http://www.bostoncocktails.com The How, Where and Why of Fine Drinking Thu, 10 Aug 2006 02:09:53 +0000 http://backend.userland.com/rss092 en I’ve been raving about aged rum. Well, this weekend I stopped at the Wine Gallery in Brookline and picked up a bottle of Ron Zacapa Centenario 15 year aged rum, a very fine and affordable ($28) Guatemalan spirit, then went to the trusty Hi-Lo market for a dozen limes, ... http://www.bostoncocktails.com/2006-08-09-keep-it-simple.html I have my friend Rebecca to thank for a new drink to the repertoire: the Jasmine. It’s a surprising, but simple enough, combination of ingredients that a well-stocked basic bar would have: Jasmine Cocktail scant jigger gin 1/2 jigger lemon juice a splash Cointreau a splash Campari She whipped up a batch Friday night, and for ... http://www.bostoncocktails.com/2006-08-06-the-jasmine.html I’ll admit I’m biased: I miss Triple D’s, the JP townie bar turned biker hangout turned lesbian karaoke joint. As my friend remarked last night, “How Boston is it to take a place that’s fun with an interesting mix of people and replace it with some bland notion of what ... http://www.bostoncocktails.com/2006-07-23-alchemist.html With all the summer heat, it’s been time for the rum drinks. In particularly, I’ve grown really fond of aged rum lately. White, golden and dark rums are familiar to most (avoid spiced rum unless you want to bring back your guest’s memories of college hangovers past), but aged rum ... http://www.bostoncocktails.com/2006-07-19-time-for-aged-rum.html I hate maraschino cherries. Or, rather, I like the look of them sitting plumply in my manhattan, but the waxy candy flavor is offputting and, in my view, undercuts the quality of the booze. Fortunately, it’s cherry season right now, and the perfect time to stock up on real cherries. ... http://www.bostoncocktails.com/2006-06-29-cherries.html Margaritas are nearly as wonderful straight up as they are on the rocks. They’re even better if you make them with sour oranges. I know that I’ve been talking up various knotty, dirty looking exotic citrus fruits you find at hispanic markets. Sour oranges – or naranja agria – are ... http://www.bostoncocktails.com/2006-06-27-margaritas-pt-2.html Having friends over yesterday evening, I wondered what I’d serve. I wanted something nice and refreshing, given the summer weather we’re having. I decided on a perennial favorite of mine, margaritas. I tend to think of the margarita as one of two drinks. The first, is the traditional limeade-y mixed drink ... http://www.bostoncocktails.com/2006-06-18-margaritas-pt-1.html Angostura bitters are a wonderful ingredient – a necessity for any home bar and an item not used enough these days. But in the original days of the cocktail (pre-Prohibition) a number of proprietary bitters were on the market. Today, a couple commercially produced bitters remain… Angostura, Peychaud’s (most famous ... http://www.bostoncocktails.com/2006-06-13-make-your-own-bitters.html When I found out that this Mixology Monday - hosted at Kaiser Penguin was going to be devoted to mint, I immediately thought of crème de menthe and one of the classic cocktails devoted to it, the Stinger, a combination of brandy and crème de menthe. I’ve never had a ... http://www.bostoncocktails.com/2006-06-04-the-stinger.html This ersatz English pub is odd at best. It’s ye-olde-England meets fern bar, a feeling not helped by the unwatched Arsenal matches on the TV or the deceptively cavernous dimensions of the place. On top of it all is the stranded feeling of the Financial District location, which thins out ... http://www.bostoncocktails.com/2006-06-04-elephant-and-castle.html