Binny's Blog

Let the good times roll and shake up this recipe for a Ramos Gin Fizz, one of New Orleans most well-known cocktails. It's perfect for your Mardi Gras celebration.

The temperatures are plummeting after a relatively warm start to the winter season. There’s no better time to whip up some hot cocktails to get you through the grey winter days and long, dark winter nights.

Toddies are a broad class of cocktails that generally combine a spirit with water and sugar. Usually but not necessarily served hot, toddies also often include citrus, spice and/or herbs to create a soothing elixir, believed by many to ease the symptoms of the common cold and flu. Toddies are easy to make, provide a potent kick of booze, and happen to be quite appealing on a cold winter’s eve in the Midwest.

Pat is constantly extolling the virtues of aromatized wines. Finally, we have a guest who will actually agree with him and won’t just make fun of him. Jake Parrott is a friend of the pod and the Whiskey Hotline and is also the national sales director of Haus Alpenz. What Jake sells, and Pat loves, is woefully esoteric. But Binny’s customers, and Barrel to Bottle listeners, are enthusiasts.

We aren’t talking about “the” perfect Manhattan, some might argue that the incredibly popular sweet Manhattan already holds that title, but “a” Perfect Manhattan. A variation on the theme that has the maker replace half of the Sweet Vermouth with Dry Vermouth. This perfect 1:1 ratio of Vermouths is the origin of the name.

This cocktail is an old timey classic, but it required a side trip to the 1980s to land on this prohibition era gem. Try this fruity but refreshing silent film era classic. It will leave you speechless.

The 1980s were a time of excess, and that included the cocktails. Every thing was overly sweet and overly proofed.

Last week we covered the wonders of wormwood in our introduction to vermouth and aromatized wines.

We're digging up an old classic. The Brandy Alexander is sweet as a candy bar and is full of nutmeg, eggnog and cinnamon flavors. Bartender Brittney describes the flavors as the bottom of an ice cream tub - and we couldn't agree more.