The SLO Booze Movement

Not-So-Simple Syrup

chris — Thu, 05 Mar 2009 01:37:09 +0000

On a recent trip down to Los Angeles I stopped by the hole-in-the-wall Los Olivos Market in the Santa Ynez Valley. In addition to having a fantastic country store kind of aesthetic, they also carry a stupendous variety of both local and imported oils and vinegars. On this particular afternoon I was tramping around the rest of the store and discovered that they also carry a decent variety of spices, sugars, and other flavoring agents. I’ve been experimenting a lot with tinctures lately (more on that another time, I hope), but I decided to mix it up a bit and buy a few different varieties of sugar instead of loading up on more spices.

The two that I want to highlight here are the muscovado and demerara varieties. Like most beverage enthusiasts, I keep my fridge stocked with regular and dark sugar syrups. But I have to admit that what I’ve been calling “demerara syrup” is actually made with turbinado sugar, simply because it’s so much more accessible in my out-of-the-way corner of California. I can buy it at Trader Joe’s, along with my eggs, citrus, and (insert shame here) frozen lunches. This was my opportunity to find out whether the easy and frugal choice of turbinado sugar was any different from the demerara.

The muscovado sugar was simply intended to fulfill my curiosity – could such a dark sugar be made into a syrup that would be useful for mixing drinks?

Not So Simple Syrup by organic.matter. A flight of simple syrups made with different varieties of sugar in various shades of brown. From left to right, medium brown sugar, muscovado sugar, turbinado sugar, and demerara sugar.

A few nights ago I got the new sugars down from my cabinet, along with my trusty TJ’s turbinado and the supermarket brand medium brown sugar I use for baking, and mixed up four cold-process syrups, each with a tablespoon of sugar and a tablespoon of lukewarm water, and went about tasting and comparing them. I’ve never used brown sugar for drinks, but intuitively I expected a fundamentally different, and much stronger, syrup than what I get with, raw sugar. My main goals were:

compare brown sugar syrup to muscovado syrup, compare turbinado syrup to demerara syrup, and by comparison with the raw (turbinado/demerara) sugar syrup, determine whether the brown or muscovado syrups had the potential for use in drinks.

On tasting, it was immediately clear that the muscovado sugar was much stronger in flavor than the brown – almost like thin molasses. Both seem too strong to be used like a conventional simple syrup, or even a raw sugar syrup. I have no doubt that uses could be found – probably with something dry and well-aged – but nothing immediately comes to mind. (Second thought: how about balancing it against something bitter; Campari or Aperol, perhaps? Or mellowing it with cream, or autumn fruit?)

Between the raw sugars, the differences were both subtle and pronounced – the base flavors of both turbinado and demerara are similar, but side-by-side the turbinado seems cloying and one-dimensional, whereas the demerara has a deeper and more distinct flavor, and isn’t off-putting (or, to repeat myself, cloying) in the way that the turbinado is.

I’ll be investing the extra time and money to use demerara for my raw sugar syrup from now on, and making a good faith effort to seek out flavors that might blend well with the muscovado syrup.

Slow Food and Local Economies

chris — Sat, 31 Jan 2009 20:14:24 +0000

Forgive the link to an unabashedly liberal blog, but this non-politcal article about a Philadelphia-local, slow-food bakery inspired the hell out of me. The author’s business model is not all that different from the kind of small, quality-oriented “speakeasy”(I use quotes because the modern common use of “speakeasy” isn’t really historically accurate) bars that are bringing back the hundred-plus year-old art of the cocktail. If the author is right, both local food and the culinary cocktail have a bright future.

Build a Bar

chris — Sat, 31 Jan 2009 10:29:16 +0000

Following the advice of every Internet-nerd-cum-beverage-geek’s favorite cocktail guru, Robert Hess, I’ve been slowly building my bar over the last year or so, one drink at a time. Starting with a Manhattans built from Elijah Craig 12, Martini & Rossi Italian vermouth, and Angostura bitters, I’ve acquired some 40 or 50 bottles to date (not counting bitters or anything homemade). And yeah, it’s been expensive, although not always as expensive as you might think. Earlier this week was a major milestone – with the purchase of bottles of Benedictine and green Chartreuse, I’ve completed my bar, to the extent that such a thing can be “complete.” There’s still a bunch of stuff on my “to buy” list, but I can make just about any classic drink that a geek like myself could reasonably order. That goal having been met, it was time to make a drink, presumably using one or the other of my new acquisitions.

Suddenly a problem became apparent: I was out of limes, and down to my last few drops of Italian vermouth, making just about all of the classics featuring Benedictine or green Chartreuse impossible. Thank God for the Internet.

I started fishing through my favorite drink blogs and websites for recipes that might fit the bill, and lo and behold, on Oh Gosh! I ran smakc into a drink that used both. Now you might say to yourself, “Self, there is no way that chartreuse and benedictine belong in the same libation!” But you would be mistaken:

Purgatory

2 oz. rye (something assertive, such as Rittenhouse Bonded)
.5 oz. green Chartreuse
.5 oz. Benedictine
Stir, strain, serve up
Garnish with a generous lemon twist

I enjoyed it from the first sip, but there was something familiar about that I couldn’t quite identify. The familiarity struck me as odd, since I haven’t had a whole lot of experience with either Chartreuse or Benedictine (athough I’ve had more experience than I’d prefer to admit with Rittenhouse Bonded). About halfway through my drink, it hit me (a realization, not the excessive booze, which had hit me a few minutes prior) – the dominant herbal flavors were shockingly reminiscent of a dry martini. Of course, it had the added benefit of complexity from the whiskey, and a touch of sweetness from the liqueurs, but the fact remains that this drink, which contains neither gin nor vermouth, made me feel like I was drinking the best damn dry martini I’ve ever had. Mix this one up the next time you’re looking for somethig both new and familiar, or if you’re just looking for an excuse to drop some coin at your local booze procurement establishment.

A Place to Enjoy a Drink

chris — Wed, 28 Jan 2009 05:59:10 +0000

There are three, maybe four, cities in these United States where you can reliably get a well-made drink at a bar. There are probably another dozen or two dozen smaller cities that have a single enclave of secretive, boozy delight. San Luis Obispo (a.k.a. SLO, pronounced like “slow”) is not one of those cities. I sense that it could be, but I’m not the entrepreneurial type. So until someone else takes the initiative, here we are: the SLO Booze Movement. I’ll be biding my time here until…

someone else takes the initiative and starts my perfect bar,
I become more of a do-it-yourself-er, or
I get evicted from what is otherwise surely one of the best places in the world to call “home.”