So here it is: our first foray into writing a cozy mystery based on our liquor of the month. We decided to take a "telephone" approach to the story - I wrote the first section and Dave brought it home. There is a clever allusion to our next liquor because Dave is a goddamned genius.
Cassius C. Remengton had a problem.
And everyone in the town of Sweetberry Grove knew that when a problem arose, Anise Starr was the detective who could crack the case.
"Mr. Remengton," Anise Starr cooed, straightening the leather swivel chair behind her massive oak desk. She rested her elbows on the ink blotter, steepling her fingers, and narrowing her eyes.
"Thank you for seeing me on such short notice, Detective Starr," Cassius said. "As you know, I have been courting Brandy Alexander for several months now."
"A lovely girl."
"Indeed. For her birthday, I bought her a bottle of beautifully-hued liqueur. Alas, I have discovered that the spirit lacks taste, depth, and mixability. Brandy is a lady of refined tastes, and I fear that she will dismiss my token of love." Cassius C. Remengton slid a decanter of deep purple liquid toward Detective Starr. She removed the crystal stopper and inhaled deeply.
"Why don't you take a sip, Miss Starr?" Remengton suggested.
"Why, Mr. Remengton. I'd be delighted," replied Anise too quickly, hoping Remengton didn't notice the slight quaver in her voice. "Did you pick this up from Mr. Collins's specialty liquor store on Main Street?"
"No, Tom doesn't carry anything quite special enough for this particular occasion. I created this little blend myself. You see, I plan to drink this with Brandy on our wedding night, to celebrate the beginning of our life together. I'd like you to try it first, though, to make sure it's...palatable."
"Niecy," Anise thought to herself, "you've really gotten yourself in over your head this time!" The liquor was a lovely color, smelled sweet and fruity, and had a hint of - what was that? - nuttiness.
Thoughts raced through Niecy's head as Remengton poured them both small snifters of the dark, almost syrupy liquid. Everyone in town knew his real estate empire was faltering and he was badly in need of money - heck, he'd even fired his maid and only had his cook and groundskeeper come in twice a week! The match with Brandy, the homely older daughter of the wealthy founding family of Sweetberry Grove had always seemed odd, but everyone's talk had just seemed like gossip. "Love springs out of the most mysterious places," Brandy had told the crowd at the dinner last weekend.
But now, as she raised the glass to her lips, Anise's hand trembled.
Was Remengton suspicious of her having asked too many questions? Had he noticed her hesitation earlier?
Were those almonds and cherries she smelled, buried in the ripe taste of currants? Or was it...gulp...cyanide!?
Saturday, January 30, 2016
Saturday, January 16, 2016
Crème de Cassis Death Match
So, we have both learned important lessons about the seeming unimportance of crème de cassis in cocktails. Neither of us thought it added much to the cocktails we tried, so tonight, after a trip to Food City, we set about making our own original cocktails featuring crème de cassis.
I call mine Ina's Vineyard:
1 oz vodka
1 oz crème de cassis
1/2 oz lemon juice
Blueberries
Sugar
Club soda
Muddle a small amount of sugar and a small handful of blueberries in the bottom of a cocktail shaker filled with ice. Add vodka, lemon juice, and crème de cassis. Shake vigorously.
Strain mixture into a highball glass over ice. Top with club soda.
This drink was amazingly okay. It is the first cocktail in which I've been able to taste crème de cassis. That said, it tastes a bit sweet and syrupy - like a starter cocktail for people who really don't like alcohol that much. I might drink it in summer, but it doesn't taste terribly different from the classic crème de cassis and soda with a spritz of lime that Amy Stewart raves about. Final grade: C+
Joe's Take on Dave's Drink:
Before Dave's drink hits your palette, you can smell it. I can't put my finger on it, but I just told Dave it smells like rotting fruit (and I wish you could see his face right now). He's incredulous, but laughing.
But really. It kind of smells like rotting fruit.
It's confusing, because there's something else that's under there - a smell that is triggering vague memories that I can't fully recall. Grapes? Celery? Bad apples? I honestly don't know. If I were a trained sommelier or food critic, I'm sure I'd be able to pinpoint it immediately. Alas.
Here's the hitch, though. The drink is actually quite refreshing: it's light and effervescent, mild but tasty. I don't get much of the lemon, but the black currant flavor is a subtle surprise (perhaps because the base liquor is so unassuming). I can imagine drinking it on the beach, one of those adorable cocktail umbrellas jutting from the ice.
Maybe vodka is the best vehicle for crème de cassis. Maybe it's what we've been missing all this time. If we were to continue experimenting with the liqueur, I think we'd continue in this direction.
••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••
And then there's mine.
Having already made a crème de cassis cocktail with a clear alcohol, I decided to explore what a darker alcohol would bring to the black currant flavor.
I call mine Grotesque Démodé. My friend Tricia would roll her eyes at my poorly appropriated French.
2 oz. bourbon
1/2 oz. crème de cassis
orange peel
club soda
sugar
Muddle orange peel and sugar (like you're making an old fashioned). Add bourbon and crème de cassis. Stir. Pour over ice. Wish you were never born.
Pretend for a moment that you are walking through the woods on a crisp autumn day. The temperature is chilly, but the sun is bright and high in the sky, and its light filters through trees, a kaleidoscope of warm colors. Every time you breathe in deeply, you are filled with the beauty of the season.
In the distance, you spy a log. A tree has fallen, perhaps decades ago, and it lays in mounds of leaves: some recent, some from years past. There's a fecundity that emanates from the log - it isn't necessarily unpleasant, but it is pungent with age and decay. You kneel before the log, plunge your hands into the rot, and stuff it in your mouth. The oaky fermentation fills your mouth. Your eyes water immediately. You wonder why you didn't resist the impulse to eat that which was clearly inedible.
You have just tasted the equivalent of my crème de cassis drink.
I have come to the horrible, sinking conclusion that I am a long, long, long way from being a mixologist. In short: this drink is awful.
Dave's Take on Joe's Drink: Yuck.
I mean, it smells nice. There are hints of vanilla and berries and orange - it's a very Christmas-y, holiday, let's-get-blitzed-and-make-snow-angels smell. That would all be good and well if we were making potpourri.
Alas, we have to drink it.
It's quite alcohol forward and hits your tongue and is immediately dark and pungent, but oddly crisp and sharp as well (the orange, maybe?).
So, I think I win this death match, but only by being the lesser of two evils. I am like the winner of the Republican National Convention, winning because I am the least disgusting here, the most digestible, and the least likely to make you want to vomit too much.
 |
| Dave's is on the left, Joe's is on the right. |
1 oz vodka
1 oz crème de cassis
1/2 oz lemon juice
Blueberries
Sugar
Club soda
Muddle a small amount of sugar and a small handful of blueberries in the bottom of a cocktail shaker filled with ice. Add vodka, lemon juice, and crème de cassis. Shake vigorously.
Strain mixture into a highball glass over ice. Top with club soda.
This drink was amazingly okay. It is the first cocktail in which I've been able to taste crème de cassis. That said, it tastes a bit sweet and syrupy - like a starter cocktail for people who really don't like alcohol that much. I might drink it in summer, but it doesn't taste terribly different from the classic crème de cassis and soda with a spritz of lime that Amy Stewart raves about. Final grade: C+
Joe's Take on Dave's Drink:
Before Dave's drink hits your palette, you can smell it. I can't put my finger on it, but I just told Dave it smells like rotting fruit (and I wish you could see his face right now). He's incredulous, but laughing.
But really. It kind of smells like rotting fruit.
It's confusing, because there's something else that's under there - a smell that is triggering vague memories that I can't fully recall. Grapes? Celery? Bad apples? I honestly don't know. If I were a trained sommelier or food critic, I'm sure I'd be able to pinpoint it immediately. Alas.
Here's the hitch, though. The drink is actually quite refreshing: it's light and effervescent, mild but tasty. I don't get much of the lemon, but the black currant flavor is a subtle surprise (perhaps because the base liquor is so unassuming). I can imagine drinking it on the beach, one of those adorable cocktail umbrellas jutting from the ice.
Maybe vodka is the best vehicle for crème de cassis. Maybe it's what we've been missing all this time. If we were to continue experimenting with the liqueur, I think we'd continue in this direction.
••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••••
And then there's mine.
Having already made a crème de cassis cocktail with a clear alcohol, I decided to explore what a darker alcohol would bring to the black currant flavor.
I call mine Grotesque Démodé. My friend Tricia would roll her eyes at my poorly appropriated French.
2 oz. bourbon
1/2 oz. crème de cassis
orange peel
club soda
sugar
Muddle orange peel and sugar (like you're making an old fashioned). Add bourbon and crème de cassis. Stir. Pour over ice. Wish you were never born.
Pretend for a moment that you are walking through the woods on a crisp autumn day. The temperature is chilly, but the sun is bright and high in the sky, and its light filters through trees, a kaleidoscope of warm colors. Every time you breathe in deeply, you are filled with the beauty of the season.
In the distance, you spy a log. A tree has fallen, perhaps decades ago, and it lays in mounds of leaves: some recent, some from years past. There's a fecundity that emanates from the log - it isn't necessarily unpleasant, but it is pungent with age and decay. You kneel before the log, plunge your hands into the rot, and stuff it in your mouth. The oaky fermentation fills your mouth. Your eyes water immediately. You wonder why you didn't resist the impulse to eat that which was clearly inedible.
You have just tasted the equivalent of my crème de cassis drink.
I have come to the horrible, sinking conclusion that I am a long, long, long way from being a mixologist. In short: this drink is awful.
Dave's Take on Joe's Drink: Yuck.
I mean, it smells nice. There are hints of vanilla and berries and orange - it's a very Christmas-y, holiday, let's-get-blitzed-and-make-snow-angels smell. That would all be good and well if we were making potpourri.
Alas, we have to drink it.
It's quite alcohol forward and hits your tongue and is immediately dark and pungent, but oddly crisp and sharp as well (the orange, maybe?).
So, I think I win this death match, but only by being the lesser of two evils. I am like the winner of the Republican National Convention, winning because I am the least disgusting here, the most digestible, and the least likely to make you want to vomit too much.
Thursday, January 7, 2016
El Diablo
1/7/16
9:24 PM
Dear Joe,
I knew I wanted to make something that would be pretty and purple and something that was substantially different than your cocktail. I also wanted something unexpected. What was the most unlikely pairing with crème de cassis, a fancy-pants French liqueur that tastes like something your grandma would enjoy sipping while watching Murder She Wrote and petting her 27 cats?
Tequila.
The liquor that fairly screams Spring Breaaaaak! And "do you even lift bro?" And hangovers. And regret.
Even as I typed the words "crème de cassis" and "tequila" into Google, I was terrified. They'll put anything on the Internet these days, and I presumed I was destined to end up with a cocktail where the ingredients mixed as well as...well, frat bros and your grandma's supper club (they eat at 5:30 at the K&W Cafeteria, thankyouverymuch).
But thankfully variations on one recipe kept coming back over and over and over: El Diablo.
Since I'd read your post, dear, and saw the difficulties you'd had, I opted for a mixture that was heavy on the crème de cassis and light on the Everything Else. I ended up using roughly:
I combined the first three ingredients in my super-cute redneck cocktail shaker [I'm from the South - I can use those words] and shook.
Then I poured it into a glass that I got for free from work - only the classiest for our blog, dear! - and topped it off with ginger beer and a lime wedge, which promptly fell off the side of the glass and straight into my drink.
Is it pretty?
Sure.
Can I taste the crème de cassis?
Nope.
But without the crème de cassis, all of these bright, forward flavors might trigger a flashback to the horrible times I had with tequila in college. The sweet, syrupy blackcurrant takes some of the bite-y edge off and makes it all feel a tee-tiny bit classier, like those people who could afford not to sleep 18 to a room and who could buy liquor that didn't taste like paint thinner when they went on Spring Break. I never did like them, but I did like this cocktail. It still tastes a bit too summery to be drinking while wearing a cardigan and staring at the still-yet-to-be-put-away Christmas tree.
Apropos of nothing, do you have any decorations for a Valentine's Day tree? They might come in handy.
Anyway, dear, perhaps I've found a tequila cocktail that you'll actually drink this summer. It's doubtful, but I'll live in hope.
I can't wait to get together and see what else we can come up with - we could try something with a dark base spirit, or mayhaps we can make one of the classic crème de cassis drinks together.
Whatever we make, though, I think one of us has to pretend like we're Ina Garten out for a jaunty afternoon drink in Paris.
We'll draw straws. The loser can be Jeffrey.
* I can't recommend Fever Tree ginger beer highly enough - it's undoubtedly the best I've ever had.
9:24 PM
Dear Joe,
I knew I wanted to make something that would be pretty and purple and something that was substantially different than your cocktail. I also wanted something unexpected. What was the most unlikely pairing with crème de cassis, a fancy-pants French liqueur that tastes like something your grandma would enjoy sipping while watching Murder She Wrote and petting her 27 cats?
Tequila.
The liquor that fairly screams Spring Breaaaaak! And "do you even lift bro?" And hangovers. And regret.
Even as I typed the words "crème de cassis" and "tequila" into Google, I was terrified. They'll put anything on the Internet these days, and I presumed I was destined to end up with a cocktail where the ingredients mixed as well as...well, frat bros and your grandma's supper club (they eat at 5:30 at the K&W Cafeteria, thankyouverymuch).
But thankfully variations on one recipe kept coming back over and over and over: El Diablo.
Since I'd read your post, dear, and saw the difficulties you'd had, I opted for a mixture that was heavy on the crème de cassis and light on the Everything Else. I ended up using roughly:
- 1 1/2 oz tequila
- 3/4 oz crème de cassis
- Juice of one lime wedge
- Ginger beer*
I combined the first three ingredients in my super-cute redneck cocktail shaker [I'm from the South - I can use those words] and shook.
 |
| Post-shaking |
 |
| Diablo with artfully-placed spoon |
Is it pretty?
Sure.
Can I taste the crème de cassis?
Nope.
But without the crème de cassis, all of these bright, forward flavors might trigger a flashback to the horrible times I had with tequila in college. The sweet, syrupy blackcurrant takes some of the bite-y edge off and makes it all feel a tee-tiny bit classier, like those people who could afford not to sleep 18 to a room and who could buy liquor that didn't taste like paint thinner when they went on Spring Break. I never did like them, but I did like this cocktail. It still tastes a bit too summery to be drinking while wearing a cardigan and staring at the still-yet-to-be-put-away Christmas tree.
Apropos of nothing, do you have any decorations for a Valentine's Day tree? They might come in handy.
Anyway, dear, perhaps I've found a tequila cocktail that you'll actually drink this summer. It's doubtful, but I'll live in hope.
I can't wait to get together and see what else we can come up with - we could try something with a dark base spirit, or mayhaps we can make one of the classic crème de cassis drinks together.
Whatever we make, though, I think one of us has to pretend like we're Ina Garten out for a jaunty afternoon drink in Paris.
We'll draw straws. The loser can be Jeffrey.
* I can't recommend Fever Tree ginger beer highly enough - it's undoubtedly the best I've ever had.
Tuesday, January 5, 2016
The Parisian
1/4/16
6:45 PM
Dear Dave,
Well, here it is: the first cocktail post.
Tonight I made something called The Parisian. The recipe seemed straightforward enough: equal measures gin, dry vermouth, and crème de cassis. However, the cocktail book in which I found this recipe has a tendency to be a bit off with its measurements. I went to Our Friend the Interwebz and located a tweaked recipe that called for only a quarter ounce of crème de cassis. I decided to use that recipe.
The cocktail has a lovely pink hue, but I'm a bit at a loss for words. It tastes, predictably, like a very dry, vermouth-y martini. The crème de cassis is buried in the mix, and I only get a hint of the black currant flavor after my brain acknowledges the vermouth. And good christ does this have an overwhelming vermouth note. The drink lacks balance and subtlety because the vermouth bangs down the door, hollering, "Y'all like fortified wine*, RIGHT?"
Joe
*Did you know that vermouth was a type of fortified wine? I didn't. Yay, reading.
• • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • •
UPDATE!
I attempted the Parisian again this evening, bringing the crème de cassis quotient up to a full ounce. This gave the drink a truly beautiful, other-worldly hue. It would not look out of place in a science fiction movie.
This revision to the recipe, though, has led me to a bit of an existential crisis with crème de cassis. Dave, I ask you: what is the point of crème de cassis? Did we buy an inferior bottle? Is its role only to imbue your cocktail with color? Are French people this desperate to get drunk?
True: this version of the Parisian is infinitely better than the one I made last night. The vermouth has been subdued by the extra 3/4 ounce of crème de cassis, but I barely taste any of the pronounced black currant flavor we enjoyed a few days ago. Additionally, this Parisian has a slightly thicker quality to it, which only solidifies my initial opinion that crème de cassis is little more than glorified cough syrup.
Maybe I'm being too harsh. Maybe the Parisian is just a bland, unoriginal cocktail that lacks depth of flavor. Maybe it's a cocktail designed for people who don't like cocktails. But, Dave, as you know, I love cocktails. I crave something interesting and unique, a remarkable flavor profile. I do not get this with the Parisian. I get Cosmopolitans for Slightly More Sophisticated Woo-Girls.
I wonder, too, if gin is too subtle a host for crème de cassis. Perhaps what this liqueur needs is a more robust host. Rum or (ugh) tequila or bourbon. Mmmmm... bourbon.
If we had followers for this blog, this is where I would make a plea to readers to help me understand what this liqueur has to offer. Alas.
I'm looking forward to what your experiment yields. Perhaps you'll have more success. And if it doesn't result in success, perhaps our collective big, beautiful brains will uncover a combination that reveals crème de cassis' true character.
I remain, though, doubtful.
Intrigued, but doubtful.
Nerdy Librarian Citations
"Parisian" Bar None Drinks. Bar None Drink Recipes, 2013. Web. 4 Jan. 2016. <http://www.barnonedrinks.com>
Walton, Stuart, Suzannah Olivier, & Joanna Farrow. The Bartender's Companion to 750 Cocktails. London: Hermes House, 2009.
6:45 PM
Dear Dave,
Well, here it is: the first cocktail post.
Tonight I made something called The Parisian. The recipe seemed straightforward enough: equal measures gin, dry vermouth, and crème de cassis. However, the cocktail book in which I found this recipe has a tendency to be a bit off with its measurements. I went to Our Friend the Interwebz and located a tweaked recipe that called for only a quarter ounce of crème de cassis. I decided to use that recipe.
The cocktail has a lovely pink hue, but I'm a bit at a loss for words. It tastes, predictably, like a very dry, vermouth-y martini. The crème de cassis is buried in the mix, and I only get a hint of the black currant flavor after my brain acknowledges the vermouth. And good christ does this have an overwhelming vermouth note. The drink lacks balance and subtlety because the vermouth bangs down the door, hollering, "Y'all like fortified wine*, RIGHT?"
The only reason I'm posting this is because I want to make the cocktail with the book's recipe.
Look forward to an edit - I can't imagine that I'll make another one tonight. This first Parisian? Mai oui, c'est fort!
Joe
*Did you know that vermouth was a type of fortified wine? I didn't. Yay, reading.
• • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • • •
UPDATE!
I attempted the Parisian again this evening, bringing the crème de cassis quotient up to a full ounce. This gave the drink a truly beautiful, other-worldly hue. It would not look out of place in a science fiction movie.
This revision to the recipe, though, has led me to a bit of an existential crisis with crème de cassis. Dave, I ask you: what is the point of crème de cassis? Did we buy an inferior bottle? Is its role only to imbue your cocktail with color? Are French people this desperate to get drunk?
True: this version of the Parisian is infinitely better than the one I made last night. The vermouth has been subdued by the extra 3/4 ounce of crème de cassis, but I barely taste any of the pronounced black currant flavor we enjoyed a few days ago. Additionally, this Parisian has a slightly thicker quality to it, which only solidifies my initial opinion that crème de cassis is little more than glorified cough syrup.
Maybe I'm being too harsh. Maybe the Parisian is just a bland, unoriginal cocktail that lacks depth of flavor. Maybe it's a cocktail designed for people who don't like cocktails. But, Dave, as you know, I love cocktails. I crave something interesting and unique, a remarkable flavor profile. I do not get this with the Parisian. I get Cosmopolitans for Slightly More Sophisticated Woo-Girls.
I wonder, too, if gin is too subtle a host for crème de cassis. Perhaps what this liqueur needs is a more robust host. Rum or (ugh) tequila or bourbon. Mmmmm... bourbon.
If we had followers for this blog, this is where I would make a plea to readers to help me understand what this liqueur has to offer. Alas.
I'm looking forward to what your experiment yields. Perhaps you'll have more success. And if it doesn't result in success, perhaps our collective big, beautiful brains will uncover a combination that reveals crème de cassis' true character.
I remain, though, doubtful.
Intrigued, but doubtful.
Nerdy Librarian Citations
"Parisian" Bar None Drinks. Bar None Drink Recipes, 2013. Web. 4 Jan. 2016. <http://www.barnonedrinks.com>
Walton, Stuart, Suzannah Olivier, & Joanna Farrow. The Bartender's Companion to 750 Cocktails. London: Hermes House, 2009.
Friday, January 1, 2016
January Liquor: Crème de Cassis
Crème de Cassis is a liqueur made of black currant, a fruit that is illegal to grow in many parts of the United States because of a tree-killing disease associated with it. Careful forestry practice has reduced the risk of the disease spreading. Most Crème de Cassis available in the United States comes from France, where the liqueur is quite popular.
We poured ourselves a small glass of crème de cassis and let the fun begin.
Joe: First of all, it smells like this black currant gum I had a dozen years ago while visiting a friend in England. I wasn't a fan of the gum. It tasted like Penicillin. With this, our initial taste test, I was expecting something syrupy and cloying. What I got was something reminiscent of cough medicine. There's a sweet undercurrant (buh-dum-CHING!), and I imagine it will give our cocktails a kick similar to grenadine. If not in taste, definitely in color. On its own, I give crème de cassis a solid B.
Dave: When Joe picked crème de cassis, I was worried our blog adventure was going to be over before it began. Joe is not a fan of sweet liqueurs, so I half expected him to taste it, screw up his face, and ask for some bourbon to wash it down. Happily, crème de cassis is not too-too sweet; it has a slightly tart, sharp nose and a warm, very sweet, almost velvety finish. Being slightly viscous, I'm curious as to whether it will foam up if shaken with ice. My initial thoughts are that it would pair nicely with dark, aged spirits like rum and whiskey, but I'm excited to try it with lighter-colored spirits like vodka, white rum, and tequila, if only for the lovely purple color it will give the final cocktail.
So next we will return to our respective homes and begin experimenting with crème de cassis. We will post about our failures, triumphs, and mediocrities here in the coming weeks.
Cheers!
Nerdy Librarian Citations
Stewart, Amy. The Drunken Botanist: The Plants That Create the World's Great Drinks. Chapel Hill: Algonquin Books of Chapel Hill, 2013. Print.
We poured ourselves a small glass of crème de cassis and let the fun begin.
Joe: First of all, it smells like this black currant gum I had a dozen years ago while visiting a friend in England. I wasn't a fan of the gum. It tasted like Penicillin. With this, our initial taste test, I was expecting something syrupy and cloying. What I got was something reminiscent of cough medicine. There's a sweet undercurrant (buh-dum-CHING!), and I imagine it will give our cocktails a kick similar to grenadine. If not in taste, definitely in color. On its own, I give crème de cassis a solid B.
Dave: When Joe picked crème de cassis, I was worried our blog adventure was going to be over before it began. Joe is not a fan of sweet liqueurs, so I half expected him to taste it, screw up his face, and ask for some bourbon to wash it down. Happily, crème de cassis is not too-too sweet; it has a slightly tart, sharp nose and a warm, very sweet, almost velvety finish. Being slightly viscous, I'm curious as to whether it will foam up if shaken with ice. My initial thoughts are that it would pair nicely with dark, aged spirits like rum and whiskey, but I'm excited to try it with lighter-colored spirits like vodka, white rum, and tequila, if only for the lovely purple color it will give the final cocktail.
So next we will return to our respective homes and begin experimenting with crème de cassis. We will post about our failures, triumphs, and mediocrities here in the coming weeks.
Cheers!
Nerdy Librarian Citations
Stewart, Amy. The Drunken Botanist: The Plants That Create the World's Great Drinks. Chapel Hill: Algonquin Books of Chapel Hill, 2013. Print.
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