I’m not pondering drinking one, just pondering the concept and spirit of the drink. I hang out with a lot of cocktail bartenders, and the vodka soda seems to be the whipping boy of popular drinking culture upon which they unleash all their all pent-up scorn and contempt. These “mixologists” view themselves as craftsmen who …
Category Archives: Entertaining
Vote For My Shaker Face!
As I’ve said, ShakerFaces is a site where you get to know bartenders from all over by the way they shake a cocktail. At Portland Cocktail Week, I brought the plate tectonic shimmy of SF to my own Shaker Face video. Vote early, vote often! And if you don’t feel like going to the site, …
BlogHer Food Cocktails
Out of the blue a few weeks ago, Jonas asked me to bartend with him at BlogHer Food, an event for female food writers in San Francisco. How could I say no? That Tuesday night, my intern, Margot was reading to me from a Nabokov novel (don’t ask, just accept it), as I toiled with …
March for Mezcal
One of the most successful events at Portland Cocktail Week was Friday’s March for Mezcal, sponsored by Ilegal Mezcal. I personally painted 92% of the signs for the protest that you will see in the pictures I took. I am particularly proud of my agave plant, the worm and “KEEP YOUR LAWS OFF MY LIQUOR!” …
Seriously Wild Turkey?
I get the most absurd promotional emails from Wild Turkey, or at least the flacks they hired. My favorite line until today was, “Wild Turkey is the official bourbon of Thanksgiving,” because last I knew, Thanksgiving was a federal holiday, and I haven’t seen an executive order endorsing or authorizing this whiskey’s holiday status. Today …
The Century Post
100 posts in just over a year isn’t too shabby by my standards, and there are several more on the way. Upcoming on LibationLab: Better Photos! I’m proud of my snapshots, but I’ll be doing some extra training in the coming weeks and hope to improve my photographic skills even more. Mamjuana! The first ever …
PDX Cocktail Week: Spirits Dinner
The launch event for Portland Cocktail Week was an amazing 4-course dinner at Spints Ale House last night with 5 paired cocktails (my math may not be so good). We started with an exceptional aperitif (galliano, cocchi americano and sanbitter with a twist of lemon) that took me out of my head and into the …
Bottling Barmen
One of the more unique opportunities in Portland this week will be a panel discussion with three pioneering distillers who began their spirits careers behind the bar. Ryan Magarian of Aviation Gin, Duggan McDonnell of Encanto Pisco, and Neil Kopplin of Imbue Vermouth will share their tales of what it took to go from bartender …
Infuse It Or Lose It
The Drink.Write seminar on “Making Your Own Ingredients†is right up my alley. Every horizontal surface in my apartment, including my entire mantle, is littered with beakers, bottles, flasks and jars full of infusions, tinctures, bitters, syrups and liqueurs that I crafted from fresh produce and hard alcohol. Creating your own cocktail ingredients is both …
Fireplace Punch Recipe in Drink Me Magazine
The latest issue of Drink Me Magazine features a hot punch recipe from yours truly.