Apologies for my absence of late—personal and professional matters converged to keep me busy (and out of town) for a week and, because I’ve been a bad blogger, I didn’t have any posts in the queue for you. Hard to believe I’ve kept this site alive for nigh on three years, isn’t it?

I return slightly more tan (only on my feet—your guess is as good as mine) and ready to provide you with a refreshing highball for your tippling pleasure. This comes from the pages of Raising the Bar which, if you haven’t already, I urge you to take a peek at. I like to flip through it just for the photos.

A buck is a traditional highball composed of a spirit, lemon juice and ginger ale. Simple and straightforward, it comes in an infinite number of variations; you’ve probably heard of the gin buck or the New Orleans Buck, two of the more famous versions.

In a southwestern spin, Mautone prefaces his take by discussing his on-going quest to find more varied uses for tequila than just a margarita—a fine quest, and one that I have long been interested in. Though ginger and tequila wouldn’t be my first choice for a complementary pairing, this drink pulls it off. Continue →

Being the tireless nerd that I am, I can’t pass by a selection of potential cocktail mixers without at least a cursory glance. I’m sure some of you picked up on that the last time I matched mixers head-to-head, but it really is a compulsion that I have a hard time ignoring. (My health food store is now carrying rhubarb, lemongrass and lavender sodas. Be still my pounding heart!)

As such, when I found myself once again venturing through one of my favorite off-the-wall shopping destinations and came upon their delightful assortment of old-fashioned sodas, I couldn’t help myself. Charlie Brown Farms is a cultural smörgåsbord that lies along Pearblossom Highway in Littlerock, California. Anyone who has done the drive from LA to Vegas has passed Charlie Brown’s, a ramshackle red farm-style building that only hints at the wonders it contains. Life size dinosaurs, a village of gnomes, room after room of dolls, toys, knick-knacks, lawn ornaments, fruits, nuts, snacks, sodas, pickles… It’s something like how I imagine the Mad Hatter’s cottage, had he the space and inclination to acquire a lifetime of popular American ephemera.

After half an hour of perusing the vast selection of snacks (the reason for our visit), I stumbled upon the sodas secreted behind the lunch counter area. In the end I had to limit my selection to three bottles of ginger beer (and two bottles of root beer) only because I avoid purchasing things that contain HFCS, but these three naturally sweetened choices represented themselves proudly despite their small number. Continue →

My bar is looking kind of sad lately. I’m pretty much completely out of gin and my rum stores are looking rather anemic as well. This is largely a result of the fact that the places I like to shop for liquor are far, far away from where I live and, in LA, far far away means dedicating at least half a day to getting there and back. As you might imagine, spending half of one of our currently gorgeous days in the car doesn’t seem appealing, even if the result is the replenishment of my shelves.

As such, my drinking has been restricted to those spirits I have in plentiful supply. Though my rum selection is dwindling, I still have more rum than anything else. Returning again to Trader Vic’s Bartender’s Guide, Revised, I hunted through the punches looking for something light and refreshing that would be plentiful enough that one batch would get us through the afternoon (and evening).

I’ve searched as many resources as I could to find the source of the Gun Club Punch (version two), but haven’t been able to turn up any leads. My best guess is that it has some relation to The Gun Club Drink Book by Charles Browne, “sometime Mayor of Princeton; onetime Member of Congress; A. M., M. D., and some other things, but primarily interested in cookery,” which retails for a reasonable $1000. Regardless, this is a much less tropical concoction than version one, which includes pineapple juice and a host of other common tiki ingredients. Continue →

I’m starting to lose time. It feels like the last Mixology Monday was just yesterday, but it’s already here again. This month’s theme is Fruit Liqueurs, hosted by the lovely Anna at Morsels & Musings. Her “reign of terror” requires only that a booze-infused fruit fluid makes it into the drink—and really, who couldn’t use more fruit in their diet?

This recipe found me through the gorgeously photographed, criminally underutilized (by me, anyway) book Raising the Bar. The drink appealed to me immediately, the word “frappé” aside—it generally reminds me of the sort of hyper-corporate bourgeoisie café outcroppings that try to make iced coffee sound like it’s worth $5 an ounce. Once this frappé had me in its grasp, however, there was no going back. Not even when I discovered that we, in fact, had no limoncello.

Thus began the strange odyssey to find limoncello on the eastern-most edge of Hollywood—on a bike, chancing life and limb on the traffic-clogged streets, through neon supermarkets and dingy liquor stores, The Boyfriend searched but there was not a bottle of limoncello to be found. Oh, the horror! In a last-ditch effort to procure something—anything—that vaguely resembled lemon liqueur, he ducked in to the liquor store downstairs, a place we primarily go when we’re out of beer, and asked the clerk if they carry limoncello. The blank stare was not promising, but the clerk looked around and popped out of the back of the shop with a bottle: “This has a lemon on it. Will it work?”

It figures: find a liquor store in Hollywood with limoncello and what do they carry? Danny DeVito’s Premium Limoncello. The very same limoncello that he so infamously shared with George Clooney, resulting in their subsequent ejection from a bar and DeVito’s colorful appearance on “The View”. Not that I knew any of this before I started drinking, but two glasses of limoncello and down the YouTube rabbit hole I go! Continue →

Before I get into the cocktail, I have some lovin’ to dispense. I had an unexpectedly wonderful weekend full of cocktails, for which I must say a big “thank you” to Ted Haigh, as ever gracious and generous in his time and knowledge, as well as being excellent company; Vincenzo, Eric, Nick and Karen at The Doheny for their hospitality and the amazing drinks; Marcos, Eric, Chris, Jacques, Damian, Michel, Natalie, Chuck!, Amy!, Rebecca, Courtney and everyone else who took part in The Sporting Life this month. It was a wonderful event and I’m thrilled to know that cocktails are finally coming of age in the City of Angels. I look forward to the wonderful things that are sure to come from such a talented group!

Remember that bottle of créme de violette I mentioned a few posts back? The one that my darling sister bought us as a gift? The bottle I’ve been trying unsuccessfully to find for months now? Well, friends, that lovely, slender, lavender vessel now lives in my bar and it has been calling out for attention. Naturally, wanting to do things right with such an unprecedented newcomer, we gave it a taste before I committed it to the shaker.

As Jamie pointed out, the nose on this isn’t precisely enticing, though I wouldn’t say it’s off-putting, either. It has an earthy, almost dusty sensibility edging around the distinctly flowery essence. The color was much more purple than I expected to find in a small pour, which made me a little bit suspicious about the coloring agents. That footnote aside, the flavor was pretty much what you would expect—violets, similar to the taste of a pastille. Subtly floral and not terribly sweet, it has a very savory character despite the candy-bright color.

I’ve been fortunate enough to taste real Créme Yvette, which is the only other violet liqueur I’ve ever had. Comparatively the violette doesn’t have the rich, complex character of the Yvette, nor the subtle sweetness, but it certainly delivers on the violet flavor—which is the main component of Yvette as well. As such, I decided to try out the violette in a Blue Moon, to see how it held up against the Yvette version. Continue →