Phantasm

Phantasm (Makes 3 drinks)

1 cup Lemongrass Vodka

1/2 cup John D. Taylor's Velvet Falernum

1 cup Fresh Lime Juice

4 Tb Ginger & Raw Sugar Simple Syrup
several leaves of fresh Rau-Ram torn into large pieces (an herb available at Vietnamese Markets)

Add all ingredients to Cocktail Shaker with Ice, shake to combine and serve up in Martini glasses.
Garnish with Rau Ram, lemongrass & lime wheel

Lemongrass Vodka:  simply cut away the tough dry parts of the lemongrass, exposing the softer interior, put several stalks into a bottle of vodka and let sit for 3 days to 2 weeks. Then put in freezer. 

Ginger & Raw Sugar Simple Syrup: Add 1 cup water and 1 cup of Raw Sugar in small pan, heat over medium heat until sugar completely dissolves, add 3 to 4 thin slices of peeled (use a spoon to peel) fresh ginger. 

I had this cocktail several years ago at The Slanted Door, an amazing Vietnamese restaurant located in the Ferry Building in San Francisco. I had the drink once with my friend Eve and once with my sister. Each time, we ordered 2, okay maybe 3, because it is so refreshing and pairs so well with many of the dishes served at the restaurant. It is no longer on the menu, but luckily I has a piece of paper in my bar which listed the ingredients. I added a few components to the drink (ginger ss & rau-ram) with great results. I have made this drink as a stand alone cocktail for happy hour, and I admit, it is MUCH better paired with food.  My mom gave me the Slanted Door Cookbook for Christmas; we made a Dungeness Crab, hot pepper, cellophane noodle dish and this drink was a perfect match.  If you want to be lazy, I suspect that even some embellished Raman would pair well with this brightly crisp, citrusy, herbaceous drink.

Happy New Year & Cheers!

If you are planning a visit to SF, check out the restaurant
http://www.slanteddoor.com

call well in advance for a reservation, they serve sublimely innovative food in a beautifully modern space with a view of the Bay Bridge.

Blind Pig IPA - Russian River Brewing Company

This beer is from Russian River Brewing Company, located in Santa Rosa, Sonoma County. My husband went to this brewery on a bus full of testosterone, I mean guys, on what can only be described as a sacred pilgrimage to drink Pliny the Younger, which is only available 2 weeks out of the year and can only be enjoyed at the brewery. A genius marketing ploy which generates viril competitions among hops-loving males to say THEY drank it there. Apparently, the line is akin to camping out for grateful dead tickets.   This is a bottle of Blind Pig that he brought home along with growlers and other RR Brewery alcoholic treats. The Niners are playing the Giants and after making Crab Po Boys, we grabbed this last little piggy to drink along with our sandwiches.  It is hoppy, perfectly bitter with citrus and pine notes. a little over 6% alcohol.  It is delicious.

The History

Blind Pig is a term from Prohibition. Apparently, it was a secret code that could mean a variety of things.  As the story goes, if you asked for a Blind Pig, you might get a beer, or you might actually get a viewing of an actual blind pig (really?) along with a beer and according to the label..."something else." Hmmm, a lap dance? moonshine? some crisp bacon fed to you by a stripper? Who's to say? either way, seems a little tawdry...

Also, a mason jar was known as a pig and an unmarked mason jar was known as a blind pig.

So there you have it.

CHEERS & GO NINERS!

White Linen

White Linen

(makes 2 drinks)

4 oz Prairie Organic Cucumber Vodka (or Hendricks Gin)

3 1/2 oz St Germain Elderflower Liquer

Juice of 3 limes

2 Tb. Simple Syrup

4 oz Club Soda

add first 4 ingredients in a cocktail shaker, put limes into the shaker after you squeeze out the juice, shake gently to blend. 

add 2 oz of Club soda to shaker and stir, pour over crushed ice and top with a splash of club soda and gently stir.

garnish with cucumber slices

Because I love salt with cucumbers, I salt the rim for this drink, although I salt the rim of most drinks. 

One of my best longtime friends Joe, flew 3,000 miles to the West Coast to celebrate my 46th birthday with me. We went to Big Sur & Carmel for the weekend. The first night in Big Sur, we went to Ventana Restaurant to have a drink and watch the sunset over the Pacific Ocean. Joe sent me out to secure sunset seating while he ordered our cocktails at the bar.  By the time he arrived outside, I had found the guitarist (Rondo) and made several new friends in the course of 15 minutes--because that's just what Southern girls are brought up to do. The weather was perfect and the sun was on its way down. We all sat on the edge of that beautiful, hazy cliff, staring out at the ocean, singing along to Bob Dylan songs while we sipped on our perfectly-made cocktails. It was a happy trinity of friends, nature and booze, as we sat talking and singing and laughing with the group we had so quickly formed. It was a such great evening that I will long remember.  The White Linen definitely enhanced this memory and enchanted my taste buds. It was so delicious, it seemed selfish not to share. 

Joe & Me at Ventana

Friends for 17 years (we have shared a lot of libations)

Wine Pairings ~ Consider the Oyster (In the words of M.F.K. Fisher)

Muscadet, Sancerre & Vin De Savoie

Wine Pairings with Oysters

My husband and I try to make the trip at least twice a year over to Pt. Reyes to sit on Tomales Bay at Marshall Store and eat oysters. We have always drank Muscadet with our oysters, but on this trip I wanted to try and compare some other wines and venture out a bit. So this is what we decided (along with the 4 other strangers-turned-fast friends that we met and hung out with for the rest of the day).


1. Muscadet  a French wine, produced in the Western Loire Valley from the Muscadet grape, also sometimes called Melon de Bourgogne, or called just melon. The name of this wine makes for a rare exception among French wines, in that it is not named after a region, but rather the grape.  Muscadet (mu-ca-DAY)) has a very distinctive minerality and the nose often summons memories of the smell of fresh rain on hot summer rocks. Muscadet is a medium-to-light bodied wine with restrained fruit and is a classic pairing with oysters. Since we tried all 3 wines with all 3 oyster preparations, we were able to experiment and choose which pairing worked best. The Muscadet was well-matched with the Oysters Rockefeller. The weight of this wine, which exhibited a nutty flavor and a fuller mouth feel than the other wines, complimented the richness of the butter and spinach perfectly. The Reserve des Cleons Muscadet is produced specifically in the Sévre de Maine, where 80% of Loire Musdaet is produced.

2. Sancerre  moving into the eastern part of the Loire Valley is one of my very favorite white wines, Sancerre. This wine, sold there at Marshall store, is a Kermit Lynch (a wonderful importer based in Berkeley) wine, Domaine Hippolyte Reverdy Sancerre. It has grassy edges, bright acidity and leaves a lemony whisper on your lips as you swallow this mouth-puckering liquid gem.  Because this wine has so much going on, it paired beautufully with the simple preparation of the raw Tomales Bay oysters with a squeeze of lemon and a touch of shallot mignonette. (of course I added Maldon salt on top, being the only person, so I'm told, who would salt an oyster).

3. Vin De Savoie yet another French white wine that was recommended by another Berkeley wine shop as an alternative to Muscadet to pair with oysters. This wine, made from the Jacquére grape is from the far eastern mountainous region of the Savoie at the western edge of the Alps.  The light crisp wine is a great example of the Alpine terroir of this region. It was pleasantly lean but also "jazzy" (as my friend Bett's grandmother might say). We loved this wine with the barbecued oysters that we then topped with ghost pepper hot sauce. The wine had enough acidity to stand up to these bold flavors atop the oyster. It was perfection.

Our New Friends from Chicago, now Oakland!

Me (far right) With my new Southern friends. I spotted these 2 southerns a mile away!

Hell or High Watermelon Wheat Beer

Happy 4th of July!

A Big shout out to my friend Amy Gulden who introduced me to this sublimely delicate, refreshing watermelon beer from 21st Amendment Brewery in San Francisco.   I love the name of the brewery.    As you know, the 21st Amendment repealed Prohibition in 1933, ending years of below-ground drinking--the liquid dark ages, as it were.  21st Amendment is located near Giants stadium in south SF and has an interesting story (see link below).   I have found this beer on tap this summer in SF, in the Central Valley (Lodi) & all the way back east in Philly!  And everyone (okay mostly women) whom I have turned on to this has instantly become cultish fans.  They sell the cans at Trader Joe's and I freeze watermelon cubes to drop in the glass on really hot days.  What is more patriotic than watermelon, the flag & exercising our reclaimed right to imbibe! Happy 4th and as my daughter told me this morning: "I'm glad we split up from Britain, but the accent would have been cool to keep!"

One of the founders of the brewery was a photographer, solidifying the natural connection for me between image capturing and cocktail making!


check out their site:   http://21st-amendment.com/beers/hell-or-high-watermelon/


After reading my blog a British friend of mine sent me this You Tube clip, which is HILARIOUS!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?list=RDh1YvJBwC4xQ&v=h1YvJBwC4xQ


CHEERS!

Campari Citrus Fizz

Campari Citrus Fizz

2 parts Campari 

1 part Grapefruit (Pompelmo) Pellegrino Soda

Juice of 1 lime per drink

Campari is one of my favorite drinks, It is an Italian Liqueur and a classic aperitif.  It is made with a blend of herbs, barks and fruit (chinotto, which is sour orange from a myrtle-leafed orange tree which produces small biter oranges)

It was invented in 1860 by Gaspare Campari in Novarra, Itlay with production being in Milan. Yes, it originally derived its red color from crushed insects, but they stopped this in 2006.  

So enjoy this perfect summer cocktail, insect free. 

"Evviva!"

Cucumber-Jalapeño Party Lemonade

Cucumber ~ Jalapeño Party Lemonade

1 bottle (1.75) of Vodka 
(or Silver Tequila)

2 containers of Minute Maid 15 Lemonade

½  Container of Simply Lemonade

1 English Cucumber, sliced

4 large Jalapeños, sliced (use gloves)

5 limes sliced

Lime Spiced Salt Rim

(you can also do a club soda or a Fresca float to add some fizz!)

Add ¾ of English cucumber & limes to vodka (I later made this with Tequila and, well, frankly, it's even better!)  soak for at least 1-2 hours. Add jalapeños and soak for an additional hour. 

Add remaining ingredients and serve over ice with your choice of spicy salted rim

I made this for a party and after several requests for the recipe, I decided to blog it, despite my only photo of the drink being sub-standard. This drink is fresh & spicy!

CHEERS!