All posts tagged: absinthe

Cocktail of the week no.19: the Tuxedo

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In 1885, in a rural patch of New York state called Tuxedo, just north of the border with New Jersey, a man named Pierre Lorillard decided to found a country club. He named it after the region, which had retained its Indian name; Etymonline and the Tuxedo Club’s own excellent history page agree that ‘Tuxedo’ probably derives from the Algonquian ‘p’tuck-sepo,’ or ‘crooked river.’ The club was a success, attracting the New York glitterati for its country pursuits and society dances, and in the year of its opening, 1886, the name went down in history for its association with a new, informal style of evening wear – the tail-less dinner jacket. Supposedly this rather avant-garde garment was brought back to New York by one James Brown Potter, who saw the Prince of Wales (the future King Edward VII) wearing one on a visit to Sandringham; the ‘notoriously unchaste’ prince recommended his tailor to Potter while simultaneously trying to seduce his wife. The Wall Street Journal has the full story here, as well as one or two other versions. This …

Cocktail of the week no. 15: the Corpse Reviver no.2

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The first time I came across the Corpse Reviver group of cocktails was reading P. G. Wodehouse, who on several occasions has Jeeves restoring Bertie from a hungover state with one of his ’tissue-restorers.’ Here’s one passage from The Code of the Woosters. “I loosed it down the hatch, and after undergoing the passing discomfort, unavoidable when you drink Jeeves’s patent morning revivers, of having the top of the skull fly up to the ceiling and the eyes shoot out of their sockets and rebound from the opposite wall like racquet balls, felt better.“ I have never been quite hardcore enough to indulge in hair of the dog cures, except once at university during a particularly hideous morning when half a Corona did considerably ease the pain. I really can’t imagine facing one of these in the morning, although I suppose, as Bertie’s experience testifies, you don’t do it for pleasure under those circumstances. As an evening snifter though, these are ideal, although something of the eyeballs shooting out of the head effect does remain – this …

Cocktail of the week no. 9: the Sazerac

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It’s back to the classics this week, with an old standard from New Orleans. The Sazerac has been around since the mid-19th century, and originated as a cognac drink. Not too long after, the spirit changed to whisky when cognac became difficult to obtain after the outbreak of phylloxera, a vine-eating parasite, swept through France’s vineyards. As with many of these classic cocktails, there’s quite a bit of debate about how exactly to make it: should you add Angostura bitters along with the Peychaud’s? Should you use absinthe, or Herbsaint, or Pernod? Should you leave the absinthe in the glass, or tip it out? Is it ever acceptable to drop the lemon peel in the drink? As usual, since I’m just learning, I’ve stuck to the most traditional version I can find: no Angostura, yes absinthe, lemon peel firmly outside the drink. Something about the combination of rye, medicinal Peychaud’s and strong absinthe sounds pretty odd on paper, but the finished product is delightful. Absinthe so easily overpowers other spirits, but here the rinse on the …

Chinese New Year cocktail: Jasmine Tail

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As you may have seen, I’m working my way through a series of classic cocktails every week, but it’s also super fun to make cocktails for all the occasions that pop up on the calendar. It gets me to think about ingredients and mixtures that I might not otherwise get to try. My workplace has been decorated recently for Chinese New Year, and although I’m not doing anything else to mark the holiday, I thought I’d make a cocktail (or three) by way of celebration. I started reading about all the different kinds of cocktails inspired by China and south-east Asia generally, and came to the conclusion that whatever I make has to involve tea. There are various highly complex concoctions out there involving ginger syrups, baiju, peppercorns, yuzu juice, etc, but a tea-based cocktail is a bit more accessible, and I know more about tea than I do about any of the above. If I wasn’t writing about cocktails, I’d probably write about tea instead (and maybe I will?). I used to have a …