Irish Coffee

IRISH COFFEE

2011

2013

2015

Here it is, the famous Irish Coffee. I admit right away, I did this cocktail wrong; I did whip the cream a bit, according to the original recipe heavy cream is indeed used, but it is not whipped per se. Plus I didn't have the Irish Coffee glass either...(editor's note; now I do!:D) Yeah and the chocolate flakes were extra, but I think it gave the drink a nice touch. Well now that we're at it, adaptability with even cocktails is okay, right? Right? :)

Not being the biggest coffee (in cocktails) kind of guy, I gave this all time classic a go and managed to pull a decent cocktail. Ingredients as follows:

• 1 teaspoon of brown sugar
• 4cl Irish whiskey
• 8cl hot coffee
• fresh cream

Add the brown sugar in the bottom of the glass (remember to heat up the glass before!), add the whiskey + coffee and stir. Float the cream on top of the drink with the help of a spoon. Serve immediately.

Personally, as mentioned before I can't say this is a truly amazing cocktail. Lies all lies! During the past year or so I've come to appreciate this cocktail so much more!

But I could now do understand its effect on a cold winter's night with good friends with good music in the background. That said, the next time I would make this...definitely for friends.

Tequila Sunrise

TEQUILA SUNRISE

Here is one of my all time favorite cocktails (made at home), the Tequila Sunrise! Easy to make yet and tastes amazing!

• 4cl silver tequila
• 12cl orange juice
• lemon juice from a wedge
• a few dashes of grenadine

Of course, prefer only the highest quality orange juice wherever possible. This way you get the best result. So here it is done. In a cocktail shaker pour in the tequila, orange juice and squeeze in the lemon juice from the wedge. Shake vigorously with plenty of ice and strain in a high ball glass filled with (crushed) ice. Then gently pour a few dashes of grenadine to create the sunrise-y effect as shown in the picture. You can garnish with a slice of lemon if you like. Add a straw and enjoy.

I don't usually order these at bars since they can't make them right (mainly because the orange juice I've seen at bars are not of great quality read the cheapest stock kind).

 A magnificent drink at any occasion...okay, during summer.

Caipiroska

THE CAIPIROSKA

How everything started! I can't remember it like yesterday, but I do know it was the 23rd of June, 2009. I specially prepared four caipiroskas for me & my friends. At the time I didn't have Cachaça to make a caipirinha so I used regular vodka. In my opinion I made a pretty good job for a first timer!

So the caipiroska contains:

• ½ a lime cut in 4 wedges
• 2 teaspoons of (brown) sugar
• 5cl vodka

Put the lime wedges in a tumbler, add the sugar and muddle. Add the vodka, stir gently and pour crushed ice on it. Stir again. Done!

This cocktail is easy to make and tastes brilliant! As mentioned, the caipirinha is the "original" cocktail and like many other cocktails, this masterpiece can be easily modified as well by changing the alcohol to something else. But if you ever happen to get your hands to some Pitú, totally try to make one of these babies!

A true classic this cocktail is.

Triple Threat

TRIPLE THREAT

Double the action...triple the threat! Here we have another "fan made" cocktail I got from the forums. Albeit being rather "costly"/drink (considering the required articles for only two cocktails), this drink has the ability to be modified easily. The recipe serves two.

What is needed:

• 1 orange
• 1 blood orange
• 1 grape fruit
• 1 dl of alcohol (e.g. vodka, gin or even flavored vodka)

 Squeeze the juices from all fruits into their separate cups. Remember to save thick-ish slices of each fruit for later garnishing. Pour the juices into a cocktail shaker, add the chosen alcohol and ice, shake vigorously and double strain into two high ball glasses filled with ice so none of the pulp reaches the drink. Decorate with the fruit slices (as seen in the picture above).

What I now suggest is that you only use half of everything and shake one cocktail at a time. When I first did this with the "full measures", my shaker was extremely (too) full thus the shaking wasn't at its best.

This drink is absolutely and plain wonderful. The mixture of three citrus fruit combined with the alcohol gives that little something to your "glass of juice". Double straining this gives it a nice homogenenous look with no actual pulp in the drink. For a summer evening, just perfect.

Challenge me!

Here we go again, with a twist!

Since I like to create cocktails, I am giving you the opportunity to challenge me with a good cocktail you think I should prepare. Should I have the ingredients to pull it off, I'll make it and post a picture of it here with the challengees regards!

So if you have anything good on your mind or once tasted that awesome drink at a bar, I can try my best to make that moment happen again! (with the exception that I'll be drinking it :) )

PS. Okay if you want to troll the living crap out of me to make a low tier cocktail, don't worry I'll still make it. Not every cocktail is a good one...

 

Colt Cruiser

Colt Cruiser

Another cocktail I truly enjoyed. The Colt Cruiser is easy to make and tastes rather sweet. In addition, one wouldn't think the ingredients for this drink would work so well together! Here we go:

• 2cl rum (white)
• 1cl amaretto
• 1cl creme de bananes
• 2cl lemon juice
• 12cl lemonade

Shake the four first ingredients in a cocktail shaker with ice and strain into a high ball glass with ice. Top the mixture with lemonade according to taste. You could garnish the drink with one or two maraschino cherries. I added a dangling rind of orange as well.

As said, this is a surprisingly excellent choice for any occasion. Highly recommended!

The Predator

The Predator

Here you have the Predator. I got this recipe from a Finnish cocktail based "forum", history of this drink is unknown. So I decided to give it a shot. To be honest, I can't really remember much of this drink. But if I really try to think hard I believe the ingredients are the following (at least the proportions):

• 2cl lime juice
• 2/4cl blueberry liquor
• 2/4cl brandy
• battery energy drink

I believe using 4cl of both alcohols give an edgier drink. So what needs to be done is to build the drink in a high ball glass filled with ice and top it up with energy drink. Garnish voluntary. Now a word of warning for you all. Any energy drink has a bad habit of totally dominating the drink. What I can remember from this as well, I couldn't taste much of anything except for the battery. If that's a good thing...that's up to you. If I would make this cocktail again, I would substitute the battery with 7Up.

Cuba Libre

Cuba Libre

Cuba Libre, 2010 May

Here's the Cuba Libre, one of my all time favorites! (when made correctly) You might notice how the Bacardi bottle has not been opened yet (gasp!) but since I still had left overs from my 0,7L bottle, this picture serves as kind of a promotional purpose as well.

As I mentioned in my very first post, there are rum&coke kind of drinks and there are Cuba Libre kind of drinks. Here I explain how to make a Cuba Libre. What you need is:

• 4cl of white rum
• ½ a lime
• coca-cola

Instead of pouring all in a high ball glass and stirring it up, what you should do is the following: Add a couple of ice cubes in a cocktail shaker. Squeeze the juice from the lime (a lime presser is a very handy tool for this) into the shaker, drop the lime in as well as the rum and give it a good shake! Then fill a high ball glass with ice, strain the lime-rum mixture in the glass and then top it off with coke. I assure you that it is going to be so much better...Remember to garnish with a lime wedge.

Cuba Libre, 2013 March

Jamaican Mule

The Jamaican Mule

Here's the Jamaican Mule. As you might or might not know, there are several versions of the mule. For example the Moscow, the London or the Mexican, to name a few. Here's the Jamaican version using:

• 4cl of Spiced Rum (in its essence, any rum is okay except white)
• ½ a lime cut half
• ginger ale

In a high ball glass filled with ice, squeeze in the lime wedges, add the rum and top it off with ginger ale. Garnish with a lime wedge.

I must say this drink was a huge disappointment. Why? Because Schweppes "ginger ale" is utter shit. Never...never use it if all possible! I can't express in words how furious I am when describing how horrible this commercial piece of garbage Schweppes somehow managed to produce. If and when I get over this huge tragedy I barely can call a cocktail, what I suggest with deepest sincerety, for the love of God, use this brand of ginger beer instead next time:

Nuff' said.

Rob Roy

Rob Roy

Here you have a Rob Roy. Since this drink can be made either sweet, dry or perfect, here's my version of the sweet one. (and when ordering this it normally comes sweet unless mentioned different). The ingredients as follows:

• 4.5cl Scotch whisky
• 2.5cl sweet vermouth
• a dash of angostura bitters

Fill a cocktail shaker's glass part with half ice. Then add the ingredients in the glass in the given order and swirl the ice a few times in the glass. Strain into a (well chilled) cocktail glass (ie. prefer a champaigne saucer over others but as you can see in my version, I used a port wine glass, that was the best I could use for this since I don't have any of the saucers). With the sweet version, garnish it with a maraschino cherry.

Tasted good. I'm not a huge fan of whisky based cocktails, but the vermouth's sweetness balanced it out well. Especially towards the end the taste got better, given the maraschino cherry added even more sweetness to the strong drink overall.

White Russian

The White Russian

Back in the days

Here it is, the White Russian. Unlike the (bad) Finnish version of this great drink, here it is how it should be. What you need is:

• 2cl quality vodka
• 2cl Kahlúa
• 2cl fresh cream

Just pour the vodka, the Kahlúa and finally the fresh cream into a tumbler filled with a few ice cubes. Stirring is not necessary. Now here you have an excellent drink. The Kahlúa really gives a very deep and aromatic coffee taste to it with a side note of cocoa. I could easily drink a few of these at a time, but due to the drink's "heaviness", less is more.

An another White Russian in 2013. This time my proportions were as follows:

• 5 cl vodka
• 4 cl Kahlúa
• fresh cream

You could add a straw and sip it slowly and if you necessarily want to use a garnish, consider a cocktail cherry (color-wise looks fantastic). Altering the proportions can make different-tasting cocktails as per personal taste.

Alien Brain Hemorrhage

ALIEN BRAIN HEMORRHAGE

This is the alien brain hemorrhage. I bumped into this shot from a couple of web sites and decided to give it a go. The shot itself has easy-to-get ingredients and doesn't take too much effort to make either.

What you need is 

• ½ a shot of peach schnapps
• ⅓ a shot of cream liquor (Baileys)
• a small amount of blue curaçao liqueur
• small amount of grenadine  

First fill the shot glass with the peach schnapps. Then carefully pour the cream liquor on top using a small (bar) spoon. After the two ingredients have settled, add a small amount (I used a tea spoon amount) of curaçao in the middle of the drink. Finally, add the grenadine (approximately the same amount as with the curaçao). The grenadine will sink to the bottom and create this very nice effect.

As for the taste, this is something everyone should try at least once. The grenadine dominates the taste quite a lot for being so sweet but I really enjoyed it.

Singapore Sling

THE SINGAPORE SLING 

This is the Singapore Sling. One of the "legendary" cocktails, which according to history books, was invented  at the Long Bar in Raffles Hotel in Singapore around 1915.

Personally, I had many expectations regarding this drink. Not only did this cocktail have many ingredients to work with but just figuring out how it would taste like...was totally worth it.

Ingredients as follows:

• 40ml (8 parts) Gin
• 20ml (4 parts) Heering Cherry Liqueur (cherry brandy)
• 5ml (1 part) Cointreau
• 5ml (1 part) DOM Bénédictine
• 10ml (2 parts) Grenadine
• 80ml (16 parts) Pineapple juice
• 30ml (6 parts) Fresh lemon juice
• 1 dash Angostura bitters

I slipped a few times. I used De Kuyper Cherry Liquer instead of Heering's. Also, I didn't have a hurricane glass at my disposal (I don't feel I need them for a long time; there are only a few drinks that employ it, otherwise they're just more (useless) glassware at home) so I used one of my bigger high ball glasses and I must admit it fit just perfectly. Thirdly, I didn't want to buy a whole pineapple so I decorated the drink with a good slice of lemon and of course the maraschino cherry.

Tastewise, it was amazing. Extremely fruity, a bit cherry candy-ish; I could hardly taste the alcohol in this one. Would I make this one again? Totally. Would I order this at a bar? No. Mainly because the price would be so horribly expensive in places they know how to actually make one of these.

Introductions!

World of Cocktails

I am going to spend one entry to introduce myself and tell you a little bit of my "world of cocktail"...project one might say.

Everything has to start from somewhere, doesn't it? My love towards cocktails bloomed in June 2009, when I made a four Caipiroskas for my friends and took an awesome picture of them (don't worry, you will see it later on). Before 2009 though, I had collected a "healthy" set of different liquors, mostly from airports but more importantly from good friends of mine who were kind enough to do me this big favor. I can always remember when my oldest brother brought me a 1L bottle of Jägermeister from the airport when he came from Germany to visit our family. This about about 2004 or so, I still lived at my parents' at the time so I just stuck the bottle in one my far end dresser and kind of...forgot about it for a long time. So there aren't any misunderstandings, my parents did know of the bottle but they would've kicked my ass had I started to drink Jäger at home casually.

When I then moved out in 2005 my collection of one Jägermeister bottle had turned into another 1L bottle of Tequila as well. As time then flew by, bottles kept joining the "liquor cabinet"; Absolut Vodka (my good friends from Germany brought me this 1L bottle of Absolut in a gift box + another bottle of Tequila) and what do you know I almost ran out of space for my bottles.

I grew fond Absolut Vodka so much I always asked to bring that if only possible. But cocktail making isn't really cocktail making if you don't have the proper tools, right? To make a long story short (not that I would even remember most details) I had bought two cocktail books, found out what tools bartenders use and acquired them. From boston shakers to lime squeezers and strainers, one item, the bar spoon caused me the most hassle. I didn't want to get one of those cheap-ass spoons from regular kitchen shops, no! I wanted to get one of those most bars use. Luckily enough I got one (for free!) from a cocktail bar in Tampere which now doesn't exist anymore. RIP.

As of 2012 and living with my fiancée I have a whole cabinet dedicated to (hard) liquors of different kinds (I'll post a picture of that later too) and one shelf just for Jägermeister. In addition, I started collecting liquour mixers from the De Kuyper set and I must say I am very proud of myself. I'm still short of a few flavors but I let the picture do the talking.

Now, regarding cocktails themselves, I'm an "old school" cocktail hobbyist meaning I prefer classic drinks (e.g the old fashioned or the white russian) over those created in new bars in a spur of a moment. Not because they're "classic drinks" per se (the martini for instance, does not taste good) but because in my opinion there's something special in those created back in the days. Imagine creating another amazing cocktail such as the Old Fashioned now. Or put it this way. There are people who drink rum&coke and there are people who drink Cuba Libres. I'm the latter one. There's a big difference how you make the foresaid cocktail and that's what cocktail making/drinking is all about. 

The White Russian is another perfect example of a cocktail gone awry...in Finland. In finland they use a high ball glass, fill it with 2cl vodka, 2cl coffee liquor and top it off with milk...milk! NO! Also, in Finland due to alcohol laws there is no way bars could use more than 4cl hard liquor in a cocktail, unless a special permit has applied for (the Long Island Ice Tea being a perfect example).

But still, I try my best to create my friends cocktails that taste good, look good and feel good. Most of this wouldn't even be possible without my friends who have got me many of the bottles I now have. I'm just returning a favor in forms of pictures and sometimes even real drinks...

Speaking of favors, should you know a cocktail you tasted in a bar which was just plain amazing, send me a holler! I could remake it and post a picture of it here.