Just when I was wondering what kind of new, unheard-of concoction to mix up for guests on Christmas, Chuck Taggart posts a recipe for this intriguing new cocktail over at the Gumbo Pages.

Réveillon Cocktail

• 2 ounces Laird’s Straight Apple Brandy (substitute Laird’s Applejack or your favorite Calvados).
• 1/2 ounce pear brandy (make sure it’s a clear eau-de-vie, not a liqueur).
• 1/2 ounce pimento dram.
• 1/4 ounce top-shelf sweet vermouth (Carpano Antica Formula or Punt-E-Mes).
• 1 dash aromatic cocktail bitters (Angostura is good, Fee Brothers’ Old Fashion Bitters are better, Abbott’s Bitters — if you can get any — are spectacular).

Combine ingredients with cracked ice in a cocktail shaker. Stir like hell for no less than 30 seconds, and strain into a cocktail glass. Garnish with a cinnamon stick.

Intrigued by the mix of flavors, I made one for myself tonight. Since I had no Laird’s bonded on hand, I used Chateau du Breuil Calvados, and mixed it with Clear Creek Distillery’s pear eau-de-vie, homemade pimento dram, Punt Y Mes and a dash of Fee’s Old-Fashioned Aromatic Bitters.

I was expecting a number of different flavors, all creating a layered profile, but with the first sip I was astounded at how well they all worked together. Each of the ingredients has a very assertive character, but in this combination, no one flavor dominates. The rich apple of the brandy and the ethereal presence of the pear eau-de-vie form a solid fruity presence in the glass, seasoned with allspice from the liqueur and the cinnamon from the Fee’s, with the Punt Y Mes undetectible, yet working behind the scenes, as it were, to temper the various flavors around it.

Apples, pears, allspice, cinnamon–the essence of the holiday in a cocktail glass. Chuck says he’s still tinkering with the cocktail, but from my brief encounter with it, I’d say no further work is needed. Maybe somewhere between the eggnog and the flaming Christmas punch (ever the traditionalist), I’ll pull this one out to liven up the afternoon.

* UPDATE: This drink was well-received by my guests on Christmas Day, and Chuck has not only decided to settle on this recipe, but Wes has come up with a fitting name: the Réveillon Cocktail, which, according to Chuck, “evokes Christmas, especially Christmas eve, but also the recent New Orleans spin on the old tradition that expands the feasting of la veille de Noël all season long …”

Well done–

Technorati tag: cocktails.

Tags: Calvados, Drinks, Eau de Vie, Pimento Dram by Paul
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When I was about four years old, I fell madly in love with Jacqueline Kennedy. My older brother had a children’s book about JFK that was filled with photographs–Jack playing football; a gaggle of well-mannered, near-identical looking children clustered on some expansive Massachusetts lawn; PT-109. Our house was a house of books, and after I’d tired of Mammals do the Most Amazing Things! and Green Eggs and Ham, I’d find myself lying on the carpet, flipping through the photos of the Kennedys.

I had yet to start kindergarten, so it’s not surprising I found little of interest in most of the book. But on one of the first pages was a clear color spread: Black sedan convertible. Men in brightly colored shirts and Brylcreemed hair and women with scarves and cats-eye sunglasses, lining the street. Pearls and a pink pillbox hat. Dallas.

They were both smiling and waving.

She looked happy and beautiful in that photo, and to my four-year-old eyes, the color of her hair and the shape of her face made her look more than a little like my mother. I coveted that photo. In hindsight, it must have been jarring to my parents–Texans, both, and lifelong Democrats–to have seen their child staring in bliss at an image from that November day. But I had no idea of the weight that photo carried. I just loved the sweep of hair across her forehead as she squinted into the sun, one gloved hand raised in a wave to the adoring crowds.

The Widow’s Kiss

• 1 1/2 ounces calvados
• 3/4 ounce yellow Chartreuse (green works, too, but it’s a little more intense)
• 3/4 ounce Benedictine
• 2 dashes Angostura bitters

Stir with ice and strain into a chilled cocktail glass. Garnish with a cherry.

The Widow’s Kiss predates Camelot by a good 65 years. In Vintage Spirits & Forgotten Cocktails, Ted Haigh credits George Kappeler’s Modern American Drinks, from 1895, with first publishing a recipe for this drink. Harry Craddock, Patrick Gavin Duffy and “Cocktail” Bill Boothby all list the same recipe in their early 20th-century bar guides (though in Old Waldorf Bar Days, Albert Stevens Crockett lists a recipe calling for equal parts Parfait d’Amour, yellow Chartreuse and Benedictine, with the beaten white of an egg positioned on top and adorned with a slice of strawberry).

Built upon the heady foundation of calvados, and with the complex aromatic firepower of not one, but two venerable herbal liqueurs, the Widow’s Kiss is a drink to nestle into. In his book, Haigh calls the Widow’s Kiss the most evocative drink ever, a cocktail suited for late fall edging toward winter. On a chilly November evening, post-Dallas, post-Watergate, post-Florida, post-9/11, and not-yet-post-Iraq, there’s no small amount of satisfaction to be found in a drink that calls up a honeyed past, and provides a moment’s distraction from the bitter present.

Technorati tag: cocktails, calvados

Tags: Calvados, Drinks by Paul
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Origins? Dunno. History? Beats me.

Thanks to Ben down at Zig Zag Cafe for turning me on to this one. I was looking for another good calvados cocktail, and this one fits the bill perfectly. Ben used a nice French calvados that gave the drink the taste of fresh fruit; at home, I tried it with Clear Creek’s Eau de Vie de Pomme, which is somewhat drier, but still gives a nice, layered experience.

Ante

• 1 1/4 ounce Calvados
• 1/2 ounce Dubonnet rouge
• 1/4 ounce Cointreau
• dash Angostura

Stir with ice; strain into chilled glass; figure out the rest.

Technorati tag: cocktails

Tags: Calvados, Drinks, Vermouth by Paul
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The season changed early in Seattle this year. Our first sullen downpour struck over Labor Day weekend, and the branches of the maple tree outside my living room windows were touched with yellow and orange just a few days later. Now, only two days into October, the incessant drizzle has begun, and a drive from our home in the Central District up 23rd Avenue toward the Montlake Bridge takes us through a riot of color in the hemlock and maple trees lining the street.

With autumn comes the mind-boggling array of apple varieties that have gradually appeared at the farmers markets I’ve grown addicted to in the past couple of years. As a non-native to the Northwest and only a fairweather fan of apples, I’m still surprised by how many different kinds of the damn things actually exist around here. Today, at the Broadway farmers market, I only picked up a few Galas, but I’m trying to branch out this season to try types I’ve never heard of, much less tasted: Cox Orange Pippins and Nick-A-Jacks, Prairie Spy and Honey Crisps.

With the prevalance of tree fruits in this part of the country, it’s not surprising that some of the finest fruit brandies in the nation, and possibly the world, are made in the Pacific Northwest. Clear Creek Distillery, down the road in Portland, makes an exceptional aged calvados-style apple brandy, along with heady eau-de-vies from the region’s pears, cherries and plums, not to mention a line of grappas that I have yet to begin exploring.

On autumn days, a fitting and especially satisfying drink is the Fallen Leaves, made with Clear Creek’s 8-year-old Eau de Vie de Pomme. This apple brandy is round and mellow when tasted neat, with the faintest essence of apples around the edges. For some reason, when mixed with sweet and dry vermouth with just a dash of brandy, this apple character becomes more evident. I first came across this drink on Drinkboy’s site, and he credits its creation to Charles Schumann, who published the recipe in American Bar in 1982. Visually, the Fallen Leaves resembles exactly that–gold and red in the glass–and with this apple essence, the drink is a perfect companion for an October evening.

Fallen Leaves

• 3/4 ounce calvados or similar apple brandy
• 3/4 ounce sweet vermouth
• 1/4 ounce dry vermouth
• dash brandy

Stir with ice and strain into glass; twist a nice piece of lemon peel over the drink and use as garnish.

Technorati tag: cocktails

Tags: Calvados, Drinks, Vermouth by Paul
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