One (or two) For The Road

It's been a fun couple of weeks for Dr. Bamboo's Mystical Traveling Bar and Road Show. For two consecutive Fridays I've loaded the Bamboo Wagon full of spirits, mixers, barware, ice and other drink-making paraphernalia in order to bring cocktails to the masses. It's a great way to evangelize good drinking and also field test which booze-hauling methods work best (initially documented here.

First up, I had the pleasure of spending a few hours making drinks for the thirsty crowd at Gallerie Chiz. The Pittsburgh Society of Illustrators celebrated the opening night of their cocktail-themed show "Drawing Under the Influence", and the group decided to supplement the usual beverage offerings with freshly-made cocktails. I was helped immeasurably by the efforts of Nathan Lutchansky, Pittsburgh-based spirits expert and proprietor of the PLCB User's Group site, which documents the ever-changing and seemingly logic-free universe of alcohol sales in Pennsylvania. Nathan graciously donated his Friday night to help keep the gallery goers well-lubricated by wielding both his considerable bartending knowledge and his Shaker of Ultimate Power, which is one of the largest pieces of drink-making equipment I've ever laid eyes on. I'd love to get one just like it, but I would have to call it something else, since two Shakers of Ultimate Power existing at the same time just doesn't sound right.

The event was a success, and I'd be remiss if I didn't acknowledge the generous product donations from Hiram Walker and award-winning locally-made vodka Boyd & Blair that made our cocktail menu possible. Speaking of the cocktail menu, here's one of the drinks we served up, created by Pittsburgh Society of Illustrators member Gina Antognoli Scanlon:


Gina's Grapefruitini (as served at the DUI opening)

3 parts Freshly-squeezed grapefruit juice
2 parts Boyd & Blair Vodka
1 part Rosemary simple syrup

Shake well with ice and strain into cocktail glass. Garnish with a small rosemary sprig

Rosemary syrup: Combine one cup water and one cup sugar with two sprigs of rosemary. Heat on stove on low heat until sugar is completely dissolved. Remove rosemary and store in refrigerator until cool.

(if you want a more pronounced rosemary flavor, leave the sprigs to steep in the syrup for at least a half-hour before removing).


The second event was the "Quickie Cocktail Class", which takes place each month at the Pittsburgh Public Market. Chef and local-food enthusiast Elizabeth Schandelmeier Gilgunn invited me to help create and serve an array of cocktails showcasing local ingredients, and as luck would have it, the PPM was celebrating its 1st Birthday, so everyone was feeling festive (which is code for "in a drinkin' mood").

Despite temperatures in the 90's, we soldiered on and delivered cool, rejuvenating cocktails to the attendees. This one was a crowd favorite, and turned out to be an ideal choice for a wickedly hot and humid late Summer afternoon:


Watermelon SMASH

3 oz. Watermelon/lemon balm puree
2 oz. Boyd & Blair Vodka
.5 oz. Mint simple syrup

Shake well with ice and strain into a double old-fashioned glass filed with crushed ice. If you're feeling adventurous, take half a lime, scoop out the pulp, and place round-side down on top of the ice. Fill with a small amount of overproof liquor and light on fire.


Elizabeth offers up the following recipes to make this drink complete:


Watermelon puree:

One lovely baby watermelon, sweet and in season
A bunch of lemon balm or lemon verbena, leaves only

Peel and cut your watermelon into chunks (remove seeds, if you’ve got ‘em. Put watermelon and herbs into a food processor, pulse a few moments and then run on full speed until smooth.


Mint syrup:

1 cup sugar (I use raw)
1 cup water
Big bunch of mint (I used a variety called Kentucky Mint)

Add sugar and water to a big-enough pot and bring to a boil, stir until sugar dissolves. Lower heat to a slow simmer and reduce until desired consistency is achieved (this will depend on what you are doing with the syrup; thinner is better for things like candied fruit rinds, thicker is better for things like sweet cocktails). A thin syrup is ready after 10 minutes or so, a nice thick syrup is achieved after reducing approximately 45 minutes. (Oh yeah, don’t let this stuff burn! Remember, we are not making candy and burnt sugar STICKS!) When your syrup is ready, turn off heat and add your mint. Cool to room temperature. Store in a glass jar in the refrigerator. The longer the herbs sit in the syrup, the stronger the flavor. Strain syrup before using.


For additional drink recipes and info and photos, check out this post over at Elizabeth's site Let's Blog About Food.


Where will the mobile hooch stand turn up next? Only Dr. Bamboo knows for certain.

Moonlighting: Sept.'11

Once again I feel compelled to direct you to a couple other places where you can aim your eyeballs at more of my words and pictures concerning booze and related topics. Proceed with all due haste! (or take your time...they'll probably still be there).

First up, everyone's favorite retro renaissance man Java brings forth another issue of Bachelor Pad Magazine stuffed to the gills with top-notch midcentury fiction, cartoons, movie reviews, lifestyle tips and the usual boatload of talented temptresses. Oh, and there's also a few thoughts on cocktails courtesy of yours truly...

This was the class I dreamed of in college.

I also check in over at BarNoneDrinks.com for my monthly musings on the adult beverage scene. This time around I ponder a few key differences between casual drinkers and booze nerds (Hint: If you've ever brought your own bitters to a bar, you're probably a booze nerd).

Wearing these would make us all so much easier to spot.

Remember kids- Don't drink and draw!

The Greatest Drink Book Ever Published (Pt. 2)

Once again I'm paging through Cocktails for Two in my mission to share the splendor that is the Greatest Drink Book Ever Published. For this installment I've selected the Shamrock, an apparent tribute to Ireland, based on both its name and green color.

Speaking of green, this drink does an admirable job of being just that. Chartreuse and green crème de menthe are key ingredients and certainly do their part color-wise. But I found myself perversely wishing they had also thrown in some Midori to blow the green right off the chart.

Here's the recipe as written:

SHAMROCK Stir one part Irish whiskey with one part dry vermouth, three dashes of green Chartreuse and three dashes of green crème de menthe.

(according to the photos and the little symbol next to the recipe, this drink is served in a cocktail glass)

So how does it taste? It's lousy. Don't make it.

Sure, the drink is unfortunate. But as we've learned in the previous GDBEP post, the recipe is only half the fun. There's also the photo to consider.

Fun Fact: she's also Annette o'Toole's stunt double!

Let's see what we've got: Green-eyed redhead holding a drink (the most enduring symbol of Ireland, as we all know). Tam o' Shanter-style hat and matching scarf (in case of inclement weather inside the pub), and a nice splash of tartan to drive the point home. As with many of the ladies pictured in this book, blazing red nail polish is the order of the day, and in case we still weren't quite clear on the Irish connection, our lovely model is standing in front of a green backdrop. The expression of fright/surprise is a nice touch, as are the very visible fillings in her teeth. If it weren't for the relatively restrained use of makeup, I'd say the shot comes off as a fine portrait of prescription medication abuse.

Cocktailing: The Early Years

If you hang around booze geeks long enough, eventually you find yourself discussing a topic that's become a perennial favorite: what kinds of stuff you used to drink before you got turned onto a wider spectrum of adult beverages. (Despite what they'd have you believe, in their youth, cocktail nerds weren't sneaking off into the woods to make Negronis or lounging around the frat house basement trying to find the perfect Singapore Sling recipe).

No, like most other people, their teens and early twenties were the age when most drink enthusiasts were only dimly aware of spirits. Hard liquor was likely something you knew only from advertisements, your parents' liquor cabinet, or whispered, cautionary tales of how somebody's brother got completely wasted that one time drinking way too much (insert liquor brand here).

I'm no different. I was actually a latecomer to the drinking scene, not really getting my feet wet until a year or so before I was legally entitled to do so. Prior to that, I'd have a couple beers now and then, but didn't really go much for the hard stuff. That changed sometime during my sophomore year of college.

Of course, this is not to say that I woke up one day and decided to responsibly explore the world of spirits and cocktails with a scholarly approach. Nope. I had a brief trial-and-error period with various things and when I ended up shelling out for my first honest-to-goodness bottle of giggle water, I ended up going with Jack Daniels. Why? Simply because it was a name I was aware of, and I knew you could mix it with Coke. No experience required.

And like most other college students, I drank my share of beer too (pretty much any brand was acceptable), and I often ponied up $2.99 for my weapon-of-choice, MD 20/20 (a surprising variety of flavors!). However, when it came to the hard stuff, I stayed loyal to only a few brands: The aforementioned Jack Daniel's, Bacardi rum (whichever one was cheapest), and bottom-shelf vodka. All three could be dumped into Coke and that pretty much covered my cocktail ambitions at that time.

But this isn't really so much about what I drank as how I drank it. While at school, my two main concerns cocktail-wise (aside from catching a nice buzz) amounted to:


1) How can I take booze with me to places where I'm not necessarily supposed to have it?

2) How can I bring along enough booze so that I won't be stuck somewhere needing a refill?


Fortunately, I had two weapons in my arsenal that weren't remarkable in any way individually, but when combined, provided the perfect traveling drinking rig: The Sports Bottle and Jean Jacket.

Obviously we aren't talking Batman-grade technology here. These were just a couple of things I already owned that I realized could suit my needs quite well. Neither was expensive or appeared special in any way, which were key parts of their simple charm. They were just a couple commonplace items any college student could use to roam around campus clandestinely hauling hooch. Here's how it worked:

First up, the sports bottle. It was made of heavy, durable plastic and came with a screw-on cap and sturdy re-usable straw (see Fig. 1 below). Virtually every convenience store and gas station with a soda fountain had them and they could be gotten for less than a buck (or sometimes free) by buying a large soft drink. It held somewhere between 24 and 32 ounces.

This was my shaker and glass in one convenient package. To make a drink, I first poured in whatever liquor I had handy (No measuring...I just eyeballed it until it was somewhere in the neighborhood of 1/4 to 1/3 full, depending on how festive I was feeling). If I had ice handy, I'd toss in a handful and top everything off with Coke or Pepsi (see Fig. 2 below) and give it a few gentle swirls. Brutally simple and effective.

The other half of the combo was a bit of outerwear made by Levi's that everyone I knew referred to simply as a "jean jacket."* You don't see them too often these days, but for a while it seemed like half the world owned one. It was cheap, durable, and comfy. It came in different colors. It was machine-washable. You could layer other stuff under or over it when it got cold. John Bender wore one, and if that's not an endorsement, I don't know what is.

All these things made it a great garment, but for me it's greatest feature was two enormous pockets located on the lower inside front of each of the jacket's sides. They were big enough you could stash surprisingly large items in them without being noticeable from the outside. I often used those pockets to carry a magazine, snacks and my Walkman, and it didn't take long for me to realize a sport bottle filled with a giant rum & Coke fit perfectly in there as well (see Fig. 3 below).

So once I had the bottle/jacket combo established, I was off to the races. I could easily smuggle my oversized cocktail anywhere. One one of my favorites places to do so was the student movies, where alcohol was not permitted, but somehow always managed to be in abundance.** It worked great in a bunch of other situations too, and if I got caught (which I never did, by the way), I could just toss the bottle. My net loss would have been a couple bucks worth of booze and a drinking vessel I could replace at the nearest Speedy Mart.

Sophisticated? Certainly not. Clever? Not terribly. All it really amounted to was a big flask tucked into a coat that hid things well. But it got the job done and then some.

I no longer drink cocktails out of sports bottles (usually), and I don't have a jean jacket anymore, but I still occasionally get nostalgic about my early days of cocktailing when what my drinks lacked in style and preparation they more than made up for with ingenuity and longevity.






* According to their website, Levi's calls this item a "trucker jacket", but I have never heard anyone use this name. They also now make it in all kinds of frou-frou materials and styles, which is the very antithesis of the jean jacket in my opinion. I remain unconvinced.

** I was clearly not the only one who regularly did this...the lecture hall where they showed the films would always be littered with bottles and cans after the crowd left. Make whatever judgments you like, but at least I get points for not being an inconsiderate slob who leaves his empties all over the place.

Tales of the Cocktail: Random Observations

So here it is a few weeks after Tales of the Cocktail. Much as I did two years ago, I find myself sifting through notes and compiling a loose collection of info from the event. It's difficult to do justice to a five-day booze extravaganza with just a few words, but hopefully what I've listed below can help illustrate a small fraction of what takes place. Just like last time, I call this handful of disjointed thoughts...

Random Observations

- If seeing a bunch of people wearing seersucker suits, vividly-colored bowties and brimmed hats with deadly seriousness unnerves you, then Tales of the Cocktail may not be the event for you.

- My advice to anyone attempting to schedule a meeting with anyone for a specific place and time during Tales is to scrap that idea immediately. Just sit in the lobby of the Monteleone for a bit, and whoever you want to see will eventually walk by (Okay, they might be staggering or crawling, but you'll see them nonetheless).

- While we're talking about the Monteleone lobby, do not be surprised if while you're there someone produces a full, sealed bottle of booze from a backpack or purse and gives it to someone else. In most cases, the person offering up the bottle is a brand rep, and the other person is someone who happened to mention they liked the particular brand the rep works for. I tell everyone I like everything, just to be on the safe side.

- However, if you see someone produce a half-full bottle from their backpack or purse, it's harder to determine where it originally came from. But they'll likely share it with you, so go strike up a conversation.

- It's been said before, but it bears repeating: The people in the Cocktail Apprentice Program are a truly vital component of Tales and need to be recognized for their efforts. They work like crazy, get little rest, and generally grind themselves to a nub so we all can enjoy nifty drinks throughout the event. Big thanks go out to all of them.

- Speaking of the CAP folks, I was lucky enough to get a brief guided tour of one of the "backstage" areas where they prepare the drinks. I don't think you can grasp the scope of what they're doing until you see a floor-to-ceiling wall of lemon crates. I wish I could have hung around, because I'm pretty sure later on Jackie Chan crashed through it.

- Telling someone in New Orleans you're a vegetarian will get you the same reaction as telling someone in Pittsburgh you don't care about football.

- Whoever put a Walgreen's a half-block away from the Monteleone has my deepest gratitude. I know New Orleans is famous for its world-class restaurants, but Clif bars and Gatorade from the big W are what kept my engine running most days. Plus, the people-watching there is sublime.

- Thanks to branded keycards, every time I unlocked my hotel room I thought about gin. Actually, it had nothing to do with keycards...I just think about gin a lot.

- You know some serious cocktailing is taking place when a local remarks he can't understand how so many people can be drinking hard liquor at ten in the morning,

- Someone described all those unorthodox drink-making techniques involving iSi whippers, sous vide, liquid nitrogen, lasers, etc., as the "'Gee whiz!' school of bartending." That is now my favorite bit of cocktail terminology.

- Seeing the look on people's faces who are trying to board the Monteleone elevators on any floor other than the lobby or the roof is priceless.

- I ate a crappy meal at a crappy sports bar purely because I was in a hurry and it was convenient. But they had beer, so it was still kinda worth it.

- If you enjoy hearing two different bar bands playing two different classic rock covers at arena-level volume 20 feet away from each other, then the French Quarter is your kind of place.

- I don't know what the current homicide rate in New Orleans is, but I'm fairly certain a few of the murders last month were committed by Monteleone staff trying to get from point A to point B around tipsy, oblivious Tales attendees clogging the high-traffic areas.

- Whoever says that Bourbon Street has the highest concentration of boisterous drunks in town has never been to the Spirited Awards ceremony.

- Security measures at the swag room continue to be top-notch. I thought the retinal scanner was a nice touch.

-Craft distillers like to talk about their products and how they make them. A lot. On the off chance you're feeling lonely at Tales, find someone who works at a small distillery and ask them how their product differs from other similar products.

- Apparently, attending Tales of the Cocktail without a smartphone is equivalent to attending a Phish concert without weed...you can still enjoy the show, but everyone will look at you with a mixture of pity and suspicion.

- Liquor companies continue to shell out absurd amounts of money to promote themselves at Tales of the Cocktail. I know there are no easy solutions to the US debt crisis, but I think one approach could involve telling multinational spirit brands that they can use Montana as "The World's Biggest Tasting Room" and watch the cash roll in.

- If you blew up the Monteleone during Tales of the Cocktail, 97% of the world's moustache wax supply would instantly disappear.

- I saw two guys almost come to blows debating the merits of the seamed vs. seamless Yarai mixing glass.

- Watching someone start their morning with a brisk treadmill session in the hotel gym is inspiring. It inspired me to hit the pool and grab a drink.

- Holding a tasting session for a very popular liquor brand in the smallest room in the hotel goes from "intimate and convivial" to "potentially fatal mosh pit" rather quickly.

- Media access was severely restricted this year, which resulted in many fine cocktail writers being noticeably absent. I don't know if this was intentional or simply an oversight, but let's hope the situation improves next year and we can look forward to a greater volume and variety of coverage.

- Judging from the faces and sounds they were making, I can only assume that for many people, consuming oysters is analogous to a sex act. (Note: this also applies to oyster po' boys.)

- Speaking of sex acts, adult film icon Ron Jeremy was in town promoting his namesake rum. I actually got to see him late one night in my hotel on the TV in my room.

- People are still obsessed with ice. Round ice, clear ice, Martian volcano ice, you name it.

- Someone created vodka that tastes like cupcakes. Which reminds of the saying, "Just because you can do something doesn't mean you should."

- There's always room for one more gin & tonic.

Tales of the Cocktail: Barrel-Aged Cocktails...Patience, Grasshopper!

Why dump a perfectly good cocktail like a Negroni or Manhattan into a wood barrel for a couple of months?

1) It’s fun in an old-world mad-scientist kinda way.
2) It may make your cocktail luxuriously smooth and even add a bit of wood character.

For over an hour, Jeffrey Morgenthaler, Gable Erenzo and Naren Young hit the highlights of this relatively new approach (with roots in older practices) to fiddling with cocktails. Booze nerds like these guys are always on the hunt for ways to improve your drinking experience, and barrel-aging cocktails is one of the latest methods that’s gaining popularity in cocktail programs worldwide. Here’s a few informational nuggets they shared…

~ Bottled cocktails originated in the Jerry Thomas era as way for customers to take drinks “to-go” and enjoy later. Being that I’m New Orleans as I write this, I can’t help but think the “go cup” phenomenon here somehow owes its existence to this earlier incarnation.

~ In the early 1900’s, the Heublein company sold pre-made cocktails that had been aged in wood.

~ A few years ago, Tony Conigliaro began experimenting with aging cocktails in glass, prompting modern bartenders to rethink the concept and apply it in new ways, using different materials, spirits and processes.

~ Experimenting with barrel-aged cocktails coincided nicely with the internet making it easy to contact distilleries and procure their used barrels.

~ Much as single spirits do, aging a cocktail in a barrel will allow it to pull distinctive characteristics from the wood. However, using new barrels can be risky because too much wood flavor can be imparted very quickly. Score another point for recycling!

~ It easy to overage a cocktail, but if that happens, it’s not a lost cause. Often simply introducing more fresh cocktail to mix can salvage the batch.

~ While experimentation is encouraged, using ingredients like eggs, cream and citrus should be avoided. But I’m sure our intrepid bartending community is already hard at work coming up with a way to get around this though.

~ Generally speaking, lighter, unaged spirits like gin, vodka, unaged Tequila etc., seem to yield the best results.

~ For those not inclined to wait several weeks for a barrel-aged cocktail to reach maturity, you can get quicker results (and satisfy any latent gadget jones you may be experiencing) by using smoked wood chips and an iSi whipper to infuse your cocktail. I’ll need to track down specific instructions for this asap.


Now go find some barrels!

Tales of the Cocktail: Classic Hotel Bars

Being that I’m staying in a hotel and doing a fair amount of drinking in a nearby hotel containing a well-known bar (that’d be the Carousel bar at the Monteleone) I felt I’d be remiss if I didn’t attend the “Classic Hotel Bars” seminar.

The focus was mainly on the hotel bars of London, with occasional detours to other cities. Anecdotes abounded, histories were revealed, and as expected, cocktails were served. Here’s a sampling of the wealth of information that was provided…


~ Unlike most “regular” bars, working in a hotel bar makes you realize you have to think beyond local drinking preferences. Your are catering to a varied clientele, and have to be prepared to meet a broad spectrum of expectations drink-wise.

~ Hotel bars have spawned great bartenders, great drinks and great bar guides. Every time you name-drop someone like Jerry Thomas or Hugo Enslin you have a hotel bar to thank. Likewise the Savoy Cocktail Book or Charles Baker’s Around the World With Jigger, Beaker and Flask. Ever had a Pina Colada or Hanky Panky? Just two of many classic cocktails that originated in hotel bars.

~ The Savoy was the first hotel in England equipped with electricity. ( I like to think having a world-class bar on the premises played a role in this).

~ The Criterion bar (which still exists) is the location where Sherlock Holmes and Watson first meet. It also has the distinction of being the first “American style” bar in England.

~ Until recently, bartending in the UK was not considered a reputable occupation, and doing so in a hotel bar was even less prestigious. Fortunately this perception has reversed in recent years and many hotel bars in the UK are leading the way in quality cocktail-crafting.

~ Part of what makes a good hotel bar experience is the idea that it is not only just a drink stop, but also a place where you are taken care of. Some “regular” bars certainly provide this, but it should be a priority for hotel bars.

~ Martini enthusiasts owe it to themselves to make the pilgrimage to Duke’s, which is famous for its exacting, signature Martini preparation which uses no ice, shaking, or stirring. All the ingredients are kept chilled, and are simply, elegantly combined in the glass. Ian Fleming was a regular there, and was fond of these. If they were good enough for him, they should be good enough for you.

~ The Connaught Hotel is another London cocktail destination famous for its attention to detail and tailoring of drinks to the customer’s preference. Connaught bartender Ago Perone says of his customers: “We are not there to tell them what to drink” and puts that idea to practice by offering a selection of bitters for patrons to choose from when ordering a Martini.

~ The concept of the fine cocktail experience goes hand-in-hand with that of the fine dining experience. If a hotel has a top-tier restaurant on he premises, then the bar must be of similar caliber.


Book your room now! (or at least swing by for a cocktail).