Drink of the Week: The Coffee Cocktail

The Coffee Cocktail.For my final post before the Thanksigiving holiday, I offer you a delicious after dinner (or breakfast!) drink that will nevertheless do absolutely nothing to counter your turkey/mash potato coma. You see, just as the chocolatey egg cream you can get at your nearest Jewish deli has neither egg nor cream, the Coffee Cocktail has no coffee. Moreover, when it was invented some time in the 1880s or so, it wasn’t even actually a cocktail, because back then that required the presence of bitters.

What it is, however, is shockingly delicious. Think a winey, lighter, fruitier egg nog. In fact, it’s so good I simply can’t decide between the two recipes I found, so I’m giving you both recipes this week in an act of outrageous pre-Turkey Day bounty. It’s got a whole egg in it, but thanks to the miracle of pasteurized eggs, there’s really no reason any tippler should avoid this.

The Coffee Cocktail

1 1/2 ounces brandy
1 1/2 ounces port
1 whole large egg
1 teaspoon sugar
grated nutmeg

OR

2-3 ounces port
1 ounce brandy
1 whole egg
1 teaspoon sugar
grated nutmeg

Combine the liquid ingredients in a cocktail shaker. Dry shake (i.e., without ice) to properly emulsify the egg. If done properly, it will disappear in a lovely beige-to-light purple froth. Then, add lots of ice and shake again. Strain into a chilled wine glass or goblet and sprinkle a bit of grated nutmeg on top. Toast the fact that you’re lucky enough to have shelter and be able to enjoy life’s simpler pleasures, such as a really delicious and refreshing not-quite-cocktail complete with all the nutrition of a whole egg.

***

I mostly made this with the remains of my bottle of St. Remy Brandy and, later, a very inexpensive bottle of a brand called Hartley, made by the Sazarac company. It’s sweetness was actually a very nice complement to the drink.

Still, the big decision a Coffee Cocktail drinker has to make is between tawny and ruby port. The first recipe above is drawn mainly from Robert Hess’s The Essential Bartender’s Guide (you can also see him make it in this video). Hess actually calls for simple syrup, but I found substituting a similar amount of actual sugar added just the right amount of additional sweetness to a drink that just wants to be that way.  He, however, does not specify a type of port. “Any port in a storm,” he suggests.

The second recipe is based on Ted “Dr. Cocktail” Haigh’s recipe in his Vintage Spirits and Forgotten Cocktails, reviving the drink first memorialized in 1887 by the legendary Jerry Thomas. He specifically calls for ruby port.

My own verdict: Stick with the tawny on the first version, it’s mellower, and the results look slightly more coffee-like, as the ruby port makes a drink that’s far more purple than beige. I loved both tawny and ruby port on the second, Haighian take.

As for my egg, yes, it was pasteurized and, especially if you can find super-safe eggs on sale at your liquor supermarket the way I did, you might as well go that way if you’re making this on the big holiday. Our digestive systems take enough Thanksgiving punishment…but I definitely wouldn’t discourage hardier souls from using a regular, garden variety egg. The Coffee Cocktail is worth a tiny risk.

  

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Drink of the Week: The Round Robin

The Round Robin.Are you into absinthe? I’m definitely not averse to it as a little-goes-a-very-long-way ingredient in a numerous drinks, but I can’t say that I’m a fan of it in it’s classic mode of preparation. It’s not just it’s strength and bitterness, it’s the fact that I’m not even a fan of licorice candy, let alone industrial-strength anise and fennel.

On the other hand, if there’s one ingredient I’ve found in my alcoholic wanderings that can transform a potentially repulsive drink into a taste treat, it’s a raw egg white, properly emulsified. This week’s drink, which comes I know not from where, puts that theory to the test in a big, big way. Let’s get this wormword and poultry-product party started.

The Round Robin

1 ounce brandy
1 ounce absinthe
1 egg white
1 teaspoon superfine sugar

Combine all the ingredients in a cocktail shaker. To emulsify the egg white, shake vigorously without ice. Then, add ice, shake vigorously again, and strain into a wine glass. Toast the legalization of absinthe back in the mid-2000s when people started to figure out that the stuff is no more (or less) dangerous than other types of booze. Prohibition never works.

****

Well, I guess this is another vote from me for the miraculous properties of raw eggs  in cocktails as, on balance, I really like this drink. In fact, I like this drink so much that, even though I’d have a hard time finding a difference between good absinthe and bad absinthe, I’d almost spend the $70 or more it takes to buy some of the putative good stuff just to try it in a Round Robin.

Why? Well, just as an Old Fashioned humanizes even a very strong bourbon or rye, the Round Robin actually makes the bitter licorice on steroids flavor of absinthe not only tolerable but fascinating.

While I only have one brand of absinthe on hand and it’s not supposed to be that good — I gather than aficionados of the wormwood liquor find Absinthe Ordinaire to be appropriately named at a mere 92 proof — I did try different brandies out. Killing my bottle of St. Remy worked just fine but a Ile de Ré Fine Island Cognac worked even better.

However, the one big change I made from my usual habit was was using a pasteurized brand of egg white I picked up at my local Trader Joe’s (3 tablespoons of the stuff is said to approximate one egg white). While the the seemingly low viscosity of the stuff looked suspect, the fact of the matter is that it worked just as well as the stuff you get directly from the chicken…and I know my friend from the local health department would agree that salmonella is about the last thing I need right now. I’m usually not one to worry about such stuff, but if you’d been through as many perfect storms I’ve been through over the last six months, you might be a bit extra cautious yourself.

Coming up next: An adventure with pasteurized whole eggs and a coffee drink with zero caffeine and no decaffeinated coffee, either.

  

Picture of the Day: Exotic Brandy

If you like exotic models, you’re going to love Brandy. Look at those amazing eyes! We love this lovely Asian model, and we’re sure you will as well. Check out her entire shoot.

Exotic Brandy

  

Drink of the Week: The Corpse Reviver #1 (Revisited)

Corpse Reviver. Yes, we’ve been down this road before at DOTW, but our vehicle has had parts of its engine replaced. First, we covered the Corpse Reviver #2, and then we eventually got around to the far lesser known original Corpse Reviver. However, I’ve decided to take another look at the original version of the drink, owing to my recent discovery of an ingredient I’ve been shamelessly ignoring up until very recently: applejack, an American brandy that fell out of favor during prohibition.

As you may recall, the idea behind the entire Corpse Reviver family of beverages is to be, if not the hair of the dog that bit you, a big, wet kiss from the entire beast. Savoy Cocktail Book author Harry Craddock informs us that this particular Corpse Reviver is “to be taken before 11 a.m., or whenever steam and energy are needed.” Alas it contains no caffeine or B-vitamins, and I’m almost never hungover, so it provides me personally with far more relaxation than “steam.”

The Craddock Corpse Reviver recipe called for either applejack or calvados, it’s more complicated French cousin. The first time around, I went with the latter, since buying the pricey French stuff seemed like enough of an expense and most recipes I found online seemed to imply that there wasn’t much of a difference between the two brandies.

That’s all changed. As discussed previously, I’m falling hard for the one surviving applejack brand, Laird’s. Moreover, since we’re looking down the musket barrel of Thanksgiving, I’m thinking that a two week look at this very old 100% North American hard liquor is the thing to do at DOTW,

So, I’m here to tell you that, if you keep your Corpse Reviver nice and simple and use applejack and not calvados, you’ll have a drink that’s more pleasant than other versions — even if its resurrection inducing qualities remain in grave doubt.

The Corpse Reviver #1 (Revisited)
1 1/2 ounces brandy or cognac
3/4 ounce applejack
3/4 ounce sweet vermouth (preferably Noilly Pratt or something similar, maybe Martini & Rossi)

Combine the ingredients in a cocktail shaker or, if you like, a mixing glass. Then either shake or stir — I lean towards shaking — and strain into a chilled cocktail glass. Toast Walt Disney, Marvel Comics and their various descendants and imitators for their ability to revive our favorite seemingly dead fictional pals again and again and again.

*****

I tried my Laird’s Applejack laced Corpse Reviver first with the remains of my bottle of Noilly Pratt sweet vermouth and it was subtly delightful, even as it was time to toss my wonderful and hard to find half-size bottle away. I loved the simpler, less abrasive take on the first Corpse Reviver, which I think has never really taken off partly because many versions of it are more fruity and complex than drinkable.

Indeed, when I tried a higher end sweet vermouth, Dolin, it didn’t come together for me at all; nor was the bitter-bottomed Punt e Mes, a huge favorite of mine, a particular success. It really does seem as if a simpler but tasty American apple brandy also requires a simpler but tasty French sweet vermouth.

Now’s the time at Drink of the Week when we dance.

 

  

Drink of the Week: The Old Fashioned (Remixed)

the Old Fashioned. This will probably drive me out of the cocktail writers’ club, but my regular, recipe-centric, DOTW was preempted by a cold. I know this will make me sound a bit wussy to some of you, but I personally do not find that alcohol “kills the cold germs”  It’s more like granting the virus superpowers. Moreover, when I’m sick, some generic Alka-Seltzer Plus more or less does me just fine. In short, liquor has not passed these lips in over a week.

On the other hand, being sick also allowed me to wipe my DVR clean of “Mad Men” episodes…including episode 12, “The Quality of Mercy,” which my device decided to turn off about 1/3 of the way through the episode. I tried recording it again last night, but the show my DVR thought was “Mad Men” turned out to be CSI or NCIS or SVU or something else with letters or what not.  I’m sure I’ll catch up with it all by next Sunday.  The point is that “Mad Men” is whipping up more controversy and hysteria than ever, and it’s lovable/hatable alcoholic antihero/hero, Don Draper, has done more than his share to revive interest in classic cocktails in general and one ultra-classic, in particular, the Old Fashioned.

If you want a recipe, as such, you can find not one but actually two if you read my last look at the Old Fashioned closely.  That was just a little over two years ago, but the two approaches to the drink in it remain pretty close to the way I often make it now…except I’m slightly more open-minded about the use of soda water. Still, I say keep it minimal if you use it at all.

On the other hand, that’s not quite what Mr. Draper does in this memorable scene from a long-ago season when he makes a new and short-lived friend in Conrad Hilton by making him an Old Fashioned. Yes, we’re breaking the format this week and in lieu of a recipe, you’re getting this legendary moment in televisionary cocktailing.

Now, watching this again, it occurs to me I’ve never made an Old Fashioned precisely this way. Don uses a bit more soda water than I would prefer. And note how he doesn’t really stir it, but just sort of dashes the bar spoon on the ice cubes a couple of times. On the other hand, his wetting of one sugar cube per glass (they look like rather large brown sugar cubes to me) with Angostura bitters and then muddling them is absolutely classic. The fact that he includes a cheap, bright red, non-Luxardo maraschino cherry in his muddling would, on the other hand, horrify many in the crafty cocktail set, but I don’t think it’s a problem.

No, if I were drinking tonight, I’d probably make pretty much exactly that drink, though I’ve never been a big Old Overholt guy. This rye has become the craft bar standard recently — I can’t speak for its popularity in 1963 — but I prefer my bonded Rittenhouse Rye or Don Draper’s favorite not-quite-rye, Canadian Club. (CC, by the way, sponsors a brief tutorial with their version of an Old Fashioned as an extra on the Blu-Ray/DVD of “Mad Men” Season Five.) Right now, I’d be using Bulleit’s Rye, because that’s what I’ve got. I’m sure it would be decent.

And that’s actually the thing about an Old Fashioned — even more than a Martini or a Manhattan, it’s sturdy and flexible. Paradoxically, it’s also easy to foul up completely, as most non-craft bars do, if you use too much sweetener, water, or even whiskey. One teaspoon for two ounces of whiskey is pretty much the right proportion, and it’s definitely also the maximum if you’re muddling fruit. Also never, ever, use the syrup that comes with the sweet-supermarket maraschino cherries as your sweetener. Don’t.

Still, like I said, there’s that a lot of leeway with your Old Fashioned. You can make the very severe kind with only a teaspoon full of soda water, a sugar cube, bitters, and not very much ice — or, the fashionable craft bar favorite, one giant and slow to dilute cube — or you can make the lusher version I mostly lean towards, in which I muddle an orange slice and maybe a cherry, too, while throwing in a splash or two, or three, of plain water and enough ice to fill my rocks glass.

There’s an idea out there that there’s one way to make a perfect Martini or Old Fashioned, and I’m here to tell you that’s balderdash. I’ve mad dozens of these drinks in dozens of ways — I’ve even served an Old Fashioned up, shaken, as if it was a Martini or Manhattan — and it nearly always works, at least a little bit.

At bars, I’ve had two truly great Old Fashioneds. One was for probably $15.00 at a very high end joint in Century City on November 4th, 2008 and used Michter’s Rye (or maybe Bourbon). The other was a $3.00 happy hour beverage with the well bourbon (Evan Williams, I think) by a nameless bartender at the Hudson in West Hollywood several months back. I’m sure they were made in completely different ways.

So, I guess what I’m trying to say is that these recipes — all of them — are guidelines. I’ve veered between the various poles of making Old Fashioneds and I’ve yet to find a consistently great way to make the drink, but some of my tries have been very good. Some have also been disappointing. I still think the official recipe I wrote two years back is the most reliable, but my results always vary.

It’s pretty much the same way as it goes with a great television series like “Mad Men.” Maybe the season closer will be a real humdinger, or maybe it won’t. We should all just relax and let it be whatever it is.

Unless, of course, the nuttier online tea-leaf readers are right and the Manson Family or stand-ins really do end up killing Megan Draper. That, my friends, would be more stupid than sweetening your Old Fashioned with two tablespoons of the cheap maraschino cherry syrup.