Golden Gate No. 2

I found this while rummaging around for San Francisco cocktails in John Poister’s New American Bartender’s Guide and thought it looked interesting. The version he gives is sort of a Twentieth Century with rum accents—more gin-forward than the one below from the CocktailDB. Wanting more of a rum cocktail, I gotta wonder what was meant by “light rum,” since the standard options give this thing no focus at all. But made with Wray & Nephew White Overproof, it’s a completely different story.



Golden Gate No. 2

• 3/4 oz gin
• 3/4 oz light rum (Wray & Nephew)
• 1/4 oz 151 proof Demerara rum
• 1/2 oz white creme de cacao
• 1/2 oz Falernum
• 1/2 oz lemon juice

Shake with ice and strain into a chilled cocktail glass.
SOURCE: COCKTAILDB

This is a miniature ocean of Tiki magic served straight up. There’s supposed to be a curled orange slice garnish but it sounded too fussy for my nice little gold-rimmed glass—like it would just hit you in the nose or something.

Plastered Punch

Like the Singapore Sling, there’s some confusion about what actually goes in a Planter’s Punch. The things I remember seeing most often are Jamaica rum, grenadine and fruit—usually orange juice. It tends to come in a collins glass and not a tiki mug. And it’s not particularly tiki-fied, though a ceramic container might help with presentation. Molasses and orange juice tend to look murky together. The grenadine helps a little—not much. (I somehow remember big, good-looking, reddish ones served in hurricane glasses at Rockefeller Center when I was a kid. No clue what they tasted like.) After some experimentation, I’ve arrived at one I like that seems roughly consistent with other Planter’s Punches I’ve had.



Plastered Punch

• 2 oz gold Jamaica rum
• 1 oz dark Jamaica rum
• 2 oz pineapple juice
• 1 oz orange juice
• 1/2 oz lime juice
• 1/4 oz grenadine
• 1 dash Angostura Bitters
• 1 dash orange bitters (Angostura)

Shake with ice and strain into a tall glass. Fresh ice to fill. Cherry, mint, straw.

OK—that there in the photo’s a sprig of basil. My mint was beyond resuscitation. Turns out basil’s actually a pretty good aroma with Jamaica rum. The combination of gold and dark rum is bright but keeps the bass note of the molasses.

For a fine study of the Planter’s Punch, drop in on Tiare at A Mountain Of Crushed Ice.

Bittercube Jamaican #1 Bitters

Feeling in the mood for a dry, spirit-forward rum cocktail to try my new Jamaican #1 bitters from Bittercube, a bright combination of allspice, ginger and black pepper—all flavors I crave. Of course this calls for a big Jamaica rum.



Jamaica & Spain

• 1 1/2 oz Smith & Cross
• 1 1/2 oz fino sherry
• 2 dashes (24 drops) Bittercube Jamaican #1

Stir with ice and strain into a chilled cocktail glass.
SOURCE: ROWEN, FOGGED IN LOUNGE

Pistachio notes in the sherry get freaky with the woodsy funk of the Smith & Cross. A friend who likes whiskey cocktails was asking about rum analogs....

Need another rum fix? Doug is serving up the magic of Tiki Month in grand style.

Beyond the Sea

A big mahalo to Doug for spurring us all into Tiki action for the month of February. (Sorry I’m late putting on my aloha shirt. Too busy getting... aw, skip it.) Here’s a spice number I made up this morning: cinnamon out front doing the funk with the Smith & Cross. Note the groovy mid-century Tapio Wirkkala glass. Hey, Finland’s an island—sort of.



Beyond the Sea

• 1 1/2 oz gold Puerto Rican rum (Don Q Añejo)
• 1 oz Smith & Cross Jamaica pot still rum
• 1/4 oz St. Elizabeth Allspice Dram
• 1 oz lime juice
• 1/2 oz Don’s Mix (B.G. Reynolds)
• 1 1/2 oz ginger beer (Fever Tree)

Shake all except ginger beer with ice cubes and strain into a double old fashioned. Add ginger beer and ice to fill. Lime garnish.
SOURCE: ROWEN, FOGGED IN LOUNGE

Skating

Greetings, folks. It’s the time of year when you might see a bowl of prefab eggnog at a party and know you shouldn’t go there, but you just can’t help but ruin your life, can you? Do you try to avoid it, or just give in right away and despise yourself for the rest of the weekend? You know it’s wrong, even as you kid yourself that the bottle of add-your-own next to it makes it all right—even legal—somehow. Like it’ll all balance out in the end. Sure, pal.

But wait—don’t touch that crap. How about a nice coconut drink instead?



Skating

• 2 1/2 oz gold Jamaica rum
• 1/4 oz Pernod
• 1/4 oz Galliano
• 1 tsp coffee brandy (Firelit Coffee Liqueur)
• 2 oz coconut milk
• 1/4 oz vanilla syrup (B.G. Reynolds’)
• 1/2 oz lemon juice

Shake hard with ice cubes and strain into a 14-ounce glass filled with crushed ice. Cherry, straw.
SOURCE: ROWEN, FOGGED IN LOUNGE

Coffee, anise and vanilla glide over a coconut-frosted rum pond. It’s wholesome—vegan, even. God Jul, Joyous Kwanzaa, grab your Gin-and-Tonic-ah, drink up.

Hot Rum Punch

Here’s a Jamaica rum punch with arrack I’m working on—tasty but maybe in need of fine tuning. I used tea to heat it, which did the job within tolerance but could’ve been hotter going in.



Hot Rum Punch

• 1 1/2 oz Jamaica rum (Smith & Cross)
• 1/2 oz arrack (Batavia Arrack van Oosten)
• 1/2 oz lemon
• 1/4 oz rich simple syrup
• 4 oz strong black tea
• lemon peel
• about 15 allspice berries

Boil water to make tea and heat a mug. Pour boiling water over tea, the yellow part of the peel of a lemon and allspice berries. While tea is steeping (4-5) minutes), heat mug, then discard hot water. Combine spirits, lemon and syrup in mug. Strain tea into spirit mixture and stir briefly.
SOURCE: ROWEN, FOGGED IN LOUNGE

I made the tea in an open vessel, and now see that I should’ve worked a little harder to keep the warmth in it. The spirits and stuff cooled it more than expected, though it was still quite drinkable. I’m also thinking I might’ve bruised the allspice berries a little too. But the housemate and I both enjoyed it. Well worth doing again. The Smith & Cross rum I used gave the right funk for the 18th-century feel of this.

Smith & Cross Cooler

Don’t know what it is—maybe the San Francisco Indian summer—but I’m craving fizzy rum sours. I was just saying to the housemate that my drinking today has been all of a type: brunch was a Pusser’s Navy Rum Collins, then later a Churchill’s Southside while I was taking a break from my errands. At home, I stared at the bottles for inspiration but it was the same story.



Smith & Cross Cooler

• 2 generous dashes Angostura Bitters
• 2 oz Smith & Cross
• juice of half a lime
• spicy ginger beer, about 3-4 oz (Fever Tree)

Build in a 12-ounce glass over ice cubes. Stir gently and briefly.
SOURCE: ROWEN, FOGGED IN LOUNGE

These are all things that are made to go together. It’s nicely dry and clean, with a balance of aromatic, bitter, sour and strong. I guess it’s a classic drink, though I have no idea what else you’d call it so I named it after the rum.

Big Yellow Curry

A banana was sitting around the kitchen for days trying to talk to me but I couldn’t understand what it was saying. Finally I recognized the accent and away we went.



Big Yellow Curry

• 3 oz gold Jamaica rum
• 3 oz pineapple juice
• 1/2 ripe banana
• 1 tsp simple syrup
• 1/8 tsp yellow curry powder

Blend with a cup of crushed ice about 20 seconds at high speed and serve in a tall glass. Mint garnish.
SOURCE: ROWEN, FOGGED IN LOUNGE

Red Goldfish

Life at the Lounge is in no small part aquatic. There are all manner of piscine and amphibious creatures of all forms and sizes. (A couple of ’em are bipedal and merely drink like fish, but whatcha gonna do.)

I’m playing a lot with Campari lately. This drink strikes me as slightly Asian with its citrus, ginger and almond notes. The falernum and Campari together seem almost savory, taking the burn off the lime without adding much sugar.



Red Goldfish

• 1 1/2 oz Cruzan light rum
• 1/2 oz Appleton V/X rum
• 1/2 oz Velvet Falernum
• 1/2 oz oz Campari
• 1/2 oz lime juice
• few drops Peychaud’s Bitters

Shake with ice and strain into a chilled cocktail glass.
SOURCE: ROWEN, FOGGED IN LOUNGE