Libation Lab » recipes

Fiery Shrub

Quinn — Sun, 29 Aug 2010 18:11:51 +0000

Almost as good as the hot sauce I made yesterday is the spicy, salty vinegar that rises to the top of the jar when the hot sauce settles. Inspired by a Strawberry Shrub I had at an SF Chefs event last year from Neyah White, then of Nopa, I whipped the bright orange vinegar into a fiery shrub to use in cocktails. It has a really unique and complex flavor, marrying spice, sweetness, salt and acidity. Next up, how to use it in a tasty cocktail.

Fiery Shrub

1 cup spicy vinegar
1 cup white sugar

In a small saucepan, combine both ingredients over medium heat, bringing to a boil just long enough to dissolve the sugar. Stores in the refrigerator up to a month.

Homemade Hot Sauce

Quinn — Sun, 29 Aug 2010 02:16:55 +0000

House-made hot sauce is a great thing to have on hand for seasoning food and cocktails, and it couldn’t be easier to make. The spicy vinegar byproduct of the process is worth preserving for other uses, which I will get into tomorrow.

Homemade Hot Sauce

spicy peppers
kosher salt
white vinegar

This recipe has no measurements. Stem and chop your peppers, whatever you can get your hands on. I like to use a combination of bird chilies and Fresnos, both bright red in color.Toss them into a blender with a handful of salt and top with white vinegar. Let the hot sauce sit in a jar for a few days, then pour off the vinegar that rises to the top.

Five Dollar Shake

Quinn — Thu, 05 Aug 2010 23:02:24 +0000

In my home town, there’s a rural hipster cafe where they serve a delightful little concoction called the $5 Shake.

It goes something like this:

$5Shake

16 ounces imperial stout, like Otter Creek Imerial Russian Stout
1.5 ounces espresso
1/2 ounce pure Vermont maple syrup

Combine all ingredients in an imperial pint glass, stirring gently.

Click here to view the embedded video.

Quinn for the Win

Quinn — Tue, 03 Aug 2010 17:26:48 +0000

At Tales of the Cocktail, my buddy Roberto and I stumbled into the “Hum Lab” at Hotel Monteleone, which was set up as a laboratory, with a wide array of ingredients and tools for visitors to make and fine-tune cocktails with Hum, and products from Perfect Puree and Preiss Imports.

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:

Vin de Noix

Quinn — Fri, 30 Jul 2010 16:09:31 +0000

As posted yesterday, I made a batch of nocino with TSB, but we also made Vin De Noix, a French walnut wine.

Vin de Noix

10 green walnuts, soaked overnight and quartered
500 ml vodka
1/2 c maple syrup
1/2 vanilla bean
2 cloves
2 orange slices
1 bottle white burgundy

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Combine all ingredients in a half-gallon mason jar and let sit, shaking occasionally for at least 3 months.

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Nocino

Quinn — Thu, 29 Jul 2010 19:41:47 +0000

Nocino is a liqueur from Northern Italy made with green walnuts. TSB and I managed to get our hands on a box of these rare, under-ripe beauties and first made a batch of nocino. Green walnuts are available mid-June, and are over-ripe by mid-July. When right, the innards are still soft enough to cut through, and jelly in some parts where eventually a nut and shell would form.

Nocino

We split this recipe between 2 half-gallon mason jars.

30 green walnuts, soaked overnight and quartered
2 cinnamon sticks
5 cloves
1 vanilla bean
zest of one lemon
2 orange slices
2 1/2 c maple syrup
1 liter of vodka
500 ml dry vermouth
1 tsp fennel seed
1 tsp szechuan peppercorns

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Combine all ingredients in jars and let sit for at least a year, shaking every once in a while. Apparently this stuff may not be fully primed for 3 years.

Perfect Cocktail Snack: Maple Glazed Nuts

Quinn — Tue, 06 Jul 2010 16:09:34 +0000

These are obscenely easy to make.

1/4 cup Vermont maple syrup (grade B if you can get it)
2 tablespoons of olive oil
2 tablespoons of herbes de Provence
1/2 teaspoon sriracha
salt and pepper to taste
6 cups nuts (I used cashews and pecans)

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Mix together first five ingredients, pour over nuts and toss to coat. Bake at 350 for 15 minutes and stir half way through.

My White Dog Article in Drink Me Magazine

Quinn — Thu, 01 Jul 2010 22:54:47 +0000

I’ve got a new article in the latest issue of Drink Me Magazine about “white dog” or unaged whiskey. Coincidentally, I picked up a bottle of Buffalo Trace White Dog at BevMo yesterday, which is exciting, because it wasn’t available outside of Kentucky until very recently. The article also includes a recipe for a cocktail called the “Yellow Lab” by Bobby Heugel from Anvil in Houston. Click the image below to download and read a PDF of the article.

Bourbon Coke Float

Quinn — Sun, 06 Jun 2010 13:06:33 +0000

It’s getting hot out there (but not here; SF always gets colder during summer). The Bourbon Coke Float is a great way to cool off and forget about the heat. Mexican coke is preferred because of its real cane sugar and a lighter, spicier bourbon like Elmer T. Lee or Blanton’s with orange bitters adds a twist reminiscent of root beer.

Bourbon Coke Float

2 ounces Elmer T. Lee bourbon
6 ounces Mexican Coke
Ben and Jerry’s vanilla ice cream
Orange bitters

Pour bourbon into glass, followed by Coke and a scoop of ice cream. Splash Ice cream with a dash of bitters and serve with a bendy straw.

Old Old Fashioned

Quinn — Thu, 20 May 2010 18:37:03 +0000

I saw the band Frightened Rabbit last night at the Fillmore in San Francisco, and their latest album just happens to be called “The Winter of Mixed Drinks,” so I can justify referencing the concert here.

One of my favorites of their songs is “Old Old Fashioned,” which brings to mind the distinction between the classic version of the cocktail known as an Old Fashioned, and the bastardized contemporary version that makes me wary to order one in a bar where I don’t know the bartender, for fear that I will get some sickly sweet abomination.

The Old Fashioned is a great drink that has gotten a bad rap, as it began to include muddled fruit to cover the flavor of bad moonshine during the early 20th century, and evolved to become commonly cloying in recent decades.

The Old Old Fashioned

3 dashes Angostura Bitters
1 teaspoon sugar
splash of soda
2 ounces bourbon

Muddle the sugar and bitters in a splash of soda until the sugar is dissolved, forming a syrup. Add the whiskey and ice, and stir. Garnish with a lemon twist.

Click here to view the embedded video.