Subject: Liquor and Spirits

• The Bartender's Favorite Drink: Diedre Hayes

  August 5, 2008

• Local Vodkas Show Their Tastes

  September 8, 2008

• Boulevard's BBQ worth the wait?

  Yesterday I finally tried Boulevard's latest Smokestack release, the Bourbon Barrel Quad  (BBQ for short). The BBQ was originally scheduled to be released right after the Brett-Saison in October. That released was pushed back until it finally arrived last week in liquor stores -- where it disappeared quickly.I visited several liquor stores trying to find it, and they all said they'd received a couple of cases at most. "At first we only got the one case and the employees bought all that," gr

  December 15, 2008

• Rachel Maddow will drink you under the table

  Oh Rachel Maddow, my crush. First, you get the luxury of going on television every night and smacking around Pat Buchanan. Now you show us how to make a classic cocktail with the best of them, first explaining that applejack is "not so much an apple brandy as it is an apple whiskey" and then coolly noting that "any liquor that has the word bond on the label is a 100 proof." Here's Maddow shaking like a pro and making a Jack Rose.The Jack Rose via CocktailDB:1 1/2 oz applejack 1/2 oz fresh lime j

  January 6, 2009

• Local bartenders in the national news

  The Chicago Sun-Times has an article this week about dealing with winter weather the old fashioned way: drinking yourself warm.There's the usual mentions and recipes from bartenders in New York and (of course) Chicago, but then author Seanan Forbes mentions not one, not two, but three bartenders from Kansas City. The first is Ryan Maybee: "Contrast might be the bartender's best tool. Kansas City's Ryan Maybee, one of the Midwest's hottest mixologists, uses a mist of absinthe to spark the senses.

  January 7, 2009

• Best Girlie Drinks

  October 18, 2001

• Best Place to Get Cued Up

  October 17, 2002

• Goats and Floats

  January 30, 2003

• TGI Thursday

  March 6, 2003

• Mock the Monkey

  January 22, 2004

• On Frozen Pond

  April 22, 2004

• Serve the Angelina Jolie cocktail at your Oscar party

  Flickr: ElvisTR The Daily Dish blog from Toronto Life posted a great piece about ideas for Oscar night parties to throw in your own home. Not everyone gets invited to the high-profile Vanity Fair shindig -- which is being downsized this year because of the crappy economy. The creative ideas on the Daily Dish list include the feature from Gourmet magazine on mixing cocktails inspired by celebrities, including the Angelina Jolie (single malt scotch coupled with elderflower liqueur) and the K

  February 21, 2009

• Best Reason to Get Over the Apple Martini

  October 7, 2004

• Best Shot of Tequila

  October 7, 2004

• If you only had 10: Liquors for a house bar

  Flickr: MayhemWith people cutting back across the board, one easy way to save money is to limit the number of drinks you buy at bars or restaurants. If ever there was a time to have a good home bar, this is it. People think they need every liquor and cordial under the sun, but really all you need to make a majority of drinks are these 10 basic liquors:1. Dirt-cheap vodka: Buy a 1.75 liter for under $15, and once it's cold in the freezer it tastes perfectly fine with heavier mixers like cranberry

  March 2, 2009

• The Artful Dodger

  December 23, 2004

• Crooked Fingers

  March 10, 2005

• Cocktail virgins

  Flickr: FibroblastThis weekend I visited Bluestem's lounge area, manned by Van John Zarr, one of the best and most knowledgeable bartenders in the area. I was with a large group that included some college students who, while no strangers to drinking, had just turned of age and were inexperienced in world of cocktails.Zarr quickly made them feel experienced. He asked what they liked to drink, and when one customers said gin and tonic, Zarr talked them through a series of possibilities and within

  March 9, 2009

• Recession a great time to find cheap booze

  Flickr: Il MungoOver the weekend, The New York Times published an article about how cheap booze is flying off the shelf. Consumers are putting price before quality, and this is apparently a bad thing for alcohol producers.Nonsense. When it comes to alcohol -- especially liquor -- price and quality don't go hand in hand. There may not be great vodkas for $5.50, but for just a little more, you can drink like a king. A king on a budget but still a king.

  March 10, 2009

• Getting a good green mixed drink

  Flickr: RoboppyWhether it's green clothing, green balloons or pets painted green, that's the color people want today. That includes cocktails, though there are only a few green liquors -- creme de menthe, Midori, Chartreuse and absinthe. Never mind that none of the above are Irish and that only the Chartreuse doesn't use artificial coloring. Since those liquors are green they are going to sell well today and most likely be mixed in some revolting cocktails. The New York Times had an articl

  March 17, 2009

• Buying spirits as an investment

  LaphroaigThe stock market has always shown "volatility" (market-speak for "nobody has any idea where the hell it's doing"). Thus a market for physical items as investments has grown in the past couple of years, especially since the September meltdown.Early in October, the Wall Street Journal ran an article called "When stocks tank, some investors stampede to alpacas and turn to drink." The first line is about a man named Andy Pick who bought $120,000 in champagne in hopes of sitting on it and ma

  April 1, 2009

• Stock versus Scotch

  Flickr: ProgieYesterday I blogged about whiskey as an investment, and today I discovered World Whiskey Index, a stock market for all your whiskey-trading needs.World Whiskey Index (better known by the unfortunate acronym WWI) was founded on  simple supply and demand. New markets, especially China, have developed a taste for single-malt scotches. But there's a limited amount of fine scotch. Most medium-grade and all high-grade single-malt scotches were casked as many as 50 years ago in small

  April 2, 2009

• Hey, Record Bar Insider

  February 15, 2007

• Drink Dance

  February 26, 2009

• Slurp It Up

  February 12, 2009

• Chez Charlie's

  December 18, 2008

• Maker's Mark Bourbon House and Lounge

  September 25, 2008

• Whack Fol, Y'all

  Test your knowledge of Irish drinking songs before getting slaintéd at the Irish Fest.

  August 30, 2007

• Stay Classy, Kansas

  March 22, 2007

• One80 Proof

  One80's bar food couldn't be further from burgers and fried mushrooms.

  November 2, 2006

• La Vida Coco

  August 31, 2006

• Bourbon dinner tonight

  City Tavern is hosting a small-batch bourbon tasting tonight, with a mind-numbing (literally) seven bourbons to choose from, along with six food pairings. If the weather holds up, it will take place on the patio outside.Flickr: Beer CoasterManager Ryan Asbury said the whole thing is being served "mix and match" style, meaning it won't be a sit-down dinner; instead, he'll have stations set up with bourbons and food. Pairings will be suggested but people are free to choose whatever they want. As A

  April 16, 2009

• The Black Diamond Heavies

  7:30 p.m. Saturday, June 18, at Davey's Uptown. Sunday, June 19, at Fred P. Ott's on the Plaza.

  June 16, 2005

• Lunch Lady

  Jagermeister and Cheez Whiz: Heidi Phillips of Abileen knows what does a body good.

  January 13, 2005

• Van Milder

  Van Hagar and its fans trudge into the future older, if not wiser.

  July 22, 2004

• Eighteen Visions

  Monday, June 21 at the Bottleneck.

  June 17, 2004

• Hitting the Sauce

  The bar at Gates is a fine place to get help.

  September 18, 2003

• Tour de France

  Patrick Quillec's third French restaurant makes happy pigs out of Midwesterners.

  August 8, 2002

• Teocali

  April 30, 2009

• Do you know what I had for dinner last night?

  I had bacon for dinner. Tonight I plan on having pork. Tomorrow, maybe bacon, pork and ham. I have no qualms about this because, except for hurting my arteries, no harm can come from eating pork. "Swine influenza viruses are not transmitted by food. You cannot get swine influenza from eating pork or pork products." That's the CDC talking, not me.But notice the CDC didn't say anything about drinking pork products. Probably because it doesn't think anyone is crazy enough to, but yes, there are sev

  May 1, 2009

• Jardine's

  January 29, 2009

• Ratios for the best margaritas

  If there's anybody who knows a good cocktail, it's Brian Flavin. Before he became an IT officer for the PB&J Restaurant Group he was a bartender at the Grand St. Cafe. He still bar-tends there on Wednesday nights because, as two regulars told me, "We won't let him leave." While the restaurant is known for its classic American pork chops, Grand St. also features an extensive list of margaritas which Flavin has been shaking for 15 years. "That's the thing -- a margarita should always been

  June 25, 2009

• Knob Creek has done run out of bourbon

  Knob Creek is one of the more popular bourbons in America. In fact, it's too popular. The Louisville Courier reports that the Clermont, Kentucky, distiller just tapped its last barrels dry and the next ones won't be ready for six months.One of the bourbon's strongest selling points is that it's aged in wooden barrels for nine years, double that of many whiskeys in the price range. The long aging process results in its distinctive sweetness -- but also means having to forecast sales nine years ou

  July 8, 2009

• Whiskey & Ice: A relationship on the rocks?

  The idea of a summer drink without ice is as perplexing as the wall of drinks at QuikTrip. Vanilla or Cherry flavor shot? What the heck is a Rooster Booster? QT itself has made it clear you're supposed to use ice, offering two kinds for those staggering in from the heat. But there might be one exception to the rule and that, fellow drinkers, is Scotch whiskey. Forget flavor shots -- the dividing line among whiskey enthusiasts is one drawn in water.  Recently the Daily Dust highlighted the I

  July 20, 2009

• You had me at Japanese ice balls

  If you're still blown away by the ice maker in your fridge, you might want to sit down for what you're about to read. Forget the argument about on the rocks or a splash of water -- you can now super-size your ice via spherical ice molds ($16). The molds create ice spheres that are 2 inches in diameter, they'll fit snugly in a lowball glass. The ice sphere has origins in Japan, where apprentice bartenders (possibly Ralph Macchio) hand carve spheres from blocks of ice. Expensive whiskeys are serve

  July 27, 2009

• The science of simple syrup

  ​The fun part of stocking any bar is buying the liquor. That won't change. But even a home bar needs items other than ice and a bottle of soda water if your drinks are going to transcend from a fancier version of a college drink to one that reflects the (mostly) sensible adult you are today. Simple syrup is one of the bar ingredients that you should always have on hand. It's simple to make, inexpensive, and can add a hint of sweetness that means drinks will be tasty without being cloying.

  August 24, 2009

• Moonshine still here

  ​Moonshine is like pickling -- odds are you know somebody who engages in the practice -- and whatever you've sampled out of a mason jar has either been fantastic or mouth-numbingly bad. The main difference is that moonshine is illegal, while pickles are kosher with the law. Salon decided to look into whether our current do-it-yourself culture will expand into distilling spirits, despite that fact that it's currently illegal to brew your own liquor without a licensed and registered still. The m

  September 10, 2009

• Halloween cocktails: Your spirits guide

  ​Whether you believe in ghosts or not, Halloween-inspired cocktails might just be the thing to lift your spirits. The place to start -- and perhaps end -- is cocktails made with candy-corn infused vodka. It would appear to have a light orange hue like that of orange drink, and what I can only imagine to be an unparalleled sweetness. But it only takes three hours to infuse the vodka, which suggests that you could make a batch the morning of your party. Kindly don't sacrifice high-end vodka in p

  October 14, 2009

• Putting the shot in flu shots

  ​Forget the clinic. It's flu season and that means it's time to belly up to the bar to take your medicinals. Medicinals -- the all-encompassing name for spirits and spirit-based drinks that are thought of as curatives and health tonics. Eat.Drink.Think has a recipe for a bourbon or rye whiskey cocktail that will either put you to sleep or have you on your feet. The heated drink also includes honey and lemon, which helps to soothe sore throats as well as inspires a pleasant warming feeling of t

  October 21, 2009

• The splendiferous ham daiquiri

  The list of meat-based cocktails grew a bit fatter last week, as the team behind the McNuggetini decided to collaborate on a Ham Daiquiri. It's nice to know that creators Alie Ward and Georgia Hardstark weren't just offering a pithy joke at the end of their first video and have delivered on the promise of a ham-inspired cocktail."I'm going to go on record that this is a bad idea .... the ham is blended," warns Hardstark at the beginning of the video. Of course, this only makes you want to see

  November 16, 2009