YumYumPanda experiments with The Fiery Almond

I love seeing other people make the drinks from Spice & Ice. Check out what the folks over at YumYumPanda did with The Fiery Almond cocktail!  Be sure to check out the nifty photo gallery/slide show of their drink-making photos.

I especially love that A) they tweaked the drink to accommodate the ingredients they had on hand, and B) that they experimented with both light and heavy cream for the cream float on the drink (the latter looks rather like an ice-cream soda, don’t you think?) I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again:  recipes are just guidelines, not hard-and fast rules. Well done, YumYumPanda!

Photo credit: YumYumPanda

A little spice in your e-mailbox

Just a friendly public-service announcement – did you know you can…

…Receive “Spice & Ice” blog posts by e-mail? Just click on the link at right, next to “Email Subscription,” and enter your e-mail address. Done!

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…Sign up for a free monthly “Spice & Ice” newsletter? Super-fast sign up here for a free e-mail update with news about upcoming events, exclusive recipes, and more.

If there’s another way you prefer to keep up with blogs you don’t see here, please let me know and I’ll look into setting that up!

3 easy ways to make your clicks count for charity

Don’t just sit there….sit there and do something to help others!  Here are three painless – even fun –ways foodies & boozies can help in the fight against hunger:

1. Bid on something at Menu for Hope. Now through Dec. 25, you can bid on all kinds of foodie items, which raises funds for the UN’s World Food Programme. Hop on over to Vinography  to view the wine items and place your bid. This year’s wine items include a dinner with NY Times wine critic Eric Asimov, a week of dining and vino in a Tuscan villa, and a cachaca tasting set.

2. Click to give at The Hunger Site.  Each time you click, sponsors pay for cups of food. It costs you nothing, and you can bookmark the site and click every day. Go ahead, do it now. I’ll wait.

3. Buy hot sauce. I’ve posted about this one before, but it’s worth repeating. Elephant Pepper hot sauces help fund agricultural research and elephant conservation efforts. And – you get hot sauce! Win-win, if you ask me.

Do you have a favorite hunger charity to share?

Drink Recipe, Deconstructed: Red Dawn

Ever tried to make cocktails in a non-kitchen setting? It’s one thing to demo cocktails at a bar, or in a kitchen classroom. But it’s a fair challenge to make a cocktail in say, a bookstore or a radio booth, where there’s no sink, no ice, and sometimes, no time to pour and measure out liquids.

So I’ve mastered the fine art of the portable cocktail. I like to think of it as advanced mise en place:  at home, I take care of squeezing citrus juice, infusing spirits, and then carefully measure out each liquid ingredient into 4-ounce disposable plastic containers. 

But guess what? It’s easy to confuse identical clear liquids in identical tiny containers. So I also label each one with the drink name (I’m often demonstrating multiple drinks), plus the amount and name of the liquid. Then I pack it all up (along with my cocktail shakers, one for each drink since there’s no time to rinse out), and take it with me. I sometimes even pack a painstakingly curled lemon peel or jalapeno round for garnish. It’s all very OCD.

At the studio, I then quickly group the containers together for each drink. And when it’s time to mix & go, I use the labels to narrate what I’m making as I pour everything into the shaker. strain, and serve the lovely radio host of the day.

Here’s a photo of one of the drinks I made this way for Everyday Food, a Martha Stewart show on Sirius. It’s like a deconstructed poem of a drink — you don’t even need the recipe, because if you read the labels across, you have all the ingredients and proportions. Note the curled lemon peel in the tiny baggie — because looks count, even on the radio. Wouldn’t it be neat to have a cookbook done this way?

The Red Dawn, deconstructed.

But just in case you’re not a visual type, here’s the Red Dawn recipe in traditional format.

Red Dawn (from Spice & Ice: 60 tongue-tingling cocktails)

2 ounces citron vodka

4 ounces tomato juice

1/2 teaspoon harissa (a Tunisian hot sauce made with red chiles, garlic, paprika…mmm…)

curled lemon peel or lemon wedge, for garnish

Combine the vodka, tomato juice, and harissa in a glass filled with ice. Garnish with lemon curl or lemon wedge.

Spice & Ice in the WaPo spirits column!

A quick brag, and a heads up for next week:

Spice & Ice was featured in the Washington Post’s spirits column (Doctored with pepper, by Jason Wilson)! 

This is a very big deal…not just because of the considerable space devoted to the book, but also because Wilson clearly took the time to experiment with many, many recipes from the book…and because he still says outright that he “enjoyed the book” (whew!), and that the ideas in the book “pushed me in new directions.” Wilson has a reputation as a particularly harsh critic, so I consider this high praise indeed.  I don’t think I breathed until I finished reading the column!

Check out also what he did with the Zapple recipe from the book; it’s an interesting adaptation.

And a quick heads-up:  on Monday, December 14, I’ll be on the Hot Grease show with Nicole Taylor, on the Heritage Radio Network. You can listen live or catch the archived version online. Nicole is all about the “good food movement,” so in addition to talking about Spice & Ice, expect to hear also about how the movement extends to cocktails.

Spice & Ice cocktail contest winners!

Many thanks to everyone who came out to last night’s Spice & Ice event at Trattoria Cinque (and a special thanks to Devin, bartender extraordinaire)!  One of the highlights was our DIY cocktail contest –  we had two winners, Meryl Rosofsky, with The Hot Scrooge, and the Law Librarians of NYC, with Fred (you’ll understand the cocktail name in a moment). Congrats to both, who each took home a copy of Spice & Ice for their tongue-tingling original creations.

The Hot Scrooge, created by Meryl Rosofsky

 

A perfect name for the holiday season! Meryl describes this drink as a “hot holiday homage” to the classic Screwdriver cocktail. We didn’t have O.J. on hand, so she cleverly subbed in pineapple juice. And get a load of that garnish! 

The Hot Scrooge

lemon wedge, for rim

1 tablespoon ancho chile powder, for rim

4 jiggers pineapple juice

1 jigger vodka

3-4 dashes Frostbite (a clear hot sauce)

1 slice each jalapeno, poblano, and habanero, skewered on a cocktail straw (alternate green and red colors), for garnish

Rub the lemon wedge around the rim of a glass to moisten it. Roll the edge of the glass in the ancho chile powder to coat; allow to dry.

Combine the pineapple juice, vodka, and hot sauce with ice in a cocktail shaker and shake vigorously. Pour into prepared glass and garnish with hot pepper skewer.  Enjoy!

 

 

Fred, created by the Law Librarians of NYC 

 

This drink was a group effort, created by Vicki Szymczak, Janet Peros, George Prager, Kathy David, and Karen Schneiderman. Since this drink heavily features ginger – both crushed fresh ginger and Domaine de Canton ginger liqueur – this drink started as “Fred Astaire & Ginger Rogers.” But in the end, the group opted for the simple, wry ”Fred.”  Ginger is implied. Get it?

Team Fred

As for the drink itself – the flavor profile is similarly clean and elegant. It reminded me a bit of a zingy, refreshing ginger-limeade, the kind I only wish I could buy at the store.

2 oz. vodka

1 oz. Domaine de Canton

2-3 Tablespoons crushed fresh ginger

lime juice

club soda

garnish – lime wedge

 

Muddle fresh ginger in the bottom of a cocktail shaker. Add vodka, ginger liqueur, and lime juice. Shake with ice and strain into a cocktail glass. Top with club soda and garnish with lime wedge.

Chalk Talk (or, “you had me at tasty salted pig parts”)

Let’s face it – no matter how fabulous the food or drinks, sometimes it still can be challenging to get people in the door. So many bars and restaurants resort to those stand-up chalkboards outside the door to entice with humor, mouth-watering description, and the occasional profanity. Here are some of my recent favorites:

Does Tapas + Lunch = Lapas? or Trunch? One more round of sangria, and no one will care.

You had me at "Tasty Salted Pig Parts."

What I love most about this one is that it was in full view of the cupcake truck parked right across the street.

This "sidewalk talker" is suspended from the wall outside Wildwood BBQ on Park Ave. The message isn't so remarkable...

...until I spotted the tiny "beer" printed in the corner. Talk about burying the lede!

Because elephants hate chiles, and we like elephants.

It’s that time of year when we all start thinking about philanthropy (right???) and I love when I can help others by doing what comes naturally to me. Enter Elephant Pepper hot sauces.

Apparently, elephants hate chile peppers (who knew?), so farmers in Africa plant chiles around their fields to deter elephants from trampling the crops. The peppers then are made into hot sauces and spice mixes, which fund elephant conservation and agricultural research.  They even have great-looking gift packs, if you’re in holiday shopping mode.

Besides, if you buy some, then you have an excuse to make these great hot-sauce cocktails! 

Girl holding chiles - photo courtesy of elephantpepper.com

Spice & Ice At Trattoria Cinque!

Mark your calendar: next week (Tuesday, Dec. 8), come out to Trattoria Cinque in Tribeca for a Spice & Ice book party with the New York Women’s Culinary Alliance! (and yes, menfolk are welcome too.) Here are the details – you can also view them on the NYWCA’s website. I hope to see you there!

Chase away the winter chill with an evening of spiced and spicy cocktails from the newly-released book Spice & Ice—60 Tongue-Tingling Cocktails, and meet author Kara Newman. We will be sampling drinks made with jalapeños, cinnamon, cloves, and other fun, fiery ingredients, including one of Trattoria Cinque’s signature libations.

Kara will also be bringing along some of the other spices featured in her book, and is encouraging participants to come up with their very own spiced-up cocktail. Best cocktail gets a copy of the book free! Come experience this brand new Tribeca eatery, serving upscale Italian food at nice prices. Small bites and beer also will be served. Books will be available for purchase.

To purchase tickets at http://www.brownpapertickets.com/event/91093.

E-mail Ellen Swandiak at hipHostess@nyc.rr.com with any questions.

Location:		Trattoria Cinque, 363 Greenwich St. (between Franklin and Harrison Streets)
Date:		Tuesday, December 8
Time:		6 to 8 pm
Event:		Open to members and guests
Cost:		$25 members, $30 non-members

Let’s Get Pickled: Kimchi Cocktails

Kimchi Bloody Mary - Photography by Jessica Boucher

Just when you finally got used to crazy ingredients like chile peppers and wasabi in your cocktails, I’m going to throw you a curve ball:  kimchi cockails!

Kimchi is a Korean side dish – usually pickled and fermented Napa cabbage, but I’m told that there are as many kimchi recipes as there are Koreans. In other words, the vegetable can differ, and so can the pickling liquid and technique. But considering the recent spate of nifty books on pickling, not to mention the recent International Pickle Day, which had a fair kimchi representation, and the simple pleasures of the Pickleback cocktail, it seems time to put new meaning behind the words “Let’s Get Pickled.”

So we’re talking kimchi cocktails today, folks. If you’d like something easy to make, I recommend the Spicy Kimchi Bloody Mary, which uses a new product called Mother-In-Law’s Kimchi – one of the kimchis on show at the International Pickle Festival. But if you’re feeling more ambitious, may I suggest…

 

Gin Kimchi - Photography by Sara Remington

 The Gin Kimchi

 I first heard about this drink two years ago, when Scott Beattie, then of Cyrus, presented drinks from his gorgeous ”Artisanal Cocktails” book at Tales of the Cocktail. It’s beautiful, complicated, and features pickled ginger and daikon (a Japanese radish) – but no cabbage.

1 1/2 oz. Sarticious gin

3/4 oz. freshly squeezed lemon juice

1/2 oz. Ginger-Shiso syrup (recipe follows)

8 pieces Pickled Ginger (recipe follows)

8 pieces Pickled Daikon (recipe follows)

5 small shiso leaves, cut into chiffonade

3/4 oz. Bundaberg or Cock’n Bull ginger beer

Combine the gin, juice, and syrup in a mixing glass and give it a stir. Add the pickled vegetables, the shiso, and enough ice to fill the mixing glass. Cover and shake a few times. Add the ginger beer, and pour it into a stemmed water glass or a tall collins glass to serve.

To make Ginger-Shiso Syrup (makes 1 cup)

1 cup simple syrup, chilled

2 drops essential oil of ginger

2 drops essential oil of galangal

1 drop essential oil of perilla (shiso)

Combine the simple syrup and essential oils in an airtight container. Cover and shake well to mix the oils into the syrup. Keeps for about 2 weeks, refrigerated.

To make Asian Pickling Liquid (for Ginger & Daikon – makes 1 2/3 cups)

1 cup rice wine vinegar

1/3 cup mirin

1/3 cup filtered sake

1/2 cup sugar

Combine the rice wine vinegar, mirin, and sake in a stainless steel saucepan over high heat. Bring the mixture to a boil, add the sugar, and stir until it dissolves. Allow the liquid to cool before pouring into an airtight container.

Pickling shorthand: The daikon and ginger each are sliced thinly and (in separate batches) marinated in pickling liquid, which is brought to a boil, poured over the vegetables, and then allowed to cool. A red beet is added to the ginger to create that pretty deep pink color. 

The full recipe is about 3 pages long…not exactly blog friendly. But if you aspire to make the cocktail and want more detail than I’ve provided, I encourage you to buy the book. You’ll want to try the five-spice Waverly Place Echo cocktail anyway, trust me!