs and flavors like Chartreuse, dill, and fennel.
• For the reposado, which has some "Christmas spice" flavors like clove, nutmeg, and cinnamon, Reiner says it would pear with apple, berries, allspice, sherry and vermouth. It would work in classic-style cocktails like a Tequila Old Fashioned.
• For the anejo, which had some nutty flavors like hazelnut and walnut, plus Mexican vanilla and to my palate a fino sherry funk, Reiner said it would work in hot cocktails, with hot chocolate, as well as with fig, pomegranate, and bitters.
• For the extra-anejo, which has some tobacco, leather, roasted banana, butter rum, and fig flavors, Reiner refused to name anything to pair with it, as it should be sipped neat. So there.

Next they filmed each bartender making a drink with the Rosangel. For a gallery of some shaker faces, see below the jump.

Vegetailians Rejoice!

In my job I'm usually the only vegetarian in the room and always the only one at the pairing dinner who has to pair all of his cocktails with salad.

Being a vegetarian was never inconvenient until I entered the spirits industry, but now all my meals are planned for me and having to get the special meal (that feels like the special ed. meal when people see my Heaping Plate of Sides come separately to the table) kinda sucks.

I even considered eating meat to make it easier on other people, but then had recurring nightmares about it. Instead of the 'falling off the cliff but you never splat on the sidewalk' dream, I had the 'chicken sandwich in my mouth but never bit down' dream. Ridiculous, I know, but after 19 years being a veggie the idea of eating a hunk of meat is really repulsive to me. (Here's a thought experiment that should help you understand: Imagine that your job would be easier if you'd just perform oral stimulation on a person of your opposite gender preference. That's how it feels.)

Anyway, there are a few other vegetarian cocktailians out there. I think Gwen from Intoxicated Zodiac, Marleigh from Sloshed, and Craig aka Dr. Bamboo are veggies. There are a couple of bartenders living in San Francisco who are vegetarians, but I'm not sure I should "out" them.

A few restaurants that do vegetarian tasting menus in SF offer wine pairings, but none as far as I know do that with cocktails- you get the cocktails paired with other peoples' food. Some of us have talked about trying to get a vegetarian cocktail dinner at Tales of the Cocktail this year, which would be awesome.

Anyone else a vegetailian? Feel free to out yourselves in the comments.

For the San Francisco folks, I have some good news about a one-off event. You know those Three on Five pairing battles I've been prattling on about at the Fifth Floor restaurant? Well the one on March 18th will be a five-course all-vegetarian dinner, with each course paired with beer, wine, and a cocktail. Finally, one I can go to!

Employees Trading Branch

When I was in New York a couple of weeks ago I was able to stop into both Employees Only and the Macao Trading Company, which was opened by some of the same crew.

The two places had similarities- both were very much busy, sceney bars rather than the quiet speakeasy shut-up-and-drink-your-cocktail bars that have proliferated everywhere.

And in both places I got a good drink while the person next to me did not. My Mai Tai at Employees Only was fine, whereas the Hemingway Daiquiri ordered next to me was completely unbalanced- super citric, and no discernible maraschino liqueur. At Macao Trading Company I had a drink with an El Tesoro tequila base that tasted largely like El Tesoro, but my companion got a tall citrus drink that was way out of proportion.

I noticed at Macao Trading Co. they were not measuring pours with jiggers, though our bartender was carefully watching the volume of spirits he poured into the shaker- so it's not like they just weren't paying attention. On the plus side, at both venues the service was ON. They were serving tons of people yet the bartenders and waiters were able to execute at a high level.

I also went to Little Branch at about 3AM one night. I had one drink, a Penicillin, and it was excellent, served with a Rubik's Cube-sized chunk of ice. I can't make any conclusions about the bar during the busy hours or the drinks overall, but I will say my experience there was perfect and I would love to find out on my next visit.

New Booze: Gran Centenario Rosangel

New Booze is an occasional introduction to new spirits on the market.

Gran Centenario's Rosangel tequila has already hit a few stores and will roll out for real in March. Unlike most flavored tequilas (not that there are that many of them) that are made from unaged blanco tequila, Rosangel has a base of reposado tequila. The standard Gran Centenario reposado is aged 10 months in French oak barrels (nearing the upper limit of one year for reposado), and blended with a little bit of older tequila.

Then to make the Rosangel, they further age it two months in used port barrels, then add hibiscus flavor to it. I had the opportunity to try this tequila, and it was much brighter than I expected- almost like a strawberry-dried berry-rose flavor, with the port wood coming in subtly underneath. It doesn't knock you out with excessive flavorings- it's definitely still tequila.

I had several cocktails with it. There are a few (largely unimpressive) ones on the website and Julie Reiner developed a few more that will be introduced as time goes by (the Ruby Fizz was particularly delicious). When experimenting with it, one bartender came up with a particularly good flavor match, and that's ginger.

Wounds, Rimmed with Salt

Can't get elected to the senate? Luckily you can always fall back on margarita mix! At least that's what Bob Schaffer is doing in Colorado. [link via Gawker via The Atlantic]

Watch the video here.

Tailor Two Times

Two weeks ago I was in New York for a brand launch that coincided with a party for Saveur Magazine and David Wondrich and Tales of the Cocktail at Tailor. It was a fun coincidence because the last time I was in NY a little over a year ago it coincided with David Wondrich's book launch for Imbibe.

After meeting Wondrich in two foreign countries and three US states before this, he said, "I never expect not to see you any place in particular." From my end I expect Wondrich to never show up unannounced. Then two days later I ran into him again at the Pegu Club- unannounced. So it was a bigger shock to me.

Anyway, at the party was almost everyone I know from the spirits industry in New York: fellow writers, editors, brand ambassadors, consultants, bartenders, and a ton of PR and marketing folk. I had no conversation for more than 30 seconds before running into someone else to say hello to.It's not easy being popular.

What was weird was that I knew all the PR folk in the room, but they didn't seem to know each other.  So I had to do a lot of introductions: "Jane, this is Sue. I was in Barbados with you and in Spain with her." Eventually I started feeling like a bit of a mooch.

Then a group of us went to PDT for more drinks, because apparently we were thirsty. We had hot dogs (veggie for me) and cocktails and then it was very late. 

Two days later, I returned to Tailor to try some of the drinks I've heard so much about. On the menu that night were pumpernickel raisin scotch, garam masala rum, cedar bourbon, and walnut cognac. The cocktails included the Rabanadas with brioche cachaca, raisin soda, and cinnamon, the Butternut & Falernum with rum, butternut squash, and falernum, and the Crumble with brown butter rum, clove, and pear.

I was able to try a bunch of the drinks and sips of the infusions. With butter, butternut, raisin, fruitcake, date, and other flavors the drinks were incredibly savory. There were some interesting spices like clove, nut flavors like walnut cognac, and wood flavors like cedar bourbon and spruce tincture.

Overall I enjoyed that the drinks were not served with a ton of pomp and circumstance- there was no grand show made of molecular mixology (though there was a section of "solids" on the menu I didn't try). On the down side, though everything I sampled was interesting, there wasn't anything I tried that made me want to order a second. Largely I found the drinks too intense for my tastes.

So I'm glad that Tailor is there doing what it does- showing how cocktails can push the flavor envelope and incorporating some really unique food elements into the drinks. I think if I lived in New York this would not be a place I would hang out all the time, but a definite spot to check in with and see what wacky new things they've done every now and again.

Idiot-Proof Glassware

Thanks to the Dallas Morning News for pointing me to this terrific tale of intoxspiration.

"About two years ago, I started noticing that people carrying martini glasses were spilling their drinks," says [Renee] Williams, a full-time information technology professional.

"The glasses looked sophisticated, but they weren't functional."

So keeping consistent with the sophisticated shape of the cocktail glass, Williams added a lip around the glass and a hole for a straw and Sipatiniz were born.

Stay classy, Sipatiniz.