Fire! Fire! Fire!

The Nuremberg Toy Fair is a Big Deal for the industry I work in. It's held in the sprawling Messe complex outside the city, and it's the largest toy trade show in the world. I spent a week talking (and playing) with a variety of game designers and industry folks, having a generally wonderful time. However, on the last day of the fair, everyone pulls down their booth (well, not everyone–most people have already left by the weekend, leaving schlubs like us to pull things down) and heads for the non-Nuremberg hills. This left me alone to feed myself in Nuremberg. The FOOLS!

Sure, I'd been eating wonderful regional German food at Steichele and Landbierparadies. The German beer had been frequent and copious, and although I hadn't eaten at Hutt'n yet, I had been by to pick up my now-annual bottle of Weihnachtslikör. So, forgive me if I decided to go non-traditional for my last meal.

Take a walk northeast from the Weißer Turm U-Bahn stop up towards the river, and just before you would cross the bridge to travel over to the Trödelmarkt (a tiny little shopping area on an island in the middle of the Pegnitz), you take a left down a dark residential street for a couple of blocks, and you'll find yourself at the Kon Tiki.

"Dinner?" I was asked (apparently I always look American) as I walked in the door, and a quick nod later I had an apertif thrust into my hand as I'm being escorted to my table. An auspicious start, thinks I.

I get to the table, peruse the drinks menu (dinner can wait), and I notice at the bottom their "Kon Tiki Surprise." Now, I am a bit self-conscious about things that include the word "surprise" in their description. If I'm in a group, one can order anything in the spirit of group experimentation, but, say, ordering the Mai-Kai Mystery Drink by myself would make me feel just a bit pervy (and not in a good way), doubly so since EVERYBODY'S WATCHING. So, maybe the Kon Tiki surprise is a really good drink, maybe two Samoan linebackers are going to burst out of the kitchen and beat the crap out of me. Only one way to find out, I suppose...

So the server comes back in a couple of minutes. A small sigh of relief: no parade, no sombreros to be forced onto my head, just a large, insanely garnished drink with a couple of sparklers stuck into the enclosing pineapple.

"Heh - better put those sparklers out before I start drinking..." thinks I.

The server sets down the drink, smiles, pulls out a lighter, and then sets off a car flare in the middle of my drink. You think I'm kidding. BEHOLD. I now have a 3-foot jet of flame shooting out of my drink, dangerously close to a triple-strong pool of alcohol, and I'm in a small alcove and EVERYTHING I'M SURROUNDED WITH IS BAMBOO.

So, yeah, Cloverfield-like, when confronted with a life-threatening event, I immediately pull out my phone to take a picture. This way, when they pull my charred, bamboo-fused remains from the ashes of the restaurant, my final moments will be sitting in the iCloud in order for my wife to print out and place in a frame on my coffin. (Most likely, with the caption "See what I had to deal with?")

This was the highlight of the experience, but only by a narrow margin, as the next thing to hit the table was my appetizer. Now, I've had pu pu platters, where I get to take my skewer of beef and add a little char at the table; I've had sizzling stone appetizers, where I get to place my paper-thin slices of meat on a hot rock and grill them. What I've not done in the past is cook raw meat over Sterno. Not that namby-pamby Sterno can that gets served inside a metal can on a wire rack underneath a hot place with a spoon to remove your food with–here, I get a bunch of raw flesh on skewers (completely murdering a pineapple just to have something to stick the skewers into), and a CUP of Sterno, alight in a coffee mug that's been wrapped in aluminum foil. I. Have. Proof.

I'd like to say that I have a recipe here, or at least a moral of some kind, but I don't. I enjoyed my dinner, the Surprise drink threw me under a bus more than one drink has in some time, and I got back to my hotel contented and char-free. Whether their trust in their guests is misplaced is debatable, although they've been open for 35 years without too much of a body count (presumably). I do know that the Ann Arbor fire marshall prevented a restaurant from serving s'mores with a Sterno can sealed inside a large iron centerpiece, so one can imagine the conniption our marshall would experience if presented with either of the above experiences. In any event, this record simply stands as homage to a nice evening out in Nuremberg. And next year, when I go back for dinner, you'll have this for my shrine at the funeral home if I don't get my pictures taken fast enough.

The Black Rose

...or, more accurately, Schwarze Rose Cocktailbar. This is a bar right around the corner from the hotel we stay at in Essen every year. It's got the vibe of a neighborhood bar - live music, a basic floor layout that puts the bar in the center of everything, and a small garden area in front to accomodate the overflow crowd (or the people who just want to drink in the absence of the live music).

They also have an amazing drink menu. Sorted by strength of drink (beware too many drinks off of the "Taxi" page), they have a nice variety of classic drinks, revised fan favorites, and a few homegrown libations. And every drink comes out of the back with a presentation that looks like a fruit truck collided with a candy shop. Seriously.

It would be easy enough to dismiss it as a bit of bar theater, unnecessary to the drink, but for me it goes to something deeper. When I visit Germany, one of the things I look forward to most is an ice cream sundae. And not just any ice cream sundae, but one with liqueurs, and nuts and sprinkles, and fresh-made whipped heavy cream, and streamers, and party favors, and a pony. Okay, not a pony, but an ice cream sundae, from ice cream parlors from Munich to Frankfurt to Essen, all seem to be built around not only amazing ingredients, but a sense of presentation.

No one needs an ice cream sundae, in the same way that no one needs a drink. Which is to say, of course, that we have both because we ideally are choosing to take a flight of fancy and whimsy - to have something that we choose to want. And, for things like these that have at least a kernel of frivolousness at their core, bringing a sense of theater and presentation to the experience seems natural upon reflection. I've had amazing drinks around the world, and many of them have been served with care, and craftsmanship, and an attention to detail that was stunning. And the process of creating a perfectly-proportioned drink in a basic rocks glass can be as much theater as a tiki drink magically appearing from a back room with a shaved ice scoop and half of Samoa's vegetation thrusting out of the top of the mug. Making a commitment to the experience of a drink, whether it be "tableside mixology" or lavish presentation, all contribute to the emotions of pleasure and exploration a voluntary experience should be.

It's easy and uncomplicated to make a drink for myself at home, and perhaps a hour or two of mise en place for an audience of one is unnecessary. But things like a Spanish coffee at La Dolce Vita, or a Zombie at the Mai Kai, or even watching the bartenders put together the Tuesday punch at the Alley Bar, all provide entertainment as well as a tasty glass. Places that understand the value of theater as part of a quality evening out, and exemplify it in every glass, or bowl, or plate that is produced, should be celebrated when it accomplishes its mission.

But I still give away my gummi rings on my Schwarze Rose drinks. Someone else is welcome to that little bit of drama.

German Shopping

So, I'm back from Germany; this is our annual trip to the Essen Spiel Fest, where over 45,000 people play board and card games, and I'm there to wallow in game culture for a week (with a bit of sightseeing on the back end). And, annually, I get to visit one of my favorite liquor stores: the Banneke Feinkost Flüssig in the shopping district off of the main train station. There's always stress in deciding what goes into the luggage going home, always mindful of the duty-free limit of one liter of spirits per person (and willing to pay the $3 for each liter over if it's something I can't get at home).

In an earlier post, I mused about bringing home a bottle of Bacardi Black, just 'cuz; I passed on that. Similarly, I scoured Schipol airport's duty-free shops for the limited edition Corenwyn that Bols just released with no success. I ended up with four bottles, one of which is a Big Deal. Here's what I found:

• In my continuing quest for a julischka recipe for domestic consumption, I bought a bottle of what passes as the commercial stuff in Germany. If I had never tasted the Waldhaus-Resse Steakhaus julischka, I'd probably be quite happy with this. As I HAVE had the privilege, this is too thin, less sweet, and not as lingering on the palate as what we are accustomed to. This all plays into my working theory that of the two basic ingredients (slivovitz and kruskovec), the kruskovec is the central taste (and, for that matter, consistency) driver, with slivovitz the restrictor plate on the viscosity and sweetness. I could probably tweak this and make it better, but I'm still looking for the right kruskovec. However...

• While wandering the streets of Aachen, I ran across a small liquor/cigar store that may have given me another ingredient for tweaking my julischka recipe. Previously, we revealed the secret ingredient in the reference julischka as hruska, a green apple extract. I purchased a small bottle of Gravenstein apple liqueur, and we're going to see if this can't act as a substitute. It's definitely tart, with a bit of apple-sweet peeking out from below, but not something I'd be eager to drink alone. We'll see how it goes with our next batch of test julischka.

• Nuremberg has lebkuchen as its signature cookie, Köln has its Dom-Spekulatius (a thin butter cookie-crisp), and Aachen has printen - a ginger cookie, glazed, with a thin, crisp exterior and a soft-but-toothsome interior. And, with the cookies, there's a liqueur that's based on the cookie. It's a very light, sweet liqueur; not as gingerbready as I would have hoped for, but pleasant. I might try tarting it up to punch up the cookie's characteristics, but it's a nice, different liqueur option.

• The star of the show, though, is The King's Ginger. It hasn't been available in the U.S. before this year, and despite its royal heritage and century of existence, it has only had a standardized recipe for the last few years. This tastes just like ginger heaven, with a taste that delivers even more than the aroma of the liqueur promises. It's base is actually a single malt (from The Glenrothes, if my reading is to be believed), and the lemon notes add a high tremulo to a warm, lingering, clean but not cloying taste of ginger in your mouth. I'll be trying this with cider, rum punch, and anything else I can get my hands on. I'm firing Canton as far as I'm concerned; this stuff is unbelieveable.

We actually brought back one more bottle: champagne that my wife received as a gift from the proprietor of the Waldhaus-Resse Steakhaus. We're always so thankful for our friends and partners-in-crime while we're over there, and the bottle will have an honored spot at our New Year's celebration this year. And, we're not done talking about our Germany adventures quite yet; stay tuned for our next episode...

Back in the Day

This drink is pictured in the 13.5 oz
Polka Dot Zombie Glass, available on the
Contemporary Complements website.

So, I'm wandering the streets of Bisbee, Arizona. (Don't worry, I'm home now, you're all safe.) Myself and a few friends duck into an antique shop, and start rummaging around the well-kept piles of aged folderol. I have two targets in the typical antique store: board games and books. (Barware is coming on strong as a third category, but unless I have a good way of getting it home, I mostly just look at it and whimper.)

My find for the evening is a well-kept 1956 copy of the Esquire Drink Book. This is, to my knowledge, not a particularly valuable or important tome, but it does fit nicely into my enjoyment of watching recipes change over time. This applies equally to food and drink - my go-to cookbook is the mid-1960's Culinary Arts Institute cookbook with the orange cover that my parents had, and that I now have a new copy of thanks to my local used bookstore. Sometimes, you do need to know how to use animal fats and cook game in the way that was ubiquitous back in the day, and you fancy-schmancy lowfat modern cookbook is not gonna have a clue.

In reading through my little window on 1957, I'm struck by the things that are to be casual knowledge to reader. There's delightful anecdotes about the various alcohols common to the Mad Men bar era, but you're also expected to be able to casually divide by 17 in your head (the "basic 17" being the number of jiggers - 1.5 ounce pours - in a standard fifth of alcohol). So if you're mixing for 20 people, you're to use 3 drinks a person, for 60 drinks, meaning four bottles of any alcohol being used in your drinks at a 1-part ratio. Fortunately for you, there should be 9 or so drinks left over at the end of it after having done all that math.

There's a much stronger focus on certain alcohols of the time: rye whiskey definitely gets its due, and applejack and gin, though certainly not uncommon today, rate page after page of recipes, with tequila ranking a miserable three recipes total. And, of course, there are several pages of celebrity-endorsed cocktail recipes. Many are notable for their lack of effort (Bob Hope's Rye Lemonade has two ingredients, left as an exercise to the reader), some are more hyperbole than substance (the Ernest Hemingway's Death in the Afternoon is absinthe and champagne - replacing the tradition water drop with the bubbly - and the admonition to "drink 3 to 5 of these slowly") and some are, well, impractical (the Erskine Caldwell's Tobacco Road Cocktail starts with step one: "Select in May six of your finest McIntosh trees and place a hive of bees under each tree in ensure the setting of the blossoms."). However, some recipes were perky enough to take notice of, and so we have arrived at Bing Crosby's Kailua Cocktail.

There's no story or information given as to the endorsement; there's a line in a Bing Crosby song named "You Took Advantage of Me" that goes:

But horses are frequently silly-
Mine ran from the beach of Kailua And left me alone for a filly,So I-a picked you-a.

Hey, they can't all be winners.

The obvious "Blue Hawaii" and "Mele Kalikimaka" aside, this may have simply been Esquire looking around and saying "hey, this Polynesian thing has some legs, let's The Bing in for a spread and ply him with drinks," which, truth be told, would actually be a pretty cool way to get an endorsement of your drink. In any event, his cocktail is a nice little tiki-ish drink that's a bit on the sweet side (thank you pineapple), and if it doesn't in any particularly new directions, it at least gives me an another reason to admire my book purchase. Certainly more than the "365 Excuses for a Party" (November 28: Anniversary of peace between U.S. and Tunis)...

Bing Crosby's Kailua Cocktail (from the Esquire Drink Book, 1957 printing)

2.25 oz. Puerto Rican dark rum (I used Bacardi Gold, spiked with a bit of Myer's*)
.75 oz. pineapple juice
.5 oz fresh lemon juice
.5 oz pomegranate syrup

Add to a shaker with ice; shake to blend. Pour into punch or tall glass with ice.

*Interestingly, when working on this, it appears that the dark rum I drank for years, Bacardi Black, is no longer available in the US (or at least in Michigan). I know that Select is also a 4-year age, the same as Black, but it's definitely not the same visual as the dark rum of my misspent youth. I obviously haven't missed it, what with my Myer's and my Cruzan Blackstrap and my Kraken and so on, but it does give me a bit of pause (and perhaps incentive to pick up a bottle at the Schipol duty-free on my way through Amsterdam next month, for nostalgia's sake...)

The Doctor is Funk

We're going into the realm of Beachbum Berry, and his excellent book Beachbum Berry Remixed. The book abounds with stories and recipes from the original king of tiki, Donn Beach. One of the most important things to remember when reading page after page of his creations is that, by and large, Donn was making this stuff up from whole cloth - certainly he knew the ingredients and flavor set of the Polynesian paradise his establishments evoked, but this was far more about his vision and his bartending skills than any wholesale lifting of native drinks.

One notable exception that proves the point, perhaps, is the Doctor Funk. This was a very real drink from Samoa, from a very real person named Dr. Bernhard Funk. A native of Germany, born in 1844, he migrated to Samoa around 1881 as reputedly the first medical practitioner in Apia (the capital city of Samoa). He was friends with Robert Louis Stevenson, and was his bedside doctor when the author died in 1894 in Samoa.

There are several references to his medical skills in works (including Fanny Stevenson's collection of letters from his husband), but he seems to also have had some impressive cocktail skills. The Doctor Funk was a notorious drink spreading out across the region, and his signature recipe had people waxing prosaic about the drink. My favorite was the quote attributed to Paul Gauguin by a skipper: "'E said Dr. Funk was a bloomin' ass for inventin' a drink that spoiled good Pernod with water." Other contemporaries were far more complimentary of the concoction.

Dr. Funk had a rich life, and even went native enough to marry the daughter of a Samoan chief. He was interested in meteorology, wrote a Samoan-English-German dictionary and medical handbooks, and constructed a recreation center at Lake Lanoto'o. Unfortunately, his deteriorating health drove him back to Germany, where he died in 1911. Friends carried out his last wish: he had a granite stone transported back to Samoa and placed on the shore of Lake Lanoto'o with a memorial service on his behalf. I recommend this thread at Tiki Central for much more (and there is much more) about the good Doctor.

All of this brings us back to the drink that is credited to him (and Donn Beach, in its modern version). The recipes can vary greatly (absinthe vs. pernod, different rums, and so on), but we'll take the advice and recipe as set out by the good Beachbum in the aforementioned book. It's a drink that comes to a remarkably happy balance based on the ingredients; the Pernod offers a distraction from the lime, the pomegranate syrup adds just enough sweet to balance the forward flavors, and the rum...well, you'd never know it was in there. A delightful riff on the usual lime-and-rum tiki flavor set that is a worthy tribute to a very interesting man.

Doctor Funk (from Beachbum Berry Remixed, 2010)

.75 oz. fresh lime juice
.5 oz. pomegranate syrup
1 tsp. Pernod
1.5 oz. light Puerto Rican rum (I use Bacardi white)
1 oz. club soda

Add the first four ingredients to a shaker with plenty of ice. Shake vigorously (a bit of water does this drink no harm). Add the club soda directly to the shaker and then pour the shaker unstrained into a glass.

Blackbeard's Revenge

This drink has not only a location and a story, but even has a date: March 31, 2010. On this day we're in the middle of our Caribbean cruise, stopping off at St. Thomas for the day. We've chosen a walking tour for our activity, starting at Blackbeard's Castle and wandering down the hill. The end point of the trip is the Amber Museum (meh) and Hotel 1829.

The view from the bar. Hotel 1829, St. Thomas

We've been walking a chunk of the day, it's warm but not unpleasant, and all of the house tours along the way take advantage of the temperate breezes for cooling (read: no air conditioning). We're warm but not uncomfortable, but ready for a break from walking downhill for a couple of hours. The hotel has a small bar attached that looks out over the bay (the bar is the former kitchen of the house, from when it was built in 1829), and we pull up a couple of chairs in the small, empty bar and survey the scene.

There's a sign attached to the woodwork touting the bar's signature drink: the Blackbeard's Revenge. We are not predisposed to turn down something new, so Julie and I each order one.

The bartender ignores the variety of glasses surrounding him and drops two translucent plastic beer glasses filled with ice on the counter. I was in college for 7 1/2 years, so this is not unfamiliar territory, even if a seems a bit odd to skip straight to the plasticware.

Next, he grabs four different bottles of Cruzan flavored rum. There's a little part of me that sighs; Cruzan's the $10 rum back home, so I'm apparently getting the cheap stuff in this drink. He gives each glass a shot from each bottle, and returns the bottles to the bar.

A dose of orange juice is next, followed by a grenadine sink to the bottom of the glass. My pancreas is now setting up protest signs for what, to my mind, has to be a syrupy-sweet tourist trap of a drink.

Then, he grabs one more bottle: Cruzan Blackstrap rum. Now THIS gets my attention. I've not had the blackstrap rum before, and I'm now much more interested in seeing what the drink will shake out like. The bartender floats a scant shot over the top.

The final drink has a pretty red base, the light orange torso, and a roiling black top, all masked and softened by the translucence of the cup. We're handed the drinks, we hand over some cash (less than I expected, as I recall), and took a sip. Fruity, clean, certainly sweet but with the blackstrap rum holding it just in check, cold, full of alcohol but not strong to the taste. The glass is even a welcome touch, giving the layers of the drink soft edges without hiding the dramatic shifts in color. At the moment we had our first sip, it was the perfect drink for the place and time: a cold, fruity rum drink in a old, wooden shady bar on a warm day overlooking paradise.

I've come to appreciate the Cruzan rums as light additions to drinks; not something I would often go to, but they have the ability to unobtrusively add delicate rum flavor to drinks that concentrate their flavors on the surface. I'm a biiiig fan of the Cruzan Blackstrap, and have found several common uses for it. In replicating this drink, the only deliberate change I've made is to reduce slightly the amount of coconut rum in the mix; it seems to take over the drink if you're not careful, and I prefer it to be more balanced in the drink. And, I totally recommend a glass with a bit of frost to it; it really does make the effect of the drink more dramatic.

The drink is pictured in the
Etched Squiggle 16 oz pint glass
and is available for purchase
on the Contemporary Complements website.

Blackbeard's Revenge (from Hotel 1829, St. Thomas USVI)

1 oz. Cruzan Pineapple Rum

.75 oz. Cruzan Coconut Rum

1 oz. Cruzan Mango Rum

1 oz. Cruzan Citrus Rum

1.5 oz. orange juice

.5 oz. grenadine (pomegranate syrup; I use Monin)

.75 oz. Cruzan Blackstrap Rum

Add the four flavored rums and the orange to a glass filled with ice; stir. Sink the grenadine to the bottom by tilting the glass slightly, then pouring the grenadine slowly so that it runs down the side of the glass to the bottom without mixing. Float the blackstrap rum on top (pour the rum over a spoon, bottom side up, positioned close to the top of the drink so that the blackstrap floats on top of the drink).
Stir before drinking.

Sangria

Well, take a month off, and coast in with an easy one, shall we?...

Sangria is a summer staple around our house, and our "adult fruit punch" is the only way Julie will drink the robust red wines that I'll occasionally sneak a taste of. There are a tremendous number of variants that we've had over the years, but we've had enough to know when a restaurant has let their fruit sit too long, or aren't balancing their flavors, or wasted time chopping up fruit salad and dumping it into our glass to somehow prove that there's fruit flavors in their sangria.

This Polka Dot Stemless Martini

glass (13.5 oz), is available on the 

Contemporary Complements

website.

Our first real flirtations with sangria came with the 1998 recipe from Cook's Illustrated (of which I am proud to be a charter subscriber to). The recipe is deceptively simple: 2 oranges, 1 lemon, sugar and triple sec for each bottle of full-bodied red wine you use. There's a bit more to it than that: Juice one of the oranges,  cut the other orange and the lime in reasonably thin slices ( a quarter-inch or so), add the quarter-cup sugar and muddle the fruit until everything looks a bit soggy, then add one juiced orange, a generous quarter-cup of triple sec and the wine, then throw the whole thing in the refrigerator. Next morning, strain the liquid from the fruit, and you're ready to go.

And, as usual, there's even still a few more details to mention. We add one lime per bottle of wine for our default recipe. Make sure, of course, to wash your fruit and pick fruit that has a good-looking skin; you're going to be drinking whatever's on the outside, remember. Places that put little chunks of fruit in your glass are doing it for garnish; all your flavor comes from the fruit soak that you do. And, critically, do NOT let your soak go longer than 8 hours. You need a few hours to get everything to start releasing, but after the 8-hour mark, the rind begins to make its presence known, and your sangria will become increasingly bitter the longer you let it soak. Six hours seems to be the sweet spot; overnight and drained around the 8-hour mark is also fine.

For the triple sec, don't go super high-end for a couple of reasons. First off, Cointreau, Citronage or Grand Marnier will either add flavor notes that detract from the base flavors, and/or will introduce a much higher proof alcohol to the mix than the other ingredients. For this, stick to a basic triple sec, and we use either the 30- or 42-proof Bols triple sec as our preferred ingredient.

We have two go-to wines for our sangria. The René Barbier Mediterranean Red (available widely, including Cost Plus World Market) has been the wine of choice for years, but we've recently started using a local winery's goods: if you're near Michigan, the St. Julian's Simply Red is a bit more robust, and stands up to the citrus without overpowering it. In both cases, you'll find these wines available for under $7 a bottle (considerably less by the case, as we tend to use a bunch of it in the summertime).

This recipe makes for a slightly sweeter sangria than some might prefer; each to their own, but given that you're going to be using ice in the drink, then going outside and letting it melt down a bit, I prefer erring on the sweet side once diluted a bit. If you choose to experiment with other fruits, do so in moderation, and do single batches (although my wife, who is the sangria master of the house, has had considerable success with a half of a pear per bottle of wine). In any event, enjoy sangria while the summer sun shines!

Sangria (after the Cook's Illustrated recipe)

1 750 ml bottle of red wine (medium body, strong fruit notes, NOT sweet)
1 orange, juiced
1 orange, cut into 1/4 in. slices
1 lemon, cut into 1/4 in. slices
1 lime, cut into 1/4 in. slices
1/4 c. white granulated sugar
1/4 c. triple sec (cheat it up to taste)


Put sliced fruit into a large container (we recommend an iced tea pitcher), layering fruit and sugar. Take a ladle or wooden spoon and gently press the fruit against the bottom (you're trying to release some juice without shredding the fruit). Continue until the sugar has incorporated into the liquid.

Add in orange juice and triple sec, and then the wine. Stir, and then place in the refrigerator for 4-8 hours (6 is best; do not allow to go past 8 hours).

Strain the sangria using a large mesh strainer to remove the large pieces of fruit; then pour it back through a fine mesh strainer to remove small pieces. Keep refrigerated until used; add ice to individual glasses to serve. Sangria theoretically should last a week or so before the notes start to change, but who would let a batch go that long?...