Snickerdoodle

It's fall time, and that means time for fall cocktails! I've been playing around with Becherovka cocktails, and this one is great for a crisp autumn evening. There's a lot of cinnamon, but enough cookie and ginger that it tastes more like a snickerdoodle than a cinnamon stick. It's not sweet, mind you, but somehow it still tastes like a cookie. This is a golden ratio recipe; it might have been too boozy, but there are enough spices in the Becherovka that you don't notice the alcohol. Recipe after the jump.

Happy Belated Rickey Month

Photo by Reece Lloyd, on flickr.

Apparently, July is National Rickey Month. I've been remiss. Typically, a rickey is made with a shot of gin, half a lime, and soda; after juicing the lime, you put the lime carcass in the drink. It's historically also been made with bourbon, though that's much less common. The rickey is the official drink of D.C., and so the D.C. Craft Bartenders Guild declared July National Rickey Month.

A rickey is a fine, refreshing drink, but there's not a whole lot going on. So there's been a contest to find the best variation in town. All month, bars across the city (as well as a couple in Virginia) have been offering their take on the rickey. Get five punches in your rickey card, and you get free admission to Jack Rose for the finals on August 5th. There's still time to get your punches, so get to it! Our favorite so far has been the Strawberry-Rhubarb rickey at Vinoteca, which sadly wasn't entered into the contest. If you like pickles, you should try Rachel Sergi's I'm Gonna Need You to Focus Rickey, which involves pickled soda and is available at Jack Rose.

Tasha's Uncontrollable Laughter

I bought some Becherovka lately, and I've been experimenting with it a bit. So if there's a surfeit of posts involving it, you know why. Becherovka is a Czech herbal liqueur, invented by a shopkeeper named Josef Vitus Becher, who had 16 children. Like most liqueurs, it's complex, but there's a strong cinnamon flavor and an undercurrent of anise. It's a bit more mixing friendly than most liqueurs, and so the experimenting hasn't been too hard on me.


My first concoction is a saucy little thing. It's very tasty and complex. I used bourbon to give it a decent backbone without overpowering it with the spiciness of a rye. A strong gin might be a good base spirit as well. I added some burlesque bitters balances out cinnamon. This resulted in a flavor mildly reminiscent of an Atomic Fireball, though the complexity of the Becherovka prevented it from becoming too candy-like. Recipe after the jump.

Manhattan Montenegro

Recently at the liquor store, I saw on the top shelf a bottle of Amaro Montenegro. Being a big fan of all forms of amaro, I wanted to give it a shot. So I bought it and gave it a good home. By itself, it's pretty tasty; it tastes a bit like a less intense Fernet Branca. So I thought it would go great in a cocktail.

Eventually, I want to try it in a Negroni, but for my first foray into mixing it, I thought I'd try a Manhattan. Since Amaro Montenegro is more bitter than sweet vermouth, I used bourbon instead of the more traditional rye. I'm not sure this was the right decision. I thought the sweetness would go well with the bitterness of the amaro, but I'm afraid the bourbon just gets overpowered. I'm not sure if I should try rye, or just reduce the proportions a bit. I guess that's what experimentation is for!

The Tribeca

I really liked the wine we had with dinner tonight, a Chateau Julien 2009 Merlot, but didn't really feel like I wanted to drink more wine. I wanted a cocktail. I don't know much about making cocktails with wine, but I know I like Manhattans, and sweet vermouth is a type of wine, right? So I made a Manhattan, but replaced the sweet vermouth with wine. In an attempt to balance out the different flavor profile, I added extra bitters and a fresh orange peel.

It makes for an interesting combination. It definitely tastes a lot fresher than a typical Manhattan, and it has a really nice finish. But for whatever reason, it's very, very bitter up front. I suspect that that is from the extra bitters, and when I make it again, I'll tone those down. But it looks like this is a good way to make a Manhattan for the summer, when you don't want the heaviness of the traditional Manhattan.

Bacon Bourbon Beef

After brunch recently, we had a large quantity of bacon left over. Since we don't usually have bacon in the morning, we figured we should use it for dinner. A little bit of searching, and we found this recipe for beef tenderloin steaks with smoky bacon bourbon sauce. It sounded great, but when we got to the store, we found that the short ribs looked fantastic, so got those instead. (My wife also really liked the apple fritter, but that's a different story.) Of course, short ribs necessitate a different cooking method from tenderloin.

What I did is take the ribs and brown them in a skillet. I put them in the slow cooker with the ingredients for the sauce, deglazed the pan with water, and added that to the slow cooker as well. I added some rosemary, because I like rosemary, and a chipotle pepper to give it a bit of heat and some additional smokiness. We left it on low for about seven hours.

It turned out great! Fork-tender, of course, but with a really good flavor to it. There was a bit of heat from the chipotle, but not much, and it added some complexity and balanced well with the bourbon. The asparagus made a really nice complement to the meat. When I do this again, which I think I will, I want to try reducing the liquid to make a sauce, as I think that would make it even better.

Bourbon Sauced Steak

For dinner, we had a peppercorn steak in a bourbon sauce, based off of a recipe I found on Epicurious. Some time I'll belabor you with the details of how I prepare steak, but I want to focus specifically on this recipe. I'm still working on an easy way to crack peppercorns without them becoming too fine. I suppose I should buy a burr grinder, but that really seems like too much. The steak was good -- a New York Strip. It was a bit thin, but it worked just fine with the recipe. The sauce, consisting predominantly of heavy cream, bourbon, shallots, and beef stock, was quite tasty, but it was thinner than is ideal. On the other hand, the quinoa did a good job of sopping it up! Next time, I'll either reduce it more before adding the cream or add some corn starch. I think I'd also add some Worcestershire Sauce to make it a bit more savory. We paired it with a Brewer's Art Green Peppercorn Trippel, which is a lovely beer, and paired really well with the dish.