Read the whole article here.

Mezcal has a bad rap, thought of by many as cheap tequila, notorious for the worm at the bottom of many bottles. In fact, mezcal is the term for all agave-based spirits made in Mexico, of which tequila is a subset made from blue agave in certain states. While there is plenty of bad, cheap mezcal on the market, there are also fantastic small-batch, traditional mezcals being produced, where multi-generational distilling families still  harvest the agave with machetes, roast the hearts in pits they dig by hand and distill the spirit in a clay still.

But back to the Pechuga.  It has an even more perplexing story.  I was fortunate enough to share a smoke last week in New Orleans with Ron Cooper, the man uniquely responsible for the rise of quality mezcal in the United States, he who went village to village tasting the local artisan mezcals to choose the finest to be bottled under his Del Maguey label.  He explained to me, a story that was hard for me to believe just six months prior. This particular spirit is called Pechuga, meaning chicken breast, because a raw chicken torso is attached to the top of the still, so that as the alcohol is evaporated out of the fermented agave mash, the vapors pass through the cavity of the chicken, which by the end of the distillation process is merely a nickel-sized morsel of dark, dehydrated meat clinging to an otherwise clean ribcage, so all of that juicy chicken, along with seasonal wild apples and plums added to the mash, is carried by the vapor into the bottle.

I called this article “If You Love Me” because if you did, you would pay the $210 that it costs to purchase a bottle of Pechuga for me, because I haven’t been able to justify doing so myself.

We were supposed to test out drinks until we made one we loved and then enter the recipe in the contest, but I was in a hurry, so I looked around, scribbled down a recipe out of my head and was out of there in less than 2 minutes, but somehow I won. I’d like to claim to be a genius, but I think I’m more idiot savant.

The Sweeney family recipe for winning cocktail recipe contests:

• Include generous amounts of at least 2 featured products
• Base your creation on a classic cocktail ingredient ratio
• Avoid products that would make bartenders cringe
• Don’t make the process so complicated that people won’t want to make it at home.
• Make it brightly colored (Hum is great because it’s fuchsia when diluted, and from hibiscus, not artificial colors)
• Carbonate if possible.  Everyone loves bubbles.

Perfect Puree Press Release:

We also saw the “Best Brand Ambassador” out for dinner with the show’s emcee, Billy Harris, the next night at Domenica, which in any other realm might be cause for scandal, but let’s face it, this guy doesn’t have much pull, or a shot in hell with the stunning Charlotte Voisey.

Thanks to the fine folks at DonQ Rum, who invited me to their table. Next year, I think this is 3 hours I will spend by the pool, but congrats to all the winners.

• World’s Best Drink Selection – Bar Lebensstern in Cafe Einstein, Berlin
• Best American Cocktail Bar – Death & Co., New York City
• World’s Best Cocktail Bar – The Cocktail Bar at The Merchant Hotel, Belfast
• World’s Best New Cocktail Bar – Mayahuel, New York City
• World’s Best Hotel Bar – The Connaught Bar, The Connaught Hotel, London
• American Bartender of the Year – Murray Stenson
• International Bartender of the Year – Agostino Perrone
• Best New Cocktail/Bartending Book – Vintage Spirits and Forgotten Cocktails by Ted Haigh
• Best Cocktail Writing – CLASS magazine
• Best New Product – Celery Bitters, The Bitter Truth
• World’s Best Cocktail Menu – Death & Co, New York City
• Best Bar Mentor – Dale DeGroff
• Best American Brand Ambassador – Charlotte Voisey, William Grant & Sons Portfolio
• Best International Brand Ambassador – John Gakuru, Sagatiba
• Helen David Lifetime Achievement Award – Brian Rea

I’ve been toying with concepts of spectrum and sequence as I reconnoiter traditional lists, thinking about how to alter a drinker’s perspective by making the time spent imbibing more complex and experiential.  At the Bax vs. Clift seminar at Tales of the Cocktail last week, they shared the cocktail list for The Tippling Club in Singapore wherein one of the pages lists the cocktails on a flavor spectrum, similar (and probably superior) to what I was considering.

My next ideas are to create a Venn diagram of flavors to show which flavors overlap in different drinks, and a sequential tasting menu of drinks based on the Kaiseki Ryori. Stay tuned.

If you are going for the first time, here are my tips:

1. You won’t pay for many drinks while you are here, so tip well when you can.

2. Make friends with the PR girls.  They like to pick up the tab for dinner.

3. Grab a spare cardboard box when you get the chance (you will end up with at least 300 airline sized bottles and a few larger, 15 branded muddlers, 7 new t-shirts, and you will probably score more and better swag than that.  I travel there carry-on only, and pack up a box to check on the way home.  They have packing tape at the airline desk, so don’t bother buying a roll).

4. Arrive a couple days early or leave a couple days late.  There will not be time during Tales to see the sights.

If you would like to stalk me, here’s my calendar:

Why must so many alcohol brands have such horrible Flash-based websites?

Welcome to the 21st century!  How about some good content that is easy to navigate?  What about creating a community for interaction and user created content?  How about a site that isn’t so slow that I close the browser window before it ever loads, or that loads at all on my phone, which is how so many of us access the web these days.

Who does the digital marketing strategies for liquor companies, and how have they gotten away with such crap for so long?

Thank you St. George for bucking a bad trend.

Your thoughts?  Who are the worst offenders?  Who has a great site (Flash or non-Flash)?